Avondale served as the headquarters of General John Breckinridge during the Battle of Totopotomoy Creek. Some walls in the home contain bullet fragments embedded in the wood, while others show the paths through which they traveled. During a renovation cannonballs were found in the chimneys. Another cannonball hit the carved rail of the staircase. The upstairs of the original central section of the home and the 1810 edition to the west served as a hospital during the war. Traces of blood still remain in one of the upstairs bedrooms. On the east side of the house there is another addition built in 1973. One wall of the den was once the outside east wall. Bullet fragments and a piece of a Minié ball are still lodged in the wall.

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