The Lacy House's Talking Walls

JPK Huson 1863

Brev. Brig. Gen'l
Joined
Feb 14, 2012
Location
Central Pennsylvania
lacey house 1.JPG

Chatham Manor, Falmouth, Virginia, LoC photograph obviously taken during occupation by Federal soldiers

A Lacy ancestor, setting out in grandiose style from Chatham Manor, to view with pleasure a forthcoming battle at a place called Bull Run took with him men servants, picnic baskets, cooks and a waved an airy hand " My dear " he said, stepping into a carriage filled with like minded gentlemen of Fredericksburg , " Next week I will be making a speech from the steps of the capitol in Washington.."

History's sequence;
.At the time the house was owned by James Horace Lacy {1823-1906}, a former schoolteacher who had married Churchill Jones’s niece. As a planter, Lacy sympathized with the South, and at the age of 37 he left Chatham to serve the Confederacy as a staff officer. His wife and children remained at the house until the spring of 1862, when the arrival of Union troops forced them to abandon the building and move in with relatives across the river in the beleaguered city of Fredericksburg. For much of the next thirteen months, Chatham would be occupied by the Union army; they referred to it as the “Lacy House” in their orders and reports, as well as diaries and letters.
https://virginiaplantation.wordpress.com/2013/04/06/chatham-manor-the-civil-war-years/
lacey1.JPG

LoC- more from Federal occupation. There would have been wounded at Chatham through most of the war.

Clara Barton famously ( thankfully ) nursed 100's of wounded stuffed, literally into the Lacy House during Fredericksburg in 1862 and nearly as famously Walt Whitman memorialized ghastly scenes of what it meant to be wounded during the war- he came to Chatham searching for brother George. ( 51st New York ) Surgeons tossing amputated limbs from windows before moving on to the next patient shocked him beyond words, as we know he found them- but also steeled Whitman's resolve. He became a nurse.

Five men shared four shelves in a closet, ' lucky ', a soldier stated, was under a table, not on a sodden blanket, in the freezing yard waiting for death to create room inside. Sumner's HQ was shared with scenes of chaos and gore so extreme "Here and there a poor fellow coiled upon the floor, too full of pain and weariness to bear his own weight " http://www.brotherswar.com/Fredericksburg-5.htm
lacey house chatam.jpg

Another LoC image, ' Chatham ' was referred to as ' Lacy House ' by the Union Army

Post war, the Lacy family claims to have found " 19 Union graves " in the yard. There seems to be no reconciling this number with an unknown but certainly ??? that number. ( Most were removed to the National Cemetery but, like all our battlefields, who on earth knows where our fallen lie? ) " At least three soldiers, each unidentified, remain buried at Chatham. "http://friendsofchatham.org/


It is fatefully easy to view Chatham today and perhaps be carried away by antebellum nostalgia. Beyond remembering perhaps these bricks themselves, each one, would have been created, stacked then used to build this lovely old home by enslaved hands, the walls themselves are indeed permeated with the cries of wounded. And have seen probably hundreds of deaths. Clara Barton refused to be escorted out of harm's way from that door and must have to-d and fro-d hundreds of times over the doorstep, the windows? How many saw limbs tossed through them as described by Whitman? Which closets held wounded, 5 to 4 shelves? Where in the yard did sodden and sick soldiers die?

We are hugely lucky. Aiding in all these questions and in keeping the memory of even nameless wounded alive is an organization which seems to certainly cherish Chatham Manor for all the reasons History insists we cherish. Until walls can talk......

http://friendsofchatham.org/
 
these bricks themselves, each one, would have been created, stacked then used to build this lovely old home by enslaved hands

So true! I must admit that I greatly enjoy visiting these stately antebellum homes, but I never forget the enslaved labor that built them. I'm happy to say that their story is now being told by most tour guides. It's about time!
 

There's a lot more on Lacy's house here- if anyone has current photos please feel free to add your own? I mean from a personal visit there, one owned by you not one on a web site somewhere.

Had forgotten this is where Walt Whitman arrived and Clara set up shop.

Hadn't been aware the Union's upper pontoon bridge, Fredericksburg, was visible from Chatham's porch! Cool stuff. Alonzo Chappel left us this, the pontoon built under fire, Gardener left us the image of the double pontoon ( which can't be it ) and there are several of the pontoon bridge below Fredericksburg- there must be one of the upper pontoon? Thought I had it.

fredericksburg chappel artist.JPG

Bridge being built by the 50th NY Engineers? The 15th ( I think? ) built the double section Gardener photographed.

Sorry, getting lost in the pontoons now. Love pontoon bridges.
 
I remember at Chatham House that there were several trees that were witness trees and were so old that they were held together with interior metal framework or scaffolding as the interior of the tree was gone. It is a beautiful house, and, as I recall, many ghost stories.
Thanks for bringing this lovely old building to our attention, JPK!
 
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Letter written to Hannah Coater of Chatham on Nov. 10th, 1842, from Mrs. E. T. Bryan (Elizabeth Tucker Coalter Bryan) of Eagle Point. I am related to the Lacy family and have several letters written to the family at Chatham.
 
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Letter written to Hannah Coater of Chatham on Nov. 10th, 1842, from Mrs. E. T. Bryan (Elizabeth Tucker Coalter Bryan) of Eagle Point. I am related to the Lacy family and have several letters written to the family at Chatham.


Ok, that just gave me chills along with you being a relative. Thanks very much for adding to the thread. It's like touching Time when someone shows up whose relatives were there.

@Bigjeep , your images gave me chills, too- we're so used to LoC and National Archives black and white images it's almost shocking to see what our ancestors saw in color. Thank you! Did not know some of the Union graves were still there and marked. Buried where he fell or a soldier who died later, buried on what was then a hospital cemetery?

Fredericksburg from the lawn. Holy heck. There's an era image exactly like it, crazy seeing it 150 ( plus ) years later.
 
Ok, that just gave me chills along with you being a relative. Thanks very much for adding to the thread. It's like touching Time when someone shows up whose relatives were there.

@Bigjeep , your images gave me chills, too- we're so used to LoC and National Archives black and white images it's almost shocking to see what our ancestors saw in color. Thank you! Did not know some of the Union graves were still there and marked. Buried where he fell or a soldier who died later, buried on what was then a hospital cemetery?

Fredericksburg from the lawn. Holy heck. There's an era image exactly like it, crazy seeing it 150 ( plus ) years later.

I was surprised to see it in the lawn and snapped a picture. Learned latter that there are 3 still buried there. I guess this is one.
 
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