quote:
On the other hand.. if the Union had taken the Confederate threat more seriously and actually set up their camps like they would later in the war.. it could have been worse for the Confederates.

To add to this while he redeemed himself later in the battle Sherman almost had to be willfully in denial to not realize what the Confederates were doing. He even court martial'd a real low level soldier over reports of Confederate activity in tbe area and had reports of sightings flowing in from all over the place yet refused to believe them or prepare in any way

The reasons for this were complicated, thought to be in part bc Sherman was labeled by many as paranoid from his previous command so at Shiloh he was determined to be the extreme opposite of that

1 ...

Report Post

Posted by CleverUserName

Member since Oct 2016

12929 posts

Posted on 4/7/23 at 7:07 am to Wishnitwas1998

quote:
Sherman almost had to be willfully in denial to not realize what the Confederates were doing.

The entire command there was in denial.

The reports written basically state they completely didn’t expect an offensive. Their thoughts were that the south would concentrate and fortify Corinth. Every clue was given to them and they ignored it.

One of the regimental commanders thought they heard something on that Saturday, after wildlife was running onto the field, and formed up a line. Sherman heard the drumming and sent a low level messenger to dress down the regimental commander and basically insulted him for being cowardly.

Same thing happened on the morning of the battle on Sunday and Sherman went to personally dress down the regimental commander. That’s when the Confederates came out of the woods and shot his orderly dead and shot Sherman in the hand. After he uttered the famous “My God! We’re attacked!!” Sherman was there alone ahead of his troops.

They were in so much denial of the possibility of an attack that General Prentiss was going to have Peabody brought up on charges for inciting an conflict by sending out a recon that exchanged the first shots of the battle. The battle was underway and that was Prentiss’ concerns.

If Peabody had lived and given an account.. he would be held up as more of a hero at Shiloh. But Prentiss didn’t give him much praise in his reports.

Here is an archives photo of Gen Prentiss at Shiloh when they had the reunion. He is standing in the Hornets nest where he and his troops were captured. You can still see the battle scars on the tree in the background. This was almost 30 years after the battle. I also think this is the reunion where the past Gov of TN, that was at Johnston’s side, showed where he died. It was unknown to that point.