Ambrose Burnside

[Jim Garrett]

I have heard the "Lincoln looking at Burnside" story over the years and the reality is no one would really have known what Lincoln was or wasn't looking at.

The mud march was Burnside looking for a ford to get across the Rappahannock river. There was a ford in front of my great aunt's home, Fall Hill. Fall Hill was my great aunt's family home and belonged to the parents of Capt. Murray F. Taylor, aide de camp to A.P. Hill and mentioned in "Come Retribution". Gen. Lee had instructed his forces to dig in around Fall Hill. Luckily for the Taylor family, Burnside's scouts did not discover the ford and kept marching. The entrenchments are still on the property today.

Fall Hill passed out of the family about 10 years ago.