Discover the most magical spots to pitch your tent or park your rig on your next Monocacy National Battlefield adventure.
Have you ever wondered what it's like to fight a battle against impossible odds? That's what happened at the Battle That Saved Washington in early July of 1864. Acres of open, rolling fields offered little cover for a lone unit of Federal troops who fought to keep the national capital from falling. The Confederacy wanted to capture Washington in hopes of influencing the presidential election of 1864.
Outnumbered three to one, a small force of Union soldiers held back their Confederate counterparts just long enough for reinforcements to arrive. Had the Union soldiers not stood their ground, Washington might have been captured and the war may have ended quite differently.
Monocacy National Battlefield gives you an idea of how this daring Confederate plan played out. As many as 18,000 Confederate troops, under the command of Gen. Jubal Early came from the north. Union Gen. Lew Wallace defended the town of Monocacy with 5,800 men.
Monocacy's wide-open spaces and battlefield placements give you a sense of desperation on both sides. It was unthinkable that Confederate troops could successfully invade the North and win. It was also impossible to win against 3-to-1 odds on the battlefield.
Although technically a Confederate victory in terms of casualties, Wallace's unit forced Early to delay his march on Washington by a day. This allowed more Union troops to enter the capital to defend it. This was the last incursion into the North by Confederate troops during the Civil War. Monocacy hasn't changed much from when it was a battlefield in the Civil War.