- Joined
- May 18, 2005
- Location
- Spring Hill, Tennessee
4 p.m. will mark the 149th anniversary of the bloody Battle of Franklin.
What some historians have led people to believe is it was a five hour battle. Perhaps the bullets were flying for five hours, but the vast majority of losses that took place occurred in only TWO hours. Over 7,000 Confederate casualties total and fully 80% or more in the first TWO hours.
Figure this.
The Confederates strike the Federal lines at about 4:15 p.m. - sunset at 4:30 and dusk at 5 p.m..
For only the first 45 minutes to an hour you can see your target. Needless to say it is much easier to hit a target when you can see it. So the first hour of the battle is by far the most deadly. The casualties that take place after that are more random than anything else. Imagine the brief, but horribly deadly field and ditches along the exterior of the main Federal line!
"And now the battle raged all along the lines. The first success of the Confederates proved their ruin, as it had been so easily gained that it led them to repeat the attack, pouring division after division upon the works, only to see them melt away under that terrible fire. After these terrific charges, came what was not less impressive—the lulls of the battle. First, there was a sound in the distance, as of a great multitude in motion, coupled with a fearful yell, which culminated in a rush and roar, as the living human wave struck upon the beach, and broke and rolled back again. Then for a few minutes there was a lull, as the enemy were gathering their forces to renew the onset—a comparative silence, broken only by the groans of the wounded and dying. One who was in the battle writes me that the charge itself was not so dreadful as these moments of expectation. Then rose the same terrific yell, and on they came again with the same desperate courage, but not with the same confidence: for they came, not with erect, martial air, but with heads bent low, as when facing a tempest, and caps drawn over their eyes, as if to shut from their sight the fate that awaited them."
"A Confederate officer tells me that the next morning he mounted his horse to ride to the front, but as he drew near the horse started back, affrighted at the smell of blood, and at the human figures that stared at him from the ground, with every look of agony in their faces; and he dismounted and endeavored to pick his way on foot, but so thick were the slain that he said, “I do not think it extravagant to say that for two hundred yards from the line of intrenchments, I could have walked on the dead, stepping from one body to another!”
Did Hood have any other good options that day? Think hard.
What some historians have led people to believe is it was a five hour battle. Perhaps the bullets were flying for five hours, but the vast majority of losses that took place occurred in only TWO hours. Over 7,000 Confederate casualties total and fully 80% or more in the first TWO hours.
Figure this.
The Confederates strike the Federal lines at about 4:15 p.m. - sunset at 4:30 and dusk at 5 p.m..
For only the first 45 minutes to an hour you can see your target. Needless to say it is much easier to hit a target when you can see it. So the first hour of the battle is by far the most deadly. The casualties that take place after that are more random than anything else. Imagine the brief, but horribly deadly field and ditches along the exterior of the main Federal line!
"And now the battle raged all along the lines. The first success of the Confederates proved their ruin, as it had been so easily gained that it led them to repeat the attack, pouring division after division upon the works, only to see them melt away under that terrible fire. After these terrific charges, came what was not less impressive—the lulls of the battle. First, there was a sound in the distance, as of a great multitude in motion, coupled with a fearful yell, which culminated in a rush and roar, as the living human wave struck upon the beach, and broke and rolled back again. Then for a few minutes there was a lull, as the enemy were gathering their forces to renew the onset—a comparative silence, broken only by the groans of the wounded and dying. One who was in the battle writes me that the charge itself was not so dreadful as these moments of expectation. Then rose the same terrific yell, and on they came again with the same desperate courage, but not with the same confidence: for they came, not with erect, martial air, but with heads bent low, as when facing a tempest, and caps drawn over their eyes, as if to shut from their sight the fate that awaited them."
"A Confederate officer tells me that the next morning he mounted his horse to ride to the front, but as he drew near the horse started back, affrighted at the smell of blood, and at the human figures that stared at him from the ground, with every look of agony in their faces; and he dismounted and endeavored to pick his way on foot, but so thick were the slain that he said, “I do not think it extravagant to say that for two hundred yards from the line of intrenchments, I could have walked on the dead, stepping from one body to another!”
Did Hood have any other good options that day? Think hard.