Fighting for Cedar Creek
Preservationists try to persuade quarry to spare battlefield land -- By Preston Knight (Daily Staff Writer)

MIDDLETOWN — A trustee of the Civil War Preservation Trust proposed Wednesday that O-N Minerals Chemstone donate either a conservation easement or all 639 acres of land it is trying to rezone to the Cedar Creek Battlefield Foundation.

Denman Zirkle, an Edinburg resident and trustee of the national group, said Chemstone can be a model for other corporations by being a generous neighbor of Cedar Creek, which was placed on a list of the nation's most endangered battlefields Tuesday. The trust releases its endangered list annually, and placed Cedar Creek at the top this year because of Chemstone's plan to rezone hundreds of acres of battlefield land from rural to extractive mining

Preservationists from a number of groups spoke on the matter at a press conference Wednesday afternoon at the battlefield.

"There's no Civil War battlefield that's so dramatic in its appearance as Cedar Creek," Zirkle said afterward. "When you consider that what you're looking at can be developed residentially and destroyed by a mining operation, it really is very sobering."

Zirkle's pleas to Chemstone — though it is battlefield land, it falls outside of the Cedar Creek and Belle Grove National Historical Park — do not make sense, company spokesman Bill Hardigg said. Donating the land would not be a wise business move, he said, while a conservation easement would be the wrong step for the environment.

The limestone that Chemstone seeks to mine under the battlefield is essential to pollution control, whether it be air, water or land, Hardigg said.

"It would make no sense to put a conservation easement [there]," he said.

Regardless of Chemstone's application to expand its operations, Cedar Creek still made the list of the most endangered battlefields for additional reasons. A power line proposal by Allegheny and Dominion Virginia Power was enough to land Cedar Creek on the trust's list twice. It is included among a string of battlefields in a number of states classified as the Northern Piedmont. The list of sites impacted by the power line proposal also includes the Front Royal battlefield.

Other threats were noted by speakers Wednesday. The expansion of Interstate 81, new houses in Middletown and changes to the area around interstates 66 and 81 pose other problems for Cedar Creek, officials said.

Cedar Creek was part of a group of 11 sites included in the trust's 2006 list of endangered battlefields because of the proposed expansion of I-81.

"This is a dubious distinction indeed," said Howard Kittell, executive director of the Shenandoah Valley Battlefields Foundation.

The Chemstone threat to Cedar Creek goes beyond the scope of what the company is proposing, preservationists said. The acreage in question, 60 percent of it listed as core battlefield land, is vital to telling the story of the battle, said Elizabeth Paradis Stern, the battlefields foundation's program manager for public and government relations.

"That's where it turned," she said.

Chemstone contends that no significant fighting occurred on the property.

"Several years ago, when the park was formed, the National Park Service assembled landowners and stakeholder groups to set the park boundaries. Our land was not considered significant enough to place within the park boundaries," Chemstone General Manager Spencer Stinson said in a prepared statement. "Over the years, the Middletown Quarry has contributed labor, money, and materials to the park and to the upkeep of Belle Grove. We take history seriously and we support historic preservation."

During his speech, Zirkle said Cedar Creek can use recent history to its advantage in trying to win the fight against Chemstone. Battlefield land in Fredericksburg was saved from development, he said, while land in Gettysburg survived a plan to build a casino nearby.

"Now it's up to the citizens of Frederick County, and to all of us, to assure this happens at Cedar Creek," Zirkle said.

The Frederick County Board of Supervisors has yet to vote on the rezoning request. The Planning Commission has recommended its denial.

The Middletown Town Council meets Monday, and speakers are expected to address the issue there.