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President Abraham Lincoln with Civil War soldiers, 1863.

In 1861, Washington, D.C. was not much more than a small, sleepy town of muddy streets and unfinished government buildings, whose residents left it virtually deserted during its steamy and malaria-prone summer months.  All that was irrevocably changed in April when the first shots were fired on Fort Sumter in South Carolina by a secessionist Confederate army.  That attack set off the deadliest conflict in US history, and by the time it ended in 1865, nearly three quarters of a million lives had been lost and the nation had been changed in profound and lasting ways.  But this city – which as the seat of the Union’s government and war machine became a boomtown of bureaucracy – and its surrounding areas were a microcosm of the country’s most profound civil conflict: communities ripped apart by opposing sympathies and horrific battles, but grimly determined to eventually return to a state of national unity.

In the spring and summer of 1861 there seemed to be little fear on either side of significant casualties and no inkling that a prolonged and destructive war was on the horizon.  The shock and anger aroused by the May shooting death in Alexandria, Virginia of Union Col. Elmer Ellsworth - the war’s first conspicuous casualty - just miles from the US Capitol made clear just how far from people’s minds the tremendous reality of impending war was.  But if any doubt remained, the clash of opposing forces in Manassas, Virginia at the battle of Bull Run in July put an end to all delusion.

Just months after the fall of Fort Sumter and Lincoln’s call for 75,000 Union volunteers, the citizenry of the Northern states clamored for a march against the Confederate capital of Richmond, Virginia, and with it a speedy end to the war.  Yielding to this political pressure, and amid a continuing mood of irrational optimism on the part of the general public and military alike, enthusiastic volunteers in colorful uniforms gathered to fight the first major land battle of the war. Confident that their foes would turn and run, neither side yet foresaw the darker realities of war.

Painting of Civil War Battle

On July 21^st, an ill-prepared Union force advanced across Bull Run against an equally unseasoned Confederate Army near Manassas Junction, Virginia. The Union’s ambitious plans for a surprise attack were undermined by a lack of troop experience, and although the Confederates initially found themselves at a disadvantage, reinforcements arriving by railroad radically changed the course of the battle.  Among them was a relatively unknown Virginia colonel, Thomas J. Jackson, who, when he ordered his brigade to stand their ground, earned the nickname, "Stonewall Jackson".

With a strong Confederate counterattack, Union troops began withdrawing under the pressure and many panicked, frantically retreating in the direction of Washington. Jubilant spectators who had ventured out with picnic lunches with the expectation that the rebels would be quickly routed, were also forced to flee amid the chaos.   With the dead and dying littering the fields of Manassas, both North and South were sobered to the fact that the war would be much longer and costlier than previously anticipated.

Washington was now a city caught in the cross hairs of the bloody conflict.  Just across the banks of the Potomac River lay the rebels of Virginia, who not only had put the Union forces to shame at the first key battle of Bull Run, but located their own insurgent government no more than 100 miles south of Washington. And to the north lay an unsettled Maryland, whose residents’ southern-leaning sympathies caused riots in Baltimore and provoked a continuing anxiety about its loyalty to the Union.  Faced with an open rebellion that had turned hostile, by August the Union Army of the Potomac began laying out the 161 earthwork forts and batteries that would ultimately ring 33 miles around the city of Washington, including Fort Ward and Fort Stevens. President Abraham Lincoln further demanded that a military force be competently organized to protect Washington.  Over the next four years, tens of thousands of soldiers would flood into Washington to fight, some ultimately die on distant battlefields, and the city became a major staging area for what was to be four agonizing years of war.

One hundred and fifty years later, America commemorates the Sesquicentennial of the war between North and South, with many Civil War events planned through 2015.  Presented at battlefields and historic sites, as well as at museums and other privately operated sites around the Washington, D.C. region, these commemorative events will showcase the capital's unique history of being surrounded by the Confederacy and give visitors a chance to see sites beyond the National Mall.

Alexandria, Virginia had a unique role in the Civil War as its longest occupied territory.  Trapped for four years in the terrible conflict, a once prosperous Southern town instantaneously transformed into an armed camp behind Northern lines. Today, with a wealth of historic sites - the homes of Civil War General Robert E. Lee's family; Fort Ward, now the best preserved remnant of the only defenses that stood between the capitol city and the South, Freedom House, once headquarters for slave traders, and the site of the Marshall House Inn, where North and South lost the lives of the first martyrs for their opposing causes - Alexandria allows visitors to experience the conflict for themselves. Telling the stories of Alexandria's citizens as well as the soldiers and officers, nurses, slaves and freedmen who passed through, Alexandria commemorates the 150th anniversary of its unique role as the Witness to War and Reunion.

Alexandria Visitor’s Center
221 King Street
Alexandria, VA
703-746-3301

Union Army Col. Elmer E. Ellsworth, National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution

Col. Elmer Ellsworth, a celebrated and charismatic Union officer – and personal friend and former law clerk of President Lincoln – became the first “martyr” for the Union cause, when he , in an attempt to cut down a Confederate flag flying over the Marshall House Inn in Alexandria Virginia, was shot and killed by rebel innkeeper James W. Jackson, who was fatally shot himself by another Union soldier, thus fulfilling Jackson's promise that the flag would be removed "over my dead body."  An inspirational figure in the North, his body lay in state at the White House and his memory spurred the enlistment of thousands of Union troops with the slogan of "Remember Ellsworth".  Relics associated with his death even became prized souvenirs.  Ellsworth is the subject of exhibits at the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery in Washington and the Fort Ward Museum and Historic Site in Alexandria, and relics connected to him can be found at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History.

National Portrait Gallery Exhibition - The Death of Ellsworth: On the site of a former Civil War hospital, the National Portrait Gallery marks the 150^th anniversary of the Civil War with an exhibit that recounts the death of Col. Elmer Ellsworth, the first Union officer to be killed in the Civil War. The exhibition brings together a select grouping of once-prized mementos, including portraits of Ellsworth and Lincoln, as well as Alonzo Chappel’s historic painting, “The Death of Ellsworth”.

8^th and F Streets,
NW Washington, D.C.
202-633-1000

National Museum of American History – The Price of Freedom, Americans at War

Col. Ellsworth’s death at the hands of James Jackson, who was then killed by one of Ellsworth’s Union soldiers, Francis Brownell, electrified Civil War Washington. Ellsworth lay in state at the White House, Brownell received the Medal of Honor, and everyone wanted relics of the Marshall House incident. Over the years the Smithsonian has acquired Jackson's shotgun and Brownell's rifle and Medal of Honor as well as a piece of the Confederate flag cut down by Col. Ellsworth in 1961.

14^th Street and Constitution Avenue, NW

Washington, DC

202-633-1000  

Fort Ward Museum and Historic Site:

Although never fired upon during the Civil War, is one of the 68 forts that ringed the Federal capital.  Abandoned after the war, it has been carefully restored and interpreted, with excellent Civil War exhibits relating to Alexandria's war-time experience - such as daily camp life and gruesomely primitive medical care. This is the place to get oriented for a tour of Civil War fortifications in the Washington area and to discover what it was like to be a Union Soldier defending Washington.

4301 W Braddock Road

Alexandria VA 22304

703-746-4848

Virginia militiamen, 1859

Manassas National Battlefield Park/Sesquicentennial of the First Battle of Manassas July 21-24, 2011

Commemorate the 150^th anniversary of the First Battle of Manassas (Bull Run) with a variety of special programs and commemorative activities from July 21–24, the highlight of which will be a reenactment on July 23^rd and 24^th. Spectators will be part of this once-in-a-lifetime experience recreating the first clash between the Blue and Gray on the fields of Manassas. The reenactment is one of more than 80 Civil War-themed events and activities planned in 2011, including living history, patriotic musical performances … even a Civil War parade and baseball game!  Park boundaries encompass key sites associated with the First (July 21, 1861) and Second (Aug. 28-30, 1862) Battles of Manassas (Bull Run).

Manassas Battlefield Park, Main Visitor Center

6511 Sudley Road, Manassas VA 703-361-1339

Event schedules and info: www.nps.gov/mana; www.manassascivilwar.org; www.manassasbullrun.com

Fort Stevens, where President Abraham Lincoln risked life and limb to view the skirmishing as Confederate Gen. Jubal Early approached Washington from the north in July 1864. The fort is partially preserved and interpreted.

Rock Creek Park, just west of Georgia Avenue, at 13^th and Quackenbos Street NW, Washington, DC 202-895-6070 www.nps.gov/rocr

By Kathleen McDonough

The Smithsonian Folklife Festival

Where can you meet a Mompox drum maker; learn how to pack a mule for transporting goods over the Andes; dance to the tunes of jump blues, soul and funk; and consider a job change as a Peace Corp volunteer? The Smithsonian Folklife Festival may be your answer!  The Festival is a chance to meet with people from across the United States and around the world, carriers of cultural traditions, who are all too willing to share their not-too-familiar stories.

This year’s Festival highlights programs on Columbia, the Peace Corps and Rhythm and Blues. The Colombian program details six ecosystems, including the Andes Mountains to the Amazon Rainforest, the hilly coffee region of Caldas, and the urban center of Bogotá.  Colombian artists will sing, dance, prepare food, tell stories, celebrate the harvest, and demonstrate religious ceremonies, traditional medicine practices, and agricultural sustainability.

The Peace Corps program at the Folklife Festival will bring together Peace Corps volunteers with many of the people with whom they have served from countries around the world.  Some highlights will include:

• Demonstrations by craft cooperatives
• Performances by musical, dance, and theatrical groups
• Hands-on educational activities to increase public understanding and appreciation of the cultures and countries where Peace Corps volunteers have lived

The Rhythm and Blues: Tell It Like It Is program  will present performances and workshops with some of the artists, songwriters, radio personalities, and others who have shaped the musical heritage of rhythm and blues in the United States.  This program is produced in partnership with the National Museum of African American History and Culture.

Don a summer hat and pack up the kids. Plan to swing your honey to the tunes of Chuck Brown, learn how to roll a cheese called queso de capa, and enjoy some authentic Colombian storytelling to pass on to your grandchildren.

Events:

• The Festival’s opening ceremony will take place June 30^th at 11:00 a.m., and will remain open daily from 11:00 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. June 30-July 4 and July 7-11.  Special evening events include concerts and dance parties beginning at 6:00 p.m.  During the Festival, you may call (202) 633-7484 to hear a recorded description of daily events.  Admission is free.

Location:

• National Mall, between 7^th and 14^th Streets in Washington, D.C.  Limited parking; use Metro: Smithsonian and Federal Triangle on the Blue Line, and L’Enfant Plaza and Archives on the Green and Yellow Lines.  Gallery Place and Metro Center on the Red Line are also just a short distance away.

Visiting Tips:

• This event is held during the warmest time of year in Washington, D.C.  Plan ahead, dress appropriately, and drink lots of water.  Give yourself time to cool off in the Smithsonian Museums that skirt the Mall.
• The best place to eat may be the festival itself.  Mealtime is an important part of folk traditions, and festival visitors can sample a variety of delicious foods from other cultures.  Almost every tent and kiosk will have food on sale, ranging from snacks to fully cooked meals.