“Get Down, You Fool!” quackenbos street nw across from fort stevens
hearing those words, President Abraham Lincoln ducked down from the Fort Stevens para- pet during the Civil War battle that stopped the Confederates from taking Washington. On July 9, 1864, some 15,000 Rebels led by General Jubal A. Early defeated Union forces at the Battle of Monocacy near Frederick, Maryland. Early’s troops, suffering from the battle and the summer heat, then turned south to march on the lightly defended capital city. But the Monocacy encounter and skirmishes along the Rockville Turnpike gave the Union time to regroup. On the 12th, the Union’s fresh troops challenged the Rebels in a fierce but brief fight. Early’s forces retreated to Virginia. The only Civil War battle fought in the District of Columbia was over. President and Mrs. Lincoln both witnessed the afternoon battle. Eyewitness Captain Elisha Hunt Rhodes of Rhode Island recorded the scene: “. . . [O]n the parapet I saw President Lincoln standing looking at the troops. [The] ladies were sitting in a carriage behind the earthworks. We marched . . . into a peach orchard in front of Fort Stevens, and here the fight began. For a short time it was warm work, but as the President and many ladies were looking at us, every man tried to do his best . . . the Rebels broke and fled . . . . A surgeon standing . . . beside President Lincoln was wounded.” Abraham Lincoln is the only serving U.S. president to have come under enemy fire.
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