ZZ-PWC069 Confederate Cemeteries

Marker text: CONFEDERATE CEMETERIES

During the late summer of 1861, Confederate troops from Alabama, Mississippi, North Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia camped in the vicinity of Bristoe Station. Typhoid, measles and other contagious diseases quickly swept through these camps decimating many of the regiments. The colonel of the 6th North Carolina wrote that his regiment averaged about one per day in deaths. Each regiment established its own separate burial ground. Military homage was paid by comrades discharging a musketry volley over the grave of the deceased at the interment and this could be heard daily throughout the camping grounds of the entire brigade. The following spring, Union troops passing through the area counted nearly 75 graves in the 10th Alabama cemetery and 128 graves in two enclosures for Mississippi soldiers. With the exception of the 10th Alabama cemetery, more permanently marked with stones after the war by veterans of the unit, the remaining 1861 Confederate burials plus the graves of Southerners killed in the fighting here in August 1862 and October 1863 are mostly unmarked and defy identification.