{"id":1503,"date":"2025-04-04T10:23:46","date_gmt":"2025-04-04T14:23:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cvbt.wpenginepowered.com\/?post_type=battlefields&p=1503"},"modified":"2025-04-07T14:53:56","modified_gmt":"2025-04-07T18:53:56","slug":"dowdalls-tavern","status":"publish","type":"battlefields","link":"https:\/\/cvbt.org\/battlefields\/dowdalls-tavern\/","title":{"rendered":"Dowdall’s Tavern"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Dowdall’s Tavern<\/h1>\n<\/div>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/div>\r\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\r\n
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Jackson’s Flank Attack at Chancellorsville, including the historic tavern location!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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History<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the battle of Chancellorsville, Maj. Gen. Oliver Otis Howard, commander of the ill-fated Federal XI Corps, headquartered at Dowdall\u2019s Tavern. On May 2, 1863, around 6:00 p.m., he reported hearing \u201cthe first murmuring of a coming storm\u2014a little quick firing on the picket line, the wild rushing of frightened game into our very camps, and almost sooner than it can be told the bursting of thousands of Confederates through the almost impenetrable thickets of the wilderness. . . .\u201d Then came \u201cthe wilder, noisier conflict\u201d:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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It was a terrible gale! the rush, the rattle, the quick lightning from a hundred points at once; the roar, redoubled by echoes through the forest; the panic, the dead and dying in sight and the wounded straggling along; the frantic efforts of the brave and patriotic to stay the angry storm! One may live through and remember impressions of those fatal moments, but no pen or picture can catch and give the whole.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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As Stonewall Jackson\u2019s Second Corps battered the XI Corps backwards, pockets of resistance formed to contest the onslaught. One of the stoutest lines\u2014eventually known as the Buschbeck Line for the Federal commander, Col. Adolphus Buschbeck, who rallied a defense with what Howard called \u201cpraiseworthy firmness\u201d\u2014formed across the Dowdall\u2019s Tavern property. \u201cBuschbeck\u2019s brigade . . . did wonders here, and held the whole impetuous onset of the enemy in check for an hour or more,\u201d Army of the Potomac commander Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker later recounted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u200b \u201cThere is no question but what Jackson\u2019s charge would have ended right there at Dowdall\u2019s Tavern if Buschbeck\u2019s flanks could have been protected,\u201d recalled Sgt. Charles W. McKay. However, the sheer weight of numbers allowed Confederates to finally outflank the position. \u201cThe order was given to retreat several times before the boys would let go, because the enemy was held firmly in front,\u201d McKay wrote; \u201cbut at last, when almost surrounded and all hope of support failed, the men who had defended the position so gallantly, sullenly retired. . . .\u201d Artillerists under Capt. Hubert Dilger, in support, \u201cgave the Johnnies medicine they did not like,\u201d but without support, \u201cwere compelled to retreat or be captured.\u201d Dilger would earn the Medal of Honor for his defense, though.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the gray tide swept eastward, Dowdall\u2019s Tavern became a field hospital for the wounded Federals left in the Confederate wake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u200bThe tavern survived the war but burned down in 1869.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Preservation Story<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the fall of 2021, the owners of the Dowdall’s Tavern parcel reached out to the preservation community, as they were making plans to sell the property. They had not put the property on the market, but they wanted to see if we were interested in preserving it, if so, they were willing to work with the preservation community to give us the opportunity to so in order that this ground, so important to the story of America’s history, remain undeveloped and preserved forever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The Central Virginia Battlefields Trust, in partnership with the American Battlefield Trust, partnered in a unique opportunity to save nearly the entirety of the Dowdall\u2019s Tavern battlefield, which remains largely pristine. At stake is a 42-acre tract of land that was the site of the tavern, as well as the Union XI Corps headquarters. The CVBT raised the sum of $67,500 to fulfill our commitment to the American Battlefield Trust. <\/p>\n<\/div>

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