It is a rather low hill, but I navigate my car up the steep one-lane road. I am driving up to one of the trails in the Manassas National Battlefield Park. It has been several years since I have been out to this particular area of the Park. The last time was before Covid.
As I approach the top of the hill, I blow my horn several times. The road goes up and over a ‘blind’ crest, and you cannot see any oncoming traffic until you are both cresting the rise from opposite directions. I want to give anyone coming towards me ample warning.
In the times I have been out here, I have only met one other car at the crest, and it was a close call. So I always blow my horn two or three times as my car climbs to the top.
No other car was coming, but as I drive down the far side I can see there is a car parked in the area of the trailhead. I am surprised to see it and wonder if I will meet the other hikers on the trail. As it was late in the day I know I might as they may be on their way back to their car.
I park my car, and as I get out I am met by the singing of the woodland birds. I recognized the Cardinal easily. I also pick out the Rufus-sided Towee as he calls out ‘drink-your-tea’. The other bird’s songs add to my enjoyment. Several trails go from the parking area out into the open fields that the current contract farmers cut for hay during the year. The first crop of tall grasses has not come up yet, and the broad paths across the fields lay open up to and beyond the location of the ‘lost-and-now-gone’ Portici farm house.
I stand for a moment in the shade of the trees which are just beginning to leaf. As I look up into the afternoon sky a spring breeze ruffles the red and green leaflets that have popped on the oaks and beech trees that cover the area. In the canopy I can see the shadows and shapes of the birds flying among the trees.
As I look towards the fields I am surprised to see the long-cut lumber of a new roof.
What could have been built here and why?
Just beyond the split rail fence and the tangle of vines at the edge of the trees is a small structure. I see the long boards rising above the peak of the roof. The structure is a chinked-log structure which would have been common for rural farm structures until the early 1900s.
To tell the truth during my days as a surveyor in North Carolina I would often come across old log structures out in the woods. They were generally storage sheds for an old and now-disappeared farm. One or two were old tobacco drying barns.
Given the location of this structure, I believe it is supposed to be a re-creation of an era “Spring House.” A Spring House was a small building that was built over or close to a spring of water that bubbled up from the ground. There are a lot of springs in this area of Virginia. The springs often rise as ‘artesian springs’ due to a natural dip of the land below the ground-water level or a “seep” on the side of a hill. In the Spring House the farmer and his family would dig a shallow pit (1 to 2 feet deep) and line it with stone.
Water would collect in the pit and was then allowed to flow out and down the hill to a stream. This would allow the pit to always be full of water. The water just having come out of the ground would be cold, and it would keep the inside of the small structure nice and cool. The farmer would build a shelf of stones in the pit so he and his family could put jugs and jars of milk and cheese and other foods in there to keep it cool and fresh. They might also have built wooden shelves on the walls for preserved fruit and vegetables. The family may have hung meat in the Spring House so it would last longer. It was like a refrigerator.
I am glad to find this new addition to the farming history of the Manassas Battlefield. The Park continues to develop the full story of the men and women who lived there and were witness to the terrible events of two Civil War battles.
The old cemeteries, foundations, trash pits, ponds, old farm equipment (after the Civil War) speak to this farming history. And there are old farm roads – wagon-width – deep in some of the woods.
I start my evening walk toward the old farm cemetery. The sun will set soon. I see the other walkers coming down one of the other paths and heading back to their car. I give them a wave and start my walk up the hill to the cemetery. If they waved back, I did not see them.