Transcript Battle of Perryville

Battle of Perryville
As
Presented by
MSG DANNY MCKINNEY
Overview:
• The Battle of Perryville was an important but largely
neglected encounter in the American Civil War. It
was fought on October 8, 1862 in the Chaplin Hills
west of Perryville, Kentucky. The Battle began with a
middle-of-the-night skirmish over a source of
precious drinking water, and ended more or less by
default with the onset of darkness and the retreat of
the tactical victor, the Confederates. It marked the
end of the Kentucky Campaign of Confederate
Generals Braxton Bragg and Edmund Kirby Smith
and, like the campaign, was marked not only by
fierce fighting and heroic achievement, but also by
indecision, confusion, and futility on both sides:
The Personnel:
It involved one Confederate General Braxton
Bragg whose charges would not initially carry
out his orders to attack, and another, Union
Major General Don Carlos Buell, who did not
intend to fight until the following day.
Unaware that the Battle had begun until it was
nearly over, Buell kept more than half his troops
aside while the rest fought for their lives.
General
Braxton
Bragg
Union Major General Don Carlos Buell
Confederate General Edmund Kirby
Smith.
Preparation
• In the summer of 1862, Confederate
generals Braxton Bragg and Edmund
Kirby Smith devised plans to invade
Kentucky. In an attempt to procure
supplies, enlist recruits, and to pull Union
troops away from the vital railhead of
Chattanooga, Tennessee, these Southern
commanders instigated a two-pronged
advance into the Commonwealth.
Leading to Perryville
• Kirby Smith left Knoxville on August 14
and entered the state. Two weeks later,
Braxton Bragg’s Confederates followed.
By mid-September, Smith’s soldiers had
whipped a Federal force at Richmond and
Bragg’s troops had captured a Union
garrison at Munfordville. The Confederate
armies had captured Lexington and
Frankfort, controlled most of central
Kentucky, and threatened the entire state.
• On the night of October 7, the Southerners moved an
advance unit of Arkansas troops between the dried
waters of Bull Run and Doctor’s Creek, located west
of town. When Union forces reached the area, a
reconnaissance mission proved that small pools of
water were available in Doctor’s Creek. The Union
command ordered the water, and the heights
overlooking it (called Peter’s Hill), secured.
• At 3:00 a.m. on October 8, Federal troops under
Brigadier General Philip Sheridan moved on Peter’s
Hill, driving back the Arkansas soldiers. The
Battle of Perryville had begun.
The Fight
• It pitted a force of superior numbers (the Union Army
of the Ohio), which included troops so green they did
not know how to properly aim their artillery, against
veteran soldiers (the Confederate Army of the
Mississippi) whose commander had badly misjudged
the size of their opposition.
• With little direction from their commanders, the
soldiers engaged in what some insisted was the most
ferocious fighting of the entire war. Following the
battle, and for the rest of their lives, both Generals
were condemned for their poor leadership and
mismanagement of their forces.
External Forces
For months, a severe drought affected the area.
As Union and Confederate forces maneuvered
around Perryville, both man and horse
suffered intensely for want of water. Only
stagnant pools were available for the
thousands of thirsty soldiers. After the Union
army left Louisville, some of the first
casualties were caused by this dry, hot
weather.
One Union colonel wrote, "Today we passed
two men laying on the roadside having died
from sunstroke . . ." The heat was unbearable,
and Perryville’s Chaplin River was nearly dry.”
Major Miscommunication
• Braxton Bragg, who had left his army to inaugurate a
Confederate governor in Frankfort, traveled to
Harrodsburg, where he hoped to concentrate his
forces. Bragg soon learned that a Federal force had
been encountered at Perryville. As Bragg believed
that the main body of Union troops was near
Frankfort, he ordered his men at Perryville to attack.
After waiting to hear the sounds of battle, Bragg
rushed to Perryville to learn why his orders had not
been followed. Upon reaching town, the Confederate
commander discovered that his staff had chosen a
"defensive-offensive" strategy. An incensed Bragg,
who did not realize that his army was outnumbered,
realigned the Southern forces and again ordered his
16,000 men to attack.
Casualties Mount
One Confederate infantryman later recalled
the Southern assault. "Such obstinate
fighting I never had seen before or
since," he wrote. "The guns were
discharged so rapidly that it seemed
the earth itself was in a volcanic uproar.
The iron storm passed through our
ranks, mangling and tearing men to
pieces."
Won the battle but….
• The Confederates had won a tactical victory but
encountered a strategic defeat. Although the
Rebel army whipped the Federal left, Bragg was
forced to withdraw his outnumbered Southerners
from the region and from the state, ending his
invasion and dashing the hopes of a
Confederate Kentucky.
• The Battle of Perryville, which was the largest
Civil War battle in the Commonwealth, killed and
wounded more than 7,500 Union and
Confederate troops.
The Result
The Confederates won a tactical victory by pushing
most of the Union forces back from the strategic
high ground and sources of water over which they
fought, but they immediately abandoned the land
they had gained at such a high price when they
realized they had been opposed by less than half of
the Union troops in the area.
• The Confederate "victory" marked the end of their
last offensive Campaign in the West, and their retreat
left the border state of Kentucky under the control of
the Union Army for the rest of the war.
The Aftermath
• The thousands of casualties lay scattered over
hundreds of acres. A Federal cavalryman later
described the horrific post-battle scene. "We
found that the Rebels had left during the night,"
he wrote.
•
"We marched over the battlefield. It was a horrible
sight. For four miles the fields are strewn with the
dead of both parties, some are torn to pieces and
some in the dying agonies of death. The ambulances
are unable to take all the wounded . . . A large pile of
legs and arms are lying around that the Rebel
doctors cut off."
• Rocky bluff along Doctor’s Creek
which part of the left wing of the
42nd had to climb up while being
fired upon by the advancing enemy.
Civilian Account of the Battle of
Perryville
On the second morning after the
battle of Perryville, or Chaplin Hills,
I visited the battle-field. In passing
out on the Springfield road, the
fencing was all leveled to the
ground - here and there a dead
rebel. After proceeding about one
mile, I came to a company of
Union soldiers, who had collected
ten or twelve of their dead
comrades and were preparing to
bury them.
Thence I proceeded to Mr. Peter's
house, meeting on the way more
than ten thousand Union troops,
pressing from their homes. The
first hospital I entered was Mr.
Peter's house. Here about two
hundred wounded soldiers, were
lying side by side on beds of
straw.
(cont’d)
Not withstanding, they were
wounded in every possible way,
there was not heard among them
a groan or complaint. In the
orchard close by a long trench
had been dug, in which to bury
the dead; about fifteen were lying
in a row, ready for internment.
Confederate Account of the
Battle of Perryville
When I think of that day it occurs to me as a unit,
from the time I awoke until about sundown.
Anyhow, we advanced across an open field, under a
rather sharp fire of the enemy's skirmishers, to the
foot of a wooded hill, where it became evident that
the enemy's lines still flanked ours, and we must
march by the right flank, taking ground to the right.
While I was thus engaged I heard a severe fire
toward the head of the column. I rode rapidly
towards the firing, and it was very pleasant to me to
see the kind feeling the brigade had for me,
expressed in continuous cheers and friendly
guying. Our whole line was then under fire, and I
was riding between the men and the enemy.
After looking at the battle for a few minutes Gen. Maney
asked me what I thought of it. I told him I didn't think
our position could be maintained; that there were
seven or eight guns of the enemy against Turner's
four, and that the enemy's line of infantry was longer
and stronger than ours. He asked what I thought
should be done, and I told him I believed our only
chance was to take those guns. He asked if I thought
it was possible for our men to do it. I said, "I think
so."
He said, "Go, direct the men to go forward, if
possible." I rode out into the field, in the rear
of the line, and, passing the whole length of
our line of battle, told the field officers of
each regiment what was expected. I was
repeatedly assured by officers and privates
as I rode along that if it were possible to
make a simultaneous movement, they
believed they could take the guns, but in the
great uproar of bursting shells and crashing
of incessant musketry a man could hardly be
heard even speaking his loudest.
• Perryville Battlefield October 8, 1862
initial positions, movements, and final positions
The Retreat
• On the evening of October the 8th Bragg’s
troops began to fall back from Perryville and
head towards Harrodsburg. The decision to
leave Perryville was due to the large number
of federal troops that were amassing west of
Perryville. Bragg hoped to unite with Smith
at Harrodsburg and thus have a force large
enough to challenge the Union army. While
marching to Harrodsburg Bragg decided to
abandon the Kentucky campaign and march
to Knoxville via the Cumberland Gap
The Retreat
October 8, 1862, Watkins and 18,000
Confederates clashed with 20,000 Union troops on
the hills outside of Perryville. Nearly 8,000 soldiers
were killed and wounded in what became
Kentucky’s largest Civil War battle. The
Confederates’ failure to attain a decisive victory
kept Kentucky in Union hands for the remainder of
the war, influenced northern Congressional
elections, and gave President Lincoln the political
acumen needed to issue a preliminary version of
the Emancipation Proclamation. Perryville is indeed
a site of national significance.
Thank you for your attention.
Reference Guide
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References-Maps
Burroughs, W.G., 1926, The
Geography of the Kentucky
Knobs, Volume 19:
Kentucky Geological
Survey, series 6, 284p.
Cressman, E.R., 1974,
Geologic Map of the
Perryville Quadrangle,
Mercer and Boyle
Counties, Kentucky: U.S.
Geological Quadrangle
Map GQ-1185, One sheet,
1:24,000.
Davis, D.H., 1924,
Geography of the
Mountains of Eastern
Kentucky, Volume 18:
Kentucky Geological
Survey, series 6, 180p.
• References-Websites
• http://www.uky.edu/ArtsScie
nces/Geology/webdogs/civil
war/index.html
• http://www.cr.nps.gov/hps/a
bpp/battles/ky009.htm
• http://www.swcivilwar.com/B
raggMissionaryRidgeReport.
html
• http://www.perryville.net/
• http://www.perryville.net/hist
ory.html
• http://www.battleofperryville.
com/