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Several historic Civil War landmarks are located in and around Frederick. Frederick was the site of a Civil War speech given by President Abraham Lincoln, which took place at what was then a train depot at the current intersection of South and Market Streets. A plaque commemorates the speech. At the Prospect Hall mansion on what is now Butterfly Lane, in the early morning hours of June 28, 1863, a messenger from President Abraham Lincoln arrived to inform General George Meade that he would be replacing General Joseph Hooker after the latter's disaster at Chancellorsville the previous May. The Army of the Potomac, which camped at Prospect Hall for weeks prior to Gettysburg, went on from there to fight several major battles. The National Museum of Civil War Medicine is located downtown.
Due west along Alternate US 40, and west of Burkittsville, lie the sites of the three episodes in the Battle of South Mountain: the battles of Crampton's (September 14, 1862), Fox's, and Turner's gaps, where Confederate troops under Jackson and Walker unsuccessfully attempted to halt the Federal army's advance into the Cumberland Valley. The war correspondents' memorial can be found at Gathland State Park at Crampton's Gap, just west of Burkittsville. The memorial to the slain Union General Jesse Reno lies on the south side of Alternate US 40, west of Middletown, just below the summit of Fox's Gap.
21 miles (34 km) southwest of Frederick lies historic Harper's Ferry, West Virginia, which dominates the confluence of the Shenandoah and Potomac rivers. Here stood a key Federal arsenal. In 1859, Kansas abolitionist John Brown seized these works, only to be surrounded and captured by a Federal force under Robert E. Lee. Early on September 17, 1862, Confederate General A. P. Hill raided the arsenal at Harper's Ferry to re-equip his own division. When a rider arrived at 1 pm that afternoon informing Hill of Lee's desperate situation at Sharpsburg, Hill ordered his 6000 men to form ranks and march at double-time to Lee's aid at Antietam (Sharpsburg). Hill drove his division to cover the 17 miles (27 km) between Harper's Ferry and the battlefield in just three hours, losing 2/3 of his battle strength due to heat exhaustion and sunstroke along the way, but arriving "in the nick of time" to turn back Burnside's men, who were just forcing the bridge across Antietam Creek. Collectors still find Civil War artifacts in the vicinity of Harper's Ferry, especially on Maryland Heights above the town on the Maryland side of the Potomac. |