Harper's Ferry - Bolivar Heights

Today we hiked one of the key battlefields in Harper's Ferry:  Bolivar Heights and School House Ridge.  This was the scene of a major rout of the Union Troops by the Confederacy in 1862.

Harpers Ferry was a strategic town because it had a munitions factory, storehouses of Union arms, and an advantageous location at the confluence of the Potomac and Shenandoah Rivers, not to mention being located on the B&O Railroad.  Both armies saw it as necessary to support their incursions into opposing territory.

Harpers Ferry started in Union hands.  By the time the Civil War ended, it had changed hands eight times!  By the end of the war, Harpers Ferry had been decimated, and its population had dwindled from 3,000 to a mere 100 souls.  The first change in control occurred in April 1861 when Virginia seceded from the Union.  Harpers Ferry, located in present West Virginia, was then part of Virginia, and the Union Army burned the arsenal and destroyed the machinery to prevent them falling into Confederate hands.  Indeed, the Confederate Army occupied Harpers Ferry thereafter, but abandoned it as too difficult to defend in June.  By October 1861, the Union Army reoccupied it.

The most well-known battle of Harpers Ferry occured in September 1862 when General Lee ordered his Army to surround and attack the town to control it in support of his intended attack on Union territory in Pennsylvania.  A key portion of the Confederate troops, led by Stonewall Jackson, took up positions on School House Ridge, located west of Bolivar Heights.  The Union Army had elected to take up defensive positions on Bolivar Heights, south of Harpers Ferry, to prevent its occupation by the Confederates.  The Federal assumption was that Harpers Ferry was protected from incursion from the north and east because it is located on a peninsula of land jutting into the confluence of the Potomac and Shenandoah Rivers, and the Union troops also occupied strategic Maryland Heights, in the State of Maryland, north of Harpers Ferry across the Potomac River.

However, Confederate troops drove the Union Army from Maryland Heights, giving the rebels command over Harpers Ferry from the north.  The South also took positions on Loudon Heights southwest of town.  The Confederates thus started a bombardment from three sides onto the Union forces that were dug in on Bolivar Heights.  This wore the Northern soldiers down.  Finally, Stonewall Jackson feinted a direct attack on Bolivar Heights from School House Ridge on the night of September 14, 1862, while simultaneously sending artillery and infantry to flank the Union position on the south end of Bolivar Heights.  With this accomplished, the Union leader recognized his hopeless position and surrendered the large Union force to Jackson's army - the largest surrender of U.S. armed forces until World War II.

Here is a view from the Union position on Bolivar Heights, looking out to Jackson's position on School House Ridge:

And here is a view back toward Bolivar Heights from Jackson's position on School House Ridge.  Maryland Heights are in the left background:

Walking the battlefield and considering the chronology of the battle, it was easy to imagine the terror both of the Northern troops as they endured artillery fire for those successive nights in their position on Bolivar Heights - and of the Southern troops who were ordered to attack Bolivar Heights as a cover for the flanking attack by Jackson.

By the time we had hiked the battlefield, we put about 6 miles under our boots, and decided this was worth a shadow photo to show we were here:

We ended this beautiful Indian Summer day with another campfire under a clear, starry sky and a delicious meal of Ahi tuna cooked in ginger and spinach cooked with shallots - along with one of our favorite Octoberfest brews!