Chickamauga - Battleground 9

From December 30, 1862, to January 1, 1863, the battle at Murfreesboro, fought over a three-day period along the Stones River near Nashville, was one of the costliest engagements of the American Civil War. In the end, William Rosecrans's Army of the Cumberland overpowered Braxton Bragg's Confederates, forcing them to retreat ingloriously toward Chattanooga. During the following summer (September 19-20, 1863), Rosecrans's high-spirited Federals continued pushing back the ragtag Rebel army beyond Chattanooga, until they reached the wooded banks of Chickamauga Creek. There, Bragg's Confederates, now reinforced by James Longstreet's corps from the Army of Northern Virginia, surprised their now-outnumbered foe along the banks of this "River of Blood." The resulting two-day melee (Chickamauga) was one of the fiercest-fought and deadliest battles of the war, resulting in one of the few Confederate victories for Bragg's Army of the Tennessee.