1813 Chattanooga Remembers It History By Preserving Civil War Battlefields

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Minneapolis Tribune

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^it^^a^ vil War memorials mmgls with moOtrn lawns on Crest fload— also known as Missionary Ridge—in Chattanooga, Tann. Thla one marks a mfederate poailion.

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Start Photos Oy Catherine Watson

Chattanooga remembers its history preserving CiviiWar battlefields Catherine Wataon vet Editor

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attanooga, Tenn. ;en the resjdems of Chattanooga's Crest Road f they nave history at their doorstep, they n't ktddmg. ,gt Road follows the too of a long ridge on the H s»de of Chattanooga and offers splendid w i over the city and the Tennessee River ping through it. But although the ridge was en coveted 119 years ago this fail, it was not •:.ctiy prime real estate.

In 1390, Congreae pasaed a law founding the military park—the nation's first and stitt its largest—ai>d veterans of both sides came back to identify the turf where they'd fought, mark it with signs and sculptures, and try to preserve ft as a memorial to the»r fallen comrades. They were almost too late. By then. Crest Road was becoming the Summrt Av. of Chattanooga. Grand houses were under construction aiong it and the empty tots between them had become some of the moat desirable m (own.

en Crest Road was Known as Missionary •jga. site of some of the most important fighting the Civil War. When Confederate forces tost 3 ndge to the Unton tn tate November 1863. ay alsotostChattanooga usetf—a terrible blow the Southern cause.

The park commission got around that by buying the roadway along the ndge and putting memorials m its right-of-way; when the road was returned to state |unsdtction later, it carried the proviso that the monuments and plaques had to stay where they were.

That toss," said Edward Tinney. chief of •,eroretanon at Crwckamauga-Chattanooga atonal Military Park, "opened up the deep

Today, the battlefield par* that first-time visitors expect to find is actually a series of parklets, strungawng the ridge read like small green

Above, a monument tangles with mora recent power llnea on Missionary Ridge. It commemorates the 8th Kansas Volunteer Infantry. Below, a memorial on Chickamsugi Battlefield, south ot the city. The inscription reads "Battery 6. 1st Ohio LL Artillery. Croft's Brigade, Palmer's Division, 21st Army d o r p s . "

unit or commander identified with them. From south to north along the ndge. they are: Bragg Reservation, named for Confederate Gen. Braxton Bragg, commander of the Confederate Army of Tenneaaee during the Battle of Chattanooga; Ohio Reservation, commemorating " Union troopa from that staia; Turchin Reservation, lor Russian-born John B. Turchm, a Union officer; OeCong Reservation, canter of the Confederate siege (jne. , And finally Sherman Reservation, named—a bit ironically—lor Union Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman, whose troopa were repeatedly pushed back here. "H might have been named for Sherman's antagonist." a park guidebook notes. "Gen. Pat Cleburne, whose stubborn defense here was the only bright spot in an otherwise dismal day for the Confederates." The park has 668 monuments. 255 cannon and 762 cast-won plaques scattered over aoout

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Minneapolis Tribune

Sun., July 25, 1062

Chattanooga

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From/ IE here by daylight—and almost itable after dark.

fighting stopped, weren't always easy.

• Above all. don't lake a travel er up on either Missionary Rid Lookout Mountain. With few « lions, there are almost no piac park legally, let alone turn an on Missionary Ridge, and mat Lookout Mountain are even tnci

"The battle was fought harder after the war than during the war!" he wild, only tial/kidding. Turchln, (or example, vehemently opposed placing one of Minnesota's four monuments (the first ones put up in the park, Tlnney said) in the DeLong Reservation.

• There's enough to see in the tanooga area to keep you bus several days. Other sites include

The reason? The monument commemorates Sgt. Axel H- Heed, a company commander In the 2nd Minnesota, who is considered one of the first men to reach the top of the ridge.

The Chattanooga Choo-Choo I plex, 1400 Market Place—whos tel. restaurant and shops centf the restored 1909 bnck railway tion that was one of the stops lo actual Chattanooga Choo-C Guestrooms in the adjoining ( Choo Hilton Hotel include rest sleeper cars on the station track.'

Bui Turchln was certain his men actually crested the ridge first. "He fought that to his dying day!" Tioney said. (Reed, by the way. lost an arm ID the fighting but refused a discharge, staying on active duty until the end of the war he was later awarded the Medal of Honor.) In between the reservations, dotting the front yards of Crest Road residents, are silver-painted cast-iron plaques marking the position of different units. Their borders and texts are in red for Confederate positions, blue for Union. Having one of these memorial markers—or even better, one of the cannon—to mow around in your front yard Is something of a status symboL Down below, some of the people living in Its shadow seem a little vague about what happened on Crest Road. Ask directions—"How do I get up to where the battle was?"—and you may draw a blank, "Battle? What battle?" one woman said. At a gas station at the foot of the ridge, the owner turned to a passing youngster and asked Mm If he knew. "Is that where ail those monuments are?" the boy wondered. Yes, said the visitor. "I've been up there on my bike." he said, pleased, and then advised- on which'cross streets would run all the way to the lop.

It's the chopped-up nature of the battlefield that makes It difficult for visitors—and apparently (or some natives—to find. Important sites are scattered all across town. Besides Missionary Ridge, there's also Orchard Knob, a foothill in the valley below. (The National Cemetery, established shortly after the battle, is two blocks away.) Chattanooga was, of course, much smaller in 1863, and the Confederate-held Orchard Knob lay then in the countryside between the two armies. Union troops took It on Nov. 23. On the other side of town from Missionary Ridge is Lookout Mountain, where the so-called "Battle Above the Clouds" took place. Much of It was actually In the clouds, because die mountain was fogbound at ihr lime. There are markers here, too— cramped clusters In the rocky hollows and little pockmarks on the mountainside. Their placement is revealing: How wretched the fighting must have been here—Americans trapped by (og and fatigue, trying to light other Americans whom they could not see. The Cravens ,House, a private home used as a Confederate headquarters during the battle on the mountain, das survived and been restored; It's now open to the public. Above It on the mountalntop is Point Park, where Confederate artillery wos deployed during the battle; there's a Visitors Center near the entrance and, nearby, the Ochs Museum,

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Staff Photo by Catherine Watson T h e B r o t h e r t o n C a b i n , site of the C o n f e d e r a t e b r e a k t h r o u g h that turned the Battle of C h l c k a m a u g e Into a S o u t h e r n victory.

whose displays focus on the battle. (The land for the museum was donated In 1934 by Adolpb S. Ochs, then-publisher of the New York Times and Chattanooga Times, Tinoey said.)

There is no real bint of that horror now—nor of dally reality, either. Chickamauga today is a place apart, a tranquil park filled with birdsong. buzxing insects, the sound of wind in the trees and over the meadows, and every now and then, a family of picnickers or a busload of school children relaxing among the monuments.

Mare accessible—and somewhat easier to comprehend—is the other part of the National Military Park, Cbickamauga battlefield, south of Char»«noog2, across the Tennessee Georgia line. This actually is the best place to start a tour, partly because Cbickamauga came first chronologically, and partly because it looks like a battlefield—5,500 acres of rolling, wooded land ail in one undeveloped piece. You can see where the enemy and the good guys stood—no matter whom you consider them to be—and you can follow ihr action more easily, thanks to displays in the visitors Center and a well-laid-out self-guiding tour. (The center also contains the Fuller Collection of Military 'Shoulder Arms, more than 350 pieces that mage from early flintlocks through World War I equipment.) Although the intricacies of fighting here are difficult for the beginning Civil War buff to follow, the sequence was roughly this: In early September 1863. Union forces captured Chattanooga, then a maior Southern rail center. Southern forces planned a counterattack, which culminated Sept. 19-20, just south of the city, In the Great Battle of the West, as Cbickamauga was called. The Confederates won at Cbickamauga—a major victory that renewed the South's hopes—but they failed to follow through, and Union forces were able to retreat to Chattanooga. The Confederates then be-

seiged the city from positions including Missionary Ridge and Lookout Mountain. The siege was so effective that U.S. Grant, then Union commander In the West, came to supervise the siegelifting operation which culminated in the campaign lor Chattanooga, Nov. 23-25. ending with Union troops driving the Confederates off Missionary Ridge and forcing them back to ballon, Ga. CuuaiUaj from Imih gjuel loinled 12,491 in the Chattanooga fighting. Cbickamauga was far bloodier, with a combined casualty figure of about 34.000 out of the 124.000 men in•voived—losses of roughly 27 percent In 17 hours. Tlnney said.

Ambrose Blerce wrote one of his most chilling short stories about Chickamauga. describing It from the point of view of a deaf, mule child who cant hear the gunfire or the shrieks. The horror happens In the render's mind, not the boy's, as he admires the new pink color the creek has turned and tries to play with the redsplashed men who come staggering past him; the little boy thinks they're

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A few words of advice are In order If you're planning to take in the Chickamauga-Chattanooga battle sites on a trip to the southeast this summer • Bone up on local history before you get to town. You'll be too busy driving and looking to do It properly after you get here—unless you can persuade your spouse or one of your kids lo read aloud from guidebooks while you negotiate traffic on strange streets. • Plan your visit so you hit Lookout Mountain well before sunset, although the vl*-w thru 1% lovely. Ihr mountain's back roads twist and tangle so much that It's easy to get lost Chattanooga/ 3E

To sense some of the horror of It, you might as easily turn to fiction as to fact

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The Incline Railway, vhich cli straight up Lookout Mountain ( St. Elmo St. The grade reaches degrees and may be tne woi steepest.

July 25

SlaH Pholo by Catherine Watson Part of the monument to the 15 U.S. Infantry at C h i c k a m a u g a .

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The Houston Museum, 201 St.—ra houseful of pressed gJas> nated io the city by the woman collected It. Every comer gii with the beautiful stuff and ever ceilings are festooned wu r . Though a must for pressed-giass lectors, the museum is a bit fnis mg for novices because few of items are labeled.

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seura. Tennessee Hwy. 153 at Jers Pike Exit—which has displays working steam and diesel locorr lives, rail cars and other equipme and occasionally offers special d; long excursions. • For city maps and more inform lion on these and other places inierest in the area, write the Chad nooga Convention and Visitors B reau. Civic Forum/1001 Market S Chattanooga, Tenn. 37402; or c; 615-756-2121. If youYe going in pe son. the center has a large, free, 0' street parking lot