The Seven Days: Turning Point?

"No military campaign had more influence on the Civil War than these Seven Days' battles." 

This proud claim greets visitors on an interpretive sign as they arrive on the Gaines' Mill Battlefield. In this post we will consider the merits of the statement.

The Watt House - located on a plateau above Boatswain's Swamp, served as Maj. Gen. Fitz John Porter's headquarters during the Battle of Gaines' Mill.

I viewed the statement yesterday, as I made my first trek to the battlefields of Gaines' Mill and Malvern Hill. The Richmond National Battlefield unit of the National Park Services operates both sites, and maintains nice hiking trails with interpretive signage. Gaines' Mill - the third of the Seven Days' battles - took place on June 27th, 1862. After establishing a strong defensive position along the slopes of Turkey Hill overlooking Boatswain's Swamp, the Army of the Potomac's 5th Corps Commander Fitz John Porter beat back successive assaults against his position throughout the afternoon. Finally, in the growing dusk, Robert E. Lee unleashed more than 30,000 men in a final assault that broke the federal lines. Darkness allowed Porter to safely withdraw his forces across the Chickahominy River.

The Army of the Potomac continued its retreat toward the James River over the next several days, finally halting on July 1st to occupy a strong position on the slopes of Malvern Hill. The federal position offered excellent fields of fire for artillery, and also received support from gunboats located in the James River. Despite the strength of George B. McClellan's position, Lee launched a series of disjointed, bloody, and ultimately unsuccessful assaults. This failure brought the Seven Days' battles to an end.

The Union gun line atop Malvern Hill.

Let's return to a consideration of that interpretive sign - "No military campaign had more influence on the Civil War than these Seven Days' battles." Freeman Tilden would smile reading this lead sentence. It's a provocative statement, and as Tilden set down in his six principles, "the chief aim of interpretation is not instruction, but provocation." I've spent a good deal of time since analyzing the strengths and weaknesses of the argument.

For context, let's look at the entire statement (courtesy of the Historical Marker Database):

No military campaign had more influence on the course of the Civil War than these Seven Days' battles. George B. McClellan's army of more than 100,000 Union soldiers landed at Fort Monroe in spring of 1862, and fought its way up the peninsula. By mid-May the Army of the Potomac lay on the outskirts of Richmond, hoping to capture the capital of the Confederacy and perhaps end the war. If that strategy succeeded the nation might be reunified, but without abolition of slavery. Confederate General Robert E. Lee chose not to wait for the Federal army's next move. Instead, he seized the initiative, and on June 26 advanced across the Chickahominy River with nearly 45,000 soldiers. That action opened a week-long series of battles that resulted in the Union army retreating to the banks of the James River. With Richmond secure, Lee's army moved north, defeating Union forces at Cedar Mountain and Second Manassas (Bull Run), and then marched toward Maryland and the first invasion of the North.

A historian could advance any number of campaigns as "most influential" on the course of the war, and make a compelling argument supported by evidence. Rather than engaging in such a debate, I want to look more closely at the evidence that supports Richmond National Battlefield's claim. How did the Seven Days' Campaign influence the war? The marker provides us with two primary examples: 

Altering the Military Situation: While he had held several important posts already during the war, the Seven Days' battles introduced the world to Robert E. Lee as commander of the Army of Northern Virginia. In Gaines' Mill, Lee achieved his first significant victory of the war. And the results of the Seven Days' not only neutralized McClellan's threat to the Confederate capital, they also gave Lee an opening which he used to transfer the seat of war from the gates of the Confederate capital to the banks of the Potomac River, and beyond.

Emancipation: Against the backdrop of the Seven Days' battles, President Abraham Lincoln continued to grapple with the issues of slavery and emancipation. He wasn't the only one. During the first half of 1862, Congress had debated the Second Confiscation Act, which extended the power of the Union military to free Confederate slaves. The act passed on July 17th, 1862 - just a few short weeks after the battle of Malvern Hill. A few days before the act passed, Lincoln first consulted with a few members of his cabinet on issuing an Emancipation Proclamation. Secretary of State William Seward eventually convinced Lincoln to await a Union victory before issuing such a document, but Lincoln's mind on emancipation had been set.

The crest of Malvern Hill viewed in the distance from the perspective of the Confederate advance.

Glenn David Brasher's recent book The Peninsula Campaign and the Necessity of Emancipation argues that "the contributions that African Americans had made to both armies, coupled with the failure of McClellan's Peninsula Campaign, played a role in turning many Northerners in favor of emancipation." Throughout the campaign army officers and the northern press noted, and abolitionists highlighted, the invaluable support roles that the Confederacy's enslaved labor force filled for its armed forces. An increasing awareness of how African Americans could support the Union war effort, coupled with the lack of success in securing victory in a limited war, changed many hearts.

The first half of 1862 had brought encouraging signs for the Union war effort. Victories in the west and McClellan's slow but seemingly unstoppable march to the outskirts of Richmond signaled a swift end to the rebellion. Yet by July stalled progress in the west, and McClellan's defeat changed the outlook dramatically. The end of the war appeared farther away than ever before, and support for the type of limited war favored by McClellan waned. Most importantly, the President of the United States no longer believed in the success of a limited war that reunified the nation but left slavery in tact. The aftermath of the Seven Days' battles brought a new commander to Washington - Henry Halleck. It brought a call for 300,000 more troops to swell the ranks of federal armies. And it caused the Lincoln administration to settle on a new a war policy, one that coupled victory with emancipation.

Did the Seven Days' battles have the greatest influence on the direction and outcomes of the Civil War? It's a debatable statement, but also one that has a lot of evidence to support it. What do you think?

Library Corner: A Few Battlefield Guides

As you might have guessed, my day job has kept me quite busy over the last month or two. Hence the lack of posts. Though I haven't had much time for blogging, I have squeezed in a few battlefield visits. At the end of July I spent a full day hiking at Manassas National Battlefield, while this past weekend I visited sites on the Petersburg National Battlefield and at Pamplin Park.

View looking over the Stone House and toward Buck Hill and Matthew's Hill at Manassas.

I have visited the Manassas National Battlefield before, though it's been nearly a decade and I never had much of a chance to take advantage of the park's forty-plus miles of trails. On the last weekend of July, I decided to change that. Armed with plenty of water and snacking provisions, a trail guide obtained at the Visitor Center, a copy of John Hennessy's Return to Bull Run, and the Civil War Trust's Second Manassas App on my phone, I set off on the 6.2 mile Second Manassas trail. This loop trail starts on Henry House Hill and covers most of the battlefield, including the Stone House, Buck Hill, a good portion of the Unfinished Railroad Cut, Groveton, and Chinn Ridge. I opted to hike an extra mile or two by adding on the Brawner Farm loop. All told, I was able to cover most of ground the battle was fought over - from the opening shots on the Brawner Farm on August 28th, 1862, to John Pope's attacks against the Railroad Cut on the 29th and 30th, and concluding fittingly with James Longstreet's counterattack that swept Pope's army from the field on the afternoon of the 30th.

The position of Stephen D. Lee's Confederate artillery, which was so effective
against Pope's assaults on the Railroad Cut.

When I finished my tour, I had just enough time to poke my head into the Visitor Center's bookstore. Here I picked up a nice looking guidebook for my next visit: Ethan Rafuse's Manassas: A Battlefield Guide. This book came out in 2014 as part of the University of Nebraska's This Hallowed Ground: Guide to Civil War Battlefields series. Though I wasn't able to use it on the field, I spent quite a few days after my visit perusing the guidebook, and it looks quite useful. The book contains detailed battlefield tours of both First and Second Manassas, as well as campaign excursions that guide you to sites further afield from the National Park. Each stop contains several subsection headings, including: directions, orientation, what happened, analysis, vignette, and further reading. The book also contains numerous illustrations and superb maps drawn by Erin Greb.

Monument to the 5th New York - Duryee's Zouaves. In just a short ten minutes, this regiment lost 332 men
of 525 engaged. Of these 121 were killed or mortally wounded.

I found myself pouring over the book for days after my visit. Those who cannot make it to Second Manssas will assuredly find it a useful resource, but the book is intended for use on the battlefield, and I can't wait to find an excuse to get back to Manassas with it in hand.

Just this past weekend, I took a trip down to Petersburg, another battlefield that I have not visited in nearly a decade. My wife came along for the ride - her first visit. We started our day poking around at the Eastern Front Visitor Center, and then followed the Eastern Front driving tour, getting out of car at several points to follow some of the short interpretive trails. We utilized the Civil War Trust's Petersburg App. I really cannot say enough good things about the various battlefield apps that the Civil War Trust has developed - they are incredibly useful on the battlefield.

Monument to the 1st Maine Heavy
Artillery. In their charge on June 18th,
1864, this unit suffered 604 casualties.

After following the interpretive trail around the Crater, we took a break for lunch. While we had originally planned to continue our tour by visiting the various forts of the Western Front, but the day was quite hot and humid, and we decided instead to spend our afternoon visiting Pamplin Park and the National Museum for the Civil War Soldier. I've always enjoyed the museum here, and thought it'd be a good way to beat the heat. For those have not visited, all guests receive an audio headset to guide them through the museum. As you enter each room, the audio player automatically begins to play an overview of the exhibit. Once the overview is done, you can enter numbers to learn more about any of the displays. Meanwhile, you are also assigned a particular soldier before entering the exhibit area, and as you progress through the museum special kiosks enable you to learn more about the soldier you've chosen to follow, through the soldiers own words and other primary sources. The museum hasn't changed much since my first visit ten years ago, but I still found it as enjoyable.

Outside of the museum, Pamplin Park preserves and interprets Tudor Hall Plantation and the site of the Battle of the Breakthrough on April 2nd, 1865. Tudor Hall was the home of the Boisseau family. Here they interpret not only life on an antebellum plantation, but also Tudor Hall's use as a Confederate encampment during the winter of 1864-1865. Visitors can take advantage of a number of programs and tours offered by living historians. We decided to simply use our audio guides as we traversed the plantation and the Breakthrough Trail, where we explored the Confederate earthworks that were carried by the Army of the Potomac's Sixth Corps, ending the Siege of Petersburg.

To cap off the day, I took some time once again to browse Pamplin Park's bookstore, and located another battlefield guide, this time a Guide to the Richmond-Petersburg Campaign, edited by Charles R. Bowery, Jr. and Ethan Rafuse (again). This book features maps by the ubiquitous Steve Stanley.  Also published in 2014 (by the University of Kansas), this guide is a bit different from the Manassas Guide. As part of the U.S. Army War College Guides to Civil War Battles series, it is much more in-depth and designed for the serious student of military history. Clocking in at more than 400 pages, the book features two parts: part one explores the main portion of Petersburg National Battlefield, or the Eastern Front. Part two offers several excursion tours, including City Point, sites north of the James River outside of Richmond, and sites associated with Grant's westward movements and the fall of Petersburg.

At each stop, the book provides a brief overview of events, orienting the visitor and situating the combat in that particular area into the context of the overall siege. After these brief explanations, each stop then provides a series of lengthy battle accounts designed to be read while viewing the terrain. Most of these accounts are from the Official Records, and they are a mix of voices from the strategic and operational leadership of both armies. 

I've enjoyed browsing through both battlefield guides, and look forward to using them on the field.

A Hike at Spotsylvania

On Friday Emily and I decided to skip the craziness of holiday shopping. Instead, we took a drive over to the Fredericksburg area to take advantage of the beautiful, if chilly, weather. We wanted to avoid the shopping traffic on Route 3 as much as possible, so we stuck to the 1864 campaign. After a very brief driving tour of the Wilderness, with stops at Saunders Field, the Widow Tapp clearing, and the Brock Road intersection, we followed the Army of the Potomac's march down the Brock Road and left our car at the Spotsylvania Exhibit shelter.

Armed with a great set of maps from Blue & Gray magazine, we set off on the Spotsylvania History Trail. For me, hiking is the only way to tour a battlefield properly, and Fredericksburg & Spotsylvania National Military Park has established some great trails at all of its battle sites. The trail at Spotsylvania consists of several connected loops, allowing a battlefield tourist the option of choosing a short hike, sampling a portion of the trail, or setting out to hike the entire seven miles. We chose to spend several hours and hike most of the trail, which begins and ends at the Exhibit shelter.

Setting out to follow in the footsteps of the 5th Corps across the open fields of the Spindle Farm.

We first traversed ground rarely seen by the average visitor touring the field in a car - Laurel Hill. The term "hill" is actually a misnomer, the terrain is undulating here. In these open fields stood the farmhouse of Sarah Spindle. On May 8th, as Confederate cavalry fell back down the Brock Road, disputing the advance of G.K. Warren's 5th Corps, Confederate infantry arrived in the nick of time to take position on a slight rise of ground behind hastily-made barricades. Warren launched several uncoordinated assaults against the Confederate position on Laurel Hill, trying to break through and into Spotsylvania Courthouse, but each failed. By the end of the day, the Army of Northern Virginia strengthened its position firmly astride the Army of the Potomac's route of advance. On May 10th and again on May 12th, the federals attempted to take Laurel Hill by frontal assault. However, the open fields and the convex shape of the Confederate works in this location subjected Union troops to a terrible crossfire during each attempt, and they met bloody repulses. Hiking across this terrain gives you a good sense of the disadvantages Union soldiers faced. You can also see a small monument to the Maryland Brigade, placed at the point of the furthest advance made by Union forces on May 8th.

Toward the Confederate position at Laurel Hill.

The Laurel Hill loop of the trail returned us to the Exhibit Shelter, and we set out on part two of our hike, which follows along the remnants of earthworks that belonged to the Army of the Potomac's 6th Corps until it reaches Upton's Road. On the evening of May 10th, Colonel Emory Upton led 5,000 hand-picked federal troops in a lightning-fast charge upon Doles' Salient, a mere 200 yards distant. The federals guided upon this narrow farm lane. Upton utilized a compact formation and ordered his men not to fire until they had reached the Confederate works. He broke the Confederate line at the salient, but receiving no support, his men were forced back eventually.

Upton's Road

Looking toward Doles' Salient.

Having followed the route of Upton's assault, the hiking trail then traverses the signature feature of the Confederate defensive line at Spotsylvania, the "Mule Shoe." Several monuments line this portion of the trail, as do multiple interpretive markers that tell the story of the famed assault on May 12th, 1864, and the fighting at the Bloody Angle. At 4 a.m. on that morning, some 20,000 federal soldiers under Winfield Scott Hancock overwhelmed Confederate forces at the Mule Shoe. Robert E. Lee fed Confederate reinforcements into the fight, hoping to buy time to allow his engineers to build a new line at the base of the Mule Shoe. For twenty hours the battle raged at close quarters, often hand-to-hand. The intensity and duration of the fighting that took place here has no other parallel during the war.

The Mule Shoe.

A side excursion of the hiking trail leads out to the Landram House ruins, which Hancock's 20,000 men swarmed past on their way to the Mule Shoe. We chose instead to continue following along the Confederate earthworks to the East Angle. From here the trail then visits two other homes unfortunately located in the path of war, the McCoull House site and the Harrison House. Both of these farms were located in the rear of the Confederate Mule Shoe position. They became the staging areas for the Confederate counterattacks that swept into the maelstrom at the Mule Shoe.

From the Harrison House, the hiking trail weaves its way through a wooded landscape along what became Lee's final line at Spotsylvania, the works constructed during the day on May 12th while the fighting raged at the Mule Shoe. Early on the morning of May 13th, the Confederates pulled back from the Mule Shoe and took position here. I had never visited this area of the battlefield before, and these earthworks are in an incredible state of preservation. The were among the strongest field fortifications that had been constructed up to that point in the war. The Army of the Potomac found this out several days later in its ill-fated assault on May 18th.

We hiked along these amazing earthworks, still imposing features on the landscape some 150 years later, until we reached the Brock Road, where we turned north and looped back to the Exhibit Shelter to complete our hike. In all, we logged somewhere close to five miles. It was a great way to spend Black Friday. If you enjoy hiking on Civil War battlefields, put the Spotsylvania History Trail on your list.

A Hike at Antietam

For those of you who don't know, I am getting married in one month. This past weekend my best man arranged a "bachelor party" of sorts, though certainly not a typical one. The full schedule included camping near Hagerstown, Maryland, hiking on the Antietam Battlefield, and a trip to a minor league baseball game. It was perfect.

I last visited Antietam in the spring of 2008. The battlefield is in a wonderful state of preservation, and it provides several contrasts to Gettysburg. You won't find the same the commercial development in the town of Sharpsburg that you see at Gettysburg, and the veterans left far fewer monuments on the field. Antietam is smaller battlefield too, and I love the various hiking trails that the National Park Service has developed. There are many places for you to get off the beaten path at Gettysburg - The trail to Willoughby Run, the path at the Slyder Farm, the Weikert farm lane, Pickett's Charge, and the old trolly line are some of my favorites - but I am not aware of anything that approaches the comprehensive trail system, complete with self-guided walking tours, that exists at Antietam.

Not a sight you see every day. As we hiked past the Dunker Church,
we ran into the mascot of the Hagerstown Suns, cheering
on runners at the nearby finish line. Photo by Ryan Stauffer.

We arrived at the Visitor Center at 9 a.m. on Saturday. While my best man handled other arrangements for this weekend, our battlefield itinerary was left to my discretion. We had six in our group, and all but one of us had toured the field before. The forecast threatened rain, but we were determined to tour the field on foot - in my opinion the only way to get a grasp of the terrain features of a battlefield. We browsed the exhibits briefly, and spent some time orienting ourselves outside on the high ground around the Visitor Center. We then drove up and parked a car at the North Woods tour stop, dodging the rear elements of a 5K taking place on the battlefield that morning. Once we arrived at the North Woods, we began our first hike - the Bloody Cornfield.

I had come prepared with a few resources to help our understanding. In advance I had printed out all of the hiking trail guides offered on the NPS website. Each of the trails have multiple interpretive stops, marked by posts. The trail guides provide very brief descriptions of the action at each stop. In addition to this, I had downloaded the Civil War Trust's Antietam Battlefield App. The Trust has developed several of these apps, all of them very impressive. They provide multiple guided walking and driving tours of each battlefield, complete with interpretive text and videos. They are also GPS enabled, so that you can locate yourself on a map. Finally, the apps feature augmented reality "field glasses" that you can use to scan the field through your camera lens and view labeled landmarks and terrain features. The Antietam app's tours did not always match up with the hiking trails, but frequently there was a great deal of cross-over. In addition to these resources, I also packed William Frassanito's study of Antietam photography, and a mini-tour booklet put together by Antietam historian John Michael Priest.

The monument to the 15th Massachusetts

We followed the hiking trail south to Miller's Cornfield, and considered the back-and-forth fight that ruptured the chilly early-morning air on September 17th, 1862. Then, we picked up the West Woods hiking trail that begins by the Dunker Church. This is a trail I've never explored before. It takes you to the Philadelphia Brigade monument, and then loops around into the West Woods, allowing you to explore the terrain crossed by Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick's 5,000 man division. The path emerges into the open at the western end of the woods near the 15th Massachusetts monument - the unit that suffered the most casualties in the battle - and then it reenters the West Woods and winds down to the monuments to the 34th New York and 125th Pennsylvania (a 12th Corps unit). These two regiments held the left flank of Union forces in the West Woods when they were struck by a devastating Confederate counterattack that would eventually rout Sedgwick's entire command. Walking through this terrain, I observed many hallows and ravines in the woods, and came to understand how confusing a place this must have been for Sedgwick's men. The division was stacked up in a column of brigades when it was struck on its flank and rear, and the smoke of battle that filling the wooded ravines must have made it very difficult for officers and men to understand what had happened.

After a brief lunch at the Red Byrd - a restaurant on the Boonsboro Pike that  I would highly recommend - we returned to the Visitor Center and headed out on the Bloody Lane hiking trail. This pathway had overgrown a bit, suggesting that it sees seldom use - but it is an excellent way to understand the fight for the Bloody Lane from the perspective of the troops in the federal divisions of William H. French and Israel Richardson. The trail leads out from the Visitor Center to the the Mumma and Roulette Farms. The trail guide provides information on these two families and the fate they suffered during and after the battle. The pathway then curls around the Roulette Farm, and picks up the line of march for French's division as it crested a rise sixty yards in front of the Sunken Road. It was on this rise that French's men first met with withering volleys of musketry from the Rebel forces firing behind fence rails in the lane. For two and a half hours, the Confederate forces in the lane held the 2nd Corps at bay and protected the main approach to Sharpsburg. Meanwhile, just across the Middle Bridge McClellan refused to commit his reserves to the engagement. The Confederate position finally collapsed at about 1 p.m., but Richardson and French's divisions could push on no further.

A view of the Bloody Lane. This photo was taken in 2004. Unfortunately the weather on my recent trip was not so nice.

After a brief jaunt up the Bloody Lane observation tower, we returned to our vehicles at the Visitor Center, and drove down to Burnside Bridge. By now, light rain had set in. We visited the bridge and then considered the weather before we headed out on the Final Attack trail. We decided to give it a go. Unfortunately the rain increased as we got out on the trail, and at some points it became a steady downpour. We were mostly prepared with rain gear though, and we pressed on.

The Final Attack trail is one of my favorite Civil War hikes. This 1.7 mile loop covers Burnside's final attack toward Sharpsburg on the afternoon of September 17th, and A.P. Hill's successful counterattack. The hike takes you across the farm owned by John Otto during the battle. This farm remained in private hands until the Park acquired it in 2003. Today, it is easy for battlefield tourists to overlook the significance of fighting on this farm. The dramatic storming of the bridge across the Antietam attracts more interest. If you do make it out on the trail, you can visit several monuments that you cannot access from any tour road. You will also reach some of the best vantage points for obtaining panoramic views of the Antietam landscape.

Many battlefield tourists end their trip on the southern end of the battlefield here at the Burnside Bridge. But the
Park Service has developed a great hiking trail that follows the 9th Corps's advance well beyond the bridge
to the very edge of Sharpsburg.

The pathway heads west from the Burnside Bridge parking lot, and connects to the Otto Farm lane. The terrain the 9th Corps faced as it drove toward Sharpsburg was daunting. The undulating landscape gradually rises from the valley cut by the Antietam to the highest point held by D.R. Jones' Confederate division near Sharpsburg. Once the Otto farm lane is reached, the trail turns south and loops down beyond the 9th Corps flank to the southern boundary of the Antietam Battlefield, and the site where A.P. Hill's soldiers arrived that evening. Here you stand in what is known as the 40-acre cornfield, and you overlook a gully. Rookie soldiers of the 16th Connecticut and 4th Rhode Island were driven into this gully by Hill's advancing men. The landscape here reveals what a terrible ordeal these soldiers must have suffered through.

The Final Assault trail ended our hike at Antietam. We didn't have time to check out several other trails on the battlefield. A devoted hiker can actually explore the entire field on foot while rarely running into the auto tour routes. Most of the trails link up together rather easily, and the park's Three Farms trail actually connects its northern trail network (the Bloody Cornfield trail, the West Woods trail, and the Bloody Lane trail), with its southern network (the Sherrick Farm trail, the Union Advance trail, the  Snavely Ford trail, and the Final Attack trail).  Sometime I would love to do this. Judging from maps, it is about an 8 or 9 mile hike.

If you want to check out some of these trails, visit Antietam NPS's guide to hiking the battlefield to download their tour maps. For a few of these trails, you can also download a more in-depth podcast tour delivered by Antietam Park Rangers from the Civil War Traveler website.  Finally, I would also highly recommend that smart phone users check out the Civil War Trust's Antietam App as an additional resource.

What are some of your favorite Civil War hiking trails?