50 Fun Facts About Battle of Antietam

A lost copy of Lee's marching orders, found by Union soldiers days before Antietam, was wrapped around what?

Three cigars were bundled in the paper when a Union corporal spotted it in the grass at a campground. Passed up the chain of command, it told McClellan that Lee had divided his army.

Which future US president, then a young sergeant, served hot coffee to his regiment under fire at Antietam?

William McKinley, a commissary sergeant in the 23rd Ohio, carried hot coffee and warm food to every man in the regiment without orders. A monument on the battlefield now marks the spot.

Which nurse had a bullet tear through her sleeve at Antietam, killing the wounded soldier she was tending?

Clara Barton reached the field with a wagon of bandages and lanterns she had collected herself, and worked until dark. She went on to found the American Red Cross.

What grim record in American military history has the Battle of Antietam held since September 17, 1862?

Bloodiest single day in American history: about 22,700 men were killed, wounded or missing by dusk. That was a quarter of the Union troops engaged and nearly a third of Lee's.

Which Union division commander at Antietam was later wrongly credited with inventing the game of baseball?

Abner Doubleday never made the claim himself; a commission named him baseball's inventor in 1908, fifteen years after his death. Historians of the game have since debunked it.

What unexpected attackers threw the rookie 132nd Pennsylvania into confusion at the Roulette farm during Antietam?

Angry bees swarmed the regiment when several hives in the farmyard were knocked over as the men hurried through. Officers had to restore order before the advance went on.

The Union's strategic win at Antietam gave Lincoln the confidence to announce which landmark measure five days later?

Emancipation Proclamation: Lincoln issued its preliminary version on September 22, giving the rebel states until January 1, 1863, to return or see their slaves declared free.

At Antietam, Robert E. Lee failed to recognize which powder-blackened Confederate gunner until the young man spoke?

His own son, Robert E. Lee Jr., was a private in an artillery battery that had been heavily engaged. The general knew him only by his voice when he asked if the guns were going back in.

Which Union general's corps took three hours to capture the stone bridge at Antietam that now bears his name?

Ambrose Burnside also gave the world the word sideburns, a reversal of his surname inspired by his whiskers. After the war he won three terms as governor of Rhode Island.

Lee's men marched toward Antietam singing 'Maryland, My Maryland', which shares its tune with which Christmas carol?

O Tannenbaum lends its melody to the pro-Confederate anthem, written in 1861. It was the official state song of Maryland from 1939 until lawmakers dropped it in 2021.

Which Civil War film starring Matthew Broderick opens with its hero wounded at the Battle of Antietam?

Glory begins with Captain Robert Gould Shaw hurt in the fighting, before he is offered command of the Black 54th Massachusetts. The real Shaw did fight there, with the 2nd Massachusetts.

Photographs taken at Antietam in 1862 were the first of an American battlefield to show what?

The unburied dead had never been photographed on an American field before. Put on display at Mathew Brady's gallery in New York City, the pictures shocked and appalled New Yorkers.

The Confederacy named the Battle of Antietam after which Maryland town that stood just behind Lee's lines?

Sharpsburg gave the battle its Southern name, while the North named it for the creek. The town was founded in 1763 and named for a colonial governor, Horatio Sharpe.

The sunken Confederate position at the centre of the Antietam battlefield earned what nickname after the fighting there?

Bloody Lane saw about 5,600 casualties in under four hours along just 800 yards of road. Years of wagon traffic had worn it down into a natural trench.

Which Confederate general captured the Union garrison at Harpers Ferry, then hurried his troops to join Lee at Antietam?

Stonewall Jackson processed more than 12,000 prisoners there, then held the northern end of Lee's line against the morning attacks.

What kind of farm field at Antietam is said to have changed hands some fifteen times in a single morning?

A cornfield on the Miller farm was swept by attack and counterattack from dawn. The first Union corps sent in lost 2,500 men in two hours and ended up back where it started.

Antietam was fought on September 17, the anniversary of the 1787 signing of which founding document?

The US Constitution was signed in Philadelphia 75 years to the day before the battle. September 17 is now observed across the country as Constitution Day.

The outcome at Antietam helped dissuade which two European powers from recognizing the Confederacy?

Britain and France had both abolished slavery, and once Lincoln tied the war to freeing the enslaved, neither government could be seen backing the South.

Which plain white house of worship, built by a pacifist sect, stood at the heart of Antietam's morning fighting?

Dunker Church took its name from the German Baptist Brethren's full-immersion baptisms. A storm flattened it in 1921, and it was rebuilt for the battle's centennial.

Lee's army escaped after Antietam by crossing which river back into Virginia on the night of September 18?

The Potomac lay at Lee's back throughout the battle, with only a single ford near Shepherdstown close enough to use. It made his position a risky one.

Frustrated that Lee's army got away after Antietam, what did Lincoln do to McClellan seven weeks later?

Lincoln relieved him of command on November 5, after McClellan spent weeks declining to chase Lee into Virginia. It effectively ended the general's military career.

George McClellan, the Union commander at Antietam, ran against Lincoln for president in 1864 for which party?

The Democrats nominated him in 1864, but Lincoln beat him. McClellan never held another field command and later served as governor of New Jersey.

The Union army's commander at Antietam was affectionately known to his soldiers by which nickname?

Little Mac was George McClellan, also called the Young Napoleon. At Antietam his caution left two corps standing in reserve while the fighting hung in the balance.

Which Union unit of mostly immigrant soldiers was given a priest's absolution before charging Antietam's sunken road?

Irish Brigade soldiers advanced under emerald green flags as Father William Corby rode across their front. They lost 540 men to heavy volleys before being ordered back.

Each December, volunteers at Antietam National Battlefield set out about 23,000 of what, one for every casualty?

Candle luminaries, each a paper bag holding sand and a candle, are set out in rows by more than a thousand volunteers. The memorial illumination began in 1989.

What were the 51st New York and 51st Pennsylvania promised back if they stormed the stone bridge at Antietam?

Whiskey rations had recently been cancelled for the two regiments, and they were told a successful charge would restore them. They took the bridge at the third attempt.

A few hundred riflemen from which state held the stone bridge at Antietam against a whole Union corps for hours?

Georgia supplied the two thin regiments posted on the bluff above the bridge. They cost the attackers more than 500 casualties and lost fewer than 160 themselves.

Whose Light Division marched 17 miles from Harpers Ferry and struck the Union flank late in the day at Antietam?

A. P. Hill arrived at about 3:30 p.m. with some 3,000 men the Federals did not know were coming. His surprise counterattack ended the battle.

Why did many of the Confederates who struck the Union flank late at Antietam confuse the defenders?

They wore blue uniforms taken from the captured Harpers Ferry garrison, which left Union regiments in the tall corn unsure who was friend and who was foe.

On the Antietam battlefield, each upturned cannon barrel set in a block of stone marks the spot where what happened?

A general was killed or mortally wounded at each of the six mortuary cannon, three from either army. Twelve more generals were wounded in the battle.

Which Confederate general, asked at Antietam where his division was, replied that it was dead on the field?

John Bell Hood had thrown his 2,300 men into the morning counterattack, and about 60 percent of them became casualties. They kept Lee's line from crumbling.

Which Union corps commander opened the dawn attack at Antietam and was shot in the foot while riding a white horse?

Joseph Hooker was picked off by a Confederate marksman who spotted the general on his conspicuous mount. With him gone, nobody was left to coordinate the Union troops on that part of the field.

Antietam's one-day casualties nearly equalled those of which two-day battle fought in Tennessee five months earlier?

Shiloh had shocked the nation that April with its losses over two days of fighting. Antietam ran up almost the same toll between dawn and dusk.

Which battle, fought three days before Antietam for the passes of a Maryland ridge, bought Lee time to gather his army?

South Mountain's passes were held stoutly enough to delay McClellan while Lee concentrated behind Antietam Creek. The Iron Brigade is said to have earned its name in the fighting there.

The Antietam campaign began days after Lee won which battle in northern Virginia at the end of August 1862?

Second Bull Run ended on August 30, and within days Lee's 55,000 men were heading for Maryland. With northern Virginia's farms stripped bare, he also needed somewhere to feed them.

The Union surrender at Harpers Ferry before Antietam was America's largest until which World War II defeat?

Bataan, in the Philippines, finally surpassed it. At Harpers Ferry more than 12,400 Union soldiers were captured for fewer than 300 Confederate casualties.

Lee's lost orders, found in a field by Union troops before Antietam, are known to history by what official title?

Special Order 191 revealed that Lee had split his army into scattered pieces. A delighted McClellan said that if he could not whip Lee with it, he would be willing to go home.

Which Confederate general later claimed he had eaten his copy of Lee's secret orders for the Antietam campaign?

James Longstreet made the claim in 1895. He led the larger of Lee's two wings in the battle and held the southern end of the line.

Which Scottish-born photographer, then working for Mathew Brady, took the first battlefield pictures at Antietam?

Alexander Gardner made about ninety images there, some seventy of them in 3D stereo. He came back two weeks later to photograph Lincoln's visit to the army.

The Pry House, McClellan's headquarters during the Battle of Antietam, later housed a museum devoted to what subject?

Civil War medicine filled its exhibits, which covered the care of the wounded. The house sat more than a mile behind the lines, making it hard for McClellan to control his corps.

The giant granite soldier called Old Simon was delayed reaching Antietam National Cemetery when its top half did what?

It fell into a river at Washington, D.C., and once retrieved was shipped by canal and dragged to the cemetery on wooden rollers. The statue was finally dedicated in 1880.

A sailor killed in a terrorist attack on which US Navy ship was later buried at Antietam National Cemetery?

USS Cole fireman Patrick Howard Roy, from nearby Keedysville, was laid to rest there in October 2000. The cemetery had been closed to new burials since 1953.

Why did Confederate soldiers deliberately burn the Mumma family's farmhouse during the Battle of Antietam?

To deny sharpshooters cover, a Confederate general ordered it torched at about 6:30 a.m. It was the only building deliberately destroyed in the battle, and the family was never compensated.

Which future Supreme Court justice was wounded at Antietam as a young officer in the 20th Massachusetts?

Oliver W. Holmes Jr. was wounded in three battles of the war: Ball's Bluff, Antietam and Chancellorsville. He sat on the Supreme Court from 1902 to 1932.

Which young aide to McClellan, later a famous cavalry general, was photographed with Lincoln after Antietam?

George Custer stands at the far right of the group portrait taken during Lincoln's October visit to the army. He had served through the campaign as an aide-de-camp to the commander.

Which regiment, later famed under Joshua Chamberlain at Gettysburg, was held in reserve at the Battle of Antietam?

The 20th Maine had been mustered into service less than three weeks before the battle and saw it from the rear. Its famous stand came the following July.

Which Union general, a forty-year army veteran, was mortally wounded at Antietam two days after taking over XII Corps?

Joseph Mansfield had never led large numbers of soldiers in combat. Fearing his raw recruits would bolt, he bunched them ten ranks deep, and was shot in the chest as they went in.

Which general defending the stone bridge at Antietam had earlier been the Confederacy's first Secretary of State?

Robert Toombs had quit the cabinet after opposing the attack on Fort Sumter and taken a brigadier's commission instead. He was wounded at Antietam.

Which Union army surgeon had a new system of aid stations and ambulances ready in time for the Battle of Antietam?

Jonathan Letterman set up forward aid stations that sorted the wounded by urgency, served by ambulances that answered to doctors rather than quartermasters. He is remembered as the father of battlefield medicine.

Which Union corps commander at Antietam was nicknamed Bull Head after a musket ball reportedly bounced off his skull?

Edwin Sumner, born in 1797, was the oldest corps commander on either side in the war. At Antietam he rode in with a division that lost over 2,200 men in under half an hour.