When Blenheim house tenant William Scott died in 1997, it ended five generations of his family’s ownership of the Fairfax City home on Old Lee Highway.

At the time of Scott’s death, David Meyer lived four houses down from the Blenheim home.

Meyer had heard rumors that the house’s history stretched back to before the Civil War and had served as a makeshift hospital during the conflict. He had also heard through his neighbor, Hildie Carney, that soldiers had left writings and drawings on the walls of the house.

"The general public didn’t have a lot of access to the house at the time," said Meyer.

Eleven years later, Meyer is a Fairfax City Council member. On Saturday, Nov. 1, the Civil War Interpretive Center at Historic Blenheim will open to the public. Meyer will be there to help cut the ribbon. The Blenheim house, purchased by the City of Fairfax in 1999 for $2.1 million, sits up on a hill a few hundred feet away from the center.

Chris Martin, historic resources director for the city, calls Blenheim’s over 110 writings and signings "a diary on walls."
"They reveal the psyche and psychology of the typical soldier," said Martin.

Barbara Scott, who died in 1987, was the last remaining descendent of Albert Wilcoxon, who owned the home in 1861. Wilcoxon, who owned six slaves, was a proud Confederate and voted along with 77 percent of Fairfax County to secede from the Union. When Union forces widen the defensive perimeter of Washington, D.C. in 1862, the Blenheim home fell under their control. Used as a hospital for illnesses and ailments like typhoid, the property in and around the house became a way station for hundreds, maybe thousands of soldiers from 22 different regiments throughout the Union Army.

Andrea Loewenwarter, historic resources specialist for the city, has spent two years studying the house, analyzing the historic graffiti that lines the walls of the home. Most of the markings on the first floor walls are indecipherable, lost after generations of painting and plastering done by its tenants. However, the second floor and attic, mostly untouched by renovations, remain in pristine condition.

"This was a blank canvass for the soldiers," said Loewenwarter.

BY MATCHING the names and signatures on the walls with service and pension records at the National Archives in Maryland, specialists like Loewenwarter have been able to identify many of the soldiers who had stayed there. They’ve also been able to trace what happened to the soldiers before they arrived at the hospital and what their fate was after they left.

Few places interpret the Civil War from the perspective of a community over the course of the war, Meyer said.
Though the center has received just under $2 million in city funding over the past 10 years, it is currently being built in phases until additional money can be secured. The centerpiece of the site will be a re-creation of the attic, giving the public its first glimpse at some of the most vivid markings of the house.

Using graphite, charcoal or wax, soldiers played games, drew pictures, wrote poems and spilled their inner consciousness onto the walls. A soldier from the 4th New York Cavalry scrawled out his moods over the course of his stay.

"First month’s hard bread, hard on stomach," reads the first box.

"Second month, pay day. Patriot-hic Ale. How we suffer for lager," reads the second, with a drawing of a soldier washing down mug of ale.

By the soldier’s fourth month, his morale is considerably lower.

"Fourth month: no money, no whiskey, no friends, no rations, no peas, no beans, no pants, no patriotism," he wrote.

"We have an interesting slice of life from the soldiers here," said Loewenwarter.

THE BLENHEIM property and the writings inside were almost lost to the city forever. After Scott died, several developers lined up to buy the property and build new residential housing in its place. Meyer and Carney had gotten a better look at the inside of the home after it went up for sale. They helped form Historic Fairfax City Inc. and partnered with other members of the community wary of more development to lobby the city to preserve the house. Though the property was purchased in 1999, Meyer said it took several years to accumulate enough funding to get the project off the ground.

"We never let up, we lobbied pretty consistently over the years to see this site made accessible to the citizens of the city," said Meyer.

Now Meyer is in a position to attend the unveiling of the project he and others had worked more than a decade to realize: An onsite resource to interpret and analyze what he described as primary source material. Interest will only grow in the build up to the 150th Anniversary of the Civil War in 2011. With that heightened awareness, Meyer said he believes the site will attract some national exposure.

"We have for the first time a recorded history of a conflict from the perspective of the common people. So the signatures and poems and drawings on the wall, it’s really primary source material. That’s a significant perspective to keep in mind," he said.