Battle at Antietam: Sensory Moment in Time

Lesson Plan

Student Objectives:

- Students will utilize their critical and historical thinking skills to analyze the Battle of Antietam during the
American Civil War.
- Students will utilize their critical and historical thinking skills to develop historical empathy for the soldiers
during the Battle of Antietam.
- Students will utilize their creativity and originality to take on the role of these Civil War soldiers and
imagine what the experience would have been like for these men.


Lesson Procedure:

- After initial notes and discussion about the Battle of Antietam, students will receive one of two articles
about this historical Civil War battle.
- These two articles are leveled for the students at two different reading levels. To the students, this seems to
be random dissemination, but I will tailor the articles to students who need an extra challenge or students
who need a modified version of the article.
- Each of the articles has the same introduction to the Battle of Antietam, but they have different
eyewitness accounts. The students read the articles independently.
- The students receive the Avid Program Sensory Moment in Time handout to complete independently. The
front side is a brainstorming activity and the back side is where the students will use their creativity and
originality to develop their sensory chart for their solider.
- The students need to be prepared to share their charts in the follow class period. The sensory charts will be
discussed and displayed in the classroom.

Resources:

1. www.avid.org
2. Call to Freedom, class textbook
3. Carnage At Antietam, 1862," EyeWitness to History, www.eyewitnesstohistory.com (1997).


















HANDOUT #1

NAME: CORE: DATE:

BATTLE OF ANTIETAM: A SENSORY MOMENT IN TIME

It is important to develop historic empathy for both ordinary and extraordinary characters.
Understanding how characters felt in the context of the time in which they lived is a challenging
but necessary skill to understand history.

Instructions:
1. Read the "Carnage At Antietam, 1862" article.

2. Imagine you are one of the two profiled soldiers who fought during this bloodiest Civil War battle in
1862. Describe your soldier below.

Individual Profile:

Name:

Union or Confederate Soldier:


Feelings about the Civil War:



3. Brainstorm ideas to complete the visual chart using YOUR FIVE SENSES in the space provided.
EVERYTHING IN THE BOX BELOW SHOULD BE PUT ON THE BACK OF THIS PAPER IN AN
ARTISIC/VISUALLY APPEALING FORMAT!

Who are you? Remember to look at the profile above.


What was the Battle of Antietam/why are you there?


If I were there, I would have experienced

Sounds Sight Taste Feel Smell








4. On the BACK side of this page create your Sensory Moment in Time VISUAL chart.
HANDOUT #2

Carnage At Antietam, 1862


General Robert E. Lee's first invasion of the North was a huge gamble that held the potential
of very great rewards. Lee's campaign could win Maryland for the Confederacy, earn diplomatic
recognition from Britain and France, and perhaps even force the Union to sue for peace. It
would also take his troops out of war-ravaged Virginia during harvest time, and enable his
troops to live off the enemy's country for a while. Following his victory at the Second Battle of
Bull Run Lee led his ragtag army northward across the Potomac
River and into Union territory.
The ensuing battle on September 17 produced the bloodiest day in
American combat history with over 23,000 casualties on both sides.
More than twice as many Americans were killed or mortally wounded
in combat at Antietam that day as in the War of 1812, the Mexican
War, and the Spanish-American War combined.
The two armies met in the Maryland farm fields bordering the
trickling Antietam Creek near the town of Sharpsburg. The Union
named the conflict the Battle of Antietam in honor of the creek while
the South called it the Battle of Sharpsburg in honor of the town.
From dawn till dark on the 17th the two armies threw frontal attacks
at each other, littering the fields with their dead and wounded. "The
whole landscape for an instant turned red," one northern soldier later
wrote. Another veteran recalled, "[The cornfield] was so full of
bodies that a man could have walked through it without stepping on
the ground." No clear victor emerged and the fighting stopped out of shear exhaustion. Lee withdrew during the night
of September 18, and re-crossed the Potomac. Tactically, the battle ended in a draw. Strategically, it was a victory for
the Union.










General Lee's
Big Gamble

Baptism of Fire at Bloody Lane
Some of the day's most brutal combat occurred during the late morning along a sunken road held by the
Confederates. For two and one half hours Union troops threw themselves at the entrenched Confederates finally
dislodging them. The murderous fire from both sides left the battlefield strewn with corpses giving the road the name
"Bloody Lane." Lt. Frederick Hitchcock was a member of the 132d Pennsylvania Volunteers and experienced his first
combat that day.
"We...moved, as I thought, rather leisurely for upwards of two miles, crossing Antietam Creek, which our men waded
nearly waist deep, emerging, of course, soaked through, our first experience of this kind. It was a hot morning and,
therefore, the only ill effect of this wading was the discomfort to the men of marching with soaked feet. It was now
quite event that a great battle was in progress. A deafening pandemonium of cannonading, with shrieking and
bursting shells, filled the air beyond us, towards which we were marching. An occasional shell whizzed by or over,
reminding us that we were rapidly approaching the 'debatable ground.'
Soon we began to hear a most ominous sound which we had never before heard, except in the
far distance at South Mountain, namely, the rattle of musketry. It had none of the deafening
bluster of the cannonading so terrifying to new troops, but to those who had once experienced
its effects, it was infinitely more to be dreaded. These volleys of musketry we were
approaching sounded in the distance like the rapid pouring of shot upon a tinpan, or the
tearing of heavy canvas, with slight pauses interspersed with single shots, or desultory
shooting.
All this presaged fearful work in store for us, with what results to each personally in the future, measured probably by
moments, would reveal. How does one feel under such conditions? To tell the truth, I realized the situation most
keenly and felt very uncomfortable. Lest there might be some undue manifestation of this feeling on my conduct, I
said to myself, this is the duty I undertook to perform for my country, and now I'll do it, and leave the results with
God. My greater fear was not that I might be killed, but that I might be grievously wounded and left a victim suffering
on the field. The nervous strain was plainly visible upon all of us. All moved doggedly forward in obedience to orders,
in absolute silence so far as talking was concerned. The compressed lip and set teeth showed that nerve and
resolution had been summoned to the discharge of duty. A few temporarily fell out, unable to endure the nervous
strain."









"Carnage At Antietam, 1862," EyeWitness to History, www.eyewitnesstohistory.com (1997).

"Soon we began
to hear a most
ominus sound."

HANDOUT #3
Carnage At Antietam, 1862

General Robert E. Lee's first invasion of the North was a huge gamble that held the potential
of very great rewards. Lee's campaign could win Maryland for the Confederacy, earn diplomatic
recognition from Britain and France, and perhaps even force the Union to sue for peace. It
would also take his troops out of war-ravaged Virginia during harvest time, and enable his
troops to live off the enemy's country for a while. Following his victory at the Second Battle of
Bull Run Lee led his ragtag army northward across the Potomac
River and into Union territory.
The ensuing battle on September 17 produced the bloodiest day in
American combat history with over 23,000 casualties on both sides.
More than twice as many Americans were killed or mortally wounded
in combat at Antietam that day as in the War of 1812, the Mexican
War, and the Spanish-American War combined.
The two armies met in the Maryland farm fields bordering the
trickling Antietam Creek near the town of Sharpsburg. The Union
named the conflict the Battle of Antietam in honor of the creek while
the South called it the Battle of Sharpsburg in honor of the town.
From dawn till dark on the 17th the two armies threw frontal attacks
at each other, littering the fields with their dead and wounded. "The
whole landscape for an instant turned red," one northern soldier later
wrote. Another veteran recalled, "[The cornfield] was so full of
bodies that a man could have walked through it without stepping on
the ground." No clear victor emerged and the fighting stopped out of shear exhaustion. Lee withdrew during the night
of September 18, and re-crossed the Potomac. Tactically, the battle ended in a draw. Strategically, it was a victory for
the Union.
With Burnside At Antietam Creek
On the night of September 16, the 9th N.Y. Volunteers took up their position opposite a stone bridge crossing
Antietam Creek and awaited orders. As dawn broke, the soldiers could hear the sounds of battle on their right and left
but no orders were given to advance. By afternoon, as the fighting ebbed and flowed on other parts of the battlefield,
General Burnside gave the order for his troops to attack the Confederates positioned across the Antietam Creek. David
Thompson, a member of the 9th N.Y. volunteers describes his experience:
"So the morning wore away and the fighting on the right ceased entirely. That was fresh anxiety -- the scales were
turning perhaps, but which way? About noon the battle began afresh. This must have been Franklin's men of the Sixth
Corps, for the firing was nearer, and they came up behind the center. Suddenly a stir beginning far upon the right,
and running like a wave along the line, brought the regiment to its feet. A silence fell on every one at once, for each
felt that the momentous 'now' had come. Just as we started I saw, with a little shock, a line-officer take out his watch
to note the hour, as though the affair beyond the creek were a business appointment which he was going to keep.
When we reached the brow of the hill the fringe of trees along the creek screened the fighting entire, and we were
deployed as skirmishers under their cover. We sat there two hours. All that time the rest of corps had been moving
over the stone bridge and going into position on the other side of the creek. Then were ordered over a ford which had
been found below the bridge, where the water was waist deep. One man was shot in mid-stream.

General Lee's
Big Gamble

At the foot of the slope on the opposite side the line was formed and we moved up through the thin woods. Reaching
the level we lay down behind a battery which seemed to have been disabled. There, if anywhere, I should have
remembered that I was soaking wet from my waist down. So great was the excitement, however, that I have never
been able to recall it. Here some of the men, going to the rear for water, discovered in the ashes of some hay-ricks
which had been fired by our shells the charred remains of several Confederates. After long waiting it became noised
along the line that we were to take a battery that was at work several yards ahead on the top of a hill. This narrowed
the field and brought us to consider the work before us more attentively.
Right across our front, two hundred feet or so away, ran a country road bordered on each side by a snake fence.
Beyond this road stretched a plowed field several hundred feet in length, sloping up to the battery which was hidden
in a corn field. A stone fence, breast-high, inclosed the field on the left, and behind it lay a regiment of Confederates,
who would be directly on our flank if we should attempt the slope. The prospect was far from encouraging, but the
order came to get ready for the attempt.
Our knapsacks were left on the ground behind us. At the word a rush was made for the fences. The line was so
disordered by the time the second fence was passed that we hurried forward to a shallow undulation a few feet ahead,
and lay down among the furrows to re-form, doing so by crawling up into line. A hundred feet or so ahead was a
similar undulation to which we ran for a second shelter. The battery, which at first had not seemed to notice us, now,
apprised of its danger, opened fire upon us. We were getting ready now for the charge proper, but were still lying on
our faces. Lieutenant-Colonel Kimball was ramping up and down the line. The discreet regiment behind the fence was
silent. Now and then a bullet from them cut the air over our head, but generally they were reserving their fire for that
better show which they knew they would get in a few minutes. The battery, however, whose shots at first went over
our heads, had depressed its guns so as to shave the surface of the ground. Its fire was beginning to tell.
I remember looking behind and seeing an officer riding diagonally across the field - - a most
inviting target - - instinctively bending his head down over his horse's neck, as though he were
riding through driving rain. While my eye was on him I saw, between me and him a rolled
overcoat with its traps on bound into the air and fall among the furrows. One of the enemy's
grape-shot had plowed a groove in the skull of a young fellow and had cut his overcoat from
his shoulders. He never stirred from his position, but lay there face downward, a dreadful
spectacle. A moment after, I heard a man cursing a comrade for lying on him heavily. He was cursing a dying man.
As the range grew better, the firing became more rapid, the situation desperate and exasperating to the last degree.
Human ature was on the race, and there burst forth form it the most vehement, terrible swearing I have ever heard.
Certainly the joy of conflict was not ours that day. The suspense was only for a moment, however, for the order to
charge came just after. Whether the regiment was thrown into disorder or not, I never knew. I only remember that as
we rose, and started all the fire that had been held back so long was loosed. In a second the air was full of the hiss of
bullets and the hurtle of grape-shot. The mental strain was so great that I saw at the moment he singular effect
mentioned, I think, in the life of Goethe on a similar occasion - - the whole landscape for an instant turned slight red.
I see again, as I saw it then in a flash, a man just in front of me drop his musket and throw up his hands, stung into
vigorous swearing by a bullet behind the ear. Many men fell going up the hill, bit it seemed to be all over in a
moment, and I found myself passing a hollow where a dozen wounded men lay - - among them our sergeant-major
who was calling me to come down. He had caught sight of the blanket rolled across my back, and called me to unroll
it and help to carry from the field one of our wounded lieutenants.



"Carnage At Antietam, 1862," EyeWitness to History, www.eyewitnesstohistory.com (1997).

"He was cursing
a dying man."