Antietam National Battlefield, along Antietam Creek in Sharpsburg, Maryland, commemorates the American Civil War Battle of Antietam, September 17, 1862.

In the Battle of Antietam, General Robert E. Lee's first invasion of the North was ended on this battlefield in 1862. 23,000 soldiers were killed, wounded or missing after twelve hours of savage combat on September 17, 1862. The Battle of Antietam ended the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia’s first invasion into the North and led to Abraham Lincoln’s issuance of the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation.

Robert Gould Shaw served as a Captain in the 2nd Massachusetts Infantry and was wounded in the Cornfield at Antietam before taking command of the 54th Massachusetts Infantry made famous in the movie Glory.

Alexander Gardner's photographs of Antietam were the first ever images to show dead soldiers on the field of battle. A New York Times article about the photographs said it was if the "dead had been laid at our doorsteps."

Antietam Battle Description

The Battle of Antietam (or Sharpsburg) on September 17, 1862, climaxed the first of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee's two attempts to carry the war into the North. About 40,000 Southerners were pitted against the 87,000-man Federal Army of the Potomac under Gen. George B. McClellan. And when the fighting ended, the course of the American Civil War had been greatly altered.

After his great victory at Manassas in August, Lee had marched his Army of Northern Virginia into Maryland, hoping to find vitally needed men and supplies. McClellan followed, first to Frederick (where through rare good fortune a copy of the Confederate battle plan, Lee's Special Order No. 191, fell into his hands), then westward 12 miles to the passes of South Mountain. There on September 14, at Turner's, Fox's, and Crampton's gaps, Lee tried to block the Federals. But because he had split his army to send troops under Gen. Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson to capture Harpers Ferry, Lee could only hope to delay the Northerners. McClellan forced his way through, and by the afternoon of September 15 both armies had established new battle lines west and east of Antietam Creek near the town of Sharpsburg. When Jackson's troops reached Sharpsburg on the 16th, Harpers Ferry having surrendered the day before, Lee consolidated his position along the low ridge that runs north and south of the town.

The battle opened at dawn on the 17th when Union Gen. Joseph Hooker's artillery began a murderous fire on Jackson's men in the Miller cornfield north of town. "In the time I am writing," Hooker reported, "every stalk of corn in the northern and greater part of the field was cut as closely as could have been done with a knife, and the slain lay in rows precisely as they had stood in their ranks a few moments before." Hooker's troops advanced, driving the Confederates before them, and Jackson reported that his men were "exposed for near an hour to a terrific storm of shell, canister, and musketry."

About 7 a.m. Jackson was reinforced and succeeded in driving the Federals back. An hour later Union troops under Gen. Joseph Mansfield counterattacked and by 9 o'clock had regained some of the lost ground. Then, in an effort to extricate some of Mansfield's men from their isolated position near the Dunker Church, Gen. John Sedgwick's division of Edwin V. Sumner's corps advanced into the West Woods. There Confederate troops struck Sedgwick's men on both flanks, inflicting appalling casualties.

Meanwhile, Gen. William H. French's division of Sumner's corps moved up to support Sedgwick but veered south into Confederates under Gen. D. H. Hill posted along an old sunken road separating the Roulette and Piper farms. For nearly 4 hours, from 9:30 a.m. to 1 p.m., bitter fighting raged along this road (afterwards known as Bloody Lane) as French, supported by Gen. Israel B. Richardson's division, also of Sumner's corps, sought to drive the Southerners back. Confusion and sheer exhaustion finally ended the battle here and in the northern part of the field generally.

Southeast of town, Union Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside's troops had been trying to cross a bridge over Antietam Creek since 9:30 a.m. Some 400 Georgians had driven them back each time. At 1 p.m. the Federals finally crossed the bridge (now known as Burnside Bridge) and, after a 2-hour delay to reform their lines, advanced up the slope beyond. By late afternoon they had driven the Georgians back almost to Sharpsburg, threatening to cut off the line of retreat for Lee's decimated Confederates. Then about 4 p.m. Gen. A. P. Hill's division, left behind by Jackson at Harpers Ferry to salvage the captured Federal property, arrived on the field and immediately entered the fight. Burnside's troops were driven back to the heights near the bridge they had earlier taken. The Battle of Antietam was over. The next day Lee began withdrawing his army across the Potomac River.

Could it be that the Civil War's greatest piece of intelligence, Lee's Special Orders 191, was deliberately passed into Union hands?

Who Lost the Lost Order?
Of any other possible suspects, Henry Kyd Douglas comes closest to fitting the circumstantial evidence: he was in a position to act for Jackson;

Henry Kyd Douglas, the youngest staff officer for Gen. Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson was a native of the Sharpsburg area. His family home was just 4 miles west of the Battlefield. His uniform and personal library are part of the Battlefield collection.

Henry "Kyd" Douglas
One of the more highly regarded Confederate memoirs is that by Henry Kyd Douglas (I RODE WITH STONEWALL), and it is here that we find one of the more ...

http://www.gdg.org/Research/People/kdouglas.html

Special Orders, No. 191 HEADQUARTERS, ARMY OF NORTHERN VIRGINIA September 9th, 1862 The Army will resume its march to-morrow, taking the Hagerstown road. General Jackson's command will form the advance, and after passing Middletown, with such portions as he may select, take the route toward Sharpsburg, cross the Potomac at the most convenient point, and by Friday night take possession of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, capture such of the enemy as may be at Martinsburg, and intercept such as may attempt to escape from Harper's Ferry. General Longstreeet's command will pursue the same road as far as Boonsboro', where it will halt with the reserve, supply, and baggage trains of the army. General McLaws with his own division and that of General R.H. Anderson, will follow General Longstreet; on reaching Middletown he will take the route to Harper's Ferry, and by Friday morning possess himself of the Maryland Heights and endeavor to capture the enemy at Harper's Ferry and vicinity. General Walker, with his division after accomplishing the object in which he is now engaged, will cross the Potomac at Check's ford, ascend its right bank to Lovettsville, take possession of Loudoun Heights, if practicable, by Friday morning, Keyes's ford on his left, and the road between the end of the mountain and the Potomac on his right. He will, as far as practicable, cooperate with General McLaws and General Jackson in intercepting the retreat of the enemy. General D.H. Hill's division will form the rearguard of the army, pursuing the road taken by the main body. The reserve artillery, ordnance, and supply trains, etc., will precede General Hill. General Stuart will detach a squadron of cavalry to accompany the commands of Generals Longstreet, Jackson , and McLaws, and, with the main body of the cavalry, will cover the route of the army and bring up all stragglers that may have been left behind. The commands of Generals Jackson, McLaws, and Walker, after accomplishing the objects for which they have been detached, will join the main body of the army at Boonsboro' or Hagerstown. Each regiment of the march will habitually carry its axes in the regimental ordinance-wagons, for use of the men at their encampments, to procure wood, etc. By command of General R.E. Lee. R. H. Chilton, Assistant Adjutant-General. Major-General D.H. Hill, Command Division.

 

The Union Army's discovery of a copy of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee's Special Orders No. 191 near Frederick, Maryland, on September 13, 1862, outlining the disposition of his thin and widespread Army of Northern Virginia, precipitated the Battle of Antietam four days later. The revelations of the orders, called the "Lost Order" in the North and the "Lost Dispatch" in the South, prompted Union commander Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan to pursue Lee's divided army and force that fateful clash from which the South never fully recovered.

The results of the Union victory at Antietam reaped political consequences exceeding this bloody battlefield of the Civil War. President Abraham Lincoln used the military success to sign the Emancipation Proclamation, injecting slavery as an emotional and moral war issue. Powerful European nations eventually refused political recognition of the Confederacy and its military and economic benefits. Lee withdrew his battered forces back into Virginia, his first foray into the North a strategic failure. Antietam thus redirected the course of the war and ultimately led to the downfall of the Confederacy.

How No. 191 was lost, and who caused it to be lost, has remained one of the war's enduring mysteries. The copy of No. 191 found wrapped around three cigars in a clover field two miles south of Frederick by members of the 27th Indiana Infantry, addressed to Maj. Gen. D. H. Hill, was either intentionally placed or carelessly dropped. The act assured the Hoosier regiment a place in history, but its loser has avoided disgrace.

The act of losing S. 0. 191 has evoked only passing interest from modern historians. Most have discussed the finding and what occurred later: when Lee knew about its disappearance, the battle itself, Lee's disastrous Maryland Campaign and the repercussions.1 The mystery has been treated as either beyond solution or too sensitive. This article scrutinizes a possible circumstance and those suspected of perpetuating it and concludes, through circumstantial evidence, what man allegedly lost it and how.

Some believe it was Henry Kyd Douglas, Stonewall Jackson's courier. There was no conspiracy. Chilton handed it to him and Douglas lost it. Read Wilbur D. Jones excellent treatment of the subject in "Civil War Regiments: A Journal of the Civil War," Vol. 5, No.3. The case is shut and closed. Douglas, who smoked cigars, had already received the order and shoved the extra in his jacket after wrapping it around his cigars. It fell out of his pocket near the railroad tracks near Frederick and the Monococy River.

 

More men were killed or wounded at Antietam on September 17, 1862, than on any other single day of the Civil War. Federal losses were 12,410, Confederate losses 10,700. Although neither side gained a decisive victory, Lee's failure to carry the war effort effectively into the North caused Great Britain to postpone recognition of the Confederate government. The battle also gave President Abraham Lincoln the opportunity to issue the Emancipation Proclamation, which, on January 1, 1863, declared free all slaves in States still in rebellion against the United States. Now the war had a dual purpose: to preserve the Union and end slavery.

Six Brigadier and Major Generals were killed or mortally wounded during the Battle of Antietam on September 17, 1862. Of the six fallen men, three were from the Union army and three were Confederates. The spot where each of the following six generals were killed is marked by a "Mortuary Cannon," a cannon tube, muzzle down in a block of stone.

Incredibly, twelve generals were wounded during the battle - six from each side. Two other generals were killed at the Battle of South Mountain, three days earlier - one Union and one Confederate. The total for the two battles was 20 Generals killed or wounded - 10 from each side.


Brig. Gen. George B. Anderson
Born near Hillsboro, North Carolina, Anderson was 31 years old at Antietam. West Point graduate, class of 1852, his brigade of North Carolinians fought desperately in the Sunken Road. Wounded in the foot, BGen Anderson was transported to Shepherdstown, then Staunton, Virginia and eventually to Raleigh, North Carolina were he died October 16.


Brig. Gen. Lawrence O'Brian Branch
Branch was born in Enfield, North Carolina in 1820. He graduated from Princeton in 1838, studied law and served in Congress from 1855 until 1861. Branch commanded a brigade attached to A.P. Hill's Division who made the grueling 17 mile march to the battlefield from Harpers Ferry on the day of the battle. Arriving on the south end of the battlefield, Branch and the other brigades of Hill's division helped turn back Burnside's attack at the end of the day. Like George Anderson, Branch was also buried in Raleigh, North Carolina.


Maj. Gen. Joseph K. F. Mansfield
Joseph King Fenno Mansfield was one of the oldest officers on the field at age 59. Born in New Haven, Connecticut, Mansfield graduated from West Point in 1822. A professional soldier, he served in the Army for forty years, including service in the Mexican War. Just two days before the battle, he was given command of the XII Corps. MGen Mansfield led his men through the East Woods towards the Cornfield in support of I Corps already in action. Wounded in the chest he died the next day. There is a monument and a mortuary cannon on the battlefield for MGen Mansfield.


Maj. Gen. Israel B. Richardson
This Vermonter was 46 years old when he led his division at Antietam. Another West Pointer, Richardson graduated from the Academy in 1841 and distinguished himself during the Mexican War. In 1855 he resigned his commission and moved to Michigan. Returning to service during the crisis of 1861, Richardson led a brigade during the First Battle of Bull Run and the Peninsula campaign. At Antietam he commanded a division in the II Corp that attacked the Sunken Road. Wounded by artillery while trying to bring up more guns, MGen Richardson died on November 3, 1862.


Brig. Gen. Isaac P. Rodman
Born in Rhode Island, Rodman served in both houses of the state legislature before the war. Rodman's middle name was Peace and he was a Quaker. Imagine his dilemma when war broke out between his religion and service to his country. Rodman was a Captain at First Bull Run and a division commander here at Antietam. Crossing at Snavely's Ford on the far south end of the battlefield, Rodman led his men in the final assault, only to be turned back by the timely arrival of A.P. Hill and his men. Mortally wounded, this Quaker General would die on September 30, 1862 at age 40.


Brig. Gen. William E. Starke
Born in Virginia, Starke was a successful cotton planter in New Orleans. He served as the Colonel of the 60th Virginia, then was promoted to Brigadier on August 6 1862. When BGen John R. Jones was stunned by an artillery shell and left the field, Starke took command of the Stonewall Division. The onslaught of the Union I Corps' attack early in the morning began to drive his men back. Starke would lead a counterattack, only to be wounded three times, he died within the hour. His body was returned to Richmond where he was buried in Hollywood Cemetery next to his son who had been killed two months earlier

Wounded at Antietam
September 17, 1862

Army of the Potomac
BGen Samuel W. Crawford
BGen Napoleon J.T. Dana
BGen George L. Hartsuff
MGen Joseph Hooker
BGen John Sedgwick
BGen Max Weber
Army of Northern Virginia
MGen Richard H. Anderson
BGen Maxcy Gregg
BGen John R. Jones
BGen Alexander R. Lawton
BGen Roswell S. Ripley
BGen Ambrose R. Wright

Killed at South Mountain
September 14, 1862

MGen Jesse L. Reno
BGen Samuel Garland

Established as Antietam National Battlefield Site August 30, 1890, the park was transferred from the War Department August 10, 1933, and redesignated November 10, 1978. Along with all historic areas administerd by the National Park Service the battlefield was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on October 15, 1966.

Ghost of the Battlefield

Antietam National Cemetery, whose 11.36 acres contain 5,032 interments, 1,836 unidentified, adjoins the park; grave space is not available. Civil War interments occurred in 1866. The cemetery contains only Union soldiers from the Civil War period. Confederate dead were interred in the Washington Confederate Cemetery within Rosehill Cemetery, Hagerstown. The Antietam National Cemetery was placed under the War Department on July 14, 1870; it was transferred to the National Park Service on August 10, 1933.

Upside down canon barrels mark the spots on the battlefield where Generals were killed. There are five in all on the Antietam battlefield. Ghost Photo sent to us from Belinda Franks.

Strange events have taken place at Bloody Lane that lead people to believe that it is haunted. The sounds of gunfire and the smell of smoke and gunpowder are just some of the strange happenings there. People have also seen strange blue lights near Burnside Bridge where many Federal soldiers died while trying to cross Antietam Creek.

The Pry House was used as McClellan's headquarters and is thought to be haunted by General Richardson's wife Frances, who cared for him on his deathbed.

The Pry House field Hospital Museum is open daily June-October; and weekends only during May and November. Hours of operation are 11:00 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Admission is free, however a $2.00 donation per person is suggested. For more information call 301-695-1864.

 

Ghosts have also been seen at the Piper House, Sherrick House, Otto House and St. Paul Episcopal Church, which was used, as a Confederate field hospital following the battle.

Many ghost hunters have investigated Antietam Battlefield and have come away with paranormal photos of "orbs" and strange mists. There certainly appears to be here ample reason to conduct an investigation of our own.

Second only to Gettysburg in the annals of warlike horror is Antietam. On a single day – September 17, 1862 – the Union and Confederate Armies clashed in the corn fields and farmlands surrounding this little corner of a divided nation. When the day had ended, 23,000 souls had been dispatched to the hereafter: this is more than all the dead of the American Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, and the Mexican American and the Spanish American conflicts combined.

Burnside Bridge at the Antietam National Battlefield near Sharpsburg, Maryland. This is taken from the Confederate position where the Georgians held off the Union troops' crossing until they were overwhelmed.

Nine months after the battle in June of 1863, Southern soldiers again found themselves walking upon the old battlefield near Sharpsburg as they marched north into Pennsylvania. One soldier, a Confederate private, took the time to write to his family and describe what he saw.

"June 15, 1863
Dear Father, Mother, and Family,

I have been this morning over the old Sharpsburg Battlefield and have witnessed the most horrible sights that my eyes ever beheld. I saw the dead in any number just lying on top of the ground, their bones bleaching and they by the many hundreds. Oh what a horrible sight for human beings to look upon. God grant that the time may speedily come that the peace may return to our once happy country and our lives be spared to meet each other again on earth."

George Harlow, Private,
Company D, 23rd Virginia [O]

Over the years visitors and park rangers alike have reported strange occurrences from the now idyllic fields of Antietam. Like their brothers at Gettysburg, the soldiers who fell at Antietam still remain as more than memory.

Operating Hours & Seasons
Daily, summer: 8:30 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.; daily, winter: 8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Closed Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year's Day.

Antietam National Park Home Page

The Battle of Antietam Official Records and Battle DescriptionThe Battle of Antietam (Sharpsburg)
(The Bloodiest Day of the Civil War)
September 17, 1862

"Baltimore: A House Divided" Civil War Trail is open.

Cross the Potomac River with Lee. Discover the "Lost Orders" with McClellan and fight the battles of South Mountain as you follow the roads the soldiers used during the 1862 Antietam Campaign. Trace the route of John Wilkes Booth's escape route through southern Maryland after he shot Abraham Lincoln. Ride with Confederate Jubal Early as he marched toward Washington in 1864. Have a look at a prisoner-of-war camp at Point Lookout. Visit Baltimore's rich store of Civil War sites and uncover the secrets of Frederick, Washington, Carroll and Montgomery counties.

Antietam National Battlefield and South Mountain State Park in Washington County.

Antietam National Battlefield - Antietam National Battlefield ...
The National Park Service's official expanded website of Antietam National Battlefield.

http://www.nps.gov/anti/

 

Civil WarTraveler.Com

NEW: Combined Virginia/Maryland Civil War Trails map-brochure

http://www.civilwar-va.com/maryland/antietam.html

Official NPS website: Antietam National Battlefield

28 photos of Antietam National Cemetery: "Sites of Memory"

History of Antietam National Cemetery, including a descriptive list of all the loyal soldiers buried therein together with the ceremonies and address on the occasion of the dedication of the grounds, September, 17th, 1867, Antietam National Cemetery, Western Maryland Public Libraries
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antietam_National_Battlefield"

ALSO SEE: THE TOP TEN MOST HAUNTED BATTLEFIELD LIST

Though the battles have long ago ended and the sound of cannons and muskets is but a distant memory, there are some souls who are still waiting for the call to “Retreat” – and for them, it may never come!

Make plans to visit a Haunted Battlefield today!

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