Creek along which manassas junction was located

On a steamy summer day in July , a host of politicians, journalists and curiosity seekers flocked from Washington, D. C to Centreville Heights in northern Virginia. The Battle of Shiloh, also known as the Battle of Pittsburg Landing, took place from April 6 to April 7, , and was one of the major early engagements of the American Civil War The battle began when the Confederate Army launched a surprise attack on Union forces The Battle of Fredericksburg on December 13, , involved nearly , combatants, the largest concentration of troops in any Civil War battle.

Ambrose Burnside, the newly appointed commander of the Army of the Potomac, had ordered his more than , troops to cross the Hoping to seize Corinth It pitted Confederate General Robert E. Fought in The victories forced the Live TV. This Day In History. History Vault. Recommended for you. Confederate encampments were scattered along Bull Run from the town of Occoquan upstream to Centreville, stretching to the modern location of the Manassas campus of Northern Virginia Community College. Modern relic hunters know that encampments are likely locations for valuable buttons, belt buckles, bullets, etc.

Battlefields were occupied for only a day or two, typically, but far more equipment was discarded at encampments that were occupied for months. Behind the lines, Confederate warehouses were built at Manassas Junction. Over one million pounds of meat were stored there in the winter of to feed the Confederate Army. The Peninsula Campaign relied upon Union ships, rather than captured Confederate railroads, as the mechanism to supply the invading army. The Confederate response to McClellan's march up the Peninsula was a dramatic reduction of forces in Northern Virginia, in order to expand the defensive capacity near Richmond.

Confederate cannon in forts at Centreville and along Bull Run were withdrawn and sent south. In some cases "Quaker guns" tree trunks disguised to look like cannon barrels were substituted to obscure the reduced capabilities of the Confederate defenses.

Confederate troops were withdrawn quickly with little advance planning; the general staff of the Confederacy was small and unable to cope with the challenge. Because the withdrawal was rapid, the Confederate railroad system was unable to carry supplies as well as troops from Northern Virginia to Richmond. The extraordinary Confederate effort to stockpile supplies since First Manassas near Centreville, to supply troops on the front lines, required a massive destruction effort in late February to prevent those same supplies from being useful to the Yankees.

After the shift of Confederate forces to Richmond at the beginning of March, , Union forces occupied the rest of Northern Virginia. Further west, the Union Army crossed the Rappahannock River and set its new line on the northern bank of the Rapidan River. More warehouses were built at Manassas Junction, this time by the Union.

A small settlement began to emerge at a massive supply depot that had been empty farmland until the Manassas Gap Railroad was linked there to the Orange and Alexandria Railroad in Northern Virginia did not escape further fighting after Confederate troops marched south to defend Richmond during McClellan's Peninsula Campaign. The Confederate Army returned in August, The Northern forces did not surrender Fortress Monroe after Virginia seceded, and it served as a key military base throughout the Civil War.

Fort Calhoun was renamed Fort Wool by the North, to avoid honoring the former Secretary of War from South Carolina who became a "fire-eating" advocate of secession. Source: Library of Congress. Confederate General Robert E. Lee took the initiative, after the Seven Days battles on the eastern edge of Richmond blocked McClellan.

Lee divided his army, which he titled the Army of Northern Virginia, and headed north. He left a small force east of Richmond, and sent the majority of his troops west of Richmond and up to the Rapidan River. Lee hoped to trap the Union between the Rapidan and Rappahannock rivers, but Union scouts spotted the Confederate movements. A contest between infantry and artillery erupts, causing havoc and accidentally killing Judith Henry in the crossfire as she hides in her home.

Sometime during the fighting, Confederate Brig. Late in the afternoon, Confederate reinforcements under Col. The withdrawal of the Union center quickly spreads to the flanks. Virginia cavalry under Col. The Federals retreat. As the battle ends, the Confederates are bolstered by the arrival from Richmond of President Jefferson Davis, but the victorious forces are too disorganized to pursue the Federals. By July 22, the remnants of the shattered Union army reach the safety of Washington, D.

McDowell is later relieved of his command. Most soldiers were volunteers from cities and towns throughout the North and South and reported for duty in the uniforms of their local units. Some Confederates actually wore blue and some Federals were clad in gray. To complicate matters, exotically dressed Zouaves, an elite Union regiment, joined the fray in red trousers and fezes. Colonel William T.

Sherman commanded a brigade under McDowell at Bull Run. In a report issued to command after the battle, he recounted how confusion over uniforms resulted in disorder and panic that stifling day. Later in the war, uniforms were standardized, with most Union troops wearing blue and most Confederate troops wearing gray.

Still, there were problems. Regulation uniforms were sometimes in short supply and soldiers simply wore their own clothes. This led to further instances of friendly fire as the conflict endured. Eager men streamed into Washington to defend the Union capital.

Architect of the Capitol Thomas U. Although some had training in local state militias, most had no battle experience and held romantic notions about the glory of war.

Few has a sense of discipline and fewer had uniforms. After the defeat at Bull Run, it became clear that serving 90 days of military service was completely unrealistic. The terms of the first men to join were already expiring that July and the war would be long.

Congress quickly passed legislation expanding the size of the army and extending the length of enlistment, and then set about reorganizing Union forces for the arduous fight ahead. Close Video.