Gettysburg Map

[Aloysius]

 

[James N.]

This one - and to a slightly lesser extent the Shiloh one - shows why I dislike maps like this: Notice that for some obtuse reason the Emmitsburg Road seems to run ALONG Seminary Ridge, with no Union units on it; therefore there's no real Peach Orchard salient nor Humphries' line running north from it. Obviously, all the Confederate troops are attacking simultaneously too. I would opine that Lt. Brown either was not present at the battle, or else he had a very contorted version of what happened there!

 

[Hussar Yeomanry]

Thanks for posting but I'm with James N. in that the more I look at it the more problems I find with it. Still it is useful in that this is the (in places innacurate) Confederate opinion of what was happening/had happened there...

 

[Aloysius]

I have much better maps for accuracy... I posted one as a new thread in the General Forum... That one comes from the Official Military atlas of the Civil War by Major George B. Davis, US Army, Leslie J Perry, Civilian Expert, Joseph W. Kirkley, Civilian Expert and Compiled by Capt. Calvin D. Cowles, 23rd Infantry...

I am inserting one of those maps here for your perusal ...

 

[James N.]

Unfortunately that one doesn't help me - since it's not Gettysburg, Antietam, Shiloh, etc. any mistakes aren't as readily apparent. There have been quite a few threads on the forum featuring maps, both of the period and modern, that have engendered a relatively large amount of comment, though it's generally about one of those better-known battles or scenarios. I remember not being appreciated very much when I pointed out that the decorative maps by Union cartographer Sneden that continually pop up, especially as magazine illustrations, contain many inaccuracies caused largely by the fact that he wasn't even present at many of the battles depicted and relied on second- and third-hand information when he created them.

 

[James N.]

Thanks for posting but I'm with James N. in that the more I look at it the more problems I find with it. Still it is useful in that this is the (in places innacurate) Confederate opinion of what was happening/had happened there...

That can be a really important factor in attempting to understand why certain individuals may have performed in the way they did. The best example I can think of is a crude and incorrect map of the Union positions at Shiloh that Confederate commander Albert Sidney Johnston was following during the morning of April 6. Apparently it was skewed in such a way as to show the Confederate right being much nearer the banks of the Tennessee River than was actually the case, leading him to believe (wrongly) that he had turned the Union left flank and was near Pittsburg Landing, neither of which was true.