Vicksburg

Started the day driving the Natchez Trace Pkwy as far as Vicksburg. The Pkwy is 444 miles from Natchez to Nashville. Our trip was to visit the Vicksburg National Military Park. The park preserves the site of the Civil War Battle of Vicksburg. There are 1,325 historic monuments and markers, historic trenches and earthworks, a 16 mile tour road, 144 cannons and the restored gunboat USS Cairo. The drive thru the battlefield made you realize just how brutal this war was. The Cairo is the only surviving gunboat, it was sunk Dec 1862 by a mine. The Capt got the boat to shore and the crew abandoned ship, it slid off shore and sank in 36' of water. In 1959 the boat was recovered and reassembled. The construction of the boat was amazing. There is also a cemetery with only Union Soldiers buried. Confederates were buried in a nearby cemetery. Czytaj więcej