During the Civil War, the Manassas Gap and the Orange and Alexandria railroads intersected at Manassas Junction, making it strategically important to both the Union and the Confederacy as a supply depot and for military transportation. Two of the war’s great battles were fought nearby, and diaries, letters, and newspaper articles recorded the war’s effects on civilians as well as the thousands of soldiers who passed through the junction. In early May 1861, Col. Philip St. George Cocke arrived to refine plans for fortifying Manassas Junction, where work had already begun. Confederate president Jefferson Davis had directed Gen. P.G.T. Beauregard, the “Hero of Fort Sumter,” to take command of the forces there and oversee the construction of the fortifications. In three months, thirteen earthwork forts, numerous rifle pits, and a network of connecting trenches were built to protect the railroad and the army’s base around the junction.
