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Headquarters for the battle of lynchburg. This home was central to the battle of lynch bug and while t battle of lynchburg, and while the union was battling. And so this is named for Charles Johnson who grew up in the lynchburg area. He entered Business Life as a stockbroker, merchant and clerk. When he was a young man about 20 years old, he went to kentucky and this is the goal to accompany the boss through the ohio territory to the state of kentucky to survey some land that his boss had bought, and they went to the ohio river and bought a boat and picked up some passengers, and six in total and traveled down the ohio river with the goal of reaching kentucky and now, along the way, they had been warned about hostile native american indian, and they were careful to the stay in the middle of the ohio river, and however, at one point, two white men came to the banks of the river and screamed help us, help us, save us. They decided to go to bank the to try to aid the two white men, and it had been but a decoy and they were led into the trap, and they were instantly attacked by 40, 50 indians and two of the six on the boat r were killed. Charles and several others were taken prisoner. They were trundled through the ohio territory northward for about five weeks and finally carried up to upper sandusky, which was a small trading post and village and there they entered a trading post run by a frenchman, and charles pleaded for the frenchman the to help him, because he was a prisoner, and he didnt know what the rest of his life might be, but he was barely 20 years old. He was able to the strike a deal with the indians purchasing Charles Johnston is out of bondage for the price of 600 silver broaches, and he was freed literally on the 21st birthday. And he then sought to come back home to virginia. Well, that was a difficult thing the to do through the wilderness, and the frontier near lake erie back to virginia and he had to waitt to find transportation back and someone who is skilled at guiding them through the dangerous parts of the frontier, and it took them five months to get back to virginia, and on the way, because he passed through new york city which is the capital of our country and in 1790 and was interviewed by president George Washington and secretary of war henry knox who wanted to know what was happening out on the frontier. There were continual struggles and strife out on our frontiers between the indians and the french and the british and between the colonists which would later come into play during the war of 1812. Charles got back to virginia, but resumed his life as a clerk and businessman, and was doing pretty well. He entered, did a lot of the biz nrns t bizness in the tobacco trade and he decided to come to this part of virginia, Campbell County and now it is lynchburg, virginia, and he built this house sandusky in 1808. And so he was op yu leaulent an his money from sales of tobacco from richmond onward and he did a number of these tobacco transacti transactions for Thomas Jefferson who was getting into growing and selling tobacco at his nearby home poplar for est. When he e built the home, it was sandusky meaning a Shawnee Indian word meaning by the cool waters meaning lake erie, and that the episode in his life had such a profound effect on his life that he named the estate thaf place where he won his freedom, and he also wrote a memoir about the captivities at the land hands of the shawn knee indians. It is a fascinating at the hands of the Shawnee Indians. And so he made his livingp on the tobacco trade. And that that was a very important part of the virginia economy. And often what goes up must come down. In and in 1880, the Tobacco Industry went down, and he so he went from prosperity to poverty overnight. He could not keep up sandusky, and we have the deed showing where he sold it in 1818 to christopher clark. So now we will take a look at the later owners of the historic sandusky. This is the formal parlor of sandusky, and ree stored to the 1850s era, and the third int interpretive period, and the era when the huder family owned the house, and also the hudders owned the battle of lynchburg, and we are restoring the home. The hudders lived here until 1852 and immigrated here from pennsylvania and prior to that from germany. Being the formal parlor of the house, this room was used primarily for entertaining. It would not be used on a daily basis. This is where guests would be received for business purposes, entertaining, music, conversation. Even weddings and wakes took place in this room, but it was not used on a daily basis. It is decorated in a fairly opulent style, because this is how the family presented itself to the world. So you will find the finest furnishings in the room between the carpet and the candle holders and the tables and the silver baskets and the mirrors and all of the portraits in landscape paintings all reflect aring the style and the taste and the class of the family and what the family wanted the present to the public. One of the central pieces of any formal parlor was the piano forte, and this is a chickering piano, and they made thousands of pianos in the 19th century, and this is basically the Entertainment Center of a 19th scentury home. And the hudders had a piano that sat right here. One interesting thing is that his niece who still lived in pennsylvania, ida reader wrote a piece of music in honor of sandusky, and in honor of mrs. Hudder, and this is the sandusky polka writt ten in 1852 by ida titus reader, and published when she was only 14 years old. The house has its own theme music if you will in the sandusky polka which is a smart piece of music. We are fortunate here at the historic sandusky in that most of the furnishings in the ohous are original to the house. They were collected by the family, and they are great supporters of what we do here. Items like the lamps, the settes and the paintings in the house. This is going to tell a unique story, and if you will notice, there is damage to the painting, and the tradition passed down through the family is that this painting was slashed, vandalized by Union Soldiers during their occupation here at sandusky in the battle, an indeed, we did find some written accounts of the vandalism that took place here in battle. This painting was passed down through the hudder family through the great grand daudaug of ada hudder who was a teenaged girl who lived here in sandusky and the battle of lynchburg and now we go into the family parlor to talk about ada and her family and the battle. This is the family parlor of sandusky, and this is the the room where the families, would spend most of their time sitting and reading and relaxing, and talking with each other. And hear over the mantle, we can see the portraits of george hudder and his wife harriat. And george and harriat owned the house during the civil war battle of lynchburg. So lynchburg was very important to the kconfederacy, and that i the Transportation Center and the Manufacturing Center and the Hospital Center and a p. O. W. Camp for Union Soldiers and by 1864, general ulysses s. Grant decided it would be very good to take lynchburg and seize it for a day, and take it out of the war effort, and so he sent Major General david hunter to march upon lynchburg and to attack it. David hunter marched down the lynchburg salem turnpike and met the first resistance at the quaker house which is a mile up the road in this direction. After that first days battle, he rode over the to sandusky, and commandeered the house to serve as his headquarters. Naturally, jgenerals liked to sleep on beds and couches rather than out on the hard ground and so this house became the headquarters and the hudder fami family, george and harriat and their daughter ada were made prisoners in the house. So try to imagine an army camped all around this house. 18,000 soldier, and in the house are dozens of officers and men and they are walking in and out of the house with muddy boots and takeing over the house, and taking things from the house, and they are eating all of the food in the house, and sleep ing in the beds. And trying to imagine your position if this were your house, and all of the sudden, you had all of the uninvited guests taking over your house and basically abusing it. We know a lot of what happened here through the writings of young ada in her diary that she kept which we are fortunate to have which were donated to us by adas great granddaughter. And so what she writes in the diary is very fascinating. She writes about the battle. She writes about her concern for her brother. She has three brothers that are all serving in the Confederate Army and their fate is unknown to her. She writes about the things that a teenaged girl would write about. She writes about not getting along with her parents. She writes a what about her hopes and dreams are for her future, a future, and we learn from the diary she is pro confederate. And when the union army is defeated, she gloats about it in the diary, and after two days battle, david hunter and the soldiers were defeated and they retreated, and lynchburg was saved. Lynchburg has the unique history of being the only Virginia City during the civil war that was not captured during the war. The battle of lynchburg caused some damage and vandalism to the house and the fields and the surroundings of the house, but the family recovered pretty well from the battle and the war. The hudders continued to own sandusky until 1952 and at that point the house was broken up amongst the family members which is why we have so much of the furniture and the Decorative Arts is because they stayed here in the house until 1952. Anothert owner took over the house in 1952 and as she became older around the year 2000, she sought to sell the house, which she did, and she sold it to a small group of concerned Community Citizens who formed a Nonprofit Organization led by dr. Peter halk to purchase the home to turn it into a museum, and that effort has been ongoing since 2000, and then two years ago, the house was acquired by Lynchburg College who operated it as a Public Museum and also as a history lab, if you will for learning and teaching students about history, how the run a museum, how the run a business, and on any given day, we have several students working here giveing tours, doing bookkeeping, doing research, working in our archaeology lab, so that it is very exciting to to see the site serving dual functions of being both a public site, but also as a Higher Learning center for people interested in history. Our citys tour staff recently traveled to virginia to learn about the rich history. Learn about lynchburg and other stops on the tour at cspan. Org city tours. You are watching American History tv every weekend on cspan3. Next on American History tv. The center for strategic and International Studies host a discussion with historians on world war i and the legacy of president Woodrow Wilson a century after he outlined the 14 points statement of principles in an address to congress. This is about two hours

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