The Civil War Museum at the Exchange Hotel, Gordonsville VA

November 2024

Museums can be hit-and-miss, and sometimes that’s not the fault of the museum. If you’re a World War II buff, a small WW2 museum might only cover events and information you’ve already read about a dozen times.

Thankfully, the Civil War Museum at the Exchange Hotel offers a window into a specific and (to me) fascinating aspect, arguably a sub-aspect, of the American Civil War. The Exchange happened to be the closest large hotel from Chancellorsville, and after that eponymous, horrendous battle in the American Civil War, The Exchange was turned into a receiving hospital for thousands of wounded soldiers. 70,000 soldiers were treated here over the course of the war.

Of course, being south of the Mason-Dixon line, it saw primarily Confederate soldiers, but it accepted everyone, and the staff prided itself on caring for Union soldiers just as well as Confederate ones. Indeed, there’s a lovely exhibit of letters exchanged between the widow of a Union soldier treated at The Exchange and the doctors who cared for him, demonstrating their commitment to equal treatment.

Each of the main rooms of the hotel has been converted into a small exhibition space with artifacts, photographs, and signs detailing the history of the hotel and the state of medicine during that terrible war. The caretakers have packed an impressive amount of information into this place, without feeling crowded. One could spend an hour perusing everything available here.

And then you could go into Gordonsville, but that’s another post.

Cost: $14 for adults< $5 for children 5-10, children under 5 free.

Sadly, no photography is allowed inside, so this is the only photo I can provide.