PEA RIDGE NATIONAL MILITARY PARK

Pea Ridge, Ark.
NPS Website; Local Website

WHAT IS IT?
Site of the March 1862 Civil War battle that “saved Missouri for the Union”.

BEAUTY (3/10)
The concepts of “well-preserved” and “endangered” battlefields appear attached to every Civil War Site we visit. Here are the questions we have developed to understand these elusive definitions:

1) Is the battleground land, in its entirety, a part of the battlefield Park?
2) Do statues and monuments honoring the soldiers litter the battleground?
3) Are any modern structures (houses, restaurants, souvenir stands, lookout towers) visible from the battleground?
4) Have all structures within the battleground boundaries been restored to the 1860’s appearance.
5) Are there cannons everywhere? (Not really a criterion, but what is a Civil War Site without cannons?)

A perfectly preserved Civil War park would answer Yes, No, No, Yes and Yes. An “endangered park” would answer No, Yes or No, Yes, No and No.

The wonderfully well-preserved Pea Ridge NMP answers Y, N, N, Y and Y to our questions. We especially enjoyed the lack of widespread white granite monuments. The Park’s only two monuments stand nearby the restored Elkhorn Tavern. Some local advocates even want those monuments torn down, presumably to attain a perfect preservation score.

Is the Park any more beautiful just because it looks almost identical to its March 1862 appearance when, we might add, people died here? Not to us. Pea Ridge remains a humid rural Arkansas expanse surrounded by dense forest and inhabited by many white-tailed deer.

HISTORICAL INTEREST (4/10)
The statement that the Union’s victory at Pea Ridge “saved them Missouri” is a little bit misleading. Firstly, it is unclear if, during the War, either the North or South wanted Missouri. After Pea Ridge, both armies abandoned the land and marched eastward. Secondly, the Union victory hardly swayed the complicated interests and beliefs of Missourians during the War. Their incomprehensible mixing and matching of Pro-slavery, anti-Union, pro-Union, anti-slavery would continue until the War ended; both the Union and Confederacy saw many Missouri volunteers.

The Missouri/Northern Arkansas theater of battle was a distant third priority for both armies (after the Eastern and Western theaters). Pea Ridge is interesting in that it was one of the Union’s earliest victories of the War, despite their distinct numbers advantage in all fights. By the time Pea Ridge happened, both Lincoln and Jeff Davis deemed Missouri to be an afterthought and were more than willing to see it descend into its own personal guerilla war.

CROWDS (6/10)
A woman with a thick Arkansas accent pulled Gab aside at the Leetown Battlefield overlook. “Hi honey. So aah you intahrested in this stuuff or you just tagging along?” Gab sheepishly said, “No, I like…” Michael interrupted her with a big laugh. “You can tell us the truth.” “OK,” Gab replied, “I don’t much care for the Civil War.” “Me neithah,” the woman revealed, “you should see the books mah husband reads. I couldn’t keep up with ‘im if I trahed. I feel for ya honey but just remembuh: you’ll be out a hiyah in no time.”

EASE OF USE/ACCESS (3/5)
It is difficult to say if you will ever be near Pea Ridge NMP, but its rural northwestern Arkansas locale is more accessible than you might think. The Park is located along U.S. Route 62, about 11 miles east of Interstate 540, Exit 86 and the town of Rogers, Ark. Rogers is three miles south of Bentonville, home of Wal-Mart, and less than 20 mile north of Fayetteville, home of the University of Arkansas Razorbacks.

The darling artsy town of Eureka Springs, home of the famous Great Passion Play, is 25 miles east along Route 62. Country music jamboree capital Branson, Mo. is 80 circuitous miles to the east-northeast.

CONCESSIONS/BOOKSTORE (5/5)
We are sick of giving perfect scores to Civil War bookstores but even the most cynical grader cannot argue with 30+ books on the Missouri/Northern Arkansas field of battle, including at least six on Pea Ridge alone. We find interesting new titles at each Civil War bookstore that we either have glanced over or are stocked only where we are. Pea Ridge NMP’s cool titles include Pulitzer Prize winner Mary Chestnut’s Civil War; Now the Wolf Has Come: the Creek Nation in the Civil War; A Plantation Mistress on the Eve of Civil War and Black Confederates. Civil War buffs and historians must have their fill of reading material.

COSTS (3/5)
Entry is $3 per person, $5 per vehicle or free with the National Parks Pass.

RANGER/GUIDE TO TOURIST RATIO (4/5)
Few other people in northern Arkansas chose to tour the Battlefield during our visit. It might have been the 100-degree midweek day coupled with high humidity or it could have been the Hurricane Katrina induced $0.50 a gallon gasoline price hike. Whichever it was, we had the Park, its two Visitor Center Rangers, a talkative but knowledgeable costumed volunteer posted at Elkhorn Tavern and his two friendly dogs all to ourselves.

TOURS/CLASSES (3/10)
The only thing we remember about the Pea Ridge NMP learning experience is that Confederate General Van Dorn was such a poor leader that it is a wonder he was not commanding Union troops in the Eastern theater.

Too geeky an explanation? Prior to battle, Van Dorn hurriedly marched his men for three straight days through snow and sub freezing temperatures, openly questioning why his men couldn’t march as fast as he could ride. On the fourth day, he asked them to fight. The rest of our Battle of Pea Ridge learning, as well as a lesson on the Missouri/Northern Arkansas theater came at the nearby Wilson’s Creek NB.

FUN (3/10)
If a Union Army General had won a game of checkers against a Confederate General, the Federal government would have honored that location with a Civil War National Park Site. The outcome at Pea Ridge produced negligible, at best, historical impact. A visit here could be fun only to an obsessive completist. Heavens, we think we just described ourselves.

WOULD WE RECOMMEND? (2/10)
If you like Civil War Battlefields, this could be the best preserved of them all.

TOTAL 36/80

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