Saving Ohio’s Largest Civil War Battlefield
After taking possession of 117 acres at Buffington Island, site of the largest Civil War battle in Ohio, the American Battlefield Trust has now protected hallowed ground at half the states in the Union. Founded in 1987 in Virginia, the Trust has saved a total of 56,000 acres across 155 sites in 25 states. Geographically, the organization’s footprint stretches from upstate New York westward to New Mexico, and chronologically from the “shot heard ’round the world” at Lexington and Concord that began the Revolutionary War to the stillness at Appomattox as the Civil War drew to a close.
The Trust first announced its intention to secure the Ohio site, adjacent to the existing Buffington Island Battlefield Memorial Park, in the spring of 2022 with assistance from the Buffington Island Battlefield Preservation Foundation.
In March, the Trust also announced the protection of 47 acres across the Cedar Creek Battlefield in the Shenandoah Valley and Cedar Mountain Battlefield in the Virginia Piedmont. The land was saved with the assistance of the National Park Service, American Battlefield Protection Program, Shenandoah Valley Battlefields Foundation, Virginia Land Conservation Fund, and Trust donors.
The newly saved and transferred property at Cedar Creek is adjacent to park headquarters and on a central part of the battlefield, once touched by the determined actions of Union and Confederate troops on October 19, 1864, during the boldly executed Battle of Cedar Creek.
this article first appeared in civil war times magazine