CWPT To Buy Siege Tract Near Petersburg; Quarry Is Proposed
By Deborah Fitts
January 2003

DINWIDDIE, Va. - Thanks to a "wonderful deal" engineered by the Civil War Preservation Trust, a piece of land that saw intense fighting during the battle of Hatcher's Run will be
preserved. At presstime, the Trust was expected to close in December on 118 acres of the battlefield.

The land is near a proposed 353-acre granite quarry that also includes earthworks from the battle, and the Trust is in negotiations in hopes of preserving them as well.

According to Trust spokesman Jim Campi, the 118-acre tract was being purchased from the Clements family for $256,000. Much, but not all, of the funds will come in the form of federal
transportation-enhancement and Civil War Battlefield Preservation Program grants, Campi predicted.

The property includes a farmhouse where Union commanders George Meade and U.S. Grant reportedly met, plus, behind the house, a portion of the main Confederate defensive line.

Chris Calkins, historian at Petersburg National Battlefield, noted that as siege works, the trenchline, with traverses, is "absolutely beautiful" nearly 140 years later. At the end of the works is a two-gun redan. Despite a recent logging operation, during which a bulldozer obliterated the two gun platforms, the redan is still visible, Calkins said.

The new purchase augments an earlier acquisition of 50 acres at Hatcher's Run by the Association for the Preservation of Civil War Sites, a predecessor to the Trust. Calkins said the new acquisition, north of Hatcher's Run, represents about one-quarter of the land that should be saved from the first day of the three-day battle, Feb. 5, 1865.

The Feb. 6 and 7 fields are about two miles distant, on the south side of Hatcher's Run. Calkins noted that other battle action occurred on the land that is being purchased by the Trust, including part of the Boydton Plank Road fight, Oct. 27, 1864, and the attack
a picket line across the property on March 25, 1865.

Preservationists and some local residents were concerned when Tidewater applied for a conditional-use permit from Dinwiddie County.

The county is now considering the permit, which would allow Tidewater to operate the quarry, an asphalt plant and a concrete plant near Interstate-85 and U.S. 1.

Tidewater is a subsidiary of Florida Rock, in Jacksonville, which is one of the top producers in the U.S. of construction aggregate and a supplier of ready-mixed concrete in the southeastern and mid-Atlantic states.

Tidewater officials say the $14 million quarry would eventually employ 50 people and generate $135,000 annually in tax income to the county. Tidewater's application has prompted opposition from neighbors, who fear that blasting, truck traffic and dust from the
will lower their quality of life.

Officials at Petersburg National Battlefield, on the other hand, have kept a low profile out of political concerns, not wanting to oppose an industry that could swell the county's coffers. Superintendent Bob Kirby was pleased and relieved, therefore, when the Trust rode to the
rescue.

Not only did Trust president James Lighthizer acquire the Clements property, but he "went a step further" and entered into negotiations with Tidewater over the earthworks. "Jim pulled off a wonderful deal," Kirby said. "We've done a masterful job of preserving the
of the core area of the battlefield."

Kirby acknowledged that his first impulse was to fight the quarry "tooth and nail," but eventually he, Calkins and Lighthizer found a less adversarial path.

"I'm not happy" about the Tidewater quarry, Kirby said. "I've got green blood. I'm biased against certain things that are so detrimental to the earth. But I'm happy that we've saved nationally significant cultural resources."