Glendale Battlefield: Cultural Landscape Inventory, Richmond National Battlefield Park, National Park Service
Hammond JW. 2017. Glendale Battlefield: Cultural Landscape Inventory, Richmond National Battlefield Park, National Park Service. Cultural Landscapes Inventory Report. 976008. NPS Northeast Regional Office. Northeast Regional Office/CLI Database
Glendale Battlefield preserves the site of the June 30, 1862 Battle of Glendale, or Frayser’s Farm, the penultimate event of the Seven Days’ Battles of General George McClellan’s 1862 Peninsula Campaign. Glendale Battlefield is located at 8301 Willis Church Road, Virginia, approximately thirteen miles southeast of Richmond. The site is part of Richmond National Battlefield Park, a unit of the National Park System comprised of eleven Civil War battlefields and engagement sites and related resources around Virginia’s capital city. These sites are variously associated with the events of the Civil War, including the 1862 Peninsula Campaign, 1864 Overland Campaign, naval operations along the James River, and the 1864-65 Richmond-Petersburg Campaign. The June 30, 1862 Battle of Glendale, part of Union Gen. George B. McClellan’s Peninsula Campaign, was fought as Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia tried to prevent the Army of the Potomac from reaching Harrison’s Landing on the James River. As the Union army retreated south toward the river, Lee’s forces converged on the Federals in the area of the Glendale crossroads, nine and a half miles north of Harrison’s Landing. At Glendale, the Confederate units attacked from the west and north, trying to break the Federal line, but the Federal defenses held, and McClellan’s army passed safely on to Malvern Hill, where they made a final defensive stand before reaching Harrison’s Landing. Today, the Glendale Battlefield cultural landscape comprises 513 acres of the core battlefield, including the intersection of Willis Church Road and Darbytown Road (the crossroads) and areas of the most intense fighting. Significant sites within the landscape include the site of the Nelson farm, also known as Glendale, which served as the headquarters for Union Gen. Edwin Sumner during the battle, and the site of the Whitlock farm, which saw some of the fiercest fighting. The landscape retains a rural character through continued agricultural use, but the setting is diminished by the predominance of forested land and the development of suburban neighborhoods in proximity to the park unit. Some of the resources associated with the battle, including Willis Methodist Church and Glendale National Cemetery, lie just outside of the park boundary.
- Type
- Published Report
- Authors
- Hammond, John
- Date of Issue
- 2017-08-23
- Publisher
- NPS Northeast Regional Office
- Units
- NER , RICH
- Keywords
- Archeology Historic-Non-Aboriginal, Archeology-Prehistoric, Battle Site, Battles in the North And South, Commemoration, Expressing Cultural Values., Farm (Plantation), Forest, Frayser's Farm, Glendale Battlefield, Horticulture Facility, Interpretive Landscape, Leisure-Passive (Park), Military, Outdoor Recreation, Shaping the Political Landscape, Single Family House, The Civil War, Vernacular Landscape