2026 Capital Campaign: Banking on Preservation

Dear Friends,

It’s been a challenging few years leading up to January of 2026 for Pamplin Historical Park. It was only recently that we solidified the future of the April 2, 1865, Breakthrough Battlefield of the Petersburg Campaign. Our Breakthrough Battlefield Foundation now operates Pamplin Historical Park and owns all rights and trademarks dealing with the Park and the Breakthrough, while the American Battlefield Trust owns the land in order to secure a conservation easement on the property that will protect it from development in perpetuity.

While this arrangement has allowed the establishment of an investment fund to support day-to-day operations and ensure the continued educational mission of the Park and the Breakthrough Battlefield Foundation, our lease with ABT includes the ongoing maintenance of our historic and modern facilities. These are capital expenses outside of our normal operations. After years of financial challenges, the deferred maintenance has reached a critical stage and action must be taken. All our historic homes and some of the more modern facilities require rehabilitation or repairs in order for continued use, and we need your help to save them.

The oldest structure within Pamplin Historical Park is the Banks House built between 1750-1760, which was part of the 331-acre Banks family plantation. Behind the Banks House is a separate building that served as both a kitchen and slave quarter constructed later between 1840 and 1850. The census records show that Thomas and Margaret Banks, along with free whites, free blacks and up to twelve slaves lived on the property between 1839 and 1850. Prior to the Civil War, vegetable crops were grown to sell in nearby Petersburg. During the war, Margaret hosted Confederate soldiers and their visiting relatives at the Banks House, to include Brigadier General James H. Lane. Son John R. Banks served in the local home guard unit that became Company B, 3rd Virginia Battalion Reserves. After the Breakthrough Battle of April 2, 1865, Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant made the Banks House his headquarters. Grant dictated telegrams announcing the morning breakthrough, sat at the base of a tree reading dispatches and writing orders. Confederate artillerists spotted the Union officers and opened fire on them. With a fifteen-minute bombardment, staff attempted to persuade the general to move to a safer position. Grant finally looked up and commented, “Well, they do seem to have the range on us.”

Now the ravages of time certainly have the range on us concerning the Banks House property. Both the main house and the kitchen with slave quarters need major rehabilitation and restoration in order for them to be used, once again, as part of our educational programming and interpretation to the public. From roofing to wood siding, and masonry work, the structures will require special historic trades to bring them back in shape for public use.

This is where you can help us in saving these structures and the experiences of those who lived, worked and visited the Banks property, both free and enslaved, for future generations. These dwellings must be preserved to continue to tell these amazing and essential stories.

This is why I ask you to give a gift today to our 2026 Capital Campaign: Banking on Preservation. Only you can help us to reach our goal of $40,000. Your gift will be matched 3 to 1 with supporting grants and funding. Pamplin Historical Park and the Breakthrough Battlefield Foundation are a 501 (c) (3) charitable organization, and we are not a government-funded historic site. Loyal and generous supporters like you have sustained us in the past and now have a chance to save one of the oldest remaining structures in Dinwiddie County and one of the last remaining wooden slave quarters in the nation. We simply cannot do this without you.

Working together, we will make this a preservation reality and enable us to share the Banks property stories with students, and visitors from across the nation. Your support will save these irreplaceable structures and allow us to share their stories. With your support today, the voices of the enslaved, Banks family, soldiers and visitors will live on and not go silent.     

Here are the ways that you can make a donation:

Donate online at www.pamplinpark.org
Call (804) 861-2408
Send a check to 6125 Boydton Plank Rd., Dinwiddie, VA 23803

Sincerely,