The preservation of the Franklin battlefield is facing many hardships

Despite the importance of the Battle of Franklin, for many years the land’s legacy was all but ignored as the city grew in the years following the war. However, the efforts of the Civil War Trust, with the help of local partners that include Franklin’s Charge, Save the Franklin Battlefield, Inc., the Battle of Franklin Trust, and the City of Franklin, have produced stirring results. Today, well over a hundred acres of battlefield land have been reclaimed and preserved, often one acre at a time over a span of many years.

Despite the efforts of so many over the years to bury history, there is so much for the visitor to see. The Carter House is considered to be “the single largest Civil War relic”. The house is where Tod Carter was born, and also the same place he died after dedicating his life to the country. His story is to be among the best stories of the American Civil War. You can go there and touch those bullet-scared walls and then out to Winstead Hill where Hood stood and watched in horror as his army seemed to vanish into the blood and night that was Franklin.

Or you can go to Ft. Granger and make your way through the center of earthen works of the Union fortifications and then make your way out to Carnton and walk through those rooms where Carrie McGavock proved herself to be the “consummate Southern Mother” as she made her way from boy to boy, with “two feet of blood on her skirts.”