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Built between 1851 and 1853, this building accommodated riverboat
travelers before and after the Civil War. General Buckner and his staff
used the hotel as their headquarters during the battle. It also served
as a Union hospital after the surrender. After Buckner accepted Grant's
surrender terms, the two generals met here to work out the details. Lew
Wallace, the first Union general to reach the hotel following the
surrender, did not want his men to gloat over the Confederate situation
and told Capt. Frederick Knefler, one of his officers, to tell the
brigade commanders "to move the whole line forward, and take
possession of persons and property ... (but) not a word of taunt-no
cheering." An estimated 13,000 Confederate soldiers were loaded
onto transports to begin their journey to Northern prisoner-of-war
camps. Neither the Union nor Confederate governments were prepared to
care for the large influx of prisoners. The Fort Donelson prisoners were
incarcerated in hastily converted and ill-prepared sites in Illinois,
Indiana, Ohio, and as far away as Boston, Mass. Fort Donelson POWs
suffered more from the northern climate than any other hardship. In
September 1862 most of the Fort Donelson prisoners were exchanged. On
two occasions, once in mid-1862 and again in February 1863, Confederate
forces tried to drive Federal troops from the area. Both attempts
failed; but the second, led by soldiers under the command of Gens.
Joseph Wheeler and Nathan Bedford Forrest, cost the town its future.
That skirmish, known as the Battle of Dover, resulted in the destruction
of all but four of the town's buildings. One of those to survive was the
Dover Hotel, which remained in business until the 1930s. It has been
restored through the efforts of the Fort Donelson House Historical
Association and the National Park Service. The exterior looks much the
same as it did when the surrender took place. |
(10-08) 
