Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park | THE BATTLE OF KENNESAW MOUNTAIN

Cannon atop Kennesaw Mountain

Cannon atop Kennesaw Mountain

By the early part of 1864, the Union Army was concentrated in two locations: in the Potomac area of Virginia fighting against Confederate General Robert E. Lee and in Chattanooga, Tennessee, ready to push into northwest Georgia with plans to capture Atlanta, the hub of most all rail lines. General George Sherman headed the 100,000 men that comprised the Union armies of the Army of the Tennessee, the Army of the Cumberland, and the Army of the Ohio (all named after rivers, thus the Army “of the”). Commanding the Confederate forces (the Army of Tennessee with 55,000 men) was General Joseph Johnston, who at the start of the Atlanta Campaign was near Dalton, Georgia, a northwestern city not too far from Chattanooga.

At the time, the South was highly outmanned and outgunned and had no illusions of winning the war. The strategy was only to prolong it. The people of the north were tired of war, and because 1864 was an election year, they were ready to vote out President Lincoln and elect Democrat George McClelland, who was running on a campaign to end the war by making peace with the south. The election would be held in November, so the South had to hold out for another six months or so. Lincoln had written letters in which he stated he was certain to lose. Only a victory in Atlanta, which would mean an inevitable victory for the North, could save him.

Sherman began his campaign on March 7, 1864, and first encountered Johnston’s troops at a steep ridge called Rocky Face. After a small battle, Sherman tried to outflank, or “get around back” of Johnston, forcing Johnston to retreat to Resaca. This scenario was repeated over and over, at Adairsville, New Hope Church, Pickett’s Mill, and Dallas (all of these cities were located along the Western & Atlantic rail line, which ran from Chattanooga to Atlanta, the supply line for both armies). To put the tactic into layman’s terms, imagine somebody trying to get around you and you are trying to block him. If he moves left and you move left in time, you block him. But if he moves left before you can and starts to go around you, you must back up, or retreat, to stay in front and have another chance of blocking him. If the attacker successfully outflanks the defender, it can now attack from both the front and the back, all but insuring the defender’s defeat.

By June 19th, Johnston’s retreats had taken him to Kennesaw Mountain. Trenches were dug and cannon were hauled to the top. The eventual battle line ran from the mountain at the northern point to what would become known as Kolb’s Farm at the southern end, approximately a seven to eight mile stretch. Moving southward from Kennesaw Mountain, the terrain is a series of gradually diminishing smaller mountains and hills, including Little Kennesaw Mountain, Pigeon Hill, and Cheatham Hill, until the terrain levels out at Kolb’s Farm. The range runs pretty much north to south as far as the compass goes. Sherman would be attacking from the west, while to the east lay Atlanta and the rail lines Johnston was defending. Kennesaw Mountain rises about 800 feet from the ground (similar to Georgia’s Stone Mountain), so it is not a large mountain by any means, but when your army is on any hill and the enemy is below, that’s a great defensive position.

On June 22nd, Sherman again tried to outflank Johnston’s position, moving part of his army to Kolb’s Farm. Johnston anticipated this move and shifted 11,000 men to the farm, successfully repelling the Union troops, though losing the battle in terms of casualties (the Confederates actually ended up being the attackers). At this point, Sherman concocted a new plan. If he were to create a diversion by sending part of this army to attack the Confederate flank on the north (Kennesaw Mountain) and part on the south, Johnston’s middle defenses might be thin. On June 27th at 8 AM, the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain began. Union troops hit the middle of the Confederate line in two places: at the area stretching from Pigeon Hill to Little Kennesaw Mountain and at Deadman’s Angle, which would become known as Cheatham Hill. The Union troops were repelled in both instances, with heavy loses, and Sherman ended the attacks, resorting once again to his flanking maneuvers. This strategy again forced Johnston to retreat, and on July 2nd, the Confederates abandoned Kennesaw Mountain and retreated across the Chattahoochee River. Eight hundred Confederate and eighteen-hundred Union soldiers were killed in the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain (this does not include other prior skirmishes, including the fighting at Kolb’s Farm).

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Last updated on February 16, 2020
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