Newsweek: ‘Battle Over the Battlefields’

Newsweek’s online edition    includes a new story by   David A. Graham on the hot debates over preserving some of the nation’s Civil War battlefields, including the Wilderness in Orange and Spotsylvania counties. They’re gaining additional notice with the advent of the 150th anniversary of the Civil War.

The Newsweek piece includes a 20-image, online gallery of threatened — or already desecrated — battlegrounds.

Graham’s first paragraph:

“A casino could soon sit near the Gettysburg battlefield, the bloodiest encounter on American soil. A Walmart supercenter may shadow the Wilderness battlefield in Virginia where Gen. U. S. Grant kept his headquarters when he first fought Gen. Robert E. Lee. And Washington, D.C.’s suburban sprawl is slowly strangling the rural lands where the Civil War’s first crucial battles were fought. It’s an ironic situation: as battlefield sites across the country prepare for an expected onslaught of visitors connected to the Civil War’s 150th anniversary, many of them are shrinking away, acre by acre.”

Here’s the link:  http://bit.ly/newsweekbattlefields

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