Smaller in scale to Gettysburg in miles and monuments and visitors, we decided at the end of our day that we liked it better. Since we just visited Gettysburg a week ago, we couldn't help but compare our experiences at the two national battlefields. At Antietam we got a live ranger presentation and summary of the battle. Since he was standing in the glass-walled visitor center, the ranger could point out actual battle locations as he showed us pictures of generals and strategies that are now beginning to sound familiar to us. We also watched the film in the visitor's center, helping us to understand the situation better. We missed all that at Gettysburg. Perhaps we should have paid the over-priced $12 per person to watch the film at the new Gettysburg-foundation-owned visitor center.
Our ranger at Antietam described in detail the battle that began the morning of September 15, 1862, and would be over in 12 hours. He described the hand-to-hand combat in the 24-acre cornfield that saw some of the most horrific fighting. Later we would drive by that same acreage, still planted in corn over 150 years later.
The ranger would also describe the farms that were part of the battlefield. Some of them became hospitals, others were generals' headquarters. The Mumma Farm was actually burned, and then rebuilt the next year when the family returned.
We took a 1.5 mile hike through the battlefield, and it was a somber walk through a place that claimed so many lives. There were 100,000 soldiers on this field that day, and 23,110 died in this day-long battle.
Mark is walking around the corner of one of the old barns still standing on the battlefield. He is being watched by more than just Denisa's eyes. In the bottom right hand corner of the picture there is a ground hog peeking out to watch the visitor.
Here's a zoomed in picture of the ground hog, watching to see if the coast is now clear.
While the battle in the cornfield raged all morning, just a mile south a three-hour battle was starting. That's where a local lane called the sunken road, was acting as a protective hedge for 2,200 confederate soldiers. They were using the tall sides of the road as protection to hold off attacks by 10,000 Union soldiers.
Finally the Union soldiers were able to capture the flank of the confederate line, and fired down the road to annihilate the trapped confederate soldiers. It was another somber walk down the road now called, "The Bloody Lane" since more than 5,000 soldiers died there that day.
There are memorials sprinkled throughout the battlefield, but it seemed like only a small number when compared to Gettysburg. We climbed the only observation tower, and you can see Denisa waving from the top.
Our view from the top was down the Bloody Lane, and across the Antietam Battlefield.
Another stop on the 8-mile car route is at a big rock memorializing a kind nurse who provided bandages, lanterns and food at the battle. She was christened as "The Angel of the Battlefield," and Clara Barton would go on to start the Red Cross organization.
We found these curious-looking cannons, buried with the muzzle buried in different places on the battlefield. Each represents a general that was killed or mortally wounded in that location during the Battle of Antietam. Three confederate and three union generals fell that day.
Further south, we also drove to the lower bridge, now known as the Burnside Bridge. It was here that General Burnside committed several battle mistakes that cost the Union army dearly. When the ranger showed the picture of General Burnside, we remembered him from our school textbooks with his ridiculous sideburns. It's good to know that we haven't forgotten everything we learned in history class.
The famous Burnside Bridge is now going through a $1.7 million dollar restoration project to bring it back to its humble beginnings. We're not sure how it could possibly cost so much to fix a little bridge that probably cost less than a hundred dollars to build back in 1836.
As we left the battlefield, we drove through the little town of Sharpsburg--showing some beautiful fall color along its main road. We reflected back on what we had learned about the Battle of Antietam. It was the deadliest one-day battle of the Civil War, with 23,110 men losing their lives that day. The ranger reminded that it not only ended so many lives, but it also forever changed so many more lives of family members left back home.
It was a somber day, but an educational day as well. After 12 hours of brutal fighting, the battles lines moved very little. The war had already been going for a year and a half, and fighting between the north and the south would continue to rage for almost another year. Skirmishes and battles would continue until these two armies would meet again in a little town in Pennsylvania named Gettysburg, about ten months later.
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