Last updated: April 16, 2020
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Archeology at Brawner Farm
The Brawner Farm
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Once the scene of fierce and bloody battle, the Brawner Farm today is a landmark in a quiet corner of the Manassas Battlefield. Archeologists digging around the standing house have found military objects from the Second Battle of Manassas and artifacts left by the people who lived on the farm. Archeology has revealed the foundations of an earlier house partly underneath the one that stands on the site today, and this earlier house was probably the one that stood in the midst of the battle.
The Battle
On the evening of August 28, 1862, Union troops marching toward Centreville along the Warrenton Turnpike (now US 29) were fired on by Confederate artillery. Union Brigadier General John Gibbon, commander of the Black Hat Brigade, led his 2nd Wisconsin regiment up the hill to silence the guns. To their surprise, instead of artillery, they found two lines of Confederate infantry advancing toward them across the field. This was the famous Stonewall Brigade, the first of six brigades Confederate General Stonewall Jackson sent against the Federal forces. Gibbon hurriedly brought the rest of his men into line. On his left was the 19th Indiana, with their left flank anchored on the farm house owned by the Douglas family but leased to John Brawner. For about 90 minutes, until after darkness fell, two lines of infantry stood 70 to 80 yards apart and shot it out in what Gibbon said was the most intense musketry fire he heard during the entire war. He wrote, “…the left of my line rested at the Douglas House, and from that point as darkness came on, I could see the enemy’s line extending far to my left. Should the enemy get possession of the house, and yard full of trees, he would entirely flank my line and enfilade it.” Toward the close of the fighting Virginia troops from Alexander Taliaferro’s brigade did take the farm house, and the Federals had to fall back toward Brawner’s Woods. William Taliaferro, the Confederate division commander, later wrote:
"A farm-house, an orchard, a few stacks of hay, and a rotten “worm” fence were the only cover afforded the opposing lines of infantry; it was a stand-up combat, dogged and unflinching, in a field almost bare..."
Although nightfall ended the fighting at Brawner Farm, the battle we know as Second Manassas raged for two more days, ending with a convincing Confederate victory.
Remains of the Battle
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Archeologists found numerous military objects at the farm. The line held by the 19th Indiana is marked by dropped, unfired .58 caliber bullets and spent percussion caps. This line extends east from the north foundation wall of the original house, and also west to the kitchen that stood in the yard 50 feet from that earlier house. All around the yard are fired bullets, many of them smashed from impacts with stone foundations or trees. US military buttons, and one stamped with the Wisconsin coat of arms, show where Union soldiers stood and struggled. Dozens of artillery shell fragments and pieces of case shot show that the antebellum house came under heavy artillery fire. Bullets and shells used by units that were not in action on August 28 show that fighting did take place at the farm on the 29th or 30th.
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The Farm
The Brawner Farm was founded around 1800 by George Tennille. When George’s widow Sarah Tennille died in 1846, the house, 326 acres of land, and six slaves passed to their grandson George Douglas. George Douglas died of typhoid fever in 1855, at the age of 36. His new wife was only 20, and she went to live with her mother in Gainesville. The farm was then rented out. The tenant at the time of the Civil War was John C. Brawner, who moved to the farm in 1857. Brawner and his wife Jane had eight children, five of whom lived at home in 1860. The Brawners did not own slaves. After the war the farm was leased to other tenants. In 1895 it was sold to William Davis, and the tax rolls show that in 1904 he made major improvements to the buildings. The property remained in the Davis family until it was acquired by the Park Service in 1985.
The House
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Is the standing house the one that was here during the battle? Evidence suggests that it was not. The house you see was built in two stages. The first floor of the northern part is older than the southern wing, which was built around 1904. Architects say that older part was built using techniques common before 1800, and it is held together partly with handmade nails, which became rare after about 1820. So it seems old enough. However, archeologists digging around the house uncovered an earlier foundation (first page, center photo), and that earlier house seems to have been built around 1800. That earlier house measured about 24 by 31 feet, and its north wall was about 10 feet north of the existing house. There is no sign that the earlier house burned or was otherwise destroyed, and no written records that suggest a major change in the farm between 1800 and 1904. Also, no bullets or shell fragments have been found in the frame of the standing house, and given the intensity of the fighting around it there should have been at least a few. From this evidence, it seems that the earlier house stood at the time of the battle. But how then to explain the traditional construction methods of the standing house? Most likely it was built on another site and moved to the Brawner farm after the battle.
The Kitchen
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When the Park Service first acquired the Brawner Farm, the yard west of the house was a dense, tangled thicket. Clearing that thicket revealed a pile of stone and brick resembling a collapsed chimney about 50 feet west of the house. The archeologists dug in and around this pile, and they exposed a massive stone chimney base measuring 5 by 10 feet, as well as numerous stones that were once part of unmortared foundations. Such a large chimney served an important outbuilding, either a kitchen, a slave quarter, or most likely a structure that served as both. A root cellar and other pits were also found. These pits contained Civil War artifacts and hundreds of pieces of pottery and glass, most of them from before the war. It looks as though the building here was badly damaged during the fighting, so that it was demolished and the pits filled in not long afterwards. Artifacts from the battle therefore ended up in the pits, along with objects that were in the building or on the ground nearby. These artifacts therefore give us a good picture of life on the farm before war came to this peaceful spot. They include tools, dishes, jewelry, children’s toys, and many objects probably used by slaves, such as hand-made “colonoware” pottery and worn bits of pottery or glass used as gaming counters.
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