Battlefield of Malvern Hill - Richmond, VA
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archway
N 37° 24.762 W 077° 14.939
18S E 300967 N 4143030
Placed by the Battlefield Markers Association, marker #21 describes the Battle of Malvern Hill, the final engagement of the Seven Days Battles.
Waymark Code: WM7ZZ3
Location: Virginia, United States
Date Posted: 12/31/2009
Views: 2
The Seven Days Battles took place in late June and early July 1862. Earlier in June, the Confederate army had stopped the Union's assault on Richmond at the Battle of Seven Pines in what is now Sandston. At the end of that battle, General Robert E. Lee was appointed commander of the Army of Northern Virginia.
Lee had been an adviser to Jefferson Davis and had a reputation for being cautious. That changed when Lee decided to attack the Union army directly and destroy it before it could retreat to the James River. As an example of this new, aggressive approach, the Confederacy used railway artillery for the first time at Savage's Station. Union General George B. McClellan was rattled by Lee's tactics and was fooled by a Confederate army that appeared larger than it actually was.
Retreating to the south, the Union army held off Confederate pursuers until they had reached Malvern Hill. This elevated location gave the Union forces a strategic advantage. Once the Confederate line had assembled, Lee sent in his men to disastrous results. The Federal army held their ground easily and completed their retreat to the James. Lee was forced to fall back, satisfied at least that Richmond was no longer under threat. The Battle of Malvern Hill ended the Seven Days Battles as well as McClellan's Peninsula Campaign.
Battlefield of Malvern Hill
Against the Federals holding this eminence, the Confederates delivered repeated assaults from the North on July 1, 1862 and lost about 5,000 men in the final, indecisive Battle of the Seven Days’ Campaign. That night McClellan withdrew to Harrison's Landing, near Westover.
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About the Battlefield Markers (Source: National Park Service):
This is one in a series of 61 markers erected beginning in 1925 to identify the battlefields around Richmond. The tablets were the work of the Battlefield Markers Association, a group of historians committed to commemorating the Richmond battlefields. Most prominent among the association's members was Dr. Douglas Southall Freeman, the eminent biographer of George Washington and Robert E. Lee. The work of Dr. Freeman and the Association ultimately led to the purchase of battlefield lands and the establishment of Richmond National Battlefield Park in 1936.