Hike Revisits Uncivil Battle
TOUR ON FOOT INCLUDES SCENERY, HISTORY
Thursday, November 19, 2009
PEA RIDGE — A windshield tour of Pea Ridge National Military Park is how most visitors see the Civil War battlefield where muskets and cannons roared during the Battle of Pea Ridge.
Hikers on two feet enjoy a longer, more detailed look at the national park, including forests, meadows and a hidden lake that visitors on the seven-mile auto tour road miss.
The park, situated four miles east of Pea Ridge, is an historic haven for hiking, birding and exploring in fields and forests away from the asphalt.
Custom-tailored hikes from one to eight or more miles are possible. The trail crosses the tour road at several points for easy hikes back to the visitor center parking lot.
Or, hikers can circle two loops for an 8.5-mile walking tour of the battlefield.
The complete route resembles a figure 8. The first loop is around five miles from the visitor center to Elkhorn Tavern.
The tavern served up lodging, not libations, and is a reconstructed two-story home that served as a field hospital and Union headquarters during the battle.
A three-mile loop begins and ends at Elkhorn Tavern. Features include a cabin foundation, a yard where hides were tanned and the site of a field hospital.
A dozen hikers on an Ozark Highlands Trail Association group hike explored both loops during a a five-hour hike on a drizzly Saturday, Oct. 17.
Visitors Afoot
Our battalion of hikers, some from the north and some from the south, marched west on the tour road from the visitor center with autumn splendor bright in the trees.
Winton Spring bubbled from a cleft in a slab of limestone to our right. The sparkling water slaked the thirst of weary soldiers at the Battle of Pea Ridge, fought March 7-8, 1862.
Not far beyond the spring, hikers leave the pavement andvanish into the forest along a mowed trail. We crossed a wooden foot bridge over another babbling brook, then hiked along splitrail fence and replica Civil War cannons.
There’s a rarely seen hidden lake that is reached by a zig here and a zag there off the trail.
The placid, rock-lined lagoon is shaded by willow trees, but fatigued soldiers never sipped its water. The small lake fills a quarry dug mere decades ago when nearby Arkansas 72 was built.
Like some of the 26,500 soldiers who fought at Pea Ridge, we hikers reached uncharted territory when we left the lake and hiked east into one of the park’s largest meadows.
It’s another feature not seen on the auto tour.
We walked through acres of grass turned golden by the change to autumn. One tree, alone, mighty walnut, was already bare and stood stark as if a selfproclaimed centerpiece of this grassland oasis.
Battlefield Transformed
Troops charged across this hallowed ground that now much like it did during the cold, bloody battle where 3,000 Union and Confederate soldiers died.
A project to restore the 4,000-acre park to its 1862 appearance95 percent complete, said Nolan Moore, resource manager at Pea Ridge.
An 30-tree apple orchard has been replanted at Elkhorn Tavern.
Seventeen miles of split-rail fence have been reconstructed. Our hike through the meadow took us past a replanted orchard of 200 peach trees.
“We’ve reopened some historic fields by removing the trees,” Moore said. “This year we’re planting 30 acres of corn.”
At Elkhorn Tavern, historian David Lewis told amazing stories about treating the battle wounded.
Elkhorn Tavern survived the Battle of Pea Ridge, but was burned in 1863 by Confederate soldiers. The replica stands tall, complete with elk antlers on the roof.
From here, it’s an easy one-mile walk back to the visitor center for a hike of five-miles plus. The loop that starts and ends at the tavern adds another pleasant three-mile hike.
Our band of hikers debated the total distance. Park literature lists it as 11 miles and some in the group said it felt every bit that.
But on a previous hike, someone with a GPS clocked it at 8.5 miles. The “Arkansas Hiking Trails” guidebook by Tim Ernst lists it as 8.7 miles.
It is what it is, we agreed. A hike at Pea Ridge is a scenic walk through history.
Outdoor, Pages 9 on 11/19/2009
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