A family farm, a Civil War encampment site, and a country home, Historic Blenheim now welcomes visitors to explore its landscape and many stories.
Over 200 years ago, family patriarch Rezin Willcoxon moved here from Prince Georges County, Maryland. By the Civil War, his extended family owned most of the acreage along today's Old Lee Highway. A labor force, including a small number of African-American slaves, aided the family's growing prosperity.
During the Civil War, Union soldiers camped and convalesced here, interrupting life for the Willcoxons, and leaving behind signatures and pictographs on the farmhouse walls. Preserved by Willcoxon descendants until the last family owner died in 1997, the evocative power of these writings prompted local citizens to lobby to save Blenheim as an historic site.
The City of Fairfax purchased the c.1859 Blenheim House and surrounding 12 acres for $2.2 million in 1999 and undertook a process of stabilization, conservation, and restoration that continues today. Completion of the Civil War Interpretive Center in 2008 ensures that the process of discovery and education at Blenheim will continue for many future generations.
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