Shiloh: Animated Battle Map

[Music] 250 Union men of ever Peabody's brigade a fairly unpatrolled for the past 3 days that pickets had been exchanging shots with Confederates many worried its signal ending the time but no one in high command had been convinced that's Sunday morning with an earshot of their camps they find a monster lurking amidst the Tennessee timber 9000 Confederates spearheading a surprise attack after the next two days at Shiloh our nation would come to realize the truth bloody cost of civil war by the spring of 1862 the union's disaster in the East had Bullrun the previous summer seemed a distant memory thanks to a string of victories in the West in February the Army and Navy under Union Brigadier General Ulysses Grant and flag officer Andrew foot had worked together to capture forts Henry and damos combined with the loss at Mill Springs Kentucky General Albert Sidney Johnston the western Confederate commander was forced to move southwest handing over Kentucky and much of Tennessee including the crucial supply an industrial center of Nashville Major General Henry Halleck commanding the department of Mississippi ordered federal forces of the Tennessee River a major conduit into the heart of the Western Confederacy the Federals embarked in March using 174 steamboats to ferry almost 40,000 men toward their eventual target and now bustling junction in northern Mississippi in this day rivers and rails are the key means to move men and supplies quickly and Corinth Mississippi is a crucial southern rail link it straddles the mobile and Ohio Railroad and sat on the only line connecting the Atlantic and the Mississippi and by mid March grants Army was in position to capture it as they encamped around Pittsburgh land his was a good defensive position waterways protected both flanks and their rear and they were within 20 miles of Corinth but Hallett cautious has ordered grant to hold until the 30,000 men of Don Carlos Buell's army of the Ohio arrives from Nashville [Music] on April 2nd Johnston learns that viewers approaching column is near Savannah Tennessee it is an opportunity to strike his opponents mouthing are divided and Johnston seizes it general PGT Beauregard the hero of Fort Sumter and Bull Run plans a very complex attack that attempts to coordinate Johnston's four core but rainy weather turns the roads into mush delaying the attack believing surprise is lost Beauregard urges retreat undeterred Johnston declares gentlemen we will attack at daylight despite warnings Union commanders are confident that Johnston's army remains at Corinth general grant headquarters across the river at Savannah and few of the regiment's Manning what is to become his front lines had ever been in a full-scale battle [Music] [Music] Johnston's intent is a turn grants left flank away from the lifeline at Pittsburg Landing but it's grants right that receives the first Confederate attacks as William Hardy's brigades advance on the camps of wooden Sherman's division as late as 7 a.m. General Sherman remains unconvinced this is a general attack until rebel skirmishes from Clay burns Brigade chill is orderly and shoot him in the hand to a clavering six regiments move around the swamp they get caught in a vicious crossfire the intense fighting air is just south of a church with a Hebrew name that ironically meant place of peace Shiloh despite initial resistance the union's lines are soon stretched thin Benjamin Prentiss forms his six division including 12 guns on the eastern current Road his untested ranks wither gladdens per game but around 8:45 Confederate attacks force Prentiss to fall back many don't stop until they get to Pittsburg Landing leaving empty caps hot meals and all their belongings hungry rebels pause to Eden look an hour is lost his commanders including Johnston struggle to get these men moving again [Music] amidst the panic Union defensive lines are patched together with anyone is shoving deaths and casualties and terrain unraveled Confederate command structure by mid-morning the Battle of Shiloh has become a soldier's fight [Music] alerted by the distant Thunder of artillery grant departs for Pittsburg Landing around 7:30 he orders bull Nelson's division appeals army to begin moving down the river but Nelson is unable to March until early afternoon grant also orders Lew Wallace's 7,500 man division to reinforce his lives but a series of errors and delays turn a two hour march into 70 neither will arrive before nightfall despite a sprained ankle after arriving at the landing grant rides the length of his battle line and rushes men and ammunition to his defenders but until Wallace and the elements imbues army arrived grant will fight outnumbered [Applause] by 10:30 a.m. the Confederate onslaught starts to overwhelm grants right flank attacks push Sherman and McClair to the back first to the crossroads of the 30 and Cora throws and then to Joan's field a mile and a half Pittsburg Landing Johnson succeeds in bending grants line but in the wrong direction toward Pittsburgh land where the line can be shorter and stronger with the Union right flank and retrieval entire Confederate regiments fall out of line to eat in pillage this will Lola lies Sherman and McLaren to regroup and launch a ferocious counter-attack by noon they drove over the unprepared looting Confederates for the next three hours Sherman and McLaren is determined Stan will force Johnston to commit his last reserves and would occupy the entire Western two-thirds of the Confederate part Confederate brigades on Johnson's right make repeated attempts to dislodge Steven Horowitz division from a blooming peach orchard just south of a pond where the dying crawl for a final drink by two o'clock robots line begins to give after Johnston personally rallies his brigades to attack and maths Johnson had an old Dueling that kept his right leg numb most of the time he may not have paid much mind to the mini ball that severed his artery by 245 Johnston bleeds to death he is a highest-ranking officer to be killed during the Civil War in grant center the division of whi Wallace and the remnants apprentices wraps form a half mouth and thick overgrowth long 6,200 men and 25 cannon make the names of the places they're in the sunken Road the hornet's nest synonymous with bloodshed [Music] thousands of brits men have retreated in panic Lew Wallace is missing and bull Nelson mules lead element is in power out of Savannah low on options grant orders a new line of defense at the land around for Sherman and McClaren that depleted ranks and no fresh troops fall back confederates cause their attack to get ammunition to the front lines Sherman and McClaren reform along the heights rugged redeemed by 4:00 p.m. probe on withdrawals forcing Prentiss to infuse his left flank with branch right and left flanks and retreat sounds of heavy fighting in the center drop Confederate brigades like a matched WHL Wallace is outnumbered Federals put up a fierce defense from an overgrown thicket they're intense fire thickens the air with whizzing metal rebels calling the hornet's nest [Music] Brigadier General Daniel ruble pounds the hornet's nest of 60 cannon the largest concentration of artillery on the North American continent up to that time by 5:00 p.m. elements of fourteen of the sixteen Confederate brigades on the field surround the hornet's nest Wallace and Prentiss start to withdraw then Wallace is shot in the head and left for dead over 2,000 men are captured the day-long federal Stan waged all across the battlefield at such places as the peach orchard hornet's nest and crossroads staves off total defeat and byes grant another day to fight grants army has fallen back to miles and incurred immense casualties heavy cannon fire from the union timber clans Tyler in Lexington Esther's the Confederate lines Grant's last line on April 6th is formidable Confederates must cross huge ravines at dill and Tillman branch stalled the Confederates withdraw to the captured Union camps little effort is made to supply ammunition or reform they're exhausted ranks that night heavy rain moves in soaking the living and the dead the light Beauregard now in command believes grants reinforcements are not coming and sends a dispatch to Richmond proclaiming a complete victory in fact the lead divisions of Buell's army had a hand in defending grant last line and Lew Wallace's division finally arrived on the scene about dusk though these reinforcements had been spotted by rebel Colonel Nathan Bedford Forrest no one in Confederate High Command took any action handed his greatest setback since the war began grant and vows to whip them at daylight [Music] by 6:00 a.m. grant has 40,000 at the ready half of which are peddle fresh the weary Confederates number around 28,000 despite their exhaustion and disorganization when grants army moved to retake the field and drive the rebels back Beauregard eventually manages a solid defense despite his savage counter-attacks he is forced back two hours later to a position along the Hamburg Purdy Road ultimately the Union numbers are too great for Beauregard's depleted wrecks a - he pulls back and retreat to court Grenn does not pursue until the next day [Music] almost 24,000 men are killed missing or maimed in just two days Shiloh is the bloodiest battle in American history up to that time despite winning Shiloh grant is vilified for the shocking losses and near defeat many demand his removal from command President Lincoln refuses saying I can't spare this man he fights in Albert Sidney Johnston the Confederacy loses a prized leader no general will fill his void in the Western theater beginning in May with Corinth the Union Army embarks on a Western mission of conquest with many more places to fall Vicksburg Chattanooga [Music] Atlanta the battlefield is quiet now though a new fight is on going against the foes of time and progress nearly 4,000 acres of land have been preserved most recently the site of the Fallen Timbers action once hosts to two of the bloodiest days in American history Shiloh is now one of the best preserved battlefields of the Civil War a sprawling living monument to the sacrifices made there a hundred and fifty years ago [Music] you

Channel: American Battlefield Trust

Views: 373,583

Rating: 4.9264846 out of 5

Keywords: American Battlefield Trust, Civil War Trust, Shiloh Preservation, Battle of Shiloh, Civil War Western Theater, Ulysses S. Grant Shiloh, Grant Shiloh, Albert Sidney Johnston death, The Hornet's Nest Shiloh, Civil War Trust Shiloh

Id: Tlhlk3bp-f4

Length: 18min 10sec (1090 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 27 2019