Battle of Fredericksburg • Tour the Battlefield • Monuments & Markers • Armies
The Battle of Fredericksburg wayside marker is at the Pelham markers at Benchmark Road. (see map below) It is next to The Gallant Pelham wayside marker and just a short distance from the Stuart and Pelham monument and the Fort Hood and The Gallant Pelham Virginia historical markers.
Text from the marker:
Battle of Fredericksburg
This landscape, now changed by commercial and residential development, once swarmed with Union soldiers. Forty thousand Northern troops, led by General William B. Franklin, having crossed the Rappahannock River, massed here on the plain south of Fredericksburg. A like number of soldiers, led by General Edwin V. Sumner, occupied the town itself.
Franklin and Sumner had the same objective: drive the Confederate army from its stronghold on the heights west of the river. Franklin would attack the right end of the Confederate line at Prospect Hill, one-half mile to your left-front, while Sumner attacked the left end of the enemy line at Marye’s Heights, in rear of Fredericksburg. Franklin deployed his troops one-quarter mile ahead of you. At 10 a.m., December 13, 1862, as he was making final arrangements for the assault, the sound of cannon fire broke the silence. Franklin himself was under attack!
From the sidebar in the upper right:
William B. Franklin – A staff officer who saw Franklin during the war described him as “an easy, unpretending soldier, strong and manly.” At Fredericksburg he commanded the left wing of the Union army.
From the caption to the photo on the lower right:
A view of the battlefield as it appeared in 1893.
Closeup of the map from the Battle of Fredericksburg wayside marker
Location of the marker
The Battle of Fredericksburg wayside marker is 3.7 miles southeast of downtown Fredericksburg and 1.1 miles southeast of the Slaughter Pen site via Business Route US 17. (38°15’09.6″N 77°25’34.5″W)