Silicon Magician Presents: A Photographic Tour of Shiloh

[SiliconMagician]

Okay.

Now we move to the center to the hellish combat of the Oak Thicket of the Hornet's Nest. The combat here ranks up there with Little Round Top and The Bloody Lane. In fact, one of the oddest things is that, as I will show you, the terrain in front of the sunken road through Duncan Field is an almost exact reversal of that of Antietam. Instead of the Confederates holding a Sunken road on a reverse slope defense, we have the Union holding a sunken road on a reverse slope defense, with the exact same predictable results. Lot's a death, lots of carnage, and little to show for it. Though the confederates did eventually surround and force Prentiss' men to surrender, which is more than the union got at Antietam.

So, here I will start at my favorite spot in the entire park. The point in the day, when after assaulting 4 times across Duncan Field and failing, Shaver's Brigade was thrown into it's last, most hellish meat grinder. Shaver was given the mission to assault through the woods and take the oak thicket and the sunken road that ran through the center of it.

Unfortanately for Shaver, and Lt. Col Dean of the 7th Arkansas, this short stretch of forested sunken road was held by a full regiment from Iowa, the elite artillery batteries of Hickenlooper and Munch, supporting each other expertly, and the handful of remnants from the fight at Spain Field.. remember the 300 or so from that Brigade who made it to the thicket? They have tablets here to. The action was hottest of the entire day right here at the this spot. First, I give you.. Shaver's Brigade Tablet.



Then.. you look up from the tablet, and this is what you see.



Yes.. That is Hickenlooper's battery of expert artillerymen, and that distance I paced off at 60 yards. These madmen, crazed with battle rage, having made at least a half dozen or more charges all over the field, now faced down that cannister shot at 60yds or less, supported by infantry. It was hell.

Here is the view back from Hickenlooper's POV, the tablet is clearly visible.



Some of these old logs still have bullet holes in them. How they managed to survive 150 years of rot is beyond me, many of them are so fragile they look ready to fall apart, but there are scars there in the wood of the biggest trees.







Here are the remnants of the 18th Missouri and other men from Prentiss' Second Brigade, that is why the tablets are so close together, just down the road across that bridge is another set of tablets where a Mississippi regiment actually got into the lines and engaged in serious hand to hand combat. The red tablet is mixed in with the blue ones.








Here was literally a place where you walked on a carpet of the dead.

[SiliconMagician]

Having covered the most brutal combat of the day, we move to the right where the combat was equally hard, if longer distanced than the brutal struggle for the wood.

We move to the sunken road behind the Duncan Field. The Duncan Field is big, it also has a low ridge running right through the center of it. General Ruggles later used this quirk in the land to his advantage to finally take the nest, but an entire day it would take.

Here we will follow one brigade, Anderson's Brigade of Ruggle's Division. Anderson had already been in heavy combat in Rhea Field against Waterhouse and the men of the 53rd Ohio who supported him. I'll let Reed describe the events at Waterhouse's Battery on up to the attack through Duncan Field.

" The Seventeenth Louisiana, of this brigade, made three separate charges upon the Fifty-third Ohio camp. In the second and third charges the left wing of the regiment passed to the left of the Rhea House around the point of the ridge. The Confederate response and Florida battalions attempted-in conjunction with the Eleventh Louisiana, of Russell's brigade-to cross the ridge, but were repulsed. This position was finally carried by the combined attacks of the right regiments of Cleburne, Anderson, and Johnson, and the left regiments of Russell's brigade. During the struggle the Washington Artillery, together with artillery of the other brigades, occupied the high ground in the rear and rendered valuable aid in the attack. The Twentieth Louisiana and Ninth Texas, on the left, were twice repulsed, but with reenforcements carried the position held by Buckland's brigade and joined the right regiments in an advance upon McClernand's second position at the crossroads, where the brigade was partially reorganized and was engaged in front of Marsh's brigade camp. About noon it joined Trabue in his engagement with McDowell's brigade. At 3 p.m. this brigade moved directly east along the Pittsburg road to Duncan Field, where the battery was placed in Ruggles's artillery line and the infantry moved to the right, where it joined other troops in an attack at the Hornets' nest, where it was repulsed, and the Twentieth Louisiana retired from the field. The other regiments returned to the attack and followed the retiring Union troops to the place of surrender."

Here is the view of Duncan Field from Munch's Battery, just inside the Oak Thicket. The ridgeline is clearly visible, with the just the bare top of a regimental monument visible on the slope behind the ridge.




Here is the view from the Confederate Side towards the Union positions in the sunken road behind Duncan Field as seen from the left of Ruggles Battery. In desperation, General Ruggles gathered together every cannon within hundreds of yards into a grand battery and pounded the far end of Duncan Field and the Hornets Nest, while at the same time assaulting the far right flank of Duncan Field. His forces got around the Union right flank and undid the positions in the Duncan Field, forcing them back towards Hickenlooper and Munch's Batteries inside the Hornet's Nest thicket visible on the right behind the trees and beginning the left flank of the envelopment that led to Prentiss' ultimate Surrender.



Unfortunately all my close up shots from the Sunken Road are missing for some reason, I'm sure they are misplaced in a folder somewhere. In the meantime, if you look at the photo above to the left, you will see the beginning of the ridgeline, Ruggles used this ridgeline to hide his batteries from counterfire attack from the many union batteries that were lined up in Duncan Field. If you get to this spot, you will see how smart Ruggles was in placing his Grand battery.

[SiliconMagician]

We now move back to the far left, behind the Peach Orchard to the Bloody Pond. Actually I prefer to call it "The Bloody Puddle", because the thing is only about 6 or 8 inches deep in the center. You won't even get your knees wet. It's just a stagnant swamp hole, probably prone to breeding mosquitoes, but if you are a desperate, wounded solider of either side or pack animal. This is where you crawled to get a last sip of "water" before dying.



Inside those woods is where Prentiss' made his last stand before surrendering the Hornets nest.




This is the view down the barrel of Mendenhall's Battery across the pond towards the Peach Orchard, which resides just behind the woodline. This is a 2nd day battery site. Honestly, all the tablets and batteries make for a confusing jumble if one doesn't know the monumentation. Plenty of signs around to teach people, but even a dedicated CW nerd myself had a hardtime figuring out parts of the field. I'm still discovering things now as I post these photos and place them in context and compare them to the maps I brought back with me.

[SiliconMagician]

So, that is really about it. I only had so much battery power and couldn't possibly cover everything that is out there. Even if there weren't a battlefield, it is a good place to hike. Hike I did aplenty of. So, I will finish up now with various "odds and ends" pics. Usually of the death markers of various commanders besides Johnston such as Peabody, Gladden and Wallace.

I didn't take a whole lot of pictures of individual monuments because as I said, battery power was limited and I was interested in more of a grand tactical picture of each field, rather than individual monuments with no context, which would have done nothing for me over the years and a monument without a context at Shiloh is just that.. a monument.


First off, I located some pictures of the Northern or Right Flank of the Duncan Field. Those are union batteries that were posted to guard the flank along with infantry. This was the position that was rolled up and forced back behind me to the Hornet's Nest









This is a shot from inside the peach orchard looking west towards the union regiments that held it against Johnston's personal attentions.




Here are the death or mortal wounding site monuments. I recommend looking each one up to get the full story. Peabody was killed in his camp, supposedly bayonetted by Rebs. Wallace was killed while leading remnants to safety outside the hornets nest just prior to Prentiss' Surrender. Gladden died leading the confederate charge against the 2nd Brigade at the base of Spain field.













Confederate Burial Trench near the Hornets Nest.




This is a closeup of the tablets at Jones Field on Sherman's Last Line of Defense.





The famous Tennessee Monument in Woolfe Field.



As I find other pics I will post them here but this is the vast majority. This only scratches the surface really of what is out there. Thanks for reading!

This photo tour is my way of following the request written on the 2nd Tennessee monument near Shiloh Church.

"Go Stranger, and tell Tennessee that here we died for her."

[Little Powell]

Thanks for taking the time to post these, Silicon. Your photographic tours put mine to shame..

[SiliconMagician]

Thanks man, but really. Shiloh profoundly affected me in a way that Gettysburg and Antietam did not. After seeing that nasty piece of forested ground myself, I can say that without a doubt, the Confederate Soldier was the baddest ass man to walk the Earth and carry a rifle. Sure, the Prussians by this time would have laughed at the half naked, barefoot army of Johnston. With their squirrel guns and brown bess rifles and worn out cannon pulled from Revolutionary war monuments around the South. Their Floppy trail hats and brogans. Their louse, ridden unshaven bodies. But if a brigade of Prussians was so equipped, would they have had the balls to charge the Hornet's Nest?

So could Prussian Landwehr go naked and starving, sick with horrendous water borne illnesses some armed with nothing but pikes when the battle began. Could they do what Shaver did? Could they run into the teeth of the union brigade that held the high ground adjacent to the peach orchard and do better? I'm not so sure.

The Confederate Army did not lose Shiloh so much as they didn't quite win. Had the commander of the Union Force been any other General than Ulysees S Grant.. the Union armyw ould have jumped on their boats and set up defensive positions on the far side of the river on the night of April 6th.

During the General's Breakfast at the Cherry Mansion, the reenactor playing Grant told the story of after the battle, Grant was standing outside a field hospital in the driving rain, when Sherman came up to him. Sherman, and the rest of Grant's staff, were of the opinion that they should fall back onto the river boats and cross over to the other side of the Tennessee. But, knowing Grant, he hedged.

"Well Grant, looks like we've had the devil's own day."(or something to that effect)

Grant looked up from under the brim of his hat, the rain pouring off the brim and looked Sherman in the eye and said..

"Yup...lick 'em tomorrow though."

Sherman instantly dropped the idea of suggesting to Grant that they withdraw across the river.

But how does one measure victory? We do it by points. But what if by losing, Johnston still won, because he slowed the Union advance by weeks. Also, the men that came back to Corinth all had new weapons, provided by the Union Army. If Johnston hadn't died. I believe he would have simply packed up on the night of the 6th every piece of union equipment on the field in his possession and left back to the Corinth a much better armed and equipped force, happy to have inflicted brutal damage on the Union army and getting away with most of their equipment. Grant would have been humiliated, and Halleck would have the ammunition he would've needed to have him sacked over Lincoln's desires. Johnston's living wouldn't have changed the outcome at Shiloh, except that he would've known that it was time to cut losses and leave, where Beauregard, a lesser general, did not.

The Union advantage in artillery was decisive. Waterhouse, Hickenlooper, Munch.. and many many more artillerymen saved the Union. It was cannister and solid shot that decided Shiloh as much as musketry and bayonet. I was overwhelmed by the amount of cannon the Union army carried with it. Then again, Ruggles gathered over 50 cannon into his Grand Battery.

This battle was so unusual, so unique and dreadful in it's own way. It is by far, without a doubt, the best Civil war experience in my life, and I truly feel like it was an honor to stand on that ground and then tell their story. Even if it's just to this game's community.

[SiliconMagician]

LOL.. I like to read open source books written by contemporaries and veterans of the civil war. Here is one I found on Project Gutenberg by a Private in Hurlbut's Division at Shiloh. It's filled with that classic soldiers wit and humor about the battle.

For instance, he cracks a joke about packing in 14 deep in a Sibley tent and sharing lice and fleas. Him coming from an upper middle class background and having attended college it was a big adjustment for him. He refers to the common louse as "the socialistic greyback" and jokes about democratic equality in the tents.

"But in time our camp was fairly established. Sibley tents were distributed, one for fourteen men. They protected us from the rain, but they had their drawbacks. Several of us were schoolmates from a Western college, and, of course, in some respects, constituted a little aristocracy. We had had a small tent to ourselves, and the socialistic grayback, as yet, had not crawled therein. Now, we were required to share our tent with others, and that might mean a great many. But when it came to a question of sleeping out in the cold rain, or camping down in a crowded tent in true democratic equality and taking the chances of immigration from our neighbors' clothing, we did not prefer the rain."

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/24548/2 ... 4548-h.htm

Funny how Americans didn't like socialism, even in 1862

[Little Powell]

Thanks man, but really. Shiloh profoundly affected me

One of the best feelings in the world for us history buffs.. Those moments when you're touring a field, viewing an old picture, or just reading a book.. When you have to just take a deep breath and say "wow". Words can't describe.. Last time I had that moment was standing on top of Buford's knoll at Brandy Station. Being the only living soul for miles, and I swear I could hear the sound of thousands of horse hooves pounding the ground, sabers clanking, and could smell the gunpowder..

Sounds like Shiloh offers many opportunities for those moments--gotta get out there one of these days. My good friend Dave W (former NSD team member) has said many times "just let me know when and I'll meet you there". One of these days..

[SiliconMagician]

Yes. I know.. Necro thread. But I was going through some folders, cleaning things out of the drive and I came across these photos from my trip to shiloh that I didn't post. Thought some of you guys would be interested anyway.

So.

This is a hillock across the road from Shiloh Church where an brigade of Ohioans held up Cleburne and Anderson's brigades long enough for Sherman to set up his first real defensive line at Woolfe Field. This was a very nasty fight, with many casualties and the hillside in front was littered with bodies. This position was never taken by assault instead the Ohio brigade retreated in good order after they were outflanked on both flanks.





Here are some pictures of Duncan Field, which was the immediate right flank of the hornets nest.





Here is the Cherry Mansion where Grant had his headquarters. Read the Plaque because it tells a funny story about Grant's alleged drunkenness on the day of the battle.







Peach Orchard:

[JC Edwards]

Thank you for this Silicone ...... especially the shots of the Hornet's Nest and Bloody Pond.

JC