Shiloh National Military Park-14 July 2013

Most people have heard of the battle of Gettysburg, but for many Shiloh is one of those lesser known battles. Some say Gettysburg was the turning point of the Civil War and in many ways this is true, but with the Union victory at Shiloh the major water way of the Tennessee river would not have been secured.  Along with the Mississippi River, the Tennessee was a major cause way providing supplies to the southern cause.
  Over a day period Union and Southern forces battled each other. On the first day Southern forces pushed General Grant back to a point that the Union was in peril of losing it's toe hold to the area. With the coming of night, each army stopped to regroup, collect their wounded and plan for the next days battle. While General Grant sat under a tree smoking his cigar and whittling on a pieces of wood, General Sherman came up and  "Took a whopping today General" Gant respond " Yes, whoop em tomorrow though". During the night the Union army received re-enforcements that turned the battle into a Union victory the next day.
  We attended a Ranger talked in one of the most hotly contended portions of the battle, "The Hornets Nest" so called because the Southern troops marched into a hail of canon and rifle fire that the sound of the bullets in the air sounded like hornets.
 This is a battlefield that takes about three hours or more to get the full view. There are a number of Ranger lectures on the battlefield that give one a better understand of what occurred there.

 

 

                                                                Shiloh Church

 

 

                                                 Many artifacts from the battlefield

 

                                                 Ranger talk at the Hornets Nest