Abandoned Northern Virginia: Desolate Beauty

Northern Virginia’s forlorn footprints are close to the din of our nation’s capital, yet some still cling to their old Southern roots, especially those from areas steeped with Civil War imprints. While a few derelict places are fortunate to have their legacies preserved, too many abandonments vanish at the direction of Mother Nature or the wrecking ball. This Northern Virginia collection of forsaken structures includes several Civil War-era vestiges–indispensable markers in America’s most decisive era. Other chapters illuminate a strategic bastion formerly immersed in Cold War tensions, a coastal defense fort secreting clandestine activity for decades, a once lively dinner theater nightspot recently eradicated from the landscape, a shuttered business cloaked in eccentric lore, an infamous prison, a penal work camp succumbing to nature’s green hand, the bygone remembrances of grist mills, a rural chapel, the remains of a bucolic gentleman’s farm, and even a Northern Virginian ghost town. Observing these Northern Virginia images’ desolate beauty and grasping the weight of their life chronicles allows one to appreciate how history is the best way to greet the future.