Fort Stevens - Washington DC
N 38° 57.831 W 077° 01.774
18S E 324159 N 4314723
President Abraham Lincoln was the only president to come into danger from enemy fire when he visited Fort Stevens during a battle on July 12, 1864.
Waymark Code: WM6G5R
Location: District of Columbia, United States
Date Posted: 05/29/2009
Views: 25
When Gen. Ulysses Grant took his troops south to pursue Gen. Robt E. Lee in Richmond, it left Washington DC defended by only about 9,000 Union troops. Lee directed General Jubal A. Early to move toward Washington which he knew was poorly defended. Early was delayed by a stubborn fight from Union Gen. Lew Wallace's forces at Monocacy Junction in Frederick, Maryland. Early won the fight, but was delayed long enough for Grant to send reinforcements to Washington.
As he approached Washington, Early's scouts found Fort Stevens thinly manned but both Early and the Union reinforcements arrived at the Fort at about the same time. Union artillery were able to hold off the Confederate attack. During the battle, President and Mrs Lincoln, Secretary of State William Seward and others came to observe the fighting. President Lincoln climbed to the top of the parapet during the fight in direct line of Confederate sharpshooters. Many encouraged the president to step back down, but a young officer named Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., the future Supreme Court justice, is credited with convincing him to do it with a straight-foward “Get down, you damn fool!”
A commemorative stone dedicated by veterans of the Battle of Fort Stevens marking the president's visit to the Fort was placed at Fort Stevens in 1920.
Fort Stevens Park now is a partial reconstruction of the fort built by the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930's.
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