A Vast Hospital

During the December 13, 1862 battle, thousands of wounded Union soldiers were crowded into Fredericksburg's houses and churches, including the Presbyterian Church across the street, and Clara Barton, the future founder of the American Red Cross, tended to patients in this area. Most of the wounded were evacuated to hospitals in Washington D.C., while those who died were buried in shallow graves. In May 1864, ambulances again carried suffering soldiers through Fredericksburg's streets, and virtually every public building became a hospital filled with wounded men from the battles of the Wilderness and Spotsylvania Court House. Those who could be moved were transferred to Northern hospitals, but many died there and were left behind. Hundreds of wounded men brought to Fredericksburg died during May and June 1864, and after the war many remains were removed from temporary graves and reinterred in the National Cemetery in Fredericksburg, which contains 15,243 Civil War burials, most recovered from surrounding battlefields and most unknown, with only 2,473 identified.

Fredericksburg, Virginia · United States