The Confederate Line

In May 1864 at Spotsylvania, soldiers built stout dirt and log works to shield themselves from fire to the front and also constructed shorter trenches called traverses to guard against enemy cross fire, especially along this part of the line. These traverses ran back from the main line like teeth on a comb, creating three-sided enclosures that soldiers called hog pens. Remains of those hog pens survive beyond the main earthwork. After the fighting on May 12, the Union army incorporated the Confederate-built works into its own line, leaving a tangled system of combined earthworks that later seemed almost impossible to unravel but had made practical sense to men fighting for their lives under fire.

Spotsylvania Courthouse, Virginia · United States