Cedar Mountain Battlefield
Civil War battlefield

The Battle of Cedar Mountain took place on August 9, 1862. Also known as the Battle of Slaughter's Mountain or Cedar Run, the battle involved approximately 28,000 active troops, 20,000 of them Confederate, under command of Major General Thomas J. 'Stonewall' Jackson. Opposing this force was Major General John Pope's Army of Virginia, in its first action. The five-hour fight was intense, with Union casualties at thirty percent of the troops engaged, 2,400 killed, wounded, and missing. The Confederates lost six percent of their force totaling approximately 1,300. The importance of the battle is often debated but has been described as a crucial preliminary battle in the Second Manassas campaign.

Clara Barton, founder of the American Red Cross, performed her first field duty at the Battle of Cedar Mountain in August of 1862 in Culpeper County.

When Major General John Pope was made commander of the newly formed Union Army of Virginia, he ordered Banks to take the railroad junction at Gordonsville, Orange County. When Banks and his 8,000 men marched south of Culpeper toward Gordonsville, they met Jackson with 14,000 at Cedar Mountain. Surprisingly, the barely-qualified Banks proved a tough match, and the Confederate troops began to scatter in disarray. Jackson, living up to his fame, rallied his forces to hold on. When Banks pushed the assault, A.P. Hill reinforced the Southern line with 6,000 troops to push Banks back toward Culpeper.

The battlefield, protected by the Civil War Preservation Trust, is a peaceful, unadorned battlefield. You can walk a pathway through meadows and woods, stopping at interpretive signs along the way. It’s a terrific site for birding, too.