Before the Civil War, the Exchange Hotel, with its high ceiling parlors and grand veranda, welcomed passengers from the two rail lines: the Virginia Central Railroad and the Alexandria Railroad.

Soon war began, and the railroads became a supply route transporting troops, supplies, and the wounded to Gordonsville.

On March 1862, the Exchange Hotel became the Gordonsville Receiving Hospital and provided care for over 70,000, both Confederate and captured Union soldiers.

Between 1865 and 1877 during the reconstruction period, the hospital provided care and education to the newly freed slaves as a Freedmen’s Bureau. As the United States healed and the railroads boomed, this elegant building returned to its role of the hotel.