A place where history reaches out and touches you

How many people can a house touch emotionally? We’ve all had a connection with our homestead, or that cool loft apartment we had in college. But those types of memories affect only a household, maybe six to eight people at the most on average.

But one house, settled quietly here in our neck of the woods for the past 150 years, has touched so many more people in many different ways. In its inception, the house now known as the Graffiti House was destined to be a store and outpost for the rail.

Having that destiny crushed by the War Between the States didn’t deter its charm. It attracted and hosted soldiers from both the North and South during the Civil War, and soldiers from both sides literally left their marks on the house in the form of signatures, drawings and general graffiti.

But as the house changed hands through the years plaster, wallpaper, dirt and dust covered those missives from a time long past. And many would say the Civil War was a time that the good ol’ U.S.A would want to forget, a time that turned brother against brother, countryman against countryman. But it would do no good to forget the bloody conflict, and the Graffiti House does the best job of keeping the history alive, that I know of.

As many historians have noted, there are tons of battlefields in this county alone. There are houses still standing from that era, but none carry the significance of this once dilapidated home.

Through the efforts of many, most notably David Guinn — the man who rediscovered the graffiti on the walls — to Greg Hebler who helped save the house from the wrecking ball, the Graffiti House has now become one of Culpeper County’s most treasured haunts.

Take, for instance, the case of Broadus “Bo” Bowman. Bowman, a retiree from Murraysville, Pa. now living in South Carolina, who picked up a copy of his local paper one day and discovered an Associated Press story about the Graffiti House. In what he calls a “moment of fate” he read the article, finding his surname among the names listed on the walls.

Bowman went on the offensive, finding where to call, arranging family to go with him to the house and then finally donating his great-great-grandfather Allen Bowman’s bayonet-turned-hoe to the Brandy Station Foundation.

Bowman was just one of three descendants that returned to talk about their connection to the Graffiti House at a dinner celebrating the 150th anniversary of the building of the Graffiti House, and the others have just as much of a connection to the house.

Ed Kelley is the descendant of Col. J. Egbert Farnum, whose name is prominently on display the Graffiti House, forever etched into the annals of history.

David Bridges, the ancestor of Capt. James Breathed has now become a noted historian, whose book “Fighting with JEB Stuart: Major James Breathed and the Confederate Horse Artillery” gives an account of the war that looks at the horse artillery, a group that is largely overlooked in history accounts of the war.

All three men whose descendants spoke last Friday signed the walls of the Graffiti House. Two were Confederate, one was Union.

It just goes to show that the house showed favor to neither side, it was a friend of both North and South.

And now the house needs help, from both North and South. It’s a rare case of where a spectator can reach out and almost touch history (I said almost, I wouldn’t recommend it), and it’s a place where the ghosts of the past come alive through paintings, scribblings and notations.

So go to the Graffiti House, donate, help keep it alive for another generation to marvel at.

You never know, like Bo Bowman, you might just find your ancestor’s name on the wall.

Jeff Say is researching his ancestor’s impact on the Civil War. If any Civil War historians want to impart knowledge about the 148th Pennsylvanian Infantry and his great-great-grandfather John Stahlman, please contact him at 825-0771 ext. 115 or at .