Again. And some more impetus to make sure the fortifications defending washington were doing their job. Over the four years, many of the forts were made larger. Guns were change to get the best guns were changed to get the best function out of each fort an out of the system itself. The defenses were tested in july 1864. Before i say that, there were raids on the forts where they would come in and steal horses or supplies. But the only real attack a reconnaissance took place on july 11, 12 of 1864 when jubal early fought at in august the at monocacy then march towards washington and eventually came up and faced these forts up there, the main one fort stevens where Abraham Lincoln actually came out to watch what was going on. He was not successful. He realized he really could not do what he wanted to do and eventually turned around and went back down into the valley. And after that, basically, nothing really tested the fortifications after that. Besides the forts themselves, you had the
Who writes his memoir 40 years after the fact, writes it in a flowery 19th century flowery style. When wallace says they arrived here in the morning and lit their camp fires, hell Say Something like, you know, the ste ste steely ska gave way to the orange sun and which was great. You have to balance what wallace says in his memoir with his telegrams from the battlefield. His after reaction report two weeks later because wallace had a way of making himself sound really good. And, you know, he did a very brave thing here. Cant get away from that. And as i say in the book, i believe and i think the judgment of history is that what wallace did here did safe washington, d. C. So this battle took place on july 9th, 1864 and right now its november 2nd, 2007. Its a beautiful day. But one thing to keep in mind about this battle is it was very, very hot. They didnt have thermometers, at least no one referred to a thermometer in their memoirs, but it had to have been in the upper 90s and very, ve
Kind of oversaw the fortifications during most of the war, as they redid and reconstructed some of these forts, he decided new guns would go in and help cover this which it wasnt doing before. So your plans for the fortifications, the system of fortifications did change over the four years of the war. Coming back, i told you we would stop and i would show you what some of the 360degree angle guns look like. See, the carriage is a little bit different, but this shows you, and you notice the bottom, that gun could be turned 360 degrees so you can fire. Now, if the gun is mounted, basically youre probably only going to want about 180degree turn, but it could be fired the other way if needed. So that gives you a good idea. But you can see the abatee. Notice the abatee coming up, the pointed stakes that i mentioned on the outside. So its in the ditch on the outside to try to keep enemy from coming in. But you can see that it is clear field of fire in front. This is ft. Stevens which is one
President will say, mary would not make a very good soldier, as she swooned. So while the president has been under fire, a man has been shot near him, and by 4 00, the 6th corps is ready to take the offensive. And they will move out from in front of fort stevens, moving across the ground that slopes down to where walter reid is now, beyond battleground cemetery, where 40odd men of the Union Soldiers who were killed here are buried and the union troops and the confederates pulled back. Lincoln will not take his eye off the big picture. Tuesday is the 12th. On the 14th, he is back out at the taking care of business. So he is going to do, and i want you to play another little tune there, because hes going to sign a bill calling for 500,000 more men. And theres one of the tunes in that, we are coming father abraham, 500,000 more. So hes showing his commitment to continuing the war. Hes also curtailed negotiations carried out through on the same day with mr. Blair, through frank blair, and
Men took up their stand against the confederate troops, who came straight down that way from where the tracks are, and this is where they held them. This is the actual junction. It says frederick junction, but its known as the monacacy junction then. The old train station was right behind us over here. And, in fact, these are the tracks that the troops came down from baltimore. Anyway, after their vermonters finally couldnt take it anymore, they fled down the tracks, around the bentd, and the old railroad bridge over there, the ones they had to flee for their lives over while they were being shot at by the confederates. What you see in the back behind me, which has been restored by the National Park service to the way it looked the day of the battle in 1864, this was the portion of the battle of monacacy, and what youre hearing is interstate 270 in the background, but what was here then was cornfields and wheatfields and they were crisscrossed by farm fences. It was not an ideal place