"Grant's crown of immortality was won, and the jewel that shone most brightly in it was set
there by the blood of the men of Champion Hills ...... Six thousand blue and gray-coated men were lying there in the woods, dead or wounded, when the last gun of Champion Hills was fired.

Major S. H. M. Byers, Fifth Iowa Infantry

VNMP Acquires Champion Hill Battlefield Property

By Rebecca Blackwell Drake

    On July 2, a crowd gathered on the grounds of Champion Hill Missionary Baptist Church for an official announcement regarding the newly acquired battlefield acreage at Champion Hill. The Mississippi Department of Archives and History was proud to make public the transfer of 800 acres of Champion Hill battlefield property to the Vicksburg National Military Park. The 800 acres includes land along the historic Old Jackson Road in the heart of the battlefield. The land transfer is the largest expansion of the VNMP since it was established in 1899.
    Plans are in the making for the Vicksburg National Military Park to develop the battlefields at Champion Hill and Raymond. Both would be an extension of the VNMP.

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Monument Unveiled
Honoring Edwin C. Bearss

    On May 3, 2019, a large crowd of friends and Civil War enthusiasts, including a tour group with the American Battlefield Trust, gathered at the crossroads on the Champion Hill battlefield for the unveiling of a large monument honoring Edwin C. Bearss. Ed holds the reputation as being the nation’s leading Civil War historian who, in earlier years, began the mission of preserving the Champion Hill Battlefield located 25 miles east of Vicksburg.

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Cockrell's Counter Attack

Historic Marker Placed

     The new historic marker, “Cockrell’s Counterattack” has been placed on the Old Jackson Road between the Cross-roads and the Hill of Death. To date the Champion Heritage Foundation has placed ten historic markers on the battlefield.

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 Bowen's Counter Attack

Historic Marker Placed

     The new historic marker, “Bowen’s Counterattack” has been permanently placed at the Crossroads within sight of the 2013 marker, “The Fight for the Crossroads.” To date the Champion Heritage Foundation has placed nine historic markers on the battlefield.

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Lt. S. E. M. Underhill
Aide-de-camp to
Brigadier General Stephen D. Lee

Letter to His Mother

From the Guernsey Times (Cambridge, Ohio),
August 20, 1863

Courtesy of Dan Masters

     This extraordinary letter, written by former English army officer Stephen E.M. Underhill to his mother in Coldstream, Scotland in the waning days of the siege of Vicksburg, gives a lengthy account of Underhill's experiences during the Vicksburg campaign while serving as an aide-de-camp to Brigadier General Stephen D. Lee. The 21-year-old Underhill resigned his commission in the British army and entered the Confederacy through the blockade at Charleston, South Carolina in January 1863, journeyed to Mississippi and gained an appointment to Lee's staff. Underhill gained favorable notice from Lee for his "gallantry and efficient service" during the campaign and following his parole at Vicksburg, he was commissioned as a first lieutenant of cavalry and eventually became colonel of the 65th Alabama Infantry.

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Death of General Lloyd Tilghman: The Legend of the “Blood-Leaved Peach”

By Sue Burns Moore

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"The Hill of Death"
Historic Marker

"THE HILL OF DEATH" read by
Edwin C. Bearss, Historian Emeritus, National Park Service