Steps Toward Freedom: Lincoln's Walk in Richmond

April 4th & 5th, 2009

Retrace Abraham Lincoln's steps on his visit to Richmond in April 1865, just a few days after the city’s fall to Union forces.

As part of the bicentennial year celebrating Lincoln’s birth, the Valentine Richmond History Center, the National Park Service, the American Civil War Center at Historic Tredegar and the Library of Virginia present a two-day program that will consider the symbolic nature of the occasion which marked both the near-end of a bloody armed conflict and the promise of freedom for enslaved African Americans.

SATURDAY, APRIL 4TH

2:00 - 3:00 p.m.

Lincoln, God, and Emancipation: A Promise Fulfilled
Dr. Lucas E. Morel, Washington and Lee University

Library of Virginia
800 E. Broad Street
Richmond, VA 23219
(804) 692-3592
Complimentary parking. Enter deck on 8th or 9th streets between Marshall and Broad.

A Lincoln scholar and professor of politics at Washington and Lee University, Dr. Morel will discuss the origins and implications of Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation. He is a member of the scholarly advisory committee of the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission and an adjunct fellow at the Ashbrook Center, for which he writes a monthly opinion piece on American current affairs. Dr. Morel has written several books and scholarly articles, including Lincoln’s Sacred Effort: Defining Religion’s Role in American Self-Government (2000), and is a contributing editor to Books and Culture: A Christian Review.

SUNDAY, APRIL 5TH

12:00 – 12:45 p.m.

Richmond Again Taken: A Sampling of Photographs of Richmond in 1865
Michael Gorman, National Park Service

- Many of these photographs are being shown publicly for the first time.

American Civil War Center
490 Tredegar Street
Richmond VA 23219
(804) 780-1865

Lecture occurs in the Theater of the National Park Service Visitor Center. Parking is available in the American Civil War Center lot at the rate of $3 per hour, $12 maximum. On-street parking also is available.

1:00 – 1:30 p.m.

“And Now the Nightmare is Gone": Abraham Lincoln & the Fall of the Confederacy
Jimmy Price, Henrico County Department of Historic Preservation and Museum Services

- Henrico County Educator Jimmy Price discusses the historical significance of Lincoln’s visit to Richmond in April 1865. Price is a former staff member of the American Civil War Center at Historic Tredegar.

American Civil War Center
490 Tredegar Street
Richmond VA 23219
(804) 780-1865

Parking is available in the American Civil War Center lot at the rate of $3 per hour, $12 maximum. On-street parking also is available.

2:00 - 5:00

LINCOLN WALK, Self-Guided Walk with Stationed Interpretation
Begins at 17th & Dock streets in Shockoe Bottom.

• COMPANION PODCAST
• MAP OF ROUTE (PDF)

This self-guided walking tour of downtown Richmond features stationed interpretation along the route traveled by Abraham Lincoln and his son Tad on their visit to Richmond on April 4, 1865, following the evacuation of Richmond by the Confederate government and its occupation by the Union military.

Historic Richmond Tour guides provided by the Valentine Richmond History Center, as well as National Park Service rangers, will be stationed along the route.

The walk begins where Lincoln disembarked from his boat at 17th and Dock streets and continues north up 14th Street to the White House of the Confederacy in the Court End neighborhood. Participants will then proceed to Capitol Square, where Lincoln visited next, and may opt to retrace Lincoln and Tad’s steps to Rockett’s Landing, the actual site of their departure, or return to 17th and Dock streets.

Along the way, guides will offer verbal and visual perspective on how the city appeared to Lincoln that day in 1865.

The walk should take approximately 90 minutes. Participants may begin at 17th and Dock and follow the route, or they may join the walk at any point along the way. Maps will be provided for all walkers on the day of the tour, or participants may download the map directly at www.lincolnwalkrichmond.com.

Parking is available on street or in pay lots near the starting point.

5:00 - 5:45

LINCOLN LITERARY READING
Patrick Henry's Pub & Grille (upstairs), 2300 E. Broad Street, 644-4242

Reading of poems and essays by Virginia contributors of the National League of American Pen Women to “Happy Birthday, Mr. Lincoln:  A Commemorative Collage,” published the NLAPW. Free to the public, no reservation required.

Featured Sponsor

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial Commission

Presenting Sponsors

Venture Richmond
Virginia Foundation for the Humanities
Segway of Richmond

Media Partner

WTVR Channel 6

The Library of Virginia, www.lva.virginia.gov, located in historic downtown Richmond, holds the world's most extensive collection of material about the Old Dominion and has been a steward of the commonwealth's documentary and printed heritage since 1823. The story of Virginia and Virginians has been told in many ways since 1607. At the Library of Virginia it is told through more than 115 million manuscripts and more than 1.8 million books, serials, bound periodicals, microfilm reels, newspapers and state and federal documents, each an individual tile in the vast and colorful mosaic of Virginia’s experience.

The mission of The American Civil War Center at Historic Tredegar, www.tredegar.org, is to tell the whole story of the conflict that still shapes our nation. The Center is located at the Tredegar Iron Works, an 8.3 acre National Historic Landmark site near the James River in Richmond. The 1861 Gun Foundry is home to the 10,000-square-foot flagship exhibit, In the Cause of Liberty, the nation’s first exhibit to explore the war’s causes, course, and legacies from Union, Confederate and African American perspectives. The Center offers History Labs and digital history programming for students K-12, while the Tredegar Institute provides ongoing adult educational opportunities through community dialogues and symposia.

Richmond National Battlefield Park, www.nps.gov/rich, preserves and protects 13 historic sites and battlefields in and around the city of Richmond, Virginia, Capital of the Confederacy, 1861-1865.