Stones River Remembered As A Turning Point In Tennessee's Rich Civil War History

Confederate re-enactors fire a volley
 at Stones River National Battlefield in Murfreesboro.

As the old year wound down, history buffs gathered at Stones River National Battlefield to commemorate the start of one of the Civil War’s bloodiest encounters, in Murfreesboro along the old Nashville Pike. December 31, 1862 through January 2 ,1863 an estimated 81,000 soldiers of the Union and Confederacy valiantly fought there for control of Middle Tennessee.The Battle of Stones River, one of the war’s bloodiest, was ultimately decided as a much-needed victory for the North just as the Emancipation Proclamation became the law of the land.

Each year the rangers at Stones River, and volunteer re-enactors, present days of events timed to the battle, as it unfolded. Ours focused on its bloody beginnings at locations appropriately memorialized as “The Slaughter Pen” and “Hell’s Half Acre.”

The programs provide insight into the terror, confusion, determination  and sacrifices of all engaged. Re-enactors in uniforms of both armies fire authentic rifles and artillery, as eyewitness accounts of the battles are read. 

Anyone interested in state and national history, and Tennessee’s vital importance to both armies, will gain much from a visit to Stones River, or any of the state’s five other nationally protected Civil War sites: Shiloh National Military Park,  Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park, Cumberland Gap National Historic Park, Fort Donelson National Battlefield and the Andrew Johnson National Historic Site.

The “War Between The States” touched all corners of Tennessee in one way or another. To learn more, download or pick up a copy of Tennessee’s Civil War Trail map, compiled to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the end of the conflict (available on the Civil War Traveler website), or Tennessee Tourism's guide to the war, as lived throughout the state.