The battle between as the world's largest retailer and those who oppose it constructing a new store on the site of one of the Civil War's largest and most important battles continues.
DCist music editor Amanda Mattos reports that a letter signed by some 250 scholars, from Ken Burns to David McCullough, puts Wal-Mart on notice: "The Wilderness is an indelible part of our history, its very ground hallowed by the American blood spilled there, and it cannot be moved."
In December, the company prepared to submit an application for a special-use permit to construct a store on a portion of the battlefield, which is part of Fredericksburg & Spotsylvania National Military Park.
As Mattos notes, the Battle of the Wilderness was the first battle between Ulysses S. Grant and Robert E. Lee. It cost 4,000 soldiers their lives and wounded 20,000 others and started the final push towards the end of the war.
Although the proposed Wal-Mart Supercenter is outside the congressionally authorized boundary of the park, which is more than 2,773 acres, it's still within the historical battle area, according to the Fredericksburg Free Lance-Star.
Wal-Mart's argument is the area is zoned for commercial use and has been for some time. Activists argue that there are many other non-historic locations the Supercenter could be built on.
When news of Wal-Mart's proposal first became public, Wal-MartWatch.com, an anti-Wal-Mart Web site based in Washington, D.C., created and released an on-line video protesting the planned location. In the video, General Ulysses S. Grant and Robert E. Lee appear together, bashing the idea of the retail chain building there.
The video wasn't the only form of opposition. About 16,000 Orange County households were mass mailed a full-color, four-page brochure.
The Free Lance-Star reported that the mailer was sent out by the Warrenton-based Piedmont Environmental Council, which not only opposed the plan for its historic site location, situated at intersection of State Routes 3 and 20, but also as much for its potential negative impact on traffic.
