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| These are some of our permanent eSpd® exhibits | ||||
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| The Battle of Ox Hill | ||||
| Is a 10 year Archeology Survey of the last battle the Of Second Manassas Campaign before Fairfax County allowed developers to completely develop the Battlefield. eSpd® has the only physical record that was collected from The Battle of Ox Hill (formally known as The Battle of Chantilly) before the battlefield was obliterated by developers with Fairfax County's approval. Chantilly was a Post Office/tavern two miles in the rear of Stonewall Jackson's Corps (Wing) during the battle but did serve as General Lee's Headquarters as he rested and replaced his casualties. Without this record there is no physical proof to sustain the many accounts of the battle. However any historian or archeologist can still discern were the battle occurred from letters and books that this investigation brought to the surface via the Internet and America's attic. | ||||
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| A 1907 photograph of the Ox Hill Battlefield looking south from the Confederate positions. The Confederate Battleline stretched south from Rt. 50 and then turned west across West Ox Road following the wood line to the western side of the cornfield - over a half mile long! | ||||
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| A Last Salute | ||||
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| Centreville, Virginia - Six U.S. soldiers were bulldozed out of their battlefield graves near the battlefields of Second Manassas and Ox Hill. This site chronicles the anthropological investigation and community effort to save these forgotten American hero's. Includes a video of the dig using Java based streaming technology. | ||||
| The battlefield graves were found adjacent to the fortifications in Centreville, Virginia. Originally built by the Confederate Army prior to the First Battle of Manassas, the fortifications changed hands several times during the beginning of the war. As the war progressed, they eventually became part of a defensive line of earthworks and cavalry outposts that protected Washington. | ||||
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The Letters of Henry Brown 21st Massachusetts Volunteer Militia |
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"It was wholesale murder to stand at the muzzle of the enemies’ guns and
have a volley poured into us." Pvt. Henry Brown The Battle of Ox Hill (Chantilly) |
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| By the beginning of 1862 the 21st Massachusetts was finally ready for war. During the early battles of the Civil War, the overall mindset of these new recruits was that the war would be of short duration and most were anxious to find glory on the battlefield before the war was over. As the regiment began to bury its war dead, these romantic notions of glory were quickly replaced by the horrific realities of combat. Throughout 1862, Henry and his regiment underwent a dramatic transformation as they began to realize they were fighting a grinding war of attrition with no end in sight. | ||||
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| Amber Fossils | ||||
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'A
drop of amber, from the weeping plant, Fell unexpected, and embalm'd an ant; The little insect we so much condemn is, from a worthless ant, become a gem. ' (Rev. R. Graves, from Martial Epigrams, Book vi, Epigram XV) |
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| In 1996 we developed a microscopic video system to study amber fossils and to test DSL capabilities for Bell Atlantic (Verizon). We also transmitted the first live microscopic video examination of amber fossils over the Internet. Although part of this research is now finished, we'll continue to add more images to the fossil database under the new name of Amberfossils.net. This large collection is privately owned and is used as a educational resource for our schools. | ||||
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