Six Interesting Coincidences of History-- Part 3: The Civil War Began in Wilmer McLean's Front Yard... And Ended in His Front Parlor

In the summer of 1861, Wilmer McLean and his family were living on  his wife's plantation near Manassas Junction, Virginia.  As Union forces approached, Confederate General P.G.T. Beauregard took over the farm as his headquarters.

On July 21, 1861, Union and Confederate forces clashed in the first major battle of the Civil War along the small stream known as Bull Run, which ran through McLean's property.  A second major battle, the Second Battle of Bull Run  took place on the same ground in August 1862.

Probably tired of all the fighting, Wilmer decided to move away.  By the end of 1863, they had relocated to the small hamlet of Appomattox  Court House, some 120 miles southwest of Manassas Junction.  McLean was supplying sugar to the Confederate Army, was in Appomattox  on April 9, 1865, when Confederate Colonel   Charles Marshal approached him for assistance in finding a suitable place for a meeting between Generals Robert E. Lee and U.S. Grant.

That afternoon, Lee surrendered his Army of Northern Virginia to Grant in McLean's parlor.  The Union soldiers later essentially stripped that parlor for momentoes of the historic occasion.  McLean put the "Surrender House" up for sale a year later.

He wanted to return to Manassas, which he did in 1867,  though he never sold the Appomattox house.  Instead, he defaulted on the property and it was sold at public auction in 1869.

Now operated by the National Park Service, the McLean House  opened to the public in 1949.

--Cooter