162nd Anniversary of the Battle of Chickamauga Hikes with Park Historian Jim Ogden

Battle Anniversary hikes with Park Historian Jim Ogden are very popular. These usually last several hours and cover several miles of terrain.

NPS

From Thursday, September 18, through Sunday, September 21, Park Historian Jim Ogden will lead in-depth hikes and tours examining, in detail, specific actions and locations during the Battle of Chickamauga. These tours typically last approximately 90 minutes to 2-hours and usually involve a mile or more of walking through uneven terrain and across unmowed fields. Please dress appropriately, bring a water bottle, and wear sunscreen and insect repellant. Some visitors bring lightweight folding chairs, but be prepared to carry them for long distances.

All programs are subject to cancellation due to inclement weather or staffing availability.

 

Thursday, September 18

This day's hikes will focus on the events of September 18, 1863.

8:30 am - The Union Left

• Location: Meet at the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center
• Duration: 90-minutes

Lee & Gordon’s Mills is a primary Battle of Chickamauga landmark. But, on Friday, September 18, 1863, it was also a target, Bragg’s target. This part car caravan tour, part short hike, program will examine just how critical this Union Left was as what became the Battle of Chickamauga began to unfold in the valley of the River of Death.

11 am - The Chickamauga Crossed: Reed’s Bridge

• Location: Meet at the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center
• Duration: 90-minutes

To attack Rosecrans’ Army of the Cumberland, Braxton Bragg’s Army of Tennessee had to cross West Chickamauga Creek. Reed’s Bridge became one of the key potential crossing sites and one of Bragg’s columns will cross there, more than half a day behind schedule. This part car caravan, part mile and a half hike, will, on some of the only recently preserved ground, examine the fight for Reed’s Bridge as the Confederates only began to cross on September 18, 1863.

2 pm - The Fight at Alexander's

• Location: Meet at the intersection of Alexander's Bridge and Viniard-Alexander Road's. Follow the "Historian Hike" signs from the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center.
• Duration: 1-hour

Colonel John Thomas Wilder’s orders to take up position at Alexander’s came straight from the army commander, in person. How Wilder with his Spencer Repeating Rifle armed mounted infantry brigade did so much to fulfill those orders will be the subject of this program at the site John P. Alexander’s farmstead.

4 pm - Hood Sweeps Up the Chickamauga

• Location: Meet on Jay's Mill Road at Reed's Bridge Road. Follow the "Historian Hike" signs from the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center.
• Duration: 90-minutes

This part car caravan, part walking tour, program will address the role of Confederate General John B. Hood’s column west of the Chickamauga on the afternoon of September 18, 1863.

 

Friday, September 19

This day’s hikes will focus on the events of September 19, 1863.

9 am - Bragg Forms for the Attack

• Location: Follow the “Historian Hike” signs from the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center to the intersection of Alexander Bridge Road and Viniard-Alexander Road, then to the designated parking area along Alexander -Viniard Road.
• Duration: 90-minutes

Braxton Bragg had been unable to attack the Union left at Lee & Gordon’s Mills on September 18 as he had planned. But, having only gotten at dark on the 18^th to where he wanted to have been at mid-day that day Bragg on the 19^th figured he could simply resume the movement of the day before. This mile and a half round trip hike will examine Bragg’s massing on the morning of September 19 for the attack on the Union left.

11:30 am - Hood’s/Law’s Division Attacks

• Location: Follow the “Historian Hike” signs from the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center to the intersection of Alexander Bridge Road and Viniard-Alexander Road, then to the designated parking area along Alexander -Viniard Road.
• Duration: 2-hours

More than 900 miles by rail, and now a dozen or so on foot, had brought Robertson’s, formerly Hood’s, Texas, and Henry L. “Rock” Benning’s Georgia, storied brigades of the Army of Northern Virginia to show the West how it’s done in the East. This two mile walking tour will look at Robertson’s and Benning’s attacks of September 19.

3 pm - Negley’s Division Joins the Fight

• Location: Gravel parking area at the intersection of Glenn-Kelly Road and Chickamauga-Vittetoe Road. Follow the “Historian Hike” signs from the Visitor Center.
• Duration: 90-minutes

Having helped cover Rosecrans’ march out of McLemore’s Cove over the last several days, James Negley’s division marched north from Crawfish Spring to join the battle on the afternoon of September 19. This mile and a half walking tour will examine the experience of Negley’s men as they arrived seemingly at a critical time.

7 pm - Thomas Builds a Line

• Location: Follow the “Historian Hike” signs from the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center to parking along Battleline Road.
• Duration: 90-minutes

Even before the fighting of the 19^th ended and Union commanders had their council of war, Major General George Thomas began positioning troops for another day’s battle. This mile and a half hike will explore Thomas’ evening efforts that did so much to define the Union line for the final day of the battle.

 

Saturday, September 20

This day’s hikes will focus on the events of September 20, 1863.

9 am - Helm’s Left

• Location: Follow the “Historian Hike” signs from the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center to parking along Battleline Road.
• Duration: 90-minutes

Former Vice President John C. Breckinridge’s Confederate division overlapped the Union left, nearly. This one-mile walking tour will examine the experience of the left of Breckinridge’s left, Benjamin Helm’s Kentucky Brigade, where they didn’t overlap the Union left.

11 am - S. A. M. Wood’s Alabamans and Mississippians Attack September 20

• Location: Follow the “Historian Hike” signs from the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center to parking along Battleline Road.
• Duration: 90-minutes

“We encountered the enemy in a position naturally strong and strengthened by fortifications…” Bragg hoped to be rolling up the Union line but another of his brigades that found itself launching a frontal assault was Sterling A. M. Wood’s mixed brigade of Alabamans and Mississippians. This one mile walking tour will look at Wood’s assault on that third September Sunday in 1863.

1:30 pm - Kershaw’s South Carolinians Enter the Fight

• Location: Poe Road. Follow the “Historian Hike” signs from the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center.
• Duration: 90-minutes

Amongst the last Confederates to arrive to participate in the battle was the brigade of South Carolinians under Joseph Kershaw, marching almost literally into the fight. This one and a half mile walking tour will follow Kershaw’s Palmetto Staters into their first fight at Chickamauga as the Union right collapsed.

3:30 pm - Kershaw’s South Carolinians Continue the Fight

• Location: Glenn-Kelly Road north of Dyer Road. Follow the “Historian Hike” signs from the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center.
• Duration: 90-minutes

Union prisoners and abandoned equipment, captured cannon, withdrawing enemy troops and formations cheered Joseph Kershaw’s South Carolinians as they swept northward into wooded rising ground; victory was at hand. This mile and a half walking will examine the fighting Kershaw’s men still had to do to help claim the victory.

 

Sunday, September 21

9 am - Parrotts, Badgers, and Horseflesh: A Special Artillery-focus Talk & Tour

• Location: Meet the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center
• Duration: 90-Minutes

They’re still muzzleloaders and horsedrawn but Robert Parker Parrott’s cannon are representative of the era of technological advances in which our nation’s Civil War unfolds and a Badger battery at Chickamauga reflects both the new and old. This special artillery-focused program will incorporate both a talk and a car caravan tour to the special anniversary program that will look at the role and experience of the 3^rd Wisconsin Battery in Dyer Field on that third September Sunday 162 years ago.

12 pm (noon) - Bragg - The Morning After

• Location: Meet the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center
• Duration: 90-minutes

September 21, 1863, was a new day for Braxton Bragg. That he had likely won a battlefield victory became increasingly clear as he rode across the now battle-scarred landscape a dozen miles south of Chattanooga. This one and a half mile walking tour will explore Bragg’s experience on that “morning after” in 1863.

2:30 pm - “The Scenes with which I was surrounded had taken away all my appetite:” Hindman’s Division Hospitals on the Hunt’s Farms

• Location: Follow the “Historian Hike” signs from the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center to parking on Alexander-Viniard Road.
• Duration: 2.5-hours

Established behind each of the two dozen divisions engaged in the battle was a field hospital to care for the unit’s hundreds of wounded. Those for the division of Confederate Thomas C. Hindman were located on the farms of Helm and Jeptha Hunt. This three mile round trip walking tour will examine the locale of where just some of the 25,000 wounded of the battle received at least initial care.