Posted on Nov 20, 2016
What was the most significant event on September 17 during the U.S. Civil War?
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In 1862 the bloodiest single day in American history took place at Antietam Battlefield. Federal casualties were “2,108 dead, 9,540 wounded and 753 missing. This was 25% of those who fought. The Confederate casualties numbered 1,546 dead, 7,752 wounded, 1,108 missing, or 31% of the troops engaged. It has been calculated that during the 12 hours the battle lasted, men died at the rate of 35 per minute. It was the bloodiest single day of the War, or in fact in North American history.”
In 1863, in the Chickamauga campaign Confederate General Braxton Bragg had defended Tennessee so well for the Confederacy that he was now backed up into northern Georgia. He had a chance for the last week to attack Maj Gen William Starke Rosecrans exceedingly scattered forces. “Several orders had admittedly been issued, for one reason or another no actual attacks had taken place. By now the Union troops were about all gathered together again. Bragg had no choice but to attack the whole army at once. The best plan he could come up with was a thrust at the Federal right, to cut off their line of retreat to Chattanooga. Unfortunately for Bragg, this thought had occurred to Rosecrans as well. The major ingredients for the bloodiest battle of the war in the Western Department (Chickamauga) have begun to gel.”
Below is a detailed account of the Battle of Antietam.
Wednesday, September 17, 1862 Antietam – “The most terrible battle of the age. “By the time McClellan wrote his wife and to Washington, giving more or less the same story, the morning battles had ended with anything but a full success. Hooker’s First Corps had attacked Stonewall Jackson’s troops from the North Woods through The Cornfield and East Woods. But, even with the addition of Mansfield’s Twelfth Corps, they could not hold the ground they took. The objective had been the ground around The Dunkard Church, which, if captured, would turn General Lee’s flank. Some of Mansfield’s men reached it, driving off Rebel batteries in the assault, but soon they were beaten back like their brethren.
General Hooker, while trying to rally his men, was wounded and left the field. His corps went to George Meade, but the field command was left to nobody. Another corps, the Second, was added to the confusion to little effect, except for one division that stumbled upon Confederates in The Sunken Road, opening a new phase of the battle.
For nearly four hours, the quarter-mile stretch of farm road was held, taken, retaken, charged and counter-charged by both sides. By the time McClellan was writing the short letter to his wife, his men were scaling parapets of their dead comrades to capture what quickly became known as Bloody Lane.
If this was the “success” McClellan has written about, he did nothing to take advantage of it. The Rebels were forced from their position, leaving Lee’s army ready to be sliced in two. McClellan did nothing. He had troops upon troops standing, waiting, and threw none forward to end it.
In Washington, where General-in-Chief Henry Halleck received McClellan’s optimistic dispatch, things were surprisingly calm. But calm did not lend itself to clarity. McClellan had sent few messages over the past couple of days, and rumors of Harpers Ferry and of the Army of the Potomac were rampant. With the Rebel army north of the city, a victory over McClellan could mean an invasion of Pennsylvania or the taking of Baltimore or even Washington itself.
The calm, at least for Henry Halleck, came from the reports that Lee’s army had slipped back into Virginia. Because of McClellan’s lack of communication, he knew nothing of even the chance of a battle until he received word in the middle of it from McClellan himself.
The attacks from the north, through The Cornfield, had prompted McClellan to change his tactics. Since Lee was strongest in the north, he must be weakest in the south. Already poised for an attack was the Ninth Corps under Ambrose Burnside and Jacob Cox. He ordered them forward to create a division, hoping to draw Confederates away from the main attack.
Burnside, with 12,000 men, waited. His orders arrived around 10am. Prior to that, three divisions of Rebels waited for him, ready to contest his crossing of the small Rohrbach’s Bridge that would shortly bear his name. But as the fighting drew heavy to the north, General Lee wicked men from wherever he could find them. Two Rebel divisions left Burnside’s front, and then most of another, leaving a mind-bogglingly scant 400 Georgians to defend the crossing.
Spending hours trying to figure out how to cross, and looking for a passable ford even farther south, Burnside whiled away the late morning. McClellan had sent couriers to find out what was keeping him, but none could offer a logical reason for the waiting.
The first attack was little more than a probe and easily beaten back. The second attack was meant for a brigade to storm down towards the bridge and rush it. The troops, however, got lost and stumbled their way towards the creek, missing the bridge by 350 yards. There they stayed, acting as pickets and skirmishers.
Before the first attack failed, Burnside sent a division south, in hopes of crossing a ford to get behind the Georgians. By this time, it was quite obvious that they were lost, too.
To cross the Rohrbach’s Bridge, a front of only eight men could be presented to the Rebels, who were perched well above the bridge and able to pick off Yankees with little danger to themselves. The next attempt would take a different approach, using the road leading to the bridge. Nobody could get lost, and if they hurried, casualties might not be so bad. But they were. The road ran parallel to the creek and the men were mowed down.
In a final attempt, the 51st Pennsylvania and 51st New York were charged down a hill, across the road to the bridge and across. They had apparently been promised whiskey by their teetotaling commander, and that was enough to make them fight.
The bridge fell and the Georgians retreated. The south end of the field was in Federal hands. But Burnside, though prodded by McClellan to move, did not. He had somehow forgotten to resupply his men with ammunition.
The Federal crossing barely phased General Lee, who knew that A.P. Hill’s Division would soon arrive from Harpers Ferry. Neither McClellan nor Burnside had any idea that another fresh Rebel division even existed. Burnside’s plan, once he was able to construct one, was to work around the very weak right flank of the enemy. This, he believed, would cut them off from Boteler’s Ford, their only means of retreating back across the Potomac.
At first, he did quite well, pitting his 8,500 men against no more than 2,800 Rebels, who put up a vicious defense. But, after repeated assaults, the line broke and the Rebel flank began to crumble. Through the streets of Sharpsburg, the Rebels ran in terror as General Lee did what he could to stem the tide of his disintegrating flank.
Only one small brigade remained, but looking towards the road leading to Harpers Ferry, Lee could see dust. It was A.P. Hill’s Division. Lee ordered whatever artillery he could find to focus everything it had upon the Yankees attacking his right flank, hoping to hold out for just a few minutes more.
When Hill’s Division arrived, around 3:30pm, their commander threw them into the fray in piecemeal fashion. He didn’t bother to properly align them or dress them as if on parade. Within ten minutes, the first of them were killing and dying. The impromptu and advantageous flank attack was enough to confound the Federal push. Hill’s men drove Burnside’s troops back to their bridgehead at the Antietam.
Burnside called upon McClellan for reinforcement, but McClellan lied, telling him that he had no infantry left. In truth, he had two full corps – the Fifth and Sixth. When Burnside’s plea arrived, McClellan turned to General Porter, commanding the Fifth Corps. Porter merely shook his head and any notion of saving Burnside was gone. The battle was all but over.
The battle of Antietam was, and still remains, the bloodiest day in American history. The Union sustained 2,108 dead, 9,540 wounded and 753 missing. This was 25% of those who fought. The Rebels lost around 1,546 dead, 7,752 wounded, 1,108 missing, or 31% of the troops engaged.
Still, with the losses, General Lee had no plans to retreat. He shifted some artillery, condensed his lines here and there, but, holding most of the ground he held twenty-four hours previous, he would not yet be moved.”
http://civilwardailygazette.com/the-battle-of-antietam/
Pictures: 1862-09-17 0600 Antietam Map 1 - Hooker's assault and Hood's counterattack; 1862-09-17 0730 Antietam Map 2 - Mansfield and Sedgwick on the assault; 1862-09-17 0900 Antietam Map 3 - Sedgwick in the West Woods and fighting on the Bloody Lane; 1862-09-17 1000 Antietam Map 4 - Burnside gains the bridge until Hill counterattacks
A. 1861: A Union landing party from USS Massachusetts took possession of Ship Island south of New Orleans, LA. This was the headquarters for ADM David Farragut's Gulf Coast Blockading Squadron. The Island became an important staging and refueling site for the blockading squadrons.
B. 1862: Antietam Campaign. Maj Gen George B. McClellan’s strategy was to attack the enemy left, then the right, and finally, when either of those movements met with success, to move forward in the center. When fighting began in the foggy dawn hours, this strategy broke down into a series of uncoordinated advances by Union soldiers under the command of Generals Joseph Hooker, Joseph Mansfield and Edwin Sumner. As savage and bloody combat continued for eight hours across the region, the Confederates were pushed back but not beaten, despite sustaining some 15,000 casualties. At the same time, Union General Ambrose Burnside opened an attack on the Confederate right, capturing the bridge that now bears his name around 1 p.m. Burnside’s break to reorganize his men allowed Confederate reinforcements to arrive, turning back the Union advance there as well.
By the time the sun went down, both armies still held their ground, despite staggering combined casualties–nearly 23,000 of the 100,000 soldiers engaged, including almost 4,000 dead. McClellan’s center never moved forward, leaving a large number of Union troops that did not participate in the battle.
C. 1863: Chickamauga Campaign. Forward echelons of CSA Lt Gen James Longstreet's Corps began arriving in Northwest Georgia. CSA Maj Gen Lafayette McLaws and Maj Gen John Bell Hood divisions began to arrive at Ringgold, Georgia by railroad. Bragg now had all the reinforcements he could get, and outnumbered Rosecrans by about 65,000 to 60,000. Col. Minty’s Federal cavalry scouts notice this arrival and confirm it. Minty reports to Gen. Crittenden, who ignores the report and refuses to pass it on to his superior, Gen. Rosecrans, insisting that Longstreet was in Virginia.
Confederate General Braxton Bragg, who had defended Tennessee so well for the Confederacy that he was now backed up into northern Georgia. He had a chance for the last week to attack Rosecrans' exceedingly scattered forces. Although several orders had admittedly been issued, for one reason or another no actual attacks had taken place. By now the Union troops were about all gathered together again. Bragg had no choice but to attack the whole army at once. The best plan he could come up with was a thrust at the Federal right, to cut off their line of retreat to Chattanooga. Unfortunately for Bragg, this thought had occurred to Rosecrans as well. The major ingredients for the bloodiest battle of the war in the Western Department (Chickamauga) have begun to gel.
D. 1864: At 9 a.m., General Hampton’s “Beefsteak Raid” is a success, as he is back in Confederate territory. There was so much beef available that Confederate sentries would sometimes offer it in trade to Union sentries in exchange for certain luxury items of which the Federal soldiers had a plentiful supply, but the Confederates lacked. Abraham Lincoln called the raid “the slickest piece of cattle-stealing” he ever heard of. A fictionalized depiction of the raid is featured in the 1966 film Alvarez Kelly.
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In 1863, in the Chickamauga campaign Confederate General Braxton Bragg had defended Tennessee so well for the Confederacy that he was now backed up into northern Georgia. He had a chance for the last week to attack Maj Gen William Starke Rosecrans exceedingly scattered forces. “Several orders had admittedly been issued, for one reason or another no actual attacks had taken place. By now the Union troops were about all gathered together again. Bragg had no choice but to attack the whole army at once. The best plan he could come up with was a thrust at the Federal right, to cut off their line of retreat to Chattanooga. Unfortunately for Bragg, this thought had occurred to Rosecrans as well. The major ingredients for the bloodiest battle of the war in the Western Department (Chickamauga) have begun to gel.”
Below is a detailed account of the Battle of Antietam.
Wednesday, September 17, 1862 Antietam – “The most terrible battle of the age. “By the time McClellan wrote his wife and to Washington, giving more or less the same story, the morning battles had ended with anything but a full success. Hooker’s First Corps had attacked Stonewall Jackson’s troops from the North Woods through The Cornfield and East Woods. But, even with the addition of Mansfield’s Twelfth Corps, they could not hold the ground they took. The objective had been the ground around The Dunkard Church, which, if captured, would turn General Lee’s flank. Some of Mansfield’s men reached it, driving off Rebel batteries in the assault, but soon they were beaten back like their brethren.
General Hooker, while trying to rally his men, was wounded and left the field. His corps went to George Meade, but the field command was left to nobody. Another corps, the Second, was added to the confusion to little effect, except for one division that stumbled upon Confederates in The Sunken Road, opening a new phase of the battle.
For nearly four hours, the quarter-mile stretch of farm road was held, taken, retaken, charged and counter-charged by both sides. By the time McClellan was writing the short letter to his wife, his men were scaling parapets of their dead comrades to capture what quickly became known as Bloody Lane.
If this was the “success” McClellan has written about, he did nothing to take advantage of it. The Rebels were forced from their position, leaving Lee’s army ready to be sliced in two. McClellan did nothing. He had troops upon troops standing, waiting, and threw none forward to end it.
In Washington, where General-in-Chief Henry Halleck received McClellan’s optimistic dispatch, things were surprisingly calm. But calm did not lend itself to clarity. McClellan had sent few messages over the past couple of days, and rumors of Harpers Ferry and of the Army of the Potomac were rampant. With the Rebel army north of the city, a victory over McClellan could mean an invasion of Pennsylvania or the taking of Baltimore or even Washington itself.
The calm, at least for Henry Halleck, came from the reports that Lee’s army had slipped back into Virginia. Because of McClellan’s lack of communication, he knew nothing of even the chance of a battle until he received word in the middle of it from McClellan himself.
The attacks from the north, through The Cornfield, had prompted McClellan to change his tactics. Since Lee was strongest in the north, he must be weakest in the south. Already poised for an attack was the Ninth Corps under Ambrose Burnside and Jacob Cox. He ordered them forward to create a division, hoping to draw Confederates away from the main attack.
Burnside, with 12,000 men, waited. His orders arrived around 10am. Prior to that, three divisions of Rebels waited for him, ready to contest his crossing of the small Rohrbach’s Bridge that would shortly bear his name. But as the fighting drew heavy to the north, General Lee wicked men from wherever he could find them. Two Rebel divisions left Burnside’s front, and then most of another, leaving a mind-bogglingly scant 400 Georgians to defend the crossing.
Spending hours trying to figure out how to cross, and looking for a passable ford even farther south, Burnside whiled away the late morning. McClellan had sent couriers to find out what was keeping him, but none could offer a logical reason for the waiting.
The first attack was little more than a probe and easily beaten back. The second attack was meant for a brigade to storm down towards the bridge and rush it. The troops, however, got lost and stumbled their way towards the creek, missing the bridge by 350 yards. There they stayed, acting as pickets and skirmishers.
Before the first attack failed, Burnside sent a division south, in hopes of crossing a ford to get behind the Georgians. By this time, it was quite obvious that they were lost, too.
To cross the Rohrbach’s Bridge, a front of only eight men could be presented to the Rebels, who were perched well above the bridge and able to pick off Yankees with little danger to themselves. The next attempt would take a different approach, using the road leading to the bridge. Nobody could get lost, and if they hurried, casualties might not be so bad. But they were. The road ran parallel to the creek and the men were mowed down.
In a final attempt, the 51st Pennsylvania and 51st New York were charged down a hill, across the road to the bridge and across. They had apparently been promised whiskey by their teetotaling commander, and that was enough to make them fight.
The bridge fell and the Georgians retreated. The south end of the field was in Federal hands. But Burnside, though prodded by McClellan to move, did not. He had somehow forgotten to resupply his men with ammunition.
The Federal crossing barely phased General Lee, who knew that A.P. Hill’s Division would soon arrive from Harpers Ferry. Neither McClellan nor Burnside had any idea that another fresh Rebel division even existed. Burnside’s plan, once he was able to construct one, was to work around the very weak right flank of the enemy. This, he believed, would cut them off from Boteler’s Ford, their only means of retreating back across the Potomac.
At first, he did quite well, pitting his 8,500 men against no more than 2,800 Rebels, who put up a vicious defense. But, after repeated assaults, the line broke and the Rebel flank began to crumble. Through the streets of Sharpsburg, the Rebels ran in terror as General Lee did what he could to stem the tide of his disintegrating flank.
Only one small brigade remained, but looking towards the road leading to Harpers Ferry, Lee could see dust. It was A.P. Hill’s Division. Lee ordered whatever artillery he could find to focus everything it had upon the Yankees attacking his right flank, hoping to hold out for just a few minutes more.
When Hill’s Division arrived, around 3:30pm, their commander threw them into the fray in piecemeal fashion. He didn’t bother to properly align them or dress them as if on parade. Within ten minutes, the first of them were killing and dying. The impromptu and advantageous flank attack was enough to confound the Federal push. Hill’s men drove Burnside’s troops back to their bridgehead at the Antietam.
Burnside called upon McClellan for reinforcement, but McClellan lied, telling him that he had no infantry left. In truth, he had two full corps – the Fifth and Sixth. When Burnside’s plea arrived, McClellan turned to General Porter, commanding the Fifth Corps. Porter merely shook his head and any notion of saving Burnside was gone. The battle was all but over.
The battle of Antietam was, and still remains, the bloodiest day in American history. The Union sustained 2,108 dead, 9,540 wounded and 753 missing. This was 25% of those who fought. The Rebels lost around 1,546 dead, 7,752 wounded, 1,108 missing, or 31% of the troops engaged.
Still, with the losses, General Lee had no plans to retreat. He shifted some artillery, condensed his lines here and there, but, holding most of the ground he held twenty-four hours previous, he would not yet be moved.”
http://civilwardailygazette.com/the-battle-of-antietam/
Pictures: 1862-09-17 0600 Antietam Map 1 - Hooker's assault and Hood's counterattack; 1862-09-17 0730 Antietam Map 2 - Mansfield and Sedgwick on the assault; 1862-09-17 0900 Antietam Map 3 - Sedgwick in the West Woods and fighting on the Bloody Lane; 1862-09-17 1000 Antietam Map 4 - Burnside gains the bridge until Hill counterattacks
A. 1861: A Union landing party from USS Massachusetts took possession of Ship Island south of New Orleans, LA. This was the headquarters for ADM David Farragut's Gulf Coast Blockading Squadron. The Island became an important staging and refueling site for the blockading squadrons.
B. 1862: Antietam Campaign. Maj Gen George B. McClellan’s strategy was to attack the enemy left, then the right, and finally, when either of those movements met with success, to move forward in the center. When fighting began in the foggy dawn hours, this strategy broke down into a series of uncoordinated advances by Union soldiers under the command of Generals Joseph Hooker, Joseph Mansfield and Edwin Sumner. As savage and bloody combat continued for eight hours across the region, the Confederates were pushed back but not beaten, despite sustaining some 15,000 casualties. At the same time, Union General Ambrose Burnside opened an attack on the Confederate right, capturing the bridge that now bears his name around 1 p.m. Burnside’s break to reorganize his men allowed Confederate reinforcements to arrive, turning back the Union advance there as well.
By the time the sun went down, both armies still held their ground, despite staggering combined casualties–nearly 23,000 of the 100,000 soldiers engaged, including almost 4,000 dead. McClellan’s center never moved forward, leaving a large number of Union troops that did not participate in the battle.
C. 1863: Chickamauga Campaign. Forward echelons of CSA Lt Gen James Longstreet's Corps began arriving in Northwest Georgia. CSA Maj Gen Lafayette McLaws and Maj Gen John Bell Hood divisions began to arrive at Ringgold, Georgia by railroad. Bragg now had all the reinforcements he could get, and outnumbered Rosecrans by about 65,000 to 60,000. Col. Minty’s Federal cavalry scouts notice this arrival and confirm it. Minty reports to Gen. Crittenden, who ignores the report and refuses to pass it on to his superior, Gen. Rosecrans, insisting that Longstreet was in Virginia.
Confederate General Braxton Bragg, who had defended Tennessee so well for the Confederacy that he was now backed up into northern Georgia. He had a chance for the last week to attack Rosecrans' exceedingly scattered forces. Although several orders had admittedly been issued, for one reason or another no actual attacks had taken place. By now the Union troops were about all gathered together again. Bragg had no choice but to attack the whole army at once. The best plan he could come up with was a thrust at the Federal right, to cut off their line of retreat to Chattanooga. Unfortunately for Bragg, this thought had occurred to Rosecrans as well. The major ingredients for the bloodiest battle of the war in the Western Department (Chickamauga) have begun to gel.
D. 1864: At 9 a.m., General Hampton’s “Beefsteak Raid” is a success, as he is back in Confederate territory. There was so much beef available that Confederate sentries would sometimes offer it in trade to Union sentries in exchange for certain luxury items of which the Federal soldiers had a plentiful supply, but the Confederates lacked. Abraham Lincoln called the raid “the slickest piece of cattle-stealing” he ever heard of. A fictionalized depiction of the raid is featured in the 1966 film Alvarez Kelly.
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In 1862 the promise of whiskey to Federal soldiers inspires them to seize what would be known to history as Burnside bridge. In a final attempt, the 51st Pennsylvania and 51st New York charged down a hill and across the road to the bridge and across. “They had apparently been promised whiskey by their teetotaling commander, and that was enough to make them fight. The bridge fell and the Georgians retreated.”
In 1861, CSA Gen A.S. Johnson made plans to seize Kentucky for the confederacy. President Abraham Lincoln was focused on protecting the capital of Washington, DC and directed that two regiments be sent from the west [U.S. Grants forces] to the east in Virginia.
Tuesday, September, 17, 1861: CSA Gen Albert Sidney Johnston planned full scale invasion of Kentucky. “Before the War, Albert Sidney Johnston commanded the United States Department of the Pacific. When word finally reached California that Texas had seceded from the Union, he joined up with the Los Angeles Mounted Rifles, a secessionist outfit, and headed through the desert in the middle of summer, passed through a warring New Mexico, finally arriving in Richmond in early September. There, President Davis, who had known Johnston since their days together at West Point and through the Mexican War, found him the perfect match for the much-needed commander of Department Number Two, the Trans-Mississippi.
Johnston then moved by rail to Nashville and assessed the situation. By this time, Confederate General Polk had seized Columbus on the Mississippi River and US Grant had taken Paducah on the Tennessee and Ohio Rivers, both violating Kentucky’s neutrality. Kentucky’s legislature demanded both to withdraw.
It was clear that the Union forces, who had quickly built Fort Holt at Paducah, were planning on staying. Johnston then decided to move the bulk of his troops into Kentucky.
To defend Kentucky’s neutrality, Governor Beriah Magoffin appointed Simon Bolivar Buckner commander of the state militia. He was twice offered a commission as a General in the United States Army, once by General-in-Chief Winfield Scott and again by Secretary of War Simon Cameron, under the orders of President Lincoln. He declined, wishing to remain neutral, like his state.
After General Polk’s Confederates took Columbus, Kentucky, Bolivar accepted a commission as Brigadier-General in the Confederate Army. Most of his militiamen followed suit.
On this date, General A.S. Johnston ordered General Buckner and his 5,000 men to board trains at Nashville and head to Bowling Green. This would flesh out the Confederate line, keeping southern Kentucky firmly in the South. Also, it would protect northern Tennessee, covering the main turnpikes and railroads through that portion of the state.
In all, General A.S. Johnston had about 30,000 troops to hold the Trans-Mississippi. He was outnumbered two to one. Geographically, the features were against him. The Mississippi River severed his command in half and the Ohio River protected the North.
Johnston devised a plan of defense. Kentucky would be the battleground. He divided the state into three parts, giving each to one of his commanders. General Felix Zollicoffer would command at Cumberland Ford in Eastern Kentucky [near modern day Pineville, close to Barbourville on the map]. Buckner commanded what would soon be known as the Army of Central Kentucky at Bowling Green. Western Kentucky and the Mississippi River were already under the command of General Polk.
Though the Confederate line was thin, the Union line wasn’t in much better shape. Union forces were split between two departments. General Fremont commanded the Western Department from St. Louis and had control over General Grant’s force at Paducah. General Anderson (of Fort Sumter fame) commanded the Department of Kentucky at Louisville and had troops at Camp Dick Robinson, near Danville.
Kentucky had gone from neutral to besieged in two short weeks.
http://civilwardailygazette.com/albert-sidney-johnston-plans-full-scale-invasion-of-kentucky/
Tuesday, September, 17, 1861: Brig Gen Ulysses S. Grant inhaled. Not yet knowing of Albert Sidney Johnston’s push into Kentucky, President Lincoln had ordered Maj Gen John C. Fremont in St. Louis to furnish 5,000 troops to be used in Virginia. In an attempt to comply, Fremont ordered Brig Gen Grant to send two of his regiments to Virginia.
Since moving into Kentucky, Grant’s small force had built Fort Holt at Paducah, captured Smithland and continued probing east and south. Fremont’s compliance with Lincoln’s orders, however, forced Grant to put a halt to his explorations and move his lines back to Fort Holt.
Fremont, believing that he was greatly outnumbered by Johnston’s forces and being completely overwhelmed by siege at Lexington, begged Washington to allow him to send only those two regiments.
http://civilwardailygazette.com/albert-sidney-johnston-plans-full-scale-invasion-of-kentucky/
Thursday, September 17, 1863: Chickamauga '63 Braxton Bragg resumes the march which was suspended – “Bragg starts, stops, and starts again. Braxton Bragg, Confederate commander of the Army of Tennessee had a plan. Originally, it had been a good plan, with roads and river crossings selected. He knew what he wanted, knew how to accomplish it, and in all likelihood could have pulled it off. But he didn’t. The plan was reduced to orders which looked very little like the plan as originally conceived. Still, it was something. Some troops would be moving, some objectives detailed, and though no crossings would be crossed, they would be guarded and held.
But even this didn’t happen. Before the sun peered from the east, Bragg countermanded the orders and his entire army remained in place. Shortly after abandoning Chattanooga, Bragg’s troops marched roughly thirty miles south and now held a scattered front stretching from La Fayette on the left to Ringgold on the right (though the concentration was closer to the former than the latter).
Bragg was opposed by William Rosecrans’ Union Army of the Cumberland, which held the mountain passes opposite his position. Their left was anchored along Chickamauga Creek at Lee & Gordon’s Mill. The Federal right had been even farther south than Bragg’s flank at La Fayette, but was slowly making its way north in an attempt at concentration.
Bragg’s plan had been to slide the Rebel army between the Union left and their supply base at Chattanooga. The original plan accomplished this, while the orders did not. The countermanding accomplished nothing, except allowing time for Rosecrans to gather together his entire army. But not even Rosecrans was ready for a fight and seemed to have only the vaguest of notions that one might soon be upon him (though with the way Bragg was generaling, perhaps not).
Confederate reinforcements were now arriving and they were not going unnoticed by the Federal cavalry. Two divisions of James Longstreet’s Corps from the Army of Northern Virginia had taken trains from their namesake and were now arriving at Catoosa Station, near Ringgold. For a day, Col. Robert Minty, Union cavalry commander, had been convinced that the Rebels were massing on the Federal left. While this wasn’t quite true, it was surprisingly advantageous, predicting Bragg’s original plan. On the morning of this date, Col. Minty reported to Thomas Crittenden, commander of the XXI Corps holding the Union left, that Confederate reinforcements were arriving.
General Crittenden flat out ignored the reports. When Minty insisted that they weren’t just any Rebels, but Longstreet’s entire corps, Crittenden actually laughed at him. “Longstreet is in Virginia,” he scoffed. But General Rosecrans wasn’t so quick to brush this new information away. Word had come from Washington that something along those lines was happening, and now it was all adding up. By the end of the day, three of Longstreet’s brigades (under Jerome Robertson, Henry Benning, and John Gregg) would be at Catoosa. The rest of Longstreet’s Corps, as well as the General himself, were two days out, though this was unknown to Minty.
Sometime in the afternoon, Braxton Bragg came back to his senses and uncountermanded his previously countermanded orders. “Division commanders will resume the march which was suspended this morning,” came the new old orders. But even this was scaled back. There was to be a general concentration near Rock Spring, but not even the crossings were to be held. On the right, Leonidas Polk’s Corps remained in position nearest to the Federal left. At the other end of the line, D.H. Hill’s Corps remained near La Fayette. It was only Simon Buckner’s and W.H.T. Walker’s Corps that moved at all, and it was only a slide to the right to reinforce Polk.
Finally, before the day was out, Rosecrans was certain that Bragg was heavy on his left. There was even a small brush up in the streets of Ringgold between the Federal Cavalry and Robertson’s Brigade from Hood’s Division. The sides were coming together and bullets, like sparks, were flying.
While Rosecrans braced his army, Bragg worked long through evening and darkness to come up with a new plan. He decided that the following morning was the time to attack. But like his other plans and orders, this new new plan was halfhearted. It completely left out both Polk’s and Hill’s Corps (as well as any of Longstreet’s men), instead, it sent Buckner and Walker splashing across Chickamauga Creek with little instruction on what to do when they got to the other side. Of course, come dawn, Bragg would probably again change his mind, so these troubles hardly mattered.
Through the night, more and more Confederate reinforcements arrived, their trains chuffing and blowing into Catoosa Station. Col. Minty, helming the Federal Cavalry, knew exactly what was going on, but all his warnings and reports were met by General Crittenden, holding the Union left, as mere annoyances. “The Rebel army is retreating,” he somehow said with a straight face, “and are trying to get away some of their abandoned stores; they have nothing but dismounted cavalry in your front.” Come dawn, even with Bragg’s ever-changing machinations, Crittenden might be proved wildly wrong.
http://civilwardailygazette.com/resume-the-march-which-was-suspended-bragg-starts-stops-and-starts-again/
In 1864, Grant Visits Sheridan While Early Divides His Forces. Grant had his own plans, probably tucked away in his pocket. “General Grant had left his headquarters at City Point on the 15th, bound for Philip Sheridan’s army east of Winchester. “My purpose was to have him attack [Jubal] Early, or drive him out of the valley and destroy that source of supplies for Lee’s army,” wrote Grant in his memoirs. He decided not to stop in Washington, preferring to deliver his orders by hand directly to Sheridan. Otherwise, he feared that his orders “would be stopped there and such orders as Halleck’s caution (and that of the Secretary of War) would suggest would be given instead, and would, no doubt, be contradictory to mine.”
Grant arrived in Charlestown on the 16th and on this date called Sheridan to his side. They met in the Rutherford House and constructed the next move to be made.
“When Sheridan arrived I asked him if he had a map showing the positions of his army and that of the enemy,” recalled Grant after the war. “He at once drew one out of his side pocket, showing all roads and streams, and the camps of the two armies. He said that if he had permission he would move so and so (pointing out how) against the Confederates, and that he could ‘whip them.'”
“I went over the situation very thoroughly,” wrote Sheridan about the meeting, “and pointed out with so much confidence the chances of a complete victory should I throw my army across the Valley pike near Newtown that he fell in with the plan at once, authorized me to resume the offensive, and to attack Early as soon as I deemed it most propitious to do so; and although before leaving City Point he had outlined certain operations for my army, yet he neither discussed nor disclosed his plans, my knowledge of the situation striking him as being so much more accurate than his own.”
Sheridan’s plan was actually fairly simple. He would through the bulk of his troops against the Valley Pike at New town, south of Winchester. His cavalry would then invest the town, fully cutting off Early’s lines of supply and communication. This would force the Rebels to fight, and to do so on ground chosen by Sheridan. If all went well, he would indeed whip them.
Sheridan had learned of the location of Early’s forces the day previous, and built his plan accordingly. But on this date, Jubal Early made a move of his own. Splitting his forces, he marched with two divisions – half his army – in the direction of Martinsburg to the north, leaving behind two divisions along the Opequon north of Winchester. His mind was to fall upon the B&O Railroad, though it might be a risk to do so.
With the cavalry commanded by Lunsford Lomax in the vanguard, Early pushed north, sending a brigade to destroy a railroad bridge west of Martinsburg. The infantry, moving more slowly, wound up around Bunker Hill with Sheridan being none the wiser. He would not learn until the following morning that Early had divided his forces.”
http://civilwardailygazette.com/grant-visits-sheridan-while-early-divides-his-forces/
Below are several journal entries from 1862, 1863 and 1866 which shed light on what life was like for soldiers and civilians – the good, the bad and the ugly. In 1864 Lt Gen U.S. Grant called Maj Gen Philip Sheridan to his side in Charlestown, WV. They met in the Rutherford House and constructed the next move to be made.
Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Antietam Campaign. Maj Gen George B. McClellan to his wife in the early afternoon. “We are in the midst of the most terrible battle of the age,” wrote McClellan, who had come to be known as grossly inaccurate when it came to estimations of pretty much everything, was dead on. Before the battle of Sharpsburg, along the winding Antietam Creek was even half over, it was the most terrible battle of the war. “So far God has given us success but with many variations during the day,” he continued, back to his less-than-accurate accounts.
By the time McClellan wrote his wife and to Washington, giving more or less the same story, the morning battles had ended with anything but a full success. Hooker’s First Corps had attacked Stonewall Jackson’s troops from the North Woods through The Cornfield and East Woods. But, even with the addition of Mansfield’s Twelfth Corps, they could not hold the ground they took. The objective had been the ground around The Dunkard Church, which, if captured, would turn General Lee’s flank. Some of Mansfield’s men reached it, driving off Rebel batteries in the assault, but soon they were beaten back like their brethren.
Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Antietam Campaign. Capt. William J. Bolton of the 51st Penn writes of this assault which begins about 12:30 PM: “. . . marching as if on regimental drill an sight never to be forgotten by those in that charge, gained the top of the hill overlooking the bridge and in full view. From that moment the regiment received volley after volley of grape, muysktery, shot, and shell, filling our faces and eyes with sand and dirt, all this time reserving our fire. . . . and after the regiment had cleared the fence that intervened between us and the bridge, the order to charge was given by [Colonel] Hartranft, certain death, as it were staring us in the face. We made the dash for the bridge through a perfect hell of shot and shell. . . . all this time the men falling all around, but in a few moments we commanded the entrance to the bridge. . . . and in less than nine minutes the bridge and the heights beyond were in our possession and beyond dispute. . . . Within the few feet of the bridge a minie ball came crashing through my right lower jaw bone carrying away all the teeth on the right side of my face, both upper and lower jaw, passed through my mouth, and came out on the other side of my face. . .”
Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Rebel artilleryman George Michael Neese, in reserve three miles away, describes the battle’s sounds: “At times the artillery fire was so fierce and heavy that it sounded like one continual roar of thunder rumbling and rolling across the sky. The musketry fire was equally severe and raged furiously, almost incessantly all day, and its hideous deathly crash vied with the deafening roar of the thundering artillery. It is utterly incomprehensible and perfectly inconceivable how mortal men can stand and live under such an infantry fire as I heard to-day. Judging from the way the musketry roared the whole surrounding air between the lines must have been thick with flying lead.”
Thursday, September 17, 1863: Josiah Marshall Favill, a young officer in the Army of the Potomac, notes with disfavor in his journal the apparent lassitude and caution of Gen. Meade’s leadership of this army: “September 17th. This is the anniversary of the battle of Antietam; another year of constant campaigning has gone, and still the war lasts. Will it ever end? This is our third year of fighting, and much of the romance of early days has faded away.
Our comrades continually drop by the wayside, causing many changes, some of which are not so agreeable, but we are still firm of purpose and sanguine of our ability to conquer in the end. General Meade, who has been in command of the army since just before Gettysburg, is a very careful officer, not thought to possess any great merit as a general, and has none of the dash and brilliancy which is necessary to popularity. It seems likely we shall be led in a plodding, ordinary sort of way, neither giving nor receiving any serious blows, a great pity. At 9 A. M. the division crossed Cedar and Slaughter mountains, a distance of about seven miles, and then bivouacked for the night.”
Saturday, September 17, 1864: Lt Gen U.S. Grant had arrived in Charlestown on the 16th and on this date he called Maj Gen Philip Sheridan to his side. They met in the Rutherford House and constructed the next move to be made.
“When Sheridan arrived I asked him if he had a map showing the positions of his army and that of the enemy,” recalled Grant after the war. “He at once drew one out of his side pocket, showing all roads and streams, and the camps of the two armies. He said that if he had permission he would move so and so (pointing out how) against the Confederates, and that he could ‘whip them.'”
“I went over the situation very thoroughly,” wrote Sheridan about the meeting, “and pointed out with so much confidence the chances of a complete victory should I throw my army across the Valley pike near Newtown that he fell in with the plan at once, authorized me to resume the offensive, and to attack Early as soon as I deemed it most propitious to do so; and although before leaving City Point he had outlined certain operations for my army, yet he neither discussed nor disclosed his plans, my knowledge of the situation striking him as being so much more accurate than his own.”
Pictures: 1862-09-17 General Thomas Stonewall Jackson, September 17, 1862, 0930 Dunker Church; 1862-09-17 Now Is the Pinch - The Battle of Antietam, Maryland; 1862-09-17 The Bloodiest Day - September 17, 1862 - Antietam; 1862-09-17 BURNSIDE'S BRIDGE Antietam Creek, Maryland
A. Tuesday, September 17, 1861: A Union landing party from USS Massachusetts took possession of Ship Island south of New Orleans, LA. This was the headquarters for ADM David Farragut's Gulf Coast Blockading Squadron. The Island became an important staging and refueling site for the blockading squadrons.
B. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Antietam Campaign. Beginning early on the morning of this day in 1862, Confederate and Union troops in the Civil War clash near Maryland’s Antietam Creek in the bloodiest one-day battle in American history.
The Battle of Antietam marked the culmination of Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s first invasion of the Northern states. Guiding his Army of Northern Virginia across the Potomac River in early September 1862, the great general daringly divided his men, sending half of them, under the command of General Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, to capture the Union garrison at Harper’s Ferry.
President Abraham Lincoln put Major General George B. McClellan in charge of the Union troops responsible for defending Washington, D.C., against Lee’s invasion. McClellan’s Army of the Potomac clashed first with Lee’s men on September 14, with the Confederates forced to retreat after being blocked at the passes of South Mountain. Though Lee considered turning back toward Virginia, news of Jackson’s capture of Harper’s Ferry reached him on September 15. That victory convinced him to stay and make a stand near Sharpsburg, Maryland.
Over the course of September 15 and 16, the Confederate and Union armies gathered on opposite sides of Antietam Creek. On the Confederate side, Jackson commanded the left flank with General James Longstreet at the head of the center and right. McClellan’s strategy was to attack the enemy left, then the right, and finally, when either of those movements met with success, to move forward in the center.
When fighting began in the foggy dawn hours of September 17, this strategy broke down into a series of uncoordinated advances by Union soldiers under the command of Generals Joseph Hooker, Joseph Mansfield and Edwin Sumner. As savage and bloody combat continued for eight hours across the region, the Confederates were pushed back but not beaten, despite sustaining some 15,000 casualties. At the same time, Union General Ambrose Burnside opened an attack on the Confederate right, capturing the bridge that now bears his name around 1 p.m. Burnside’s break to reorganize his men allowed Confederate reinforcements to arrive, turning back the Union advance there as well.
By the time the sun went down, both armies still held their ground, despite staggering combined casualties–nearly 23,000 of the 100,000 soldiers engaged, including almost 4,000 dead. McClellan’s center never moved forward, leaving a large number of Union troops that did not participate in the battle. On the morning of September 18, both sides gathered their wounded and buried their dead. That night, Lee turned his forces back to Virginia. His retreat gave President Lincoln the moment he had been waiting for to issue the Emancipation Proclamation, a historic document that turned the Union effort in the Civil War into a fight for the abolition of slavery.
C. Thursday, September 17, 1863: Forward echelons of CSA Lt Gen James Longstreet's Corps began arriving in Northwest Georgia. CSA Maj Gen Lafayette McLaws and Maj Gen John Bell Hood divisions began to arrive at Ringgold, Georgia by railroad. Bragg now had all the reinforcements he could get, and outnumbered Rosecrans by about 65,000 to 60,000. Col. Minty’s Federal cavalry scouts notice this arrival and confirm it. Minty reports to Gen. Crittenden, who ignores the report and refuses to pass it on to his superior, Gen. Rosecrans, insisting that Longstreet was in Virginia.
Confederate General Braxton Bragg, who had defended Tennessee so well for the Confederacy that he was now backed up into northern Georgia. He had a chance for the last week to attack Rosecrans' exceedingly scattered forces. Although several orders had admittedly been issued, for one reason or another no actual attacks had taken place. By now the Union troops were about all gathered together again. Bragg had no choice but to attack the whole army at once. The best plan he could come up with was a thrust at the Federal right, to cut off their line of retreat to Chattanooga. Unfortunately for Bragg, this thought had occurred to Rosecrans as well. The major ingredients for the bloodiest battle of the war in the Western Department (Chickamauga) have begun to gel.
D. Saturday, September 17, 1864: At 9 a.m., General Hampton’s “Beefsteak Raid” is a success, as he is back in Confederate territory. There was so much beef available that Confederate sentries would sometimes offer it in trade to Union sentries in exchange for certain luxury items of which the Federal soldiers had a plentiful supply, but the Confederates lacked. Abraham Lincoln called the raid “the slickest piece of cattle-stealing” he ever heard of. A fictionalized depiction of the raid is featured in the 1966 film Alvarez Kelly.
1. Tuesday, September, 17, 1861: Union Forces Push Forward in Western Virginia. While Confederate forces in Kentucky were pushing forward, in Western Virginia, they were retreating. General Lee and the Army of the Northwest were still licking their wounds after the debacle at Cheat Mountain. Meanwhile, any working relationship had by Generals Wise and Floyd of the Army of the Kanawha was completely gone.
The previous day, General Floyd had ordered his wing of the Army to move eastward and for Wise’s wing to act as a rear guard. This day saw Floyd’s force leave Wise’s force behind. It wouldn’t be long before Floyd missed his rival.
Since the Confederates pulled back from the Gauley River, Union troops under Generals Rosecrans and Cox pushed deeper into Western Virginia, following Floyd and Wise. Cox, who had been faced off against Wise at Gauley Bridge, had established Camp Lookout a few miles west of Big Sewell Mountain and General Wise’s camp (now called Camp Defiance).
Rebel scouts had been seen on the summit of Big Sewell the previous night and Cox was determined to press his own scouts forward, even before General Rosecrans’ orders to do the same had arrived.
In Western Virginia, it was mostly a day of rest. Cox was waiting for his wagons to arrive and hoping that the Confederates would not attack. The Confederates were either in their well-hidden fortifications (Wise) or, unknown to the Union commanders, marching away from the enemy (Floyd).
http://civilwardailygazette.com/albert-sidney-johnston-plans-full-scale-invasion-of-kentucky/
2. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Battle of Munfordville, Kentucky: Nearly 4,000 men under Col. Wilder surrender to Gen. Bragg’s Confederates.
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=September+17%2C+1862
3. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Saint John's Bluff, Florida - On September 17, a Union flotilla of 5 gunboats arrived just offshore at Saint John's Bluff. They opened fire on the Confederate shore batteries, which also fired back at the ships. After awhile, the ships withdrew from the area.
http://www.mycivilwar.com/battles/1862s.html
4. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Munfordsville, Kentucky - On September 17, the Union troops at Munfordsville were forced to surrender to the arriving Confederate forces, commanded by Gen. Braxton Bragg.
http://www.mycivilwar.com/battles/1862s.html
5. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Munfordsville, Kentucky end. After being initially repulsed by a federal garrison of 4,000, Braxton Bragg [CS] laid a brief siege. Federals surrendered on the 17th.
http://blueandgraytrail.com/year/186209
6. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Battle of Sharpsburg (Confederate)/Battle of Antietam (Union). Army of the Potomac under McClellan [US] defeats the Army of Northern Virginia under Lee [CS], resulting in the bloodiest day in American history.
Union losses: 12,401 men 2,108 dead 9,540 wounded 753 missing
Confederate losses: 10, 406 1,546 dead 7,752 wounded 1,108 missing
http://blueandgraytrail.com/year/186209
7. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Antietam Campaign. Capt. William J. Bolton of the 51st Penn writes of this assault which begins about 12:30 PM: “. . . marching as if on regimental drill an sight never to be forgotten by those in that charge, gained the top of the hill overlooking the bridge and in full view. From that moment the regiment received volley after volley of grape, muysktery, shot, and shell, filling our faces and eyes with sand and dirt, all this time reserving our fire. . . . and after the regiment had cleared the fence that intervened between us and the bridge, the order to charge was given by [Colonel] Hartranft, certain death, as it were staring us in the face. We made the dash for the bridge through a perfect hell of shot and shell. . . . all this time the men falling all around, but in a few momnets we commanded the entrance to the bridge. . . . and in less than nine minutes the brigde and the heights beyond were in our possession and beyond dispute. . . . Within the few feet of the bridge a minie ball came crashing through my right lower jaw bone carrying away all the teeth on the right side of my face, both upper and lower jaw, passed through my mouth, and came out on the other side of my face. . . .”
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=September+17%2C+1862
8. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Rebel artilleryman George Michael Neese, in reserve three miles away, describes the battle’s sounds: “At times the artillery fire was so fierce and heavy that it sounded like one continual roar of thunder rumbling and rolling across the sky. The musketry fire was equally severe and raged furiously, almost incessantly all day, and its hideous deathly crash vied with the deafening roar of the thundering artillery. It is utterly incomprehensible and perfectly inconceivable how mortal men can stand and live under such an infantry fire as I heard to-day. Judging from the way the musketry roared the whole surrounding air between the lines must have been thick with flying lead.”
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=September+17%2C+1862
9. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Antietam Campaign. Maj Gen George B. McClellan to his wife in the early afternoon. “We are in the midst of the most terrible battle of the age,” wrote McClellan, who had come to be known as grossly inaccurate when it came to estimations of pretty much everything, was dead on. Before the battle of Sharpsburg, along the winding Antietam Creek was even half over, it was the most terrible battle of the war. “So far God has given us success but with many variations during the day,” he continued, back to his less-than-accurate accounts.
By the time McClellan wrote his wife and to Washington, giving more or less the same story, the morning battles had ended with anything but a full success. Hooker’s First Corps had attacked Stonewall Jackson’s troops from the North Woods through The Cornfield and East Woods. But, even with the addition of Mansfield’s Twelfth Corps, they could not hold the ground they took. The objective had been the ground around The Dunkard Church, which, if captured, would turn General Lee’s flank. Some of Mansfield’s men reached it, driving off Rebel batteries in the assault, but soon they were beaten back like their brethren.
http://civilwardailygazette.com/the-battle-of-antietam/
10. Thursday, September 17, 1863: Josiah Marshall Favill, a young officer in the Army of the Potomac, notes with disfavor in his journal the apparent lassitude and caution of Gen. Meade’s leadership of this army: “September 17th. This is the anniversary of the battle of Antietam; another year of constant campaigning has gone, and still the war lasts. Will it ever end? This is our third year of fighting, and much of the romance of early days has faded away.
Our comrades continually drop by the wayside, causing many changes, some of which are not so agreeable, but we are still firm of purpose and sanguine of our ability to conquer in the end. General Meade, who has been in command of the army since just before Gettysburg, is a very careful officer, not thought to possess any great merit as a general, and has none of the dash and brilliancy which is necessary to popularity. It seems likely we shall be led in a plodding, ordinary sort of way, neither giving nor receiving any serious blows, a great pity. At 9 A. M. the division crossed Cedar and Slaughter mountains, a distance of about seven miles, and then bivouacked for the night.”
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=September+17%2C+1863
11. Thursday, September 17, 1863: Forward echelons of Longstreet's Corps begins arriving in Northwest Georgia.
http://blueandgraytrail.com/year/186309
12. Saturday, September 17, 1864: John C. Fremont withdraws from the race for President.
http://blueandgraytrail.com/year/186409
13. Saturday, September 17, 1864: Lieut. Col. Vincent A. Witcher’s (CSA) begins a 2 week expedition into West Virginia that will include skirmishes at Buckhannon, and as he visits Bulltown, Jacksonville, Westover, Buckhannon, Walkersville and Weston; he will destroy $1,000,000 worth of stores, capture 300 prisoners, and much needed 500 horses and 200 beef-cattle for the ragged Army of Northern Virginia.
https://sites.google.com/site/civilwarhardemancotn/departments/1864/week-179
A Tuesday, September, 17, 1861: The Union takes possession of Ship Island, Mississippi, with the landing party from the U.S.S. Massachusetts. The Island will become an important staging and refueling site for the blockading squadrons.
https://sites.google.com/site/civilwarhardemancotn/departments/department-a/part-23
A+ Tuesday, September, 17, 1861: Union landing party from USS Massachusetts takes possession of Ship Island south of New Orleans, LA. This was the headquarters for ADM David Farragut's Gulf Coast Blockading Squadron.
http://www.marinelink.com/news/september-history-naval335547
B Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Battle of Antietam. Beginning early on the morning of this day in 1862, Confederate and Union troops in the Civil War clash near Maryland’s Antietam Creek in the bloodiest one-day battle in American history.
The Battle of Antietam marked the culmination of Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s first invasion of the Northern states. Guiding his Army of Northern Virginia across the Potomac River in early September 1862, the great general daringly divided his men, sending half of them, under the command of General Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, to capture the Union garrison at Harper’s Ferry.
President Abraham Lincoln put Major General George B. McClellan in charge of the Union troops responsible for defending Washington, D.C., against Lee’s invasion. McClellan’s Army of the Potomac clashed first with Lee’s men on September 14, with the Confederates forced to retreat after being blocked at the passes of South Mountain. Though Lee considered turning back toward Virginia, news of Jackson’s capture of Harper’s Ferry reached him on September 15. That victory convinced him to stay and make a stand near Sharpsburg, Maryland.
Over the course of September 15 and 16, the Confederate and Union armies gathered on opposite sides of Antietam Creek. On the Confederate side, Jackson commanded the left flank with General James Longstreet at the head of the center and right. McClellan’s strategy was to attack the enemy left, then the right, and finally, when either of those movements met with success, to move forward in the center.
When fighting began in the foggy dawn hours of September 17, this strategy broke down into a series of uncoordinated advances by Union soldiers under the command of Generals Joseph Hooker, Joseph Mansfield and Edwin Sumner. As savage and bloody combat continued for eight hours across the region, the Confederates were pushed back but not beaten, despite sustaining some 15,000 casualties. At the same time, Union General Ambrose Burnside opened an attack on the Confederate right, capturing the bridge that now bears his name around 1 p.m. Burnside’s break to reorganize his men allowed Confederate reinforcements to arrive, turning back the Union advance there as well.
By the time the sun went down, both armies still held their ground, despite staggering combined casualties–nearly 23,000 of the 100,000 soldiers engaged, including almost 4,000 dead. McClellan’s center never moved forward, leaving a large number of Union troops that did not participate in the battle. On the morning of September 18, both sides gathered their wounded and buried their dead. That night, Lee turned his forces back to Virginia. His retreat gave President Lincoln the moment he had been waiting for to issue the Emancipation Proclamation, a historic document that turned the Union effort in the Civil War into a fight for the abolition of slavery.
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/battle-of-antietam
B+ Wednesday, September 17, 1862: At 6:00 AM, General McClellan (US) began what would become the single bloodiest day in American military history. He started his attack with an artillery bombardment that turned into more attacks and counterattacks. Lee was soon reinforced, when Stonewall Jackson’s 9,000 men arrived. Although still outnumbered two-to-one, Lee committed his entire force, while McClellan sent in less than three-quarters of his army, enabling Lee to fight the Federals to a standstill. By the end of the day, the Confederates had held their line despite the North’s overwhelming superiority in terms of manpower. The losses for the one-day battle were staggering. Union casualties included 2,108 dead, 9,540 wounded, and 753 missing, while Confederate casualties numbered 1,546 dead, 7,752 wounded, and 1,108 missing. It has been calculated that during the 12 hours the battle lasted, men died at the rate of 35 per minute. It was the bloodiest single day of the War, or in fact in North American history.
https://sites.google.com/site/civilwarhardemancotn/departments/department-b/part-seventy-five
B++ Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Battle of Antietam (or Sharpsburg), Maryland. Eastern Theater, Maryland Campaign
The Bloodiest Single Day in American History.
In what many historians consider the most important battle of the Civil War, Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan of the Army of the Potomac finally launches an attack on Gen. Robert E. Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia, which has taken position on hilly terrain around Sharpsburg, Maryland, where he protects the roads by which is army is concentrating and his escape route across the Potomac at Boteler’s Ford. He is also able to anchor both flanks on the Potomac to prevent the Federals from turning his line, using a large bend in the river. During the night, Stonewall Jackson has come up from Harper’s Ferry to bolster the mere 18,000 Lee had in place: now, there are over 35,000 Confederates in position. McClellan has been in position for nearly two days, and has chosen not to attack until this day. Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker (I Corps) and Maj. Gen. Mansfield (XII Corps) are in position on the west side of Antietam Creek to strike directly southward at Lee’s left flank. Lee, however, has seen the Federal movement, and has hurried reinforcements to his left to counter it.
Little Mac’s battle plan is not known to many; he remains in his headquarters some distance from the battlefield, and ends up launching three separate assaults with three separate parts of his army—and apparently never contemplates striking simultaneously at all parts of the Rebel line, which would likely have destroyed Lee and forced him to surrender, thus bringing an early end to the war.
Part One: Gen. Hooker advances troops from the divisions of Doubleday, Meade, and Ricketts down the Hagerstown Road between the West Woods and the East Woods, into a cornfield owned by a man named Miller. At 5:30 AM, Hooker’s I Corps steps off north of the North Woods – Dunkard Church – East Woods line to push down through the clear area by the church in order to smash the Confederate right, with Mansfield’s XII Corps right behind him.
Hooker’s three divisions push into the Confederate lines with heavy losses on both sides—although on the tactical level, most fights are piecemeal, a brigade at a time. Gen. Lee begins to bleed his right flank (under command of Gen. Longstreet) of units to bolster the beleagured left. He sends Hood with his two-brigade division, and Wofford’s Texas brigade (along with Laws’ Mississippians) smashes into the Federal lines, driving the Yankees back through the cornfield, until Federal reserves decimate the Texas regiments with well-time volley fire.
But Hood’s counterattack breaks the Federal momentum for a time, despite the fact that his brigades suffer 60% casualties. The Union line surges ahead again with Mansfield’s XII Corps, who are mostly green troops; Mansfield advances them in a bunched formation and they take heavy losses from Southern cannon fire. However, Greene’s Division pushes the Rebels back into the West Woods and gets as far as Dunker Church, but then are stuck with no orders.
Union field command problem: McClellan has sent in two corps on the right wing, but has designated no field commander. At any rate, soon Hooker is wounded and carried off the field, and awhile later Mansfield is also mortally wounded at a critical juncture–and the individual brigades settle into just so many disconnected firefights with whichever Rebels are in front of them, having no orders to either advance or withdraw. The fight on the Federal right bogs down.
Part Two: McClellan finally sends in Sumner’s II Corps. Gen. Edwin Sumner, the oldest general in the Army of the Potomac, advances directly westward, cutting across the front of battle, unsure even as to where his fellow Yankees are on the battlefield, so far. Part of Sumner’s men even open fire on their fellow Yankees in the murk of the East Woods.
Somehow, at about 9:00 AM, only Sedgwick’s division arrives, French and Richardson having drifted off to the left, and as this division crosses the front perpendicularly, the Rebels counterattack from the south, striking Sedgwick on the flank, and his formation breaks up. Meanwhile, farther away in the center of the field, French and Richardson deploy their divisions and advance on what appears to be a thinly-held line along a sunken wagon road. It is indeed thinly held, but the cover afforded by the sunken road allows D.H. Hill’s Confederates to shoot down large numbers of the French’s Federals as they advance over open ground. by 10:30 AM, within a mere hour of fighting, French’s division has lost 1,750 men out of 5,700.
Then, Richardson’s division comes up, and renews the assault. Meagher’s famous Irish Brigade, green flags fluttering, makes a gallant assault and breaks the Rebel line for a time. Southern officers are falling, all of Hill’s brigade commanders being hit, and confusion reigns as orders are misunderstood. The Rebels are very thin, and a misunderstanding causes them to retreat. Lee, all this time, is desperately shifting reserves down to his center, to prevent a Yankee breakthrough. Richardson himself is mortally wounded, though, and the advance grinds to a halt. At this point, The Rebels here really have nothing left to resist a resumed Union advance. At this odd moment, Gen. Longstreet and his staff see the peril, and see nothing between them and the Yankee division but a battery of artillery, with most of the crews dead. Lonstreet, wearing carpet slippers, orders his staff to dismount and serve the guns, and they keep up a hot fire. D.H. Hill scrapes together a few stragglers and counterattacks. That–and getting a mortal would himself—convinces Richardson that they cannot push the attack. But for a while, it is clear that a big Federal push would win the day. McClellan feels he must hold on to his reserves and declines to send them in. Two entire Corps—the V Corps, under Porter, and Franklin’s VI Corps.
Part Three: Finally prodded into action by orders he does not receive until 10:00 AM, Gen. Burnside, still miffed over the slight he feels from McClellan’s assignments of command, begins to deploy his troops. He sends troops on several approaches to reach the Rohrbach Bridge (henceforth known as the Burnside Bridge).
On the other side, entrenched in a ridge that dominates the bridge is Gen. Robert Toombs and his brigade–or, rather, part of it, since most of it had been summoned to assist elsewhere. All Toombs has left are two under-strength regiments, the 2nd and 20th Georgia, numbering 400 men plus—only this to face Burnside’s 12,500 men. But this position gives the Georgians a clear field of fire that sweeps down the length of the bridge, and they shoot down nearly every unit coming across. The bridge is littered with dead and dying Federals. Assaulting troops have to run down the ridge, run along the road parallel to the creek, and then dash across in column. Burnside ignores the fact that the creek is fordable, and sends wave after wave to take the bridge. Finally, Ferrero’s brigade, notably the 51st New York and the 51st Pennsylvania, make a desperate dash across the bridge, using a more direct route downhill, and they drive off Toombs and his men. Capt. William J. Bolton of the 51st Penn writes of this assault which begins about 12:30 PM: “. . . marching as if on regimental drill an sight never to be forgotten by those in that charge, gained the top of the hill overlooking the bridge and in full view. From that moment the regiment received volley after volley of grape, muysktery, shot, and shell, filling our faces and eyes with sand and dirt, all this time reserving our fire. . . . and after the regiment had cleared the fence that intervened between us and the bridge, the order to charge was given by [Colonel] Hartranft, certain death, as it were staring us in the face. We made the dash for the bridge through a perfect hell of shot and shell. . . . all this time the men falling all around, but in a few momnets we commanded the entrance to the bridge. . . . and in less than nine minutes the brigde and the heights beyond were in our possession and beyond dispute. . . . Within the few feet of the bridge a minie ball came crashing through my right lower jaw bone carrying away all the teeth on the right side of my face, both upper and lower jaw, passed through my mouth, and came out on the other side of my face. . . .”
The 51st Penn loses 135 men in that attack.
Burnside gains the bridge until Hill counterattacks
Now that the bridge has been gained, Burnside takes another two hours before organizing a force to cross it and deploy on the far side to attack Lee’s right flank. In the meantime, he has sent Gen. Rodman’s division downstream to cross at a more fordable place. He moved his corps across the bridge slowly, and then found that he needed to bring up more ammunition. Finally, by 3:00 PM, Burnside is ready to attack Gen. D. R. Jones’s threadbare division. The Union assault is successful, and Jones pulls back. His line is about to break, and dust on the road and cheers announce the arrival of A.P. Hill’s division from Harper’s Ferry in the nick of time. Hill has lost half of his strength due to straggling, but he attacks Burnside anyway with about 3,000 troops on the Yankee left flank. This blow stops Burnside cold, who is now convinced that he cannot resume the assault. In one more push, he could have turned the flank and captured Lee’s only escape route.
The battle is over, and Hill’s’ counterattack has saved the Confederates from complete destruction. Union Victory.
Losses: Killed Wounded Captured or Missing Total
Union 2,108 9,540 753 12,401
Confederate 1,546 7,752 1,108 10,406
The Army of the Potomac has lost over 25% of those engaged in battle, and the Army of Northern Virginia loses over 33% of its strength present.
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=September+17%2C+1862
C Thursday, September 17, 1863: Confederate General Braxton Bragg, who had defended Tennessee so well for the Confederacy that he was now backed up into northern Georgia. He had a chance for the last week to attack Rosecrans' exceedingly scattered forces. Although several orders had admittedly been issued, for one reason or another no actual attacks had taken place. By now the Union troops were about all gathered together again. Bragg had no choice but to attack the whole army at once. The best plan he could come up with was a thrust at the Federal right, to cut off their line of retreat to Chattanooga. Unfortunately for Bragg, this thought had occurred to Rosecrans as well. The major ingredients for the bloodiest battle of the war in the Western Department (Chickamauga) have begun to gel.
https://sites.google.com/site/civilwarhardemancotn/departments/department-c/week-127
C+ Thursday, September 17, 1863: Gen. Longstreet’s two divisions, under McLaws and Hood, begin to arrive at Ringgold, Georgia by railroad. Bragg now has all of the reinforcements he can get, and outnumbers Rosecrans by about 65,000 to 60,000. Col. Minty’s Federal cavalry scouts notice this arrival and confirm it. Minty reports to Gen. Crittenden, who ignores the report and refuses to pass it on to his superior, Gen. Rosecrans, insisting that Longstreet was in Virginia.
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=September+17%2C+1863
D Saturday, September 17, 1864: At 9 a.m., General Hampton’s “Beefsteak Raid” is a success, as he is back in Confederate territory. There was so much beef available that Confederate sentries would sometimes offer it in trade to Union sentries in exchange for certain luxury items of which the Federal soldiers had a plentiful supply, but the Confederates lacked. Abraham Lincoln called the raid “the slickest piece of cattle-stealing” he ever heard of. A fictionalized depiction of the raid is featured in the 1966 film Alvarez Kelly.
https://sites.google.com/site/civilwarhardemancotn/departments/1864/week-179
FYI GySgt Jack Wallace CWO4 Terrence Clark SMSgt Lawrence McCarter LTC Trent Klug SFC Bernard WalkoSSG Franklin Briant SSG Byron Howard Sr CPL Ronald Keyes Jr SFC William Farrell CMDCM John F. "Doc" Bradshaw SPC Lyle MontgomeryPO2 Marco MonsalveSPC Woody Bullard SSG Michael Noll SSG Bill McCoy SFC David Reid, M.S, PHR, SHRM-CP, DTMSgt Christopher Collins SPC (Join to see) SPC Gary C. PO3 Lynn Spalding
In 1861, CSA Gen A.S. Johnson made plans to seize Kentucky for the confederacy. President Abraham Lincoln was focused on protecting the capital of Washington, DC and directed that two regiments be sent from the west [U.S. Grants forces] to the east in Virginia.
Tuesday, September, 17, 1861: CSA Gen Albert Sidney Johnston planned full scale invasion of Kentucky. “Before the War, Albert Sidney Johnston commanded the United States Department of the Pacific. When word finally reached California that Texas had seceded from the Union, he joined up with the Los Angeles Mounted Rifles, a secessionist outfit, and headed through the desert in the middle of summer, passed through a warring New Mexico, finally arriving in Richmond in early September. There, President Davis, who had known Johnston since their days together at West Point and through the Mexican War, found him the perfect match for the much-needed commander of Department Number Two, the Trans-Mississippi.
Johnston then moved by rail to Nashville and assessed the situation. By this time, Confederate General Polk had seized Columbus on the Mississippi River and US Grant had taken Paducah on the Tennessee and Ohio Rivers, both violating Kentucky’s neutrality. Kentucky’s legislature demanded both to withdraw.
It was clear that the Union forces, who had quickly built Fort Holt at Paducah, were planning on staying. Johnston then decided to move the bulk of his troops into Kentucky.
To defend Kentucky’s neutrality, Governor Beriah Magoffin appointed Simon Bolivar Buckner commander of the state militia. He was twice offered a commission as a General in the United States Army, once by General-in-Chief Winfield Scott and again by Secretary of War Simon Cameron, under the orders of President Lincoln. He declined, wishing to remain neutral, like his state.
After General Polk’s Confederates took Columbus, Kentucky, Bolivar accepted a commission as Brigadier-General in the Confederate Army. Most of his militiamen followed suit.
On this date, General A.S. Johnston ordered General Buckner and his 5,000 men to board trains at Nashville and head to Bowling Green. This would flesh out the Confederate line, keeping southern Kentucky firmly in the South. Also, it would protect northern Tennessee, covering the main turnpikes and railroads through that portion of the state.
In all, General A.S. Johnston had about 30,000 troops to hold the Trans-Mississippi. He was outnumbered two to one. Geographically, the features were against him. The Mississippi River severed his command in half and the Ohio River protected the North.
Johnston devised a plan of defense. Kentucky would be the battleground. He divided the state into three parts, giving each to one of his commanders. General Felix Zollicoffer would command at Cumberland Ford in Eastern Kentucky [near modern day Pineville, close to Barbourville on the map]. Buckner commanded what would soon be known as the Army of Central Kentucky at Bowling Green. Western Kentucky and the Mississippi River were already under the command of General Polk.
Though the Confederate line was thin, the Union line wasn’t in much better shape. Union forces were split between two departments. General Fremont commanded the Western Department from St. Louis and had control over General Grant’s force at Paducah. General Anderson (of Fort Sumter fame) commanded the Department of Kentucky at Louisville and had troops at Camp Dick Robinson, near Danville.
Kentucky had gone from neutral to besieged in two short weeks.
http://civilwardailygazette.com/albert-sidney-johnston-plans-full-scale-invasion-of-kentucky/
Tuesday, September, 17, 1861: Brig Gen Ulysses S. Grant inhaled. Not yet knowing of Albert Sidney Johnston’s push into Kentucky, President Lincoln had ordered Maj Gen John C. Fremont in St. Louis to furnish 5,000 troops to be used in Virginia. In an attempt to comply, Fremont ordered Brig Gen Grant to send two of his regiments to Virginia.
Since moving into Kentucky, Grant’s small force had built Fort Holt at Paducah, captured Smithland and continued probing east and south. Fremont’s compliance with Lincoln’s orders, however, forced Grant to put a halt to his explorations and move his lines back to Fort Holt.
Fremont, believing that he was greatly outnumbered by Johnston’s forces and being completely overwhelmed by siege at Lexington, begged Washington to allow him to send only those two regiments.
http://civilwardailygazette.com/albert-sidney-johnston-plans-full-scale-invasion-of-kentucky/
Thursday, September 17, 1863: Chickamauga '63 Braxton Bragg resumes the march which was suspended – “Bragg starts, stops, and starts again. Braxton Bragg, Confederate commander of the Army of Tennessee had a plan. Originally, it had been a good plan, with roads and river crossings selected. He knew what he wanted, knew how to accomplish it, and in all likelihood could have pulled it off. But he didn’t. The plan was reduced to orders which looked very little like the plan as originally conceived. Still, it was something. Some troops would be moving, some objectives detailed, and though no crossings would be crossed, they would be guarded and held.
But even this didn’t happen. Before the sun peered from the east, Bragg countermanded the orders and his entire army remained in place. Shortly after abandoning Chattanooga, Bragg’s troops marched roughly thirty miles south and now held a scattered front stretching from La Fayette on the left to Ringgold on the right (though the concentration was closer to the former than the latter).
Bragg was opposed by William Rosecrans’ Union Army of the Cumberland, which held the mountain passes opposite his position. Their left was anchored along Chickamauga Creek at Lee & Gordon’s Mill. The Federal right had been even farther south than Bragg’s flank at La Fayette, but was slowly making its way north in an attempt at concentration.
Bragg’s plan had been to slide the Rebel army between the Union left and their supply base at Chattanooga. The original plan accomplished this, while the orders did not. The countermanding accomplished nothing, except allowing time for Rosecrans to gather together his entire army. But not even Rosecrans was ready for a fight and seemed to have only the vaguest of notions that one might soon be upon him (though with the way Bragg was generaling, perhaps not).
Confederate reinforcements were now arriving and they were not going unnoticed by the Federal cavalry. Two divisions of James Longstreet’s Corps from the Army of Northern Virginia had taken trains from their namesake and were now arriving at Catoosa Station, near Ringgold. For a day, Col. Robert Minty, Union cavalry commander, had been convinced that the Rebels were massing on the Federal left. While this wasn’t quite true, it was surprisingly advantageous, predicting Bragg’s original plan. On the morning of this date, Col. Minty reported to Thomas Crittenden, commander of the XXI Corps holding the Union left, that Confederate reinforcements were arriving.
General Crittenden flat out ignored the reports. When Minty insisted that they weren’t just any Rebels, but Longstreet’s entire corps, Crittenden actually laughed at him. “Longstreet is in Virginia,” he scoffed. But General Rosecrans wasn’t so quick to brush this new information away. Word had come from Washington that something along those lines was happening, and now it was all adding up. By the end of the day, three of Longstreet’s brigades (under Jerome Robertson, Henry Benning, and John Gregg) would be at Catoosa. The rest of Longstreet’s Corps, as well as the General himself, were two days out, though this was unknown to Minty.
Sometime in the afternoon, Braxton Bragg came back to his senses and uncountermanded his previously countermanded orders. “Division commanders will resume the march which was suspended this morning,” came the new old orders. But even this was scaled back. There was to be a general concentration near Rock Spring, but not even the crossings were to be held. On the right, Leonidas Polk’s Corps remained in position nearest to the Federal left. At the other end of the line, D.H. Hill’s Corps remained near La Fayette. It was only Simon Buckner’s and W.H.T. Walker’s Corps that moved at all, and it was only a slide to the right to reinforce Polk.
Finally, before the day was out, Rosecrans was certain that Bragg was heavy on his left. There was even a small brush up in the streets of Ringgold between the Federal Cavalry and Robertson’s Brigade from Hood’s Division. The sides were coming together and bullets, like sparks, were flying.
While Rosecrans braced his army, Bragg worked long through evening and darkness to come up with a new plan. He decided that the following morning was the time to attack. But like his other plans and orders, this new new plan was halfhearted. It completely left out both Polk’s and Hill’s Corps (as well as any of Longstreet’s men), instead, it sent Buckner and Walker splashing across Chickamauga Creek with little instruction on what to do when they got to the other side. Of course, come dawn, Bragg would probably again change his mind, so these troubles hardly mattered.
Through the night, more and more Confederate reinforcements arrived, their trains chuffing and blowing into Catoosa Station. Col. Minty, helming the Federal Cavalry, knew exactly what was going on, but all his warnings and reports were met by General Crittenden, holding the Union left, as mere annoyances. “The Rebel army is retreating,” he somehow said with a straight face, “and are trying to get away some of their abandoned stores; they have nothing but dismounted cavalry in your front.” Come dawn, even with Bragg’s ever-changing machinations, Crittenden might be proved wildly wrong.
http://civilwardailygazette.com/resume-the-march-which-was-suspended-bragg-starts-stops-and-starts-again/
In 1864, Grant Visits Sheridan While Early Divides His Forces. Grant had his own plans, probably tucked away in his pocket. “General Grant had left his headquarters at City Point on the 15th, bound for Philip Sheridan’s army east of Winchester. “My purpose was to have him attack [Jubal] Early, or drive him out of the valley and destroy that source of supplies for Lee’s army,” wrote Grant in his memoirs. He decided not to stop in Washington, preferring to deliver his orders by hand directly to Sheridan. Otherwise, he feared that his orders “would be stopped there and such orders as Halleck’s caution (and that of the Secretary of War) would suggest would be given instead, and would, no doubt, be contradictory to mine.”
Grant arrived in Charlestown on the 16th and on this date called Sheridan to his side. They met in the Rutherford House and constructed the next move to be made.
“When Sheridan arrived I asked him if he had a map showing the positions of his army and that of the enemy,” recalled Grant after the war. “He at once drew one out of his side pocket, showing all roads and streams, and the camps of the two armies. He said that if he had permission he would move so and so (pointing out how) against the Confederates, and that he could ‘whip them.'”
“I went over the situation very thoroughly,” wrote Sheridan about the meeting, “and pointed out with so much confidence the chances of a complete victory should I throw my army across the Valley pike near Newtown that he fell in with the plan at once, authorized me to resume the offensive, and to attack Early as soon as I deemed it most propitious to do so; and although before leaving City Point he had outlined certain operations for my army, yet he neither discussed nor disclosed his plans, my knowledge of the situation striking him as being so much more accurate than his own.”
Sheridan’s plan was actually fairly simple. He would through the bulk of his troops against the Valley Pike at New town, south of Winchester. His cavalry would then invest the town, fully cutting off Early’s lines of supply and communication. This would force the Rebels to fight, and to do so on ground chosen by Sheridan. If all went well, he would indeed whip them.
Sheridan had learned of the location of Early’s forces the day previous, and built his plan accordingly. But on this date, Jubal Early made a move of his own. Splitting his forces, he marched with two divisions – half his army – in the direction of Martinsburg to the north, leaving behind two divisions along the Opequon north of Winchester. His mind was to fall upon the B&O Railroad, though it might be a risk to do so.
With the cavalry commanded by Lunsford Lomax in the vanguard, Early pushed north, sending a brigade to destroy a railroad bridge west of Martinsburg. The infantry, moving more slowly, wound up around Bunker Hill with Sheridan being none the wiser. He would not learn until the following morning that Early had divided his forces.”
http://civilwardailygazette.com/grant-visits-sheridan-while-early-divides-his-forces/
Below are several journal entries from 1862, 1863 and 1866 which shed light on what life was like for soldiers and civilians – the good, the bad and the ugly. In 1864 Lt Gen U.S. Grant called Maj Gen Philip Sheridan to his side in Charlestown, WV. They met in the Rutherford House and constructed the next move to be made.
Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Antietam Campaign. Maj Gen George B. McClellan to his wife in the early afternoon. “We are in the midst of the most terrible battle of the age,” wrote McClellan, who had come to be known as grossly inaccurate when it came to estimations of pretty much everything, was dead on. Before the battle of Sharpsburg, along the winding Antietam Creek was even half over, it was the most terrible battle of the war. “So far God has given us success but with many variations during the day,” he continued, back to his less-than-accurate accounts.
By the time McClellan wrote his wife and to Washington, giving more or less the same story, the morning battles had ended with anything but a full success. Hooker’s First Corps had attacked Stonewall Jackson’s troops from the North Woods through The Cornfield and East Woods. But, even with the addition of Mansfield’s Twelfth Corps, they could not hold the ground they took. The objective had been the ground around The Dunkard Church, which, if captured, would turn General Lee’s flank. Some of Mansfield’s men reached it, driving off Rebel batteries in the assault, but soon they were beaten back like their brethren.
Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Antietam Campaign. Capt. William J. Bolton of the 51st Penn writes of this assault which begins about 12:30 PM: “. . . marching as if on regimental drill an sight never to be forgotten by those in that charge, gained the top of the hill overlooking the bridge and in full view. From that moment the regiment received volley after volley of grape, muysktery, shot, and shell, filling our faces and eyes with sand and dirt, all this time reserving our fire. . . . and after the regiment had cleared the fence that intervened between us and the bridge, the order to charge was given by [Colonel] Hartranft, certain death, as it were staring us in the face. We made the dash for the bridge through a perfect hell of shot and shell. . . . all this time the men falling all around, but in a few moments we commanded the entrance to the bridge. . . . and in less than nine minutes the bridge and the heights beyond were in our possession and beyond dispute. . . . Within the few feet of the bridge a minie ball came crashing through my right lower jaw bone carrying away all the teeth on the right side of my face, both upper and lower jaw, passed through my mouth, and came out on the other side of my face. . .”
Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Rebel artilleryman George Michael Neese, in reserve three miles away, describes the battle’s sounds: “At times the artillery fire was so fierce and heavy that it sounded like one continual roar of thunder rumbling and rolling across the sky. The musketry fire was equally severe and raged furiously, almost incessantly all day, and its hideous deathly crash vied with the deafening roar of the thundering artillery. It is utterly incomprehensible and perfectly inconceivable how mortal men can stand and live under such an infantry fire as I heard to-day. Judging from the way the musketry roared the whole surrounding air between the lines must have been thick with flying lead.”
Thursday, September 17, 1863: Josiah Marshall Favill, a young officer in the Army of the Potomac, notes with disfavor in his journal the apparent lassitude and caution of Gen. Meade’s leadership of this army: “September 17th. This is the anniversary of the battle of Antietam; another year of constant campaigning has gone, and still the war lasts. Will it ever end? This is our third year of fighting, and much of the romance of early days has faded away.
Our comrades continually drop by the wayside, causing many changes, some of which are not so agreeable, but we are still firm of purpose and sanguine of our ability to conquer in the end. General Meade, who has been in command of the army since just before Gettysburg, is a very careful officer, not thought to possess any great merit as a general, and has none of the dash and brilliancy which is necessary to popularity. It seems likely we shall be led in a plodding, ordinary sort of way, neither giving nor receiving any serious blows, a great pity. At 9 A. M. the division crossed Cedar and Slaughter mountains, a distance of about seven miles, and then bivouacked for the night.”
Saturday, September 17, 1864: Lt Gen U.S. Grant had arrived in Charlestown on the 16th and on this date he called Maj Gen Philip Sheridan to his side. They met in the Rutherford House and constructed the next move to be made.
“When Sheridan arrived I asked him if he had a map showing the positions of his army and that of the enemy,” recalled Grant after the war. “He at once drew one out of his side pocket, showing all roads and streams, and the camps of the two armies. He said that if he had permission he would move so and so (pointing out how) against the Confederates, and that he could ‘whip them.'”
“I went over the situation very thoroughly,” wrote Sheridan about the meeting, “and pointed out with so much confidence the chances of a complete victory should I throw my army across the Valley pike near Newtown that he fell in with the plan at once, authorized me to resume the offensive, and to attack Early as soon as I deemed it most propitious to do so; and although before leaving City Point he had outlined certain operations for my army, yet he neither discussed nor disclosed his plans, my knowledge of the situation striking him as being so much more accurate than his own.”
Pictures: 1862-09-17 General Thomas Stonewall Jackson, September 17, 1862, 0930 Dunker Church; 1862-09-17 Now Is the Pinch - The Battle of Antietam, Maryland; 1862-09-17 The Bloodiest Day - September 17, 1862 - Antietam; 1862-09-17 BURNSIDE'S BRIDGE Antietam Creek, Maryland
A. Tuesday, September 17, 1861: A Union landing party from USS Massachusetts took possession of Ship Island south of New Orleans, LA. This was the headquarters for ADM David Farragut's Gulf Coast Blockading Squadron. The Island became an important staging and refueling site for the blockading squadrons.
B. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Antietam Campaign. Beginning early on the morning of this day in 1862, Confederate and Union troops in the Civil War clash near Maryland’s Antietam Creek in the bloodiest one-day battle in American history.
The Battle of Antietam marked the culmination of Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s first invasion of the Northern states. Guiding his Army of Northern Virginia across the Potomac River in early September 1862, the great general daringly divided his men, sending half of them, under the command of General Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, to capture the Union garrison at Harper’s Ferry.
President Abraham Lincoln put Major General George B. McClellan in charge of the Union troops responsible for defending Washington, D.C., against Lee’s invasion. McClellan’s Army of the Potomac clashed first with Lee’s men on September 14, with the Confederates forced to retreat after being blocked at the passes of South Mountain. Though Lee considered turning back toward Virginia, news of Jackson’s capture of Harper’s Ferry reached him on September 15. That victory convinced him to stay and make a stand near Sharpsburg, Maryland.
Over the course of September 15 and 16, the Confederate and Union armies gathered on opposite sides of Antietam Creek. On the Confederate side, Jackson commanded the left flank with General James Longstreet at the head of the center and right. McClellan’s strategy was to attack the enemy left, then the right, and finally, when either of those movements met with success, to move forward in the center.
When fighting began in the foggy dawn hours of September 17, this strategy broke down into a series of uncoordinated advances by Union soldiers under the command of Generals Joseph Hooker, Joseph Mansfield and Edwin Sumner. As savage and bloody combat continued for eight hours across the region, the Confederates were pushed back but not beaten, despite sustaining some 15,000 casualties. At the same time, Union General Ambrose Burnside opened an attack on the Confederate right, capturing the bridge that now bears his name around 1 p.m. Burnside’s break to reorganize his men allowed Confederate reinforcements to arrive, turning back the Union advance there as well.
By the time the sun went down, both armies still held their ground, despite staggering combined casualties–nearly 23,000 of the 100,000 soldiers engaged, including almost 4,000 dead. McClellan’s center never moved forward, leaving a large number of Union troops that did not participate in the battle. On the morning of September 18, both sides gathered their wounded and buried their dead. That night, Lee turned his forces back to Virginia. His retreat gave President Lincoln the moment he had been waiting for to issue the Emancipation Proclamation, a historic document that turned the Union effort in the Civil War into a fight for the abolition of slavery.
C. Thursday, September 17, 1863: Forward echelons of CSA Lt Gen James Longstreet's Corps began arriving in Northwest Georgia. CSA Maj Gen Lafayette McLaws and Maj Gen John Bell Hood divisions began to arrive at Ringgold, Georgia by railroad. Bragg now had all the reinforcements he could get, and outnumbered Rosecrans by about 65,000 to 60,000. Col. Minty’s Federal cavalry scouts notice this arrival and confirm it. Minty reports to Gen. Crittenden, who ignores the report and refuses to pass it on to his superior, Gen. Rosecrans, insisting that Longstreet was in Virginia.
Confederate General Braxton Bragg, who had defended Tennessee so well for the Confederacy that he was now backed up into northern Georgia. He had a chance for the last week to attack Rosecrans' exceedingly scattered forces. Although several orders had admittedly been issued, for one reason or another no actual attacks had taken place. By now the Union troops were about all gathered together again. Bragg had no choice but to attack the whole army at once. The best plan he could come up with was a thrust at the Federal right, to cut off their line of retreat to Chattanooga. Unfortunately for Bragg, this thought had occurred to Rosecrans as well. The major ingredients for the bloodiest battle of the war in the Western Department (Chickamauga) have begun to gel.
D. Saturday, September 17, 1864: At 9 a.m., General Hampton’s “Beefsteak Raid” is a success, as he is back in Confederate territory. There was so much beef available that Confederate sentries would sometimes offer it in trade to Union sentries in exchange for certain luxury items of which the Federal soldiers had a plentiful supply, but the Confederates lacked. Abraham Lincoln called the raid “the slickest piece of cattle-stealing” he ever heard of. A fictionalized depiction of the raid is featured in the 1966 film Alvarez Kelly.
1. Tuesday, September, 17, 1861: Union Forces Push Forward in Western Virginia. While Confederate forces in Kentucky were pushing forward, in Western Virginia, they were retreating. General Lee and the Army of the Northwest were still licking their wounds after the debacle at Cheat Mountain. Meanwhile, any working relationship had by Generals Wise and Floyd of the Army of the Kanawha was completely gone.
The previous day, General Floyd had ordered his wing of the Army to move eastward and for Wise’s wing to act as a rear guard. This day saw Floyd’s force leave Wise’s force behind. It wouldn’t be long before Floyd missed his rival.
Since the Confederates pulled back from the Gauley River, Union troops under Generals Rosecrans and Cox pushed deeper into Western Virginia, following Floyd and Wise. Cox, who had been faced off against Wise at Gauley Bridge, had established Camp Lookout a few miles west of Big Sewell Mountain and General Wise’s camp (now called Camp Defiance).
Rebel scouts had been seen on the summit of Big Sewell the previous night and Cox was determined to press his own scouts forward, even before General Rosecrans’ orders to do the same had arrived.
In Western Virginia, it was mostly a day of rest. Cox was waiting for his wagons to arrive and hoping that the Confederates would not attack. The Confederates were either in their well-hidden fortifications (Wise) or, unknown to the Union commanders, marching away from the enemy (Floyd).
http://civilwardailygazette.com/albert-sidney-johnston-plans-full-scale-invasion-of-kentucky/
2. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Battle of Munfordville, Kentucky: Nearly 4,000 men under Col. Wilder surrender to Gen. Bragg’s Confederates.
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=September+17%2C+1862
3. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Saint John's Bluff, Florida - On September 17, a Union flotilla of 5 gunboats arrived just offshore at Saint John's Bluff. They opened fire on the Confederate shore batteries, which also fired back at the ships. After awhile, the ships withdrew from the area.
http://www.mycivilwar.com/battles/1862s.html
4. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Munfordsville, Kentucky - On September 17, the Union troops at Munfordsville were forced to surrender to the arriving Confederate forces, commanded by Gen. Braxton Bragg.
http://www.mycivilwar.com/battles/1862s.html
5. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Munfordsville, Kentucky end. After being initially repulsed by a federal garrison of 4,000, Braxton Bragg [CS] laid a brief siege. Federals surrendered on the 17th.
http://blueandgraytrail.com/year/186209
6. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Battle of Sharpsburg (Confederate)/Battle of Antietam (Union). Army of the Potomac under McClellan [US] defeats the Army of Northern Virginia under Lee [CS], resulting in the bloodiest day in American history.
Union losses: 12,401 men 2,108 dead 9,540 wounded 753 missing
Confederate losses: 10, 406 1,546 dead 7,752 wounded 1,108 missing
http://blueandgraytrail.com/year/186209
7. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Antietam Campaign. Capt. William J. Bolton of the 51st Penn writes of this assault which begins about 12:30 PM: “. . . marching as if on regimental drill an sight never to be forgotten by those in that charge, gained the top of the hill overlooking the bridge and in full view. From that moment the regiment received volley after volley of grape, muysktery, shot, and shell, filling our faces and eyes with sand and dirt, all this time reserving our fire. . . . and after the regiment had cleared the fence that intervened between us and the bridge, the order to charge was given by [Colonel] Hartranft, certain death, as it were staring us in the face. We made the dash for the bridge through a perfect hell of shot and shell. . . . all this time the men falling all around, but in a few momnets we commanded the entrance to the bridge. . . . and in less than nine minutes the brigde and the heights beyond were in our possession and beyond dispute. . . . Within the few feet of the bridge a minie ball came crashing through my right lower jaw bone carrying away all the teeth on the right side of my face, both upper and lower jaw, passed through my mouth, and came out on the other side of my face. . . .”
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=September+17%2C+1862
8. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Rebel artilleryman George Michael Neese, in reserve three miles away, describes the battle’s sounds: “At times the artillery fire was so fierce and heavy that it sounded like one continual roar of thunder rumbling and rolling across the sky. The musketry fire was equally severe and raged furiously, almost incessantly all day, and its hideous deathly crash vied with the deafening roar of the thundering artillery. It is utterly incomprehensible and perfectly inconceivable how mortal men can stand and live under such an infantry fire as I heard to-day. Judging from the way the musketry roared the whole surrounding air between the lines must have been thick with flying lead.”
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=September+17%2C+1862
9. Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Antietam Campaign. Maj Gen George B. McClellan to his wife in the early afternoon. “We are in the midst of the most terrible battle of the age,” wrote McClellan, who had come to be known as grossly inaccurate when it came to estimations of pretty much everything, was dead on. Before the battle of Sharpsburg, along the winding Antietam Creek was even half over, it was the most terrible battle of the war. “So far God has given us success but with many variations during the day,” he continued, back to his less-than-accurate accounts.
By the time McClellan wrote his wife and to Washington, giving more or less the same story, the morning battles had ended with anything but a full success. Hooker’s First Corps had attacked Stonewall Jackson’s troops from the North Woods through The Cornfield and East Woods. But, even with the addition of Mansfield’s Twelfth Corps, they could not hold the ground they took. The objective had been the ground around The Dunkard Church, which, if captured, would turn General Lee’s flank. Some of Mansfield’s men reached it, driving off Rebel batteries in the assault, but soon they were beaten back like their brethren.
http://civilwardailygazette.com/the-battle-of-antietam/
10. Thursday, September 17, 1863: Josiah Marshall Favill, a young officer in the Army of the Potomac, notes with disfavor in his journal the apparent lassitude and caution of Gen. Meade’s leadership of this army: “September 17th. This is the anniversary of the battle of Antietam; another year of constant campaigning has gone, and still the war lasts. Will it ever end? This is our third year of fighting, and much of the romance of early days has faded away.
Our comrades continually drop by the wayside, causing many changes, some of which are not so agreeable, but we are still firm of purpose and sanguine of our ability to conquer in the end. General Meade, who has been in command of the army since just before Gettysburg, is a very careful officer, not thought to possess any great merit as a general, and has none of the dash and brilliancy which is necessary to popularity. It seems likely we shall be led in a plodding, ordinary sort of way, neither giving nor receiving any serious blows, a great pity. At 9 A. M. the division crossed Cedar and Slaughter mountains, a distance of about seven miles, and then bivouacked for the night.”
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=September+17%2C+1863
11. Thursday, September 17, 1863: Forward echelons of Longstreet's Corps begins arriving in Northwest Georgia.
http://blueandgraytrail.com/year/186309
12. Saturday, September 17, 1864: John C. Fremont withdraws from the race for President.
http://blueandgraytrail.com/year/186409
13. Saturday, September 17, 1864: Lieut. Col. Vincent A. Witcher’s (CSA) begins a 2 week expedition into West Virginia that will include skirmishes at Buckhannon, and as he visits Bulltown, Jacksonville, Westover, Buckhannon, Walkersville and Weston; he will destroy $1,000,000 worth of stores, capture 300 prisoners, and much needed 500 horses and 200 beef-cattle for the ragged Army of Northern Virginia.
https://sites.google.com/site/civilwarhardemancotn/departments/1864/week-179
A Tuesday, September, 17, 1861: The Union takes possession of Ship Island, Mississippi, with the landing party from the U.S.S. Massachusetts. The Island will become an important staging and refueling site for the blockading squadrons.
https://sites.google.com/site/civilwarhardemancotn/departments/department-a/part-23
A+ Tuesday, September, 17, 1861: Union landing party from USS Massachusetts takes possession of Ship Island south of New Orleans, LA. This was the headquarters for ADM David Farragut's Gulf Coast Blockading Squadron.
http://www.marinelink.com/news/september-history-naval335547
B Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Battle of Antietam. Beginning early on the morning of this day in 1862, Confederate and Union troops in the Civil War clash near Maryland’s Antietam Creek in the bloodiest one-day battle in American history.
The Battle of Antietam marked the culmination of Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s first invasion of the Northern states. Guiding his Army of Northern Virginia across the Potomac River in early September 1862, the great general daringly divided his men, sending half of them, under the command of General Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, to capture the Union garrison at Harper’s Ferry.
President Abraham Lincoln put Major General George B. McClellan in charge of the Union troops responsible for defending Washington, D.C., against Lee’s invasion. McClellan’s Army of the Potomac clashed first with Lee’s men on September 14, with the Confederates forced to retreat after being blocked at the passes of South Mountain. Though Lee considered turning back toward Virginia, news of Jackson’s capture of Harper’s Ferry reached him on September 15. That victory convinced him to stay and make a stand near Sharpsburg, Maryland.
Over the course of September 15 and 16, the Confederate and Union armies gathered on opposite sides of Antietam Creek. On the Confederate side, Jackson commanded the left flank with General James Longstreet at the head of the center and right. McClellan’s strategy was to attack the enemy left, then the right, and finally, when either of those movements met with success, to move forward in the center.
When fighting began in the foggy dawn hours of September 17, this strategy broke down into a series of uncoordinated advances by Union soldiers under the command of Generals Joseph Hooker, Joseph Mansfield and Edwin Sumner. As savage and bloody combat continued for eight hours across the region, the Confederates were pushed back but not beaten, despite sustaining some 15,000 casualties. At the same time, Union General Ambrose Burnside opened an attack on the Confederate right, capturing the bridge that now bears his name around 1 p.m. Burnside’s break to reorganize his men allowed Confederate reinforcements to arrive, turning back the Union advance there as well.
By the time the sun went down, both armies still held their ground, despite staggering combined casualties–nearly 23,000 of the 100,000 soldiers engaged, including almost 4,000 dead. McClellan’s center never moved forward, leaving a large number of Union troops that did not participate in the battle. On the morning of September 18, both sides gathered their wounded and buried their dead. That night, Lee turned his forces back to Virginia. His retreat gave President Lincoln the moment he had been waiting for to issue the Emancipation Proclamation, a historic document that turned the Union effort in the Civil War into a fight for the abolition of slavery.
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/battle-of-antietam
B+ Wednesday, September 17, 1862: At 6:00 AM, General McClellan (US) began what would become the single bloodiest day in American military history. He started his attack with an artillery bombardment that turned into more attacks and counterattacks. Lee was soon reinforced, when Stonewall Jackson’s 9,000 men arrived. Although still outnumbered two-to-one, Lee committed his entire force, while McClellan sent in less than three-quarters of his army, enabling Lee to fight the Federals to a standstill. By the end of the day, the Confederates had held their line despite the North’s overwhelming superiority in terms of manpower. The losses for the one-day battle were staggering. Union casualties included 2,108 dead, 9,540 wounded, and 753 missing, while Confederate casualties numbered 1,546 dead, 7,752 wounded, and 1,108 missing. It has been calculated that during the 12 hours the battle lasted, men died at the rate of 35 per minute. It was the bloodiest single day of the War, or in fact in North American history.
https://sites.google.com/site/civilwarhardemancotn/departments/department-b/part-seventy-five
B++ Wednesday, September 17, 1862: Battle of Antietam (or Sharpsburg), Maryland. Eastern Theater, Maryland Campaign
The Bloodiest Single Day in American History.
In what many historians consider the most important battle of the Civil War, Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan of the Army of the Potomac finally launches an attack on Gen. Robert E. Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia, which has taken position on hilly terrain around Sharpsburg, Maryland, where he protects the roads by which is army is concentrating and his escape route across the Potomac at Boteler’s Ford. He is also able to anchor both flanks on the Potomac to prevent the Federals from turning his line, using a large bend in the river. During the night, Stonewall Jackson has come up from Harper’s Ferry to bolster the mere 18,000 Lee had in place: now, there are over 35,000 Confederates in position. McClellan has been in position for nearly two days, and has chosen not to attack until this day. Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker (I Corps) and Maj. Gen. Mansfield (XII Corps) are in position on the west side of Antietam Creek to strike directly southward at Lee’s left flank. Lee, however, has seen the Federal movement, and has hurried reinforcements to his left to counter it.
Little Mac’s battle plan is not known to many; he remains in his headquarters some distance from the battlefield, and ends up launching three separate assaults with three separate parts of his army—and apparently never contemplates striking simultaneously at all parts of the Rebel line, which would likely have destroyed Lee and forced him to surrender, thus bringing an early end to the war.
Part One: Gen. Hooker advances troops from the divisions of Doubleday, Meade, and Ricketts down the Hagerstown Road between the West Woods and the East Woods, into a cornfield owned by a man named Miller. At 5:30 AM, Hooker’s I Corps steps off north of the North Woods – Dunkard Church – East Woods line to push down through the clear area by the church in order to smash the Confederate right, with Mansfield’s XII Corps right behind him.
Hooker’s three divisions push into the Confederate lines with heavy losses on both sides—although on the tactical level, most fights are piecemeal, a brigade at a time. Gen. Lee begins to bleed his right flank (under command of Gen. Longstreet) of units to bolster the beleagured left. He sends Hood with his two-brigade division, and Wofford’s Texas brigade (along with Laws’ Mississippians) smashes into the Federal lines, driving the Yankees back through the cornfield, until Federal reserves decimate the Texas regiments with well-time volley fire.
But Hood’s counterattack breaks the Federal momentum for a time, despite the fact that his brigades suffer 60% casualties. The Union line surges ahead again with Mansfield’s XII Corps, who are mostly green troops; Mansfield advances them in a bunched formation and they take heavy losses from Southern cannon fire. However, Greene’s Division pushes the Rebels back into the West Woods and gets as far as Dunker Church, but then are stuck with no orders.
Union field command problem: McClellan has sent in two corps on the right wing, but has designated no field commander. At any rate, soon Hooker is wounded and carried off the field, and awhile later Mansfield is also mortally wounded at a critical juncture–and the individual brigades settle into just so many disconnected firefights with whichever Rebels are in front of them, having no orders to either advance or withdraw. The fight on the Federal right bogs down.
Part Two: McClellan finally sends in Sumner’s II Corps. Gen. Edwin Sumner, the oldest general in the Army of the Potomac, advances directly westward, cutting across the front of battle, unsure even as to where his fellow Yankees are on the battlefield, so far. Part of Sumner’s men even open fire on their fellow Yankees in the murk of the East Woods.
Somehow, at about 9:00 AM, only Sedgwick’s division arrives, French and Richardson having drifted off to the left, and as this division crosses the front perpendicularly, the Rebels counterattack from the south, striking Sedgwick on the flank, and his formation breaks up. Meanwhile, farther away in the center of the field, French and Richardson deploy their divisions and advance on what appears to be a thinly-held line along a sunken wagon road. It is indeed thinly held, but the cover afforded by the sunken road allows D.H. Hill’s Confederates to shoot down large numbers of the French’s Federals as they advance over open ground. by 10:30 AM, within a mere hour of fighting, French’s division has lost 1,750 men out of 5,700.
Then, Richardson’s division comes up, and renews the assault. Meagher’s famous Irish Brigade, green flags fluttering, makes a gallant assault and breaks the Rebel line for a time. Southern officers are falling, all of Hill’s brigade commanders being hit, and confusion reigns as orders are misunderstood. The Rebels are very thin, and a misunderstanding causes them to retreat. Lee, all this time, is desperately shifting reserves down to his center, to prevent a Yankee breakthrough. Richardson himself is mortally wounded, though, and the advance grinds to a halt. At this point, The Rebels here really have nothing left to resist a resumed Union advance. At this odd moment, Gen. Longstreet and his staff see the peril, and see nothing between them and the Yankee division but a battery of artillery, with most of the crews dead. Lonstreet, wearing carpet slippers, orders his staff to dismount and serve the guns, and they keep up a hot fire. D.H. Hill scrapes together a few stragglers and counterattacks. That–and getting a mortal would himself—convinces Richardson that they cannot push the attack. But for a while, it is clear that a big Federal push would win the day. McClellan feels he must hold on to his reserves and declines to send them in. Two entire Corps—the V Corps, under Porter, and Franklin’s VI Corps.
Part Three: Finally prodded into action by orders he does not receive until 10:00 AM, Gen. Burnside, still miffed over the slight he feels from McClellan’s assignments of command, begins to deploy his troops. He sends troops on several approaches to reach the Rohrbach Bridge (henceforth known as the Burnside Bridge).
On the other side, entrenched in a ridge that dominates the bridge is Gen. Robert Toombs and his brigade–or, rather, part of it, since most of it had been summoned to assist elsewhere. All Toombs has left are two under-strength regiments, the 2nd and 20th Georgia, numbering 400 men plus—only this to face Burnside’s 12,500 men. But this position gives the Georgians a clear field of fire that sweeps down the length of the bridge, and they shoot down nearly every unit coming across. The bridge is littered with dead and dying Federals. Assaulting troops have to run down the ridge, run along the road parallel to the creek, and then dash across in column. Burnside ignores the fact that the creek is fordable, and sends wave after wave to take the bridge. Finally, Ferrero’s brigade, notably the 51st New York and the 51st Pennsylvania, make a desperate dash across the bridge, using a more direct route downhill, and they drive off Toombs and his men. Capt. William J. Bolton of the 51st Penn writes of this assault which begins about 12:30 PM: “. . . marching as if on regimental drill an sight never to be forgotten by those in that charge, gained the top of the hill overlooking the bridge and in full view. From that moment the regiment received volley after volley of grape, muysktery, shot, and shell, filling our faces and eyes with sand and dirt, all this time reserving our fire. . . . and after the regiment had cleared the fence that intervened between us and the bridge, the order to charge was given by [Colonel] Hartranft, certain death, as it were staring us in the face. We made the dash for the bridge through a perfect hell of shot and shell. . . . all this time the men falling all around, but in a few momnets we commanded the entrance to the bridge. . . . and in less than nine minutes the brigde and the heights beyond were in our possession and beyond dispute. . . . Within the few feet of the bridge a minie ball came crashing through my right lower jaw bone carrying away all the teeth on the right side of my face, both upper and lower jaw, passed through my mouth, and came out on the other side of my face. . . .”
The 51st Penn loses 135 men in that attack.
Burnside gains the bridge until Hill counterattacks
Now that the bridge has been gained, Burnside takes another two hours before organizing a force to cross it and deploy on the far side to attack Lee’s right flank. In the meantime, he has sent Gen. Rodman’s division downstream to cross at a more fordable place. He moved his corps across the bridge slowly, and then found that he needed to bring up more ammunition. Finally, by 3:00 PM, Burnside is ready to attack Gen. D. R. Jones’s threadbare division. The Union assault is successful, and Jones pulls back. His line is about to break, and dust on the road and cheers announce the arrival of A.P. Hill’s division from Harper’s Ferry in the nick of time. Hill has lost half of his strength due to straggling, but he attacks Burnside anyway with about 3,000 troops on the Yankee left flank. This blow stops Burnside cold, who is now convinced that he cannot resume the assault. In one more push, he could have turned the flank and captured Lee’s only escape route.
The battle is over, and Hill’s’ counterattack has saved the Confederates from complete destruction. Union Victory.
Losses: Killed Wounded Captured or Missing Total
Union 2,108 9,540 753 12,401
Confederate 1,546 7,752 1,108 10,406
The Army of the Potomac has lost over 25% of those engaged in battle, and the Army of Northern Virginia loses over 33% of its strength present.
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=September+17%2C+1862
C Thursday, September 17, 1863: Confederate General Braxton Bragg, who had defended Tennessee so well for the Confederacy that he was now backed up into northern Georgia. He had a chance for the last week to attack Rosecrans' exceedingly scattered forces. Although several orders had admittedly been issued, for one reason or another no actual attacks had taken place. By now the Union troops were about all gathered together again. Bragg had no choice but to attack the whole army at once. The best plan he could come up with was a thrust at the Federal right, to cut off their line of retreat to Chattanooga. Unfortunately for Bragg, this thought had occurred to Rosecrans as well. The major ingredients for the bloodiest battle of the war in the Western Department (Chickamauga) have begun to gel.
https://sites.google.com/site/civilwarhardemancotn/departments/department-c/week-127
C+ Thursday, September 17, 1863: Gen. Longstreet’s two divisions, under McLaws and Hood, begin to arrive at Ringgold, Georgia by railroad. Bragg now has all of the reinforcements he can get, and outnumbers Rosecrans by about 65,000 to 60,000. Col. Minty’s Federal cavalry scouts notice this arrival and confirm it. Minty reports to Gen. Crittenden, who ignores the report and refuses to pass it on to his superior, Gen. Rosecrans, insisting that Longstreet was in Virginia.
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=September+17%2C+1863
D Saturday, September 17, 1864: At 9 a.m., General Hampton’s “Beefsteak Raid” is a success, as he is back in Confederate territory. There was so much beef available that Confederate sentries would sometimes offer it in trade to Union sentries in exchange for certain luxury items of which the Federal soldiers had a plentiful supply, but the Confederates lacked. Abraham Lincoln called the raid “the slickest piece of cattle-stealing” he ever heard of. A fictionalized depiction of the raid is featured in the 1966 film Alvarez Kelly.
https://sites.google.com/site/civilwarhardemancotn/departments/1864/week-179
FYI GySgt Jack Wallace CWO4 Terrence Clark SMSgt Lawrence McCarter LTC Trent Klug SFC Bernard WalkoSSG Franklin Briant SSG Byron Howard Sr CPL Ronald Keyes Jr SFC William Farrell CMDCM John F. "Doc" Bradshaw SPC Lyle MontgomeryPO2 Marco MonsalveSPC Woody Bullard SSG Michael Noll SSG Bill McCoy SFC David Reid, M.S, PHR, SHRM-CP, DTMSgt Christopher Collins SPC (Join to see) SPC Gary C. PO3 Lynn Spalding
Albert Sidney Johnston Plans Full Scale Invasion of Kentucky
Tuesday, September 17, 1861 Before the War, Albert Sidney Johnston commanded the United States Department of the Pacific. When word finally reached California that Texas had seceded from the Union,…
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SFC William Farrell
Even more than 170 years later, its still sad to see our dead on the battlefield LTC Stephen F.
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LTC Stephen F.
Thank you friend and brother-in-Christ TSgt Joe C. for letting us know you consider all of teh events I listed as significant for September 17 during the US Civil War
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