Video
Gilgal Church
Transcript
Hello everyone. My name is Ranger Kyle and on behalf of Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park, I want to welcome you to the Gilgal Church Battlefield. Behind me is a wooden backdrop. To my right is a small marker describing the fighting that occurs here and directly behind me is a white wooden building which happens to be a school that this community built after the Civil War.
Now you may ask why are we here? Why is this area important? So on June 9, 1864, the Confederate army will leave their positions of the Dallas, New Hope, and Pickett's Mill line and come to this line that we now call the Brushy Mountain line. It will involve three mountains: the Brushy Mountain line (the Brushy Mountain), to its, to my right would be Pine Mountain and to my left would be Lost Mountain. This area where we are right now, at Gilgal Church, would be directly between, in the center of, Lost Mountain and Pine Mountain. Now on June 14th, General Leonidas Polk, a core Confederate Corps Commander is killed at Pine Mountain. So General Joseph Johnston decides to pull the troops that are on that mountain back into the main Confederate line. So Sherman, feeling that General Joseph Johnston is withdrawing his entire line, feels the need to press and use this to his advantage. So he is going to start on June 15th assaulting all along the Brushy Mountain line. That will also involve the fighting here where it was relatively heavy. So on Pine Mountain, the Union Army was able to get up to those slopes, bring up artillery up there, and focus it down here. General John Schofield, Commander of the Army of the Ohio is able to push and actually take Lost Mountain. That involves this line right here commanded by General Patrick Cleburne to be taken fire from three different angles: from his front, his left, and his right. So as Joseph Johnston realizes that Patrick Cleburne's men are getting attacked from three different angles, he decides it is now time to withdraw from the Brushy Mountain line. He will fall back to the Mud Creek line and two days later will fall back to the Kennesaw Mountain line. Now as a result of this fighting, General William Sherman's frustration will grow and he even considers a frontal assault, something that he's been trying to avoid this entire campaign. He will write to the secretary or Henry Halleck, Lincoln's Chief of Staff,
"I am now inclined to feign on both flanks and assault the center. It may cost us dearly but a result would surpass an attempt to pass around."
Which will actually happen at Kennesaw Mountain. Luckily for Sherman, he hears that the Confederates have vacated this line so his frontal assault will have to wait. So one of the very cool things about the Gilgal Church Battlefield is that they have very lifelike replicas of what Civil War earthworks would look like. So if you follow me, we're going to go check them out and I'll describe them briefly for you. So here we are in the Civil War replica earthworks. To my right, here in front of everything is going to be a dirt mound. Holding to support that are going to be these horizontal logs and to keep that from moving anywhere we have one vertical log holding these together. And this will continue throughout the entire line. So what we have right here, this ledge, is what we call a banquette. It is going to allow the soldiers to get up and take a look at the field in front of them. Now if they're trying to aim and shoot at someone, what is most vulnerable? Their head. So it seems to have fallen here, but there would be what we call a headlog which would create a gap in between the top log and the next log. You could fit your rifle in, take aim and fire. This would protect your head from getting shot. So what happens if artillery were to happen uh bombard your earthworks? If it knocks the headlog down, where's it going to land? Right on top of the soldiers here using cover. That is what this diagonal piece of wood is for. So if the headlog were to get dislodged, it's going to roll down this skid and it will protect the soldiers from getting crushed. So something else that would happen is soldiers would put out in front of the earthworks what we call abatis. It is a primitive barbed wire. Soldiers would get branches, twigs, anything sharp, pointy, something to scratch the oppo, the offensive army. So this gives you a very good idea of what armies were going against. It gives you a good idea of the Civil War in 1864 and 1865. And the theme of everything then and the Eastern Theater, Western Theater is trench warfare. It is not fun. It is going to be also the precursor to 50 years later in World War I.
So I want to thank you all for visiting with me here at the Gilgal Church Battlefield. And we will see you at the Kennesaw Mountain Battle Anniversary.
Description
Ranger Kyle Carlson travels to the battlefield at Gilgal Church to talk about the fighting preceding Kennesaw Mountain and the in's and out's of trench warfare during the American Civil War.
Duration
5 minutes, 53 seconds
Credit
NPS/ K. Carlson
Date Created
06/14/2021
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