Gordonsville was an important rail center at the time of the Civil War with the Virginia Central and the Orange and Alexandria Railroad meeting to form a vital transportation hub. In March of 1862, the Exchange Hotel was taken over by the military to become the Gordonsville Receiving Hospital. Nearly 70,000 soldiers from both sides were treated there, and 700 soldiers were buried on the grounds of the hospital.
Later the dead were moved to unmarked graves at Maplewood Cemetery which was established around 1880. Today an empty field surrounded by trees holds the remains of these men, and their memory is honored by a single stone marker, and the trees that shelter the edge of this sacred ground.
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