Marye's Heights

Marye's Heights dominated a battlefield that saw repeated Union assaults during the Civil War. On December 13, 1862, thousands of Union soldiers hurried past Federal Hill toward the Heights and briefly saw this panoramic view before the attacks failed disastrously. The area saw more fighting on May 3, 1863, when a Union attack overran the Heights during the Chancellorsville campaign. By May 1864, a photographer set up in front of Federal Hill to capture the battleground. Although streets and houses now cover the plain where thousands of Union soldiers died, parts of the wartime landscape remain, including Hanover Street on its wartime course, the line of the canal ditch now covered by Kenmore Avenue, the abrupt bluff across the street, and several houses from the photograph that survived the war and are still occupied by Fredericksburg families.

Fredericksburg, Virginia · United States