Section 3: Interstate 70 to Fox Gap

Multiple Paces

(5.9 miles)

“On a warm, sunny Sunday in 1862, a force of 9000 Rebels used the ramparts of South Mountain as a natural fort from which to stage a delaying action against 30,000 Yankee soldiers. Although they lost the mountain, they won the day, saving General Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia from almost certain destruction.”—from Exploring the Appalachian Trail: Hikes in the Mid-Atlantic States, by Glenn Schere and Don Hopey, 2nd edition. This section hike passes through two of the three mountain gaps where this battle was fought, just 3 days before the armies met again to the west at Antietam on September 17, 1862, in the bloodiest single day of fighting of the Civil War. At the end of the hike, take a short walk along the road to see where some of the fiercest fighting of the Civil War took place on South Mountain. Two monuments are erected at the crest of the road. Earlier during the hike, the trail passes near the original Washington Monument, a stone tower with steps leading to a great view and fantastic photo opportunities, and the Old South Mountain Inn, a public house built in the early to mid-1700s.