The Canal Ditch

The Canal Ditch. Fredericksburg: Timeless.. , The millrace through this part of Fredericksburg was known locally as Marye's Race. Pragmatic military men called it a canal ditch. , (Photo courtesy of National Park Service)., The post-Civil War street in front of you, Kenmore Avenue, covers a wartime millrace. On December 13, 1862, that ditch became a maddening obstacle to Union soldiers advancing against Marye's Heights. Five feet deep, 15 feet wide, and filled with frigid water, it could only be crossed on three battered bridges. As the Federals funneled across the waterway, they were pummeled by Confederate artillery., Once across the ditch, the Federals formed under the shelter of a slight bluff then charged the Sunken Road and Marye's Heights. By the end of the day more than 1,000 Union soldiers lay dead on the plain that stretches out before you. Seven thousand more were wounded. One soldier wrote: "It was a great slaughter pen . . . they might as well have tried to take Hell.", [Captions:] , Union soldiers huddle along the canal ditch (foreground) while their comrades charge across open fields to attack Marye's Heights, Brompton and the Rowe, Stratton, and Innis houses, all appear in this image. (Image courtesy of the National Park Service.), Three bridges spanned the canal ditch: one here at Hanover Street (the Telegraph Road), one to your right at William Street (the Orange Plank Road), and one to your left at William Street (the Orange Plank Road), and one to your left at Prussia Street (modern Lafayette Boulevard).