Hurricane Also Hits Non-NPS Civil War Sites
November 2003

Hurricane Isabel caused damage at private and state Civil War parks and sites when it roared into North Carolina, Virginia and the Mid-Atlantic on Sept. 18 and headed north. Here's a
on some of that damage:

Newport News
In Newport News, Va., The Mariners' Museum and its collection, including the turret and other recovered artifacts of the USS Monitor, came through unscathed, despite winds gusting to nearly 100 mph. Not so, however, the private museum's 550-acre wooded park, where more than 2,000 trees were felled.

Museum spokesman Justin Lyons said the park's 5-mile Noland Trail will be closed for months for a cleanup, which is estimated to cost more than $500,000. Lyons noted that the park is open to the public free of charge and attracts 100,000 visitors a year.

"We're asking the local community to embrace us a little bit at this time," he said. The museum is seeking donations and is taking names of volunteers willing to help clear the fallen trees.

Donations to the Park Restoration Fund may be sent to 100 Museum Dr., Newport News, VA 23606. Volunteers may call (757) 591-7747.

Also in Newport News, two historic city-owned properties, Endview Plantation and Lee Hall Mansion, escaped damage but a power outage forced closures for several days.

At Endview, built in 1769 and thought to have served as a field hospital during the Civil War, a large black walnut that Senior Custodian Jesse Gundry said probably dated from the war fell in the front yard. Also, one of the two dozen replica winter huts in the back field was "probably totaled" by some of the innumerable toppling trees and limbs. "I would hate to be in the business of selling firewood for the next two or three years," Gundry said.

At Lee Hall Mansion, spokesman Michael Moore said the 1859 structure, which served as headquarters for Confederate generals John Magruder and Joseph Johnston during the Peninsula Campaign, escaped with only "minor fence damage" and "tree limbs and debris everywhere."

Museum of Confederacy
At the Museum of the Confederacy in Richmond, Isabel brought down a giant, 200-year-old horse chestnut tree that had framed the White House of the Confederacy. According to museum spokesman Sarah Dowdey, the chestnut was probably planted in 1818-19 by Dr. John
Brockenbrough when he built the mansion.

"Certainly the children of Jefferson and Varina Davis played on the tree's broad branches and collected the chestnuts," said Dowdey. The tree was the last of three historic chestnuts that shaded the garden; one oak remains from the early 19th-century plantings.

Dowdey noted that the very week of the storm, the museum and the White House of the Confederacy were documenting the horse chestnut for nomination to the National Registry of Historic Trees. Now the staff is considering possible commemorative products from the tree, and invites inquiries.

Pamplin Historical Park
Pamplin Historical Park & The National Museum of the Civil War Soldier preservation efforts extend from caring for more than 2,000 museum artifacts to preserving some three-quarters of a mile of Confederate earthworks. Disaster preparedness and recovery procedures are a part of those efforts, said park spokesman Richard Lewis.

Isabel gave park staff a chance to implement their procedures. Because of the rainy summer the ground was already saturated when Isabel arrived. The resulting winds, which were recorded in excess of 70 mph, along with a deluge of rain uprooted trees around the park
and blew down sections of split rail fencing.

Lewis said that "miraculously, all of the park's historic structures escaped damage and the museum buildings were likewise spared." The administrative building basement offices were flooded, but equipment and records had been placed at desktop level or higher.

Sections of the battlefield were hard hit by tree damage. A 100- yard stretch of earthworks bordering an open meadow was pummeled by fallen trees. The "Breakthrough Trail" which winds through the battlefield also suffered some damage to boardwalks and wooden bridges. The earthworks will be repaired after fallen trees are removed.

All of the park's museums, including The National Museum of the Civil War Soldier, The Battlefield Center, Tudor Hall Plantation, The Banks House and The Field Quarter, are open and interpretive programs are going on as scheduled. The battlefield will be closed until downed
trees are cleared and trails repaired.

Point Lookout
The Civil War sites at Point Lookout State Park, Maryland, which include the original earthen walls of Fort Lincoln, the only surviving Civil War fort in southern Maryland, survived Hurricane
Isabel, according to Darl L. Stephenson, a member of the Friends of Point Lookout board.

The park was closed after the storm because of downed trees and power lines and damage to Maryland Route 5.

Stephenson said the reconstructed Civil War buildings of Fort Lincoln - two officers' quarters, the guard shack and the enlisted barracks which is about 25 feet by 65 feet - also escaped the storm. The barracks was reconstructed with all volunteer labor and would cost over $100,000 to replace had it been destroyed.

Downed trees on access roads to Fort Lincoln and around the fort and between the prison pen had to be removed. The moat around the fort was partially filled up with sand from the storm surge. A temporary cut through the sand allowed the moat to drain. Eventually the sand
will be removed.

Members of the non-profit Friends of Point Lookout spent three weekends in a row clearing trees, removing debris from Fort Lincoln, cleaning up the memorial which they constructed at the end of the Point to all who were at Fort Lincoln and helping park staff clean up campsites and the visitors' center which had extensive water damage. Artifacts and papers had been moved from the building prior to the storm.

The Friends will return on Oct. 24-26 to repaint buildings and finish clearing out wood which will be used for future Civil War events.

Donations to help with the cost of the cleanup may be made to: The Friends of Point Lookout, Point Lookout State Park, P.O. Box 48, Scotland, MD 20687