Battle Of Antietam
The Battle of Antietam was fought on September 17, 1862. The United States
Army of the Potomac led by General George B. McClellan fought against the
Confederate Army of Northern Virginia led by General Robert E. Lee. The battle
was fought along the Antietam Creek near Sharpsburg, Maryland. Both of the
armies were densely concentrated in the Sharpsburg area, and it was a very
bloody battle. The Union Army lost over twelve thousand men, while the
Confederate Army lost around ten thousand men. General Robert E. Lee narrowly
escaped defeat this battle and the lack of men cause him and his army to retreat
back in to Virginia. Lee had good reason for wanting to bring Maryland into the
Confederacy. With having Maryland, he would have good location to attack the
major cities like Washington D.C. and Philadelphia. It would also give him a
chance to get to the rich farmland of the North that would give his army
supplies of food. Lee split up his army of fifty thousand men, sending
“Stonewall” Jackson to capture the Union arsenal at Harper’s Ferry. He told
James Longstreet to move north towards Hagerstown, Maryland. Smaller groups were
left with the task of guarding against McClellan’s troops. Even with all the
planning, his adventure seemed to be doomed from the very beginning. The people
of Maryland did not give Lee and his Confederate troops a happy welcome. Instead
of being treated like heroes as Lee thought, they were treated like invaders.
Even the secessionist from Maryland did not like the idea of the Confederacy
invading their state. Lee was setback once again when a letter containing his
plan of attacks and the locations of all Confederate troops were found by a
Union private near Frederick, Maryland. If McClellan had moved quickly, he could
have easily crushed Lee’s army and ended the whole war altogether. But McClellan
did not move quickly enough and within twenty-four hours, Lee learned of his
danger and pulled his troops to Sharpsburg. On September 15, “Stonewall” Jackson
captured Harper’s Ferry and was moving to join up with Lee at Sharpsburg. When
Lee arrived at Sharpsburg, he met Longstreet and, with their troops, they
occupied a ridge overlooking the Antietam Creek. Later on during that very same
day, McClellan’s troops, under the command of Major General Ambrose Burnside
came up and occupied the other side of the creek. Longstreet was horribly
outnumbered, almost five to one, but McClellan did not order the attack.
Instead, he took an entire and studied the situation. During the time McClellan
took to study the situation, Jackson’s forces rejoined Lee, and another
Confederate division under the command of General A.P. Hill, was moving to join
Lee. On September 17, 1862, the Battle of Antietam, or Sharpsburg, began. There
was a massive attack of cannon and rifle fire. General Joseph Hooker’s men
crushed the Rebel troops. Only a counterattack by a Texan force kept the Yankees
from breaking the Confederate line. Hooker threw his troops up against the
Rebels, causing heavy losses. Several hours later, General Mansfield’s Union
Corps struck at Hood’s men in the second Union attack.
Mansfield was killed
almost instantly, but that did no stop the fighting that just raged on and for
hours the pattern attack and retreat was just repeated. Neither side seemed to
get the clear advantage. In the third attack of the day, General Sumner’s Corps
found themselves caught in a pocket and in a matter of minutes, over 2,000 men
fell to the ground. The fourth Union attack of the day, two other divisions of
Sumner’s Corps were met by Daniel Harvey Hill’s troops at a suknen road in the
middle of the Confederate position. Since this was the site of some of the most
bitter and desperate fighting of the day, that area was called The Bloody Lane.
The Union troops just kept on pushing forward and finally reached a position
that overlooked the entire battlefield. At this point, McClellan had another
chance to end the battle just by sending a large-scale attack from their high
ground, but the call never came. After trying to cross the creek over the
bridge, which is now named after him, General Ambrose Burnside rushed the
Burnside Bridge and captured it, only to find that most of the Rebels had
withdrawn and gone to the hills above. He then gathered his troops and began to
march on Sharpsburg. It seemed that his victory was inevitable because Lee had
no more reserve units to stop him. But suddenly, A.P. Hill arrived with his men
from Harper’s Ferry and drove the Yankees back to Antietam Creek. Because of
Hill’s arrival, Lee narrowly escaped defeat. Because of the many men that were
killed or wounded, the Battle of Antietam is called “the bloodiest single day of
the war”.
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