Chickamauga stands as the Granite Forest of the West, a counterpoint to Gettysburg. The battlefield lies much more scattered than you find at the Granite Forest of the East. The battlelines here ebbed and flowed during the two main days of battle. One of the largest groupings of granite monuments stands atop Horseshoe Ridge where for five and a half hours, Federal forces staved off total defeat following the catastrophic rupture of their lines along Lafayette Road.
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If you start wandering about the battlefields of the American Civil War you might start noticing names appearing on more than one battlefield. One such name is George Maney of Tennessee. A recent trip took me out onto the fields of Chickamauga where our group, led by the indomitable David Powell and National Park historian James Ogden, wandered in the footsteps of Maney’s brigade on both 19 and 20 September 1863. Maney’s brigade fought hard on those two days. While they did not achieve greatness, turning the tide of the battle in one direction or the other, they stayed steady.
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Chickamauga was a battle full of high drama at various stages of the long battle. An excellent case concerns the arrival of the Federal Reserve Corps.
Brigadier General John Beatty stood on Snodgrass Hill along with Major General George Thomas looking off to the north. The Federals chance of holding the line on the afternoon of 20 September 1863 seemed more tenuous by the minute. “We saw off to our rear the banners and glittering guns of a division coming towards us, and we became agitated by doubt and hope. Are they friends of foes?” Still too far off to ascertain exactly, Thomas became agitated as his hand shook, raising his field glass to observe. “Take my glass, some of you whose horse stands steady – tell me what you can see.”
Two officers went to check for sure the identity of the newcomers to the party brewing on Horseshoe Ridge. They waved their hats after the meeting signaling the identity was not foe by friend. Gordon Granger and his Reserve Corps arrived and Thomas with his remaining Cumberlanders felt relief at the addition of 3,819 Federals attempting to salvage something from a very long day at Chickamauga.
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As the dawn rose over the smoking hulk of Fort Sumter and the war clouds finally erupted in a blaze of gun shells zeroing in on the former protector of Charleston, South Carolina, the widely dispersed forces of the Regular Army of the United States began to gather facing the storm as it lashed across the landscape. In the west, Regular Army regiments formed into what became the Regular Brigade.
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The number of monuments and marker you can find in some of the National Battlefield Parks preserving American Civil War battlefields can simply numb you. Granite monuments form literal forests inside some National Battlefield Parks from the American Civil War. Each monument does have a story, even those not as fancy, expensive and artistic as others. If you want to see all of them, say in a day or so – a true monumental dash, you will need to put on your running shoes – boots, in some cases, depending on the weather.
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Walking out onto a Civil War battlefield, one can become bogged down by maps and monuments – regimental, State, and others. Most of the major battlefields lie preserved within the National Park Service today, though there are a few important exceptions – Perryville, Resaca, Atlanta, Bentonville, are some of those not within the federal system. And how and why did the actions occur on those battlefields. Here, we dive a bit into the actual tactics used during the Civil War.
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Lookout Mountain is an amazing place to discover nature, history and enjoy vistas reaching out to a claimed seven states. The Mountain is best explored on foot along its myriad of trails traversing the dense forest slopes of this quintessential Appalachian prominence. Surrounded to the north, east and on top by urbanity, it is easy to forget you are never far from civilization if not for the subtle roar of traffic on Interstate 24 far below.
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The second deadliest battle of the American Civil War, Chickamauga is nowhere near as well-known as other battles such as Gettysburg, Antietam, or Vicksburg. The first two were fought by the Army of the Potomac, the main Federal army fighting in the eastern theater of the war centered on Virginia. If this army had been destroyed, the Federal cause would have been defeated. Neither Gettysburg nor Antietam were large-scale Federal victories. They both were emphatic ending notes to the two invasions of the Northern States in 1862 and 1863 by General Robert E. Lee and his Confederate Army of Northern Virginia. Vicksburg meant the Confederate States were split into two as Federal control over the Mississippi came into being.
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Oregon in its early days featured many folks who by today’s standards would score very low with Political Correctness points. James Willis Nesmith falls into that category, but with some redeeming qualities. One of Oregon’s first politicians, his time began with the Provisional Government, extending through the Territorial period well into Oregon’s early Statehood years. A member of the so-called Salem Clique, a group of Democratically inclined politicians who were prominent in that era, Nesmith outlasted the Clique’s breakup with the Civil War, serving as one of Oregon’s senators through the war years.
He was one of only eight Democratic senators – four Border State Democrats and four Union Democrats – to vote in favor of the 13th Amendment outlawing slavery. He abstained from the senate vote on the 14th allowing equal rights to all citizens under the law. Here, he was following the lead of President Andrew Johnson, a fellow Unionist. His allegiance to his fellow Democrat would cost him in the years to come.
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