Antietam and Harpers Ferry... Thursday, September 20, 2012

Today we visited Antietam Civil War battlefield and Harper's Ferry. Antietam happened on my birthday, September 17th, 150 years ago. This day is known as the bloodiest day of the Civil War because 23,000 casualties. The federals had 2,108 killed, 9,450 wounded, and 753 missing in action. Other battles had greater casualties, but not in one day.

So the United States had almost 10,000 wounded. Antietam was one of early battles where Clara Barton started traveling to the front lines to care for wounded soldiers. She followed the sound of the cannon to arrive on the northern end of the Antietam battlefield. She brought medical supplies. She and her companions also served gruel to the wounded men still lying on the field.

Historians have always claimed Pickett's Charge at Gettysburg was the high point of the Confederacy. Pickett's Charge may have been the high point of the Army of Northern Virginia, but I think the battle of Antietam was the high point of the Confederacy.

On the military front, Lee had taken command of the Army of Northern Virginia during June 1862. He won the Seven Days Battles June 1862, the Second Battle of Bull Run, August 1962 and was invading Maryland to resupply his army. And rebel forces were planning an invasion of Kentucky which ended at Perryville, October 8, 1862.

On the diplomatic front, England wanted to recognize and support the Confederacy, but were held back because of slavery, a practice England had outlawed 30 years before and the potential of going to war with the United States. However, if the confederates won a major battle on union soil, England would propose negotiating peace between the United States and Confederate States on humanitarian grounds that the war was a stalemate. So if the confederates had won Antietam, they had a chance of winning the war.

When the north won Antietam, Lincoln announced the Emancipation Proclamation. This made the war also about ending slavery, seriously damaging England's and France's ability to officially recognize and support of the Confederacy. Even though Lee invaded Pennsylvania with an even larger army in 1863, it may be the case that the Confederacy's real possibility of victory vanished in 1862, not 1863.

Kathy and I arrived at Harper's Ferry too late to see the movie about John Brown's raid. The firehouse where John Brown made his last stand has been return to within 150 feet of its original spot, but it is empty. So Kathy and I saw streets looking a little like a Civil War town. There are some shops and restaurants, but it is no Williamsburg. So the drama of those events is lost on us. We were disappointed.

Tomorrow we head to Baltimore. I have never been to Baltimore.