"At the edge of the busy commercial area of the community of McLean, hidden from the heavy traffic on Dolley Madison Boulevard by a natural screen of trees and shrubs, stands the substantial brick dwelling known as Salona." This book traces the history of this iconic house with associations to many American historical moments. It was to Salona that President James Madison fled to in August 1814 as British forces burned the new federal city, including the White House, during the 'Burning of Washington'. The mansion house also became headquarters for General George B. McClellan and other Union commanders during the American Civil War.
In his latest book, The Civil War in Fairfax County: Civilians and Soldiers, Charles Mauro has given voice to the heretofore silent majority of the participants in the Civil War: the civilians. This overdue study examines the full spectrum of men, women, slaves and freedmen who lived in Fairfax County, Virginia, during this chaotic, uncertain period. Drawn from the files of the Southern Claims Commission, Mauro recounts the stories the civilians told the Commission after the war to document their losses, lives and living conditions. The citizens of Fairfax County found themselves occupying front row seats at the most horrific show that this country has ever seen. Because of its position just across the Potomac River on the doorstep of the city of Washington, Fairfax County was heavily targeted by the Confederate army and defended with equal determination by the Union army. Fairfax was the first county in the South that the Union army invaded, and the last it occupied as soldiers were mustered out of service after the Grand Review. The Civil War in Fairfax County contains stories of the devastation that both armies brought upon the civilians and their property, as well as the daily strife caused by a war that pitted neighbor against neighbor and family members against themselves. It gives an important, fascinating and unprecedented look into the everyday lives of the civilians who lived through the most tumultuous four years in American history, in a county that was occupied by both the Confederate and Union armies throughout the entire Civil War.
The Virginia Landmarks Register, fourth edition, will create for the reader a deeper awareness of a unique legacy and will serve to enhance the stewardship of Virginia's irreplaceable heritage.
With all the immediacy of an eyewitness account, Anthony Pitch tells the dramatic story of the British invasion of Washington in the summer of 1814, an episode many call a defining moment in the coming-of-age of the United States. The British torched the Capitol, the White House, and many other public buildings, setting off an inferno that illuminated the countryside for miles and sending President James Madison scurrying out of town while his wife Dolley rescued a life-sized portrait of George Washington from the flames. The author's gripping narrative--hailed by a White House curator, a Senate historian, and the chairman of the National Geographic Society, among others--is filled with vivid details of the attack. Not confining his story to Washington, Pitch also describes the brave, resourceful defense of nearby Fort McHenry and tells how Francis Scott Key, a British hostage on a ship near the Baltimore harbor during the fort's bombardment, wrote a poem that became the national anthem.
