BENNETT PLACE

'Bennett Place', the popular name for the farmhouse in Durham, North Carolina, owned by James and Nancy Bennett (alternatively and probably correctly, Bennitt), was the site of the largest surrender of troops during the American Civil War, on April 26, 1865.

Contents

History

Surrender

Present day

Notes

External links

History

After General William Tecumseh Sherman's March to the Sea, he turned north through the Carolinas for the Carolinas Campaign. Confederate President Jefferson Davis met General Joseph E. Johnston (who had spent the winter in Hillsborough, North Carolina^[2]) in Greensboro, North Carolina, while Sherman had stopped in Raleigh. Sherman offered an armistice on April 17 and Johnston, whose army was vastly overmatched and recently defeated at the Battle of Bentonville, agreed to meet to discuss terms of surrender. Johnston traveling east from Hillsborough and Sherman traveling west from Raleigh along the Hillsborough Road, met half-way in Durham three times (April 17th, 18th and 26th) in the farmhouse located seven miles from Durham Station before they agreed upon surrender terms.

Surrender

The difficulty in reaching an agreement lay in part in Johnston's desire for more than the purely military surrender that Sherman offered. His original terms matched those offered by Ulysses S. Grant to Robert E. Lee at Appomattox Court House, while Johnston insisted on resolutions of political issues such as the reestablishment of state governments after the war. General Sherman, in keeping with Lincoln's stated wishes for a compassionate and forgiving end to the war, agreed on terms of surrender that included the political issues. However, Union officials in Washington, angered over the recent assassination of President Abraham Lincoln on April 14, turned them down in favor of purely military terms. In response, Jefferson Davis ordered Johnston to disband his infantry and escape with his mounted troops, but Johnston disobeyed his orders and agreed to meet General Sherman again at the Bennett Farmhouse on April 26th. There they signed the new surrender terms, which ended the war for 90,000 men in the Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida.

Present day

Currently, Bennett Place is a registered historic site located in Durham, North Carolina. The buildings presently on the site are similar in style and date to the originals and were moved there in the 1960s. The originals burned in 1921, leaving only the original chimney and foundation. The site is also home to a memorial museum, guided tours and a yearly reenactment of the surrender.

Notes

1. National Register Information System
2. Minding the museum

External links

★ North Carolina Historic Sites: Bennett Place