Explore 50 Civil War Battlefields
From 1861 to 1865 great armies fought in a terrible Civil War for competing visions of America. Gettysburg, Antietam, The Wilderness and The Crater are all written in blood in our nation’s history. Today the armies are long gone, but sentinels still guard their memory, messages carved in stone for future generations.
Stone Sentinels is a virtual tour that lets you explore over 50 Civil War battlefields and other important locations in the Eastern United States. Maps, photos and text from the monuments, historical markers, and battlefield farms and buildings tell the stories. Background history and links to related pages provide additional information.
The Great Battles
Ten of the eleven costliest battles and sieges fought in the Civil War were in the Eastern Theater. This site visits them all. The Battle of Gettysburg section alone has a thousand pages which explore each of the monuments and markers on the battlefield as well as the battlefield’s farms and terrain features.
Lesser-known Fights and Other Sites
In between the great battles were dozens of smaller fights, all life and death struggles for the men involved. This site visits over 40 battles and significant locations that didn’t make it into the Great Battles category, covering everything from skirmishes to major pitched battles.
Battlefields by Region
Many Civil War battles were fought on battlefields that were near each other or even overlapped. Some returned to the same ground several times – six battles were fought within a few miles of Winchester, Virginia. The Battlefields by Region map lets you view several of these areas to help plan your trip or understand a campaign.
Civil War in the East
This companion website provides in-depth information such as biographies of many commanders, information on West Point graduates who fought in the war, unit histories of the regiments and batteries that fought in the Eastern Theater, and month to month organizations of the armies throughout the war. Many pages in the Stone Sentinels website link to this resource.