As we commemorate National Armed Forces Day, the nation's leading voice for the national parks, the nonprofit National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA), today released a new assessment recommending additional federal funding to maintain several of the nation's historic Civil War battlefields.

The report, which features four Civil War parks in Tennessee: Fort Donelson National Battlefield, Shiloh National Military Park, Stones River National Battlefield, and Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park, also finds that adjacent land development threatens historic views that are essential to understanding the important battles and history that took place there.

"As we approach the sesquicentennial of the Civil War, we must ensure that our national treasures, and Tennessee's Civil War heritage, is preserved and protected for our children and grandchildren to enjoy," said Emily Jones, National Parks Conservation Association program manager.

According to the assessment by the National Parks Conservation Association's Center for State of the Parks, each of the four Civil War battlefields suffer from staffing and federal funding shortfalls that affect the National Park Service's ability to provide educational programs to visitors and maintain hundreds of historic military markers, cannons, and monuments.