Battles of Manassas • Tour the Battlefield • Monuments • Facts • The Armies
The Invaded Farmland wayside marker is on the Henry Hill walking tour next to the Henry House.
Note: The marker was updated in the recent past. The older version is shown here for historical interest.
The Henry House, a postwar reconstruction. The photo shows the original wayside marker.
Text from the current wayside marker:
Spring Hill Farm – now simply known as Henry Hill – lay fallow and overgrown in the summer of 1861. A small vegetable garden and orchard surrounded the frame house. Inside the home, 84-year old Judith Henry remained bedridden, too old to work the land that had been in her family for more than a century. She shared the home with her daughter Ellen. A hired teenage slave, Lucy Griffith, assisted with domestic chores.
The Battle of Bull Run culminated on the Henry property. Unaware of civilians inside the home, Federal artillery fired on the dwelling to drive away Confederate sharpshooters. The cannon fire crashed through the house, mortally wounding the widow Henry, the battle’s only known civilian fatality. By day’s end the family matriarch was dead, the house in ruin, and the surrounding landscape forever redefined by the events of July 21, 1861.
Caption to the main photo:
The Henry House as it appeared after the battle.
Sketch made by Captain Leon J. Fremaux, 8th Louisiana Infantry.
Caption to the photo on the upper right:
Little remained of the Henry House by the time this photo was taken in March 1862. The current structure is postwar.
Original Wayside marker
Text from the replaced wayside marker:
Invaded Farmland
The morning of the battle was hot and still. Except for a few details the scene mirrored today’s pastoral landscape. Fields lay fallow, overgrown with tall grass. Around the Henry House grew rose bushes and a small peach orchard. Eighty-five-year-old Judith Henry was inside, bedridden, too old to work the farm that had been in her family for more than a century.
At ten o’clock Confederate cannon suddenly rumbled into position on the rise 100 yards ahead. There artillerists turned their guns towards Matthews Hill.
First
Battle of Manassas
Caption to the photo on the upper right:
Henry House during peacetime
Caption to the photo at the bottom:
Henry House as it appeared just after the battle, riddled with bullets and cannon-fire. Mrs. Henry had insisted on remaining in her house. That afternoon she was killed by an artillery shell meant for sharpshooters firing from her windows. (Judith Henry’s grave and inscribed headstone are in the cemetery nearby.)
Location of the marker
The marker is next to the Henry House about 220 yards north of the Henry Hill Visitor Center. (38°48’53.4″N 77°31’22.1″W)