Manassas National Battlefield Park

The Union and Confederate armies met twice in this area, known variously as Manassas and Bull Run, July 18–21, 1861, and August 25–28, 1862. The major portion of the battlefield park, formed in the 1930s, encompasses nearly 5,000 acres of open fields and woods, which, from a landscape and protected-open-space point of view, is significant. From an architectural point of view, the major interest is fourfold. The Visitors Center (1941–1942, later additions, National Park Service Design Staff) has a massive and primitive Doric-columned portico that recalls Arlington House. Nearby is a statue depicting Stonewall Jackson (1938, J. P. Polla); the base is inscribed, “There stands Jackson, like a stonewall.” The statue amply demonstrates that the heavy WPA sculptural idiom does not work for all subjects. Jackson, who was small, slouched in his saddle, and was known for his tattered uniforms, looks like Batman. It is certainly one of the more ludicrous interpretations of the subject. Also nearby is the Henry Hill Monument (dedicated June 13, 1865), one of the first Civil War memorials: a stumpy central obelisk with four short piers at the corners, each topped by a howitzer shell. On the corner of U.S. 20 and Virginia 234 is the four-bay fieldstone Stone House (c. 1828), a former tavern that served a number of other purposes during the battles.