Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville

Apparently the weather did not receive the memo that we were having our battlefield visit to Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville today. The only words I can use to describe the day are wet, soaked, drenched, drowned, sopping, and any other adjective that describes the absolute monsoon that we paraded around in all morning and afternoon. I think everyone suspected it was going to be just one of those days as our usual leave time was changed to be a half an hour earlier. This would not have been a problem if we had left on time, but right from the start we were already late due to a departure time miscommunication. After getting on the road the rain finally struck! We all hoped that it would dissipate by the time we arrived at Fredericksburg, but I think all of our luck for the day had run out.

After arriving at the Fredericksburg visitor center, we picked up our tour guide, Keith Alexander. We kicked off our tour of Fredericksburg at the Chatham residence which has seen many visitors including: Robert E. Lee, Abraham Lincoln, and even George Washington. The wettest part of the tour at Fredericksburg occurred while we followed Barksdale's men during their inner-street fighting. After a quick look at the middle pontoon crossing, the little bit that was left of the area surrounding the sunken road, and the Exxon gas station where Joshua Chamberlin and the 20th Maine were pinned down under Confederate fire, we loaded up and headed for the second part of the tour at Chancellorsville.  

We finally had lunch at Chancellorsville around 2:30 P.M. under a very precarious awning at the visitors' center due to the continuous incessant rain. After having what the majority of us refer to as the turkey log for lunch, we headed back out into the storm to a have look around and hear Keith's retelling of the battle of Chancellorsville. Our first stop, and out of order due to the rain, was the site in which Stonewall Jackson's men fired upon him. Although the monument is in the wrong place according to Keith and other fellow contemporaries, we decided to stay under the shelter of the VC and listen to this argument rather than next to the monument in the wet, soggy woods. A couple of other stops at Chancellorsville included Lee and Jackson's last meeting spot, the furnace, the Chancellor house, and last but not last, Hazel Grove and the placement of E.P. Alexander's guns.

All in all, despite the enormous amount of rain water in my shoes, we had an excellent tour of both battlefields and an excellent tour guide as well. And as a side note, for all of those in the mini-van, Washington D.C. was great, especially Dulles International Airport and the exit for the National Air and Space Museum.

(Note from the driver of said minivan: why was DAN the navigator not navigating???)