Battle of Chickamauga - Research Paper Example

Battle of Chickamauga The battle of Chickamauga refers to the civil war that was fought in Northern Georgia, near Chattanooga. The battle was a two-day bloody civil war and it was fought on 19th and 20th, September 1863. This battle was actually one of the bloodiest civil wars in the history of USA (Summary of the Battle of Chickamauga, n.p). The battle of Chickamauga was between the army of the Cumberland, under Major General William Rosecrans, and the Confederate Amy of Tennessee, under Major General Braxton Bragg. Development of Battle of Chickamauga After succeeding in the Tullahoma Campaign, Major General William Rosecrans resolved to flush out the Confederate army out of Chattanooga (Robertson, 11). Earlier on, Rosecrans’ army scattered throughout Tennessee and Georgia had forced the army of Bragg to leave the Chattanooga city. This move prompted Bragg to consolidate his Army in Georgian, ready to occupy Chattanooga again. The two generals had fought before at the battle of Stones River, but this battle wasn’t as serious as the battle of Chickamauga. The army of Bragg however had won the battle of the Stones River, and had taken over Chattanooga. General Rosecrans therefore was very determined and prepared to win this war. In the Battle of Chickamauga, Major General Rosecrans had around 55,000 soldiers, while major General Bragg had around 70,000 soldiers. The scene of the battle was a thick forest at Chickamauga. This war therefore was named after the scene where it was fought. Due to the fact that the war was fought in the forest, the canons were not very useful in the war. Also, battle lines were not drawn, and the battle was mainly fought on hand-to hand style. Fighting begun in earnest on 19th September 1863, the Confederate army, under the leadership of Brigg were strongly assaulted by the Cumberland army, but the assault did not break the federate union line. Throughout the first day of fighting, Rosecrans army gained a lot of ground, although they were unable to break the extended line, irrespective of the series of attacks that they launched against the confederate army. At around 11 p.m., on the first day of fighting, the confederate army received reinforcement and this made the confederate army more powerful than the Cumberland army (The Battle of Chickamauga: Summary and Facts, n.p). After the reinforcement, Brigg divided his army into wings, with left wing under Commander Longstreet, and the right wing under General Leonidas K. Polk. The following day, second day of fighting, the battle began again at around 9:30 in the morning, with coordinated left assaults by the confederate army against the Cumberland army. About an hour into the war, General Rosecrans thought that there was a gap in his line, and as a remedy, he ordered General Thomas Wood to fill the gap. General Wood was convinced that there wasn’t any gap in the Rosecrans’ army, and he was sure that taking such an action would open a wide gap in the Cumberland union army. However, having been accused before for not taking orders from his superiors, General Wood obliged and this created a wide gap in the Cumberland union army. This was a huge blunder that General Rosecrans made and the mistake led to the defeat of the Rosecrans’ union army. Immediately after noticing the wide gap in the Rosecrans’ union army, the confederate army capitalized swiftly on the gap to assault the Rosecrans’ army. The attack was led by General Longstreet, and the attacking division had eight brigades dividend into three lines. The united Cumberland army tried to resist the assault, but General Longstreet’s attack was so strong that the Rosecrans’ army was unable to resist it. For this reason, the united Cumberland army were pushed far away in the field. Following this move, two thirds of the Rosecrans’ union army members were in full flight, running away from the mighty confederate army. The confederate army seized the golden opportunity and they pursued the fleeing Rosecrans’ army, they managed to bag a sizeable number of the fleeing Cumberland army. But although a good number of the Cumberland army members run away, out of fear, there were some members of the Cumberland army who withstood the confederate attack throughout the day. The leader of those who resisted the confederate assault was George. H. Thomas. Thomas gathered a number of gallant Cumberland soldiers and they formed an ad hoc force that operated on top of an elevation known as Snodgrass (Cleaves, 47). This ad hoc force was reinforced by Major General Gordon Granger and Brigadier James Steedman. The ad hoc force managed to resist the assaults of the confederate army throughout the afternoon. And at night, the members of the ad hoc force withdraw secretly to Chattanooga, where they spent the night. The following day, Thomas urged the Rosecrans to go back to the war, but the members of the Cumberland army refused to go back to the war, for they were convinced that they could not win the war. This marked the end of the war and the federal army occupied the heights surrounding the Chattanooga. The victorious federate army however did not pursue the members of the Cumberland army further. Following this bold move by Thomas, Thomas was nicknamed “The Rock of Chickamauga”. And one month after the war, when Rosecrans was relieved of his duty as the commander of the Cumberland army and sent to the department of Missouri, Thomas was made the new commander of the united Cumberland army. Thomas would later led the Cumberland army in defeating the Army of Tennessee in the Battle of Nashville. The army of Tennessee was led by Major General Bell Hood’s. The battle of Chickamauga indeed was a very bloody war; the results of the battle were staggering. There were over 16, 000 Cumberland army members casualties, and over 18,000 Confederate casualties. These figures actually made the Chickamauga battle one of the bloodiest civil wars in the history of USA. The high number of casualties in this battle can be attributed to the confused nature of the fighting and the close-quarters nature of the war. The fighting was indeed confused because the fighting was done in thick forest; there was also constant shift of the troops in course of the war. Although the Confederate army won the battle, the commander of the Confederate army, General Bragg, however wasn’t happy with the manner in which he had won the war; the war did not end as General Bragg expected. The main aim of General Bragg was to destroy the Cumberland army completely and to reoccupying the Chattanooga city. The Confederate army managed only to drive the Cumberland army from the field, but they did not manage to reoccupy the Chattanooga city. This fact made General Bragg quite unhappy for he did not achieve his goal. Works Cited Cleaves, F. Rock of Chickamauga: The Life of General George H. Thomas. USA: University of Oklahoma Press, 1948. Print Robertson, W. G. "The Chickamauga Campaign: The Fall of Chattanooga." Blue & Gray Magazine, 2006. Pg-10- 22. Print Summary of the Battle of Chickamauga. Web The Battle of Chickamauga Battle: Summary and Facts. Web Read More