Restoring the Bentonville Battlefield: A Combined Effort to Preserve the Last Major Battlefield of the Civil War

Bentonville Battlefield State Historic Site at sunrise.

Bentonville Battlefield State Historic Site

Recipient: North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources
Amount: $100,000.00

The Battle of Bentonville, North Carolina, was the last major battle of the American Civil War. After fighting for three days in March of 1865, the Confederate Army under General Joseph E. Johnson was forced to retreat and attempted to move north to unite with other Confederate forces in Southwest Virginia. However, after Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s Army surrendered at Appomattox Court House a month later, Johnson was on his own and he decided any further resistance was pointless. As a result, Johnson surrendered to the Union Army under Major General William Tecumseh Sherman outside of Durham, North Carolina on April 26, 1865, basically ending the war in the eastern theater.

By the time of the Civil War’s Centennial in 1965, the State of North Carolina had preserved 130 acres of the Bentonville Battlefield, but large portions of the battlefield’s landscape remained unprotected. Today, through the concentrated efforts of state government and local non-profit preservation partners, over 2,000 acres have been preserved in perpetuity as part of the Bentonville Battlefield State Historic Site. Many of those acres being acquired using the support of Battlefield Land Acquisition Grants.
Now with the financial assistance of a Battlefield Restoration Grant, the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources will develop an in-depth cultural landscape report that will be used to guide the future restoration of the battlefield to how it appeared in March of 1865. This report will include an analysis of the complex cultural and natural resources that exist on the battlefield, and include the input of local landowners, descendant groups of formerly enslaved people, and interested tribal entities to guide future preservation efforts.

Battlefield Restoration Grants from the National Park Service’s American Battlefield Protection Program support projects that restore “day-of-battle” conditions at nationally significant American Revolution, War of 1812, and Civil War battlefields and associated historic sites. The awards are made possible by the Land and Water Conservation Fund, which reinvests revenue from offshore oil and natural gas leasing to help strengthen conservation and recreation opportunities across the nation. These grants empower preservation partners to inspire wonder, understanding and empathy at the places that witnessed some of our nation’s most challenging events. In addition to this grant opportunity, the program also provides financial assistance through Battlefield Land Acquisition Grants, Battlefield Interpretation Grants, and Preservation Planning Grants. This financial assistance encourages and sustains community-driven stewardship of historic resources in Tribal, state, and local communities.