Term Paper on "Bloody Lane"

Term Paper 5 pages (1760 words) Sources: 5

[EXCERPT] . . . .

Battle of Antietam, and the Bloody Lane. The Bloody Lane is only one station in the hellish Battle of Antietam, but it is one of the most memorable because so many men fought and died here. Today, walking the Bloody Lane, the sounds of battle are never far away. Some people say this road is haunted by the souls of the men who died here, and it is quite easy to see why, once you visit the Bloody Lane.

The Union and Confederate forces fought the Battle of Antietam on September 17, 1862, outside the small town of Sharpsburg, Maryland. (the Confederates refer to this battle as the Battle of Sharpsburg.) it was the most ferocious and deadly battle of the war, and in American history - over 23,000 casualties, wounded, and missing resulted from this one bloody battle. It was also the first battle fought on Northern soil, making it quite memorable for yet another reason.

The Bloody Lane became a lasting element of Antietam because photographer Matthew Brady memorialized it. He showed an exhibition of photographs taken after the battle and graphically brought the carnage home to Americans (Heidler, et al. 56). Historian James M. McPherson notes, "The most concentrated carnage took place in a sunken farm road in the center of the Confederate line, known ever after as Bloody Lane" (McPherson 4). The Sunken Road became known as the Bloody Lane, and remains one of the most legendary and notorious battlefields of the Civil War today.

In command of the southern forces was General Robert E. Lee, while General George B. McClellan commanded the Union forces. Later, estimates indicate Lee commanded about 30,000 troops, while McClellan had about 60,000 at his command. Lee's men were glowing with their recent victory at Manassas, but they were exhausted and ill prepared for another battle so soon. Lee wrote to Confederate President Jefferson Davis, "The army is not properly equipped for an invasion of an enemy's territory. It lacks much of the material of war, is feeble in transportation, the animals being much reduced, and the men are poorly provided with clothes, and, in thousands of instances, are destitute of shoes'" (Steele 260). In several horrible campaigns, the Union forces pressed the Confederates back, and ultimately, the Confederates lost the battle. This was significant because it also took several Confederate commanders, leaving the army without much cohesive leadership. Historian McPherson continues,

The Army of Northern Virginia was not destroyed at Antietam, as Lincoln had hoped. Nor was it beaten utterly, as McClellan claimed. But it was badly hurt. Three of the nine division commanders, nineteen of thirty-six brigade commanders, and eighty-six of 173 regimental commanders were killed or wounded (McPherson 133).

It was here at this station, the Bloody Lane, that much of the fighting and bloodshed took place. Here is what happened here nearly 146 years ago.

Fought in three separate arenas, the Battle of Antietam culminated right here on the Bloody Lane. By now, it was midday, and from the woods and cornfields, the battle now centered on the 800-yard long deeply cut "Sunken Road" that ran between farmland toward the creek. Confederates massed in the road, which resembled a trench and provided good cover for the sharpshooters. For over four hours, the fighting raged here, and during that time over 5,000 men were killed on the road, earning it the nickname the Bloody Lane. "A Union lieutenant colonel whose New York regiment was in the thick of the fighting at Bloody Lane described the scene there after the battle: 'In the road the dead covered the ground. It seemed, as I rode along, that it was the Valley of Death. I think that in the space of less than ten acres, lay the bodies of a thousand dead men and as many more wounded'" (McPherson 4). The battle raged on, and the Bloody Lane led to more minor skirmishes, but for all intents and purposes, the Bloody Lane spelled the end for the Confederate forces at Antietam.

Confederate troops, five brigades of them, under the command of General Daniel Harvey Hill, were in place on the road by dawn on September 17. This sunken road actually looked down on a ridge of Union forces, so it seemed the perfect location for Confederates to command at least this area of the battlefield. By early morning, the Confederates pulled three brigades from the road to help support General Jackson's troops in the East Woods, and by mid-morning the soldiers were stacking fence rails to the north side to build up their defenses against Union troops, commanded by General William H. French, whose division was already marching across the fields toward the Bloody Lane.

At first, the Confederates seemed insurmountable. The road, sunken from years of heavy wagons rumbling over it to market, seemed like the perfect defense. Author McPherson notes, "This ready-made trench was an exceptionally strong defensive position. Wave after wave of brigade-size Union attacks were beaten back, with the famous Irish Brigade taking especially heavy punishment but dealing out just as much in return" (McPherson 122). French's forces attacked four different times, and the Rebels pushed them back each time. "For three hours and thirty minutes,' one Union officer wrote, 'the battle raged incessantly, without either party giving way'" (Editors). Finally, General Israel B. Richardson's division joined French's troops, and they managed to beat the Confederates back and take the road, leading to over 5,000 dead just right here on this Bloody Lane. Richardson sent in Brigadier General Thomas F. Meagher's brigade to help clear the road, and "His Irishmen stayed on the field blazing away until their muskets were so hot that officers reported 'the rammers were leaping out of the pipes at every discharge'" (Cannan 170). This 800-yard long road became a burying ground for all these soldiers, and ultimately, the battle led to a decisive defeat of General Lee and his troops. Many historians feel that if General McClellan had actually pressed his reserve troops into service, the entire war might have ended after the Battle of Antietam.

The end to the Bloody Lane came when two infantry troops from New York overwhelmed one of Lee's weak spots on a hill and began firing cannon directly on to the road. The Confederates deserted the road, and because of a misunderstood order, over 300 of them withdrew all the way to the town of Sharpsburg and surrendered (Editors). The Lane itself is commanding and immensely sad, and somehow, as you walk this stretch of battlefield, it is almost as if you can hear the voices of the soldiers who fought here, so many years ago. They are the voices of the wounded, the dying, and the survivors, one of whom included Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., who survived the battle after being seriously wounded, and went on to be a Supreme Court judge (McPherson 122).

Another Union soldier describes the end of the battle. "As the fight grew furious, the colonel cried out, 'Put on the war paint. We rubbed the torn end of the cartridges over our faces, streaking them with powder like a pack of Indians'" (McPherson 123). Another historian writes of a man wounded late in the battle, "Lieutenant W.W. Bloss of the 108th New York took up his regimental colors and was wounded when a minie ball crushed the bridge of his nose and almost suffocated him with coagulated blood. He ran to the rear, yelling out to some of his men, 'For God's sake...jam a straw up my nose, I am strangling'" (Cannan 168).

You can almost see the frenzied attack, led by a pack of war whooping soldiers, carrying down on the Confederates and confusing what was left of their defenses. As they broke and ran, they left the rest of Lee's soldiers defenseless, and there was no way they could possibly have warded off any more advances after this. The battle continued through the afternoon, but the Confederates were never the same after their defeat on the Bloody Lane.

After the battle, the clean up was just as vivid and horrific. A volunteer for the Sanitary Commission (the modern Red Cross), attempting to help after the battle wrote, "No words can convey' the 'utter devastation and ruin,' he wrote, but he tried to find words anyway. 'For four miles in length, and nearly half a mile in width, the ground is strewn with...hats, caps, clothing, canteens, knapsacks, shells and shot'" (McPherson 5). Even the animals could not survive the onslaught at Bloody Lane. "A lieutenant in the 14th Connecticut, which also fought at Bloody Lane, described 'hundreds of horses too, all mangled and putrefying, scattered everywhere'" (McPherson 4). The aftermath was even more ghastly. Every available bed and farmhouse became a makeshift hospital, and the stench from the battlefield lingered for days into weeks. The countryside had been effectively stripped of life - farms ruined, woods shattered, and bodies buried wherever they could find room (McPherson 5).… READ MORE

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