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Auto Tour Stop 5 - Audio
Transcript
Hundreds of men fought and perished on the piece of land that you are standing on. Some of the fiercest fighting at the Battle of Stones River happened here. The carnage was so great that the men who survived the battle named this place, “Hell’s Half Acre.”
The fighting that occurred here on “Hell’s Half Acre” was some of the most intense fighting that occurred between the two armies. Colonel William B. Hazen’s Brigade defended the Nashville Pike from this location, called the Round Forest. The brigade did not lose any ground to the Confederate Army on that day. They were the only unit of the Union line who held their position during against four Confederate charges. The attacks against the brigade began at mid-morning. Several Confederate brigades charged this Union position. Corporal Magee from Mississippi described the wild and chaotic scene afterwards, stating, “Then commenced the most terrible cannonading I ever witnessed, [the] canon[s] were belching forth their deadly contents at once, while thousands of small arms kept up a roar equal to the falls of Niagara. Men were swept down by hundreds- trees, shrubs and everything [were] torn up, cut off, or shivered.” Hazen’s men repulsed every Confederate attack and became the anchor point of the Union line that halted the Confederate tide before it reached the Nashville Pike.
The men of the Colonel William B. Hazen’s Union brigade constructed this monument after the Battle of Stones River to commemorate their fight in Hell’s Half Acre. The Hazen Brigade Monument is the oldest, intact Civil War monument in the nation.
Description
Listen to a description of the critical fighting at Hell's Half Acre and the stand of Col. William B. Hazen's brigade against four Confederate attacks.
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