For the benefit of those not here last night when i was talking about the campaign from petersburg i mentioned when i worked at the park in the early 1970s through the mid1970s my days off i would close to longwood. Only one book published in 1959. It was called to appottamox, it is a popular book. I had a lot of questions as to where these events took place and how did the armys get from here to there. This book here set up my quest to learn more about these sites. At that time when i worked at a paramedics , you probably know how order, hebron trading excavator wrist soldier estate in the village. I took the role as a Union Officer who was stationed on provost duty after the surrender. And he and i were companions in trying to learn more about the events that took place on the retreat. One of the areas that i was interested in was the battle of Sailors Creek. Sailors creek became a state park in 1936. Became a state park in 1936. Efforts were made to purchase more land for the park and have it become a National Park. Something happened, world war ii came along and the impetus was lost. After the war when things started looking up, there was a congressman who was from appomattox county and guess who got the National Park . Appomattox. Sailors creek languished for the next couple of decades. Finally in 2008, Sailors Creek which had been a satellite to a Recreational Park called twin like Sailors Creekake, i was fortunate enough even though i was working for the National Park service to be asked to be on a Planning Team for Sailors Creek and later here at highbridge. I was familiar with the goals of the park service as to what they wanted. Thanks to a bond referendum, 3. 2 million was raised to develop Sailors Creek. Thats where i came in. I was offered this job. The first year we restored the house which had structural problems and opened it to the public. We built a Visitor Center the next year. After that, we put a museum in it. Currently, we are doing landscape restoration and those who have been out there before know that the Hillsman House is on high ground overlooking Sailors Creek. The battle took place on the opposite side of the creek. You could never see one for the other. You look down with the creek is an all you could see was trees. Now you can see both sides. We just finished a tree clearing project. Getting back to the interest in finding out what happened at Sailors Creek, they even had a map of the battle. We initially use that when we went out there. Unfortunately, the current road system does not match. It was quite inaccurate. We would go out to Sailors Creek five days a week and the Hillsman House was open. Of course, the house was empty at that time. It would open up and answer questions. His name was chris. Three or four times, harold and i would go out there when it was supposed to be open and there was a note on the door that said gone to farmville for supplies. This went on for a couple of visits and we did catch up with chris. He did not know that we had made these earlier visits. We mentioned the signed that was on the door and he said the supplies were my girlfriend at longwood college. [applause] talking to the people around there, the state park gentlemen will tell you that the battle was here at the hillsman farm. A mile down the road at the intersection marshalls crossroads, the farmer that owned that property would tell us they dont know what they were talking about. Look at all of these cannonballs and bullets that i find here. Someone told us, you need to go two miles down the creek. See the gentleman owns the farm. We drive over to the locket farm. The gentleman there, his mother was in the house at the time of the battle. He was in world war i, so that tells you how old he was. We talked to him. He said they dont know what they are talking about. The battle was on my property. There is a marker out front. Look at my house, its full of loopholes. That he would take us into one of his sheds. He had relics of the family had picked up. Thats where the confusion came in. The more i studied it, the more i realized it is the annals of Sailors Creek. Battles of Sailors Creek. I mentioned briefly the three sites. There was fighting at the Hillsman House. He would fight at the hillsman farm. Then marshalls crossroads, that was richard anderson. He had troops under johnson and george pickett. Youve got marshalls crossroads and hillsmans farm. Then you have the battle of the locket farm or what they referred to as double bridges. There is little Sailors Creek and theres big Sailors Creek. They both come together at double bridges. There is a bridge over each one. Thats where that comes in. One of the most common questions is how do you spell the creek . The park and the road that goes through it used to be spelled with all with with a y. The earliest map that i found was a 1750 map. On that map, this area, it was spelled the regular way. When i look at other maps produced for the civil war, all of them were spelled that way. The spelling that you come across, the earliest i found that on a map was 1878. That is where we are now. We tell our visitors that is the postwar spelling. If you are referring to the civil war, or to the park, its. I brought some of our brochures