[30] Battles and Leaders, vol. ii, p. 554.
[31] O.R., vol. xix, part i, p. 65.
[32] Battles and Leaders, vol. ii, p. 667.
[33] O.R., vol. xix, part i, p. 55.
[34] According to Jackson’s staff officers he himself reported shortly after daylight.
[35] Battles and Leaders, vol. ii, p. 675.
Chapter XIX
SHARPSBURG
1862. Sept. 17 It is a curious coincidence that not only were the number, of the opposing armies at the battle of Sharpsburg almost identical with those of the French and Germans at the battle of Wörth, but that there is no small resemblance between the natural features and surrounding scenery of the two fields. Full in front of the Confederate position rises the Red Hill, a spur of the South Mountain, wooded, like the Vosges, to the very crest, and towering high above the fields of Maryland, as the Hochwald towers above the Rhineland. The Antietam, however, is a more difficult obstacle than the Sauerbach, the brook which meanders through the open meadows of the Alsatian valley. A deep channel of more than sixty feet in width is overshadowed by forest trees; and the ground on either bank ascends at a sharp gradient to the crests above. Along the ridge to the west, which parts the Antietam from the Potomac, and about a mile distant from the former stream, runs the Hagerstown turnpike, and in front of this road there was a strong position. Sharpsburg, a village of a few hundred inhabitants, lies on the reverse slope of the ridge, extending in the direction of the Potomac, and only the church steeples were visible to the Federals. Above the hamlet was the Confederate centre. Here, near a limestone boulder, which stood in a plot which is now included in the soldiers’ cemetery, was Lee’s station during the long hours of September 17, and from this point he overlooked the whole extent of his line of battle. A mile northward, on the Hagerstown pike, his loft centre was marked by a square white building, famous under the name of the Dunkard Church, and backed by a long dark wood. To the right, a mile southward, a bold spur, covered with scattered trees, forces the Antietam westward, and on this spur, overlooking the stream, he had placed his right.