NPS Buys 36 Acres At Chancellorsville
By Deborah Fitts
FREDERICKSBURG, Va.

Continuing to meet the challenge of rapid development at the doorstep of Fredericksburg-area battlefields, the National Park Service has purchased 36 acres of Stonewall Jackson's famous flank attack at Chancellorsville.
John Hennessy, assistant superintendent of Fredericksburg & Spotsylvania National Military Park, said of the recent acquisition, "This is visually the most prominent chunk of Jackson's flank-attack area, which is really, really good."
The Park Service paid owner Jo Ann Ashton $700,000 for the "farmette," located just west of Wilderness Church north of Route 3.
A nonhistoric house and outbuildings will be removed. The property will be combined with an adjoining 40 acres purchased by the park in 1998, and all 76 acres will be leased for farming.
It was across this open ground the evening of May 2, 1863, that the Confederate commander sent his forces against a surprised Union army, catching them in the flank and driving them from their campfires. Jackson's victory was blighted that night by his mortal wounding.
Of the 380 acres of the flank attack area within the park boundary, the park now owns 150. The Central Virginia Battlefields Trust has purchased 28 acres on the portion of the flank attack that lies outside the boundary, on the south side of Route 3, and is negotiating for more.
"We still have a long way to go," acknowledged Hennessy. "There are two really large tracts "within the boundary" that we'd like."
Land buys for the Fredericksburg park have been facilitated by a willing Congress. For fiscal year 2001 the park will receive $6 million, the largest federal allocation in memory for land acquisition at the park. Of that amount, $2.5 million was appropriated in the Interior funding bill and another $3.5 million comes from the federal Land & Water Conservation Fund.
In the fiscal year just ended, the park received a total of $3 million to buy land, and $5 million in 1999. Park Superintendent Sandy Rives said the recent flood of money for land was no coincidence.
"This park has made a considerable effort to put out to Congressional committees our urgent need to buy land, based on the development in the area," Rives said. "They've come and looked at the sites and they've seen the urgency of the need. We need to do it in the next few years."
Congress approved an expanded boundary for Fredericksburg & Spotsylvania National Military Park in 1989. Out of the total 8900 acres that comprise the park's units, 1800 acres remain privately held by 35 landowners.
"We were very successful in this past year," Rives said, purchasing about 140 acres. The acquisitions bring with them "an endless list of things to do" to prepare the properties for public access.
For instance, a 3500-square-foot house dating from the 1970s, part of a 40-acre tract along Jackson's Flank Attack that was purchased by the Park Service a year ago, was moved from the property in early November. And nine modern homes bought by the park were "all in the process of being jacked up and moved," having been sold to the highest bidder for between $4000 and $20,000.