A trio of Civil War battlefield parks will divvy up nearly $1 million to spend on land acquisition to protect their landscapes, according to National Park Service officials.

Richmond Battlefield in Kentucky, Franklin Battlefield in Tennessee, and Bentonville Battlefield in North Carolina will benefit from the appropriation from the Land and Water Conservation Fund.

“Americans have a duty to protect these scenes of combat. We must honor the memories of those who fought and teach people about the Civil War and its pivotal role in our nation’s history,” said National Park Service Director Jonathan B. Jarvis, whose agency administers the funds. “These grants ... will help state and local governments commemorate fallen soldiers and offer place-based education on par with that provided by the National Park Service.”

According to a Park Service release, Madison County, Kentucky, received $29,500 to buy the Moody Tract of the Richmond Battlefield; the city of Franklin received a grant of $492,000 to acquire land at the Franklin Battlefield, and; the North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources received grants to acquire two segments of the Bentonville Battlefield: $306,000 for the Nell Howell Tract and $150,000 for the Joyce Britt-Halliwell Tract.

Confederate forces won the Battle of Richmond, fought on August 29 and 30, 1862, however, a battle in November 1864 saw significant Confederate losses at Franklin, Tennessee, according to Park Service historians. "This engagement, launched by Confederate Gen. John Bell Hood, contributed to the failure of Hood’s military efforts in Tennessee," they said.

At Bentonville, Confederate forces led by Gen. Joseph E. Johnston waged an attack on the left column of Maj. Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman’s army, which was making its way north to combine with Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant’s forces, the Park Service noted. According to the national historic landmark documentation for the battlefield, the defeat of Confederate forces at Bentonville rang “the Confederacy’s death knell, for it fatally weakened their last mobile field army.”

State and local governments received a total of $977,500 from the National Park Service. Priority was given to battlefields listed in the National Park Service’s Civil War Sites Advisory Commission Report on the Nation’s Civil War Battlefields. Funds are awarded based on the significance of the land to be acquired and the availability of required non-federal matching funds.