Walk 15: Block House Point and Glory

The walk to Block House Point overlooking the Potomac runs you through a small who's who of Civil War luminaries, a small point I made to Loki without much success. I think he was scratching his ear when I was talking.

The point overlooking one of the fords of the  Potomac.

Going back 151 years, and you'd have General Robert E. Lee giving his troops the order in 1861 that they must cut the C&O Canal to prevent the North from moving goods to Washington. To stop this, Lincoln ordered Union troops to guard the upstream fords of the Potomac and to protect the canal. In particular, the troops were on hand to stop the Confederates from burning the crucial locks with their wooden gates.

One of the men sent to Block House Point was Robert Gould Shaw, a member of the Massachusetts 19th regiment. While stationed in Maryland at Muddy Branch Creek, he wrote home saying it was the worst campsite he had ever seen and described it as damp, swampy, and unhealthy. Which sounds about right to me as a description of the shores of the Potomac, and he must have been one tough man.

Robert Gould Shaw of the 19th Massachusetts and commander of the 54th Massachusetts of "Glory" fame.

After keeping an eye on the fords, Shaw would go on to fight in the battles of Winchester, Cedar Mountain and Antietam. But what he is most famous for is commanding the 54th Massachusetts Regiment, an all black regiment. Yep, that's the one depicted in the movie glory. Shaw died leading the 54th in an unsuccessful attack on Fort Wagner in South Carolina in 1863. Strangely enough, the fight over Fort Wagner was just a skirmish compared compared to Antietam, the single bloodiest day in U.S. warfare.

I looked down to see if Loki were following all this but what he was following was the tennis ball in my hand.

Yeah, I got it. Robert Shaw was here. Throw the damn ball already.

But Block House Point's intersections with famous people wasn't done with Shaw. Nope, in July 1864 when Jubal Early led 10,000 hardened rebels in a raid on Washington, a panicked city  stripped troops from all the defenses along the Potomac to fend him off. (By the way, Early's men marched down Georgia Avenue in Silver Spring past Sniders Grocer enroute to DC for those who are curious.)

Early's men ran into a hail of shot and grapeshot at Fort Stevens. President Lincoln rode out to witness the battle, and while attracting fire to himself because of his height and his tall stovepipe hat, a union officer shouted at Lincoln, "Get down, you damn fool." I've heard Lincoln was the last U.S. President to come under fire in battle, but off hand, I can't name any other president who did come under enemy fire while in office. Assassinations don't count.

Jubal Early. I'd imagine Loki would be a little scared of this guy. Hell, I'd say sir myself.

With the three block houses deserted, Confederate Colonel John Mosby, the famous Gray Ghost, forded the Potomac and burned them to the ground. Mosby commanded a band of irregular troops during the war which bedeviled the Union forces with lightning quick raids and their ability to melt away when pursued because they didn't bother to dress in uniform. After the war, Mosby became the campaign manager for Ulysses S. Grant when Grant ran for president. Yep, the same Grant that pounded  Lee's Army of Northern Virginia into the dust into the run up to Appomattox Court House. 

John Mosby: Fop, Guerrilla Commander, and Post-War Presidential Campaign manager in Virginia for Grant's run for the presidency.



Above is an illustration of what a Block House looked like.

Basically it was a small fort. Well, nothing remains of the block houses now, except a clearing on a bluff which would have been an obvious point to place the fort.

I'm betting that a blockhouse sat here back in the Civil War. Loki didn't care either way.

Block House Point Conservation area is 640 acres of recovering woodlands along some of the higher bluffs of the Potomac. When you stand in the clearing at the end of the point, you can hear the Potomac rushing over the shallows of the ford. There are several trails marked through the woods and as you walk them, you know this is a recovering woodland.

 In whole sections of the wood, the trees aren't much more than 8 to 12 inches in diameter. This must have been cleared ground 40 years ago.

So there you have the vital statistics of the park: 640 acres, President Lincoln, Colonel Robert Shaw, the 54th Massachusetts Regiment, Colonel John Mosby, General Jubal Early, and 10,000 hardened Rebels marching down Georgia Avenue with the half finished Capitol Dome in their sights.

Not bad for a 1.5 mile walk.

Practical information: Drive out River Road towards Poolesville past Pennyfield Lock Road. Park at the second small lot on the left right by Petit Drive. The Block House Trail which leads to the point is 1.5 miles one way. The walk is mostly down hill going towards the river and uphill on the way back.