Talk:Battle of Chickamauga

message: Satisfies the B-class criteria of MILHIST. PKKloeppel (talk) 04:05, 17 January 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Assessed

message: The following passage gives the false impression that Thomas immediately complied with Rosecrans' order to retreat:  
"At that same time Thomas received an order from Rosecrans to take command of the army and began a general retreat. "
Put aside the stirring prose of Cozzens and Robertson for a moment and read Thomas's report:
:"I determined to hold the position until nightfall, if possible, in the meantime sending Captains Barker and Kellogg to distribute the ammunition, Major Lawrence, my chief of artillery, having been previously sent to notify the different commanders that ammunition would be supplied them shortly. As soon as they reported the distribution of the ammunition, I directed Captain Willard to inform the division commanders to prepare to withdraw their commands as soon as they received orders. At 5.30 p.m. Captain Barker, commanding my escort, was sent to notify General Reynolds to commence the movement..."
Garfield arrived with the order to withdraw at 4.  Thomas didn't comply until 5:30, because of the need for darkness.  I will modify the passage again to reflect this fact, but if anyone would like to first craft an alternate passage, feel free.    All I care about is that the falsehood of the current passage be corrected.  Thomas recognized it would be foolhardy to immediately comply with Rosecrans' order and didn't.  J JMesserly (talk) 10:02, 5 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Oops, I meant to change 'began' to 'begin' and forgot in my mad rush. :-) I don't think the language here is a direct quotation of either author, so the responsibility of stirring prose is not theirs. I am not hung up on the specific language of this, but I do not want to give the false impression that the army waited until full darkness before starting to move out. Hal Jespersen (talk) 22:55, 5 September 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Thomas waiting until nightfall

message: The following paragraph was deleted as "not necessary"
:After the defeat at Gettysburg, Jefferson Davis was receptive to the strategy of gaining Confederate independence by diverting the Union attention and resources from fighting Lee's weakened army in the east. On September 5, 1863 Davis and General Lee decided to temporarily move via rail to Chickamauga a corps of veteran troops under the General James Longstreet. It was thought that the South's second most gifted general would have the best chance of delivering a swift crushing blow, possibly destroying the Army of the Cumberland. Though it achieved a tactical victory, the Confederates failed to achieve their strategic goal of routing the Union Army from Chattanooga.
I hope we have common ground that some background to this important battle is needed in the article.  If we can agree on that, then I shall re insert the background information in a place at the beginning of the article but not the summary section.  Ok?  J JMesserly (talk) 10:02, 5 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  There's no problem improving the Background section, although I'd omit the POV that Longstreet was "the South's second most gifted general" unless you can present it as part of a quotation. You would also need to omit the sentence starting "Though it achieved ..." (That misplaced sentence in the middle of the second paragraph of the lead was another reason to delete it.) Hal Jespersen (talk) 22:55, 5 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  As we know, Davis was not deliberately selecting a general he thought best for the assignment from some Army-wide order of merit, but because Longstreet was politicking for an army command, hoping to replace Bragg, as well as to emerge from the shadow of Robert E. Lee. So emphasizing Longstreet's merit is not so important. However, it is always easy to praise him with expressions such as "one of the most accomplished generals of the Confederacy," which would be quite easy to cite without POV concerns. By the way, sending Longstreet west is mentioned in the final paragraph of the section Crossing the Tennessee. Hal Jespersen (talk) 16:29, 6 September 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Lead section

message: According to Garfield, then Rosecrans's chief of staff, Garfield publicly contended that Rosecrans fled Bragg's Army.  Was this statement made in reference to Rosecrans staying in Chattanooga, rather then joining up with Thomas's division (XIV Corps) at Chickamauga, as Garfield had done or was ordered to by Rosecrans?  In other words, did Rosecrans lose his nerve during the Battle of Chickamauga? Cmguy777 (talk) 19:02, 20 February 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Rosecrans's actions are covered here and in William Rosecrans#Chickamauga in reasonable detail. Yes, after Longstreet's breakthrough Rosecrans and a number of other officers "fled" to Chattanooga. Rosecrans sent Garfield back to communicate with Thomas about withdrawing the remainder of the army rather than returning to the battlefield himself, decision under grea stress that arguably ruined his career. Hal Jespersen (talk) 22:06, 20 February 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rosecrans fled from Bragg 

message: I've created this section to continue the discussion begun at User talk:Hlj#Chickamauga comments about the content Harold Knudsen wishes to add to the article. Please continue discussing here. Mojoworker (talk) 23:19, 11 September 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Part of the craft of writing an encyclopedia article is deciding on, and sticking to, a consistent level of detail to be used throughout. This article devotes 19 paragraphs to the second day's battle, two of which describe the organization of Longstreet's column and his initial assault. In my judgment, adding two very lengthy paragraphs outlining one author's opinion on his tactics is not a balanced approach from a level of detail standpoint. Furthermore, the two paragraphs do not balance alternative viewpoints in the manner required by Wikipedia for handling conflicting secondary sources. That is the reason I edited down your submission and balanced it with the other viewpoint, primarily expressed by Glenn Robertson of the Combat Studies Institute. (In theory, a two-paragraph exposition of one opinion ought to be balanced by two paragraphs of the opposite, and that is obviously not practical here.) Your work may eventually turn out to be influential, and numerous secondary sources may emerge in the future with the same point of view, but Wikipedia is a place to summarize consensus, not advocate. Hal Jespersen (talk) 21:31, 12 September 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Longstreet's assaults 

message: The following was moved from User talk:Hlj:
On secondary source of whether Longstreet thought about this formation later in the war; I am not aware of any (none that I have come acress yet), except Wert citing the letter from Longstreet to Alexander after the war. But that really talks to the idea of force ratios; the type of discussions you find in military manuals of the 1980s about the later decades versions of the schwerpunkt of WWII and also what the Soviet Army was going to use in Germany in a WWWIII offensive. I do say that Longstreet and Lee (we know from the records) did discuss previous battles for learning purposes; to review the actions and look for ways to improve. This came from a discussion between me and Dr. Bill Piston and so I added it, so that could be secondary source sentence from two historians. Overall, my book covers the expamples of Anteitam and Fredericksburg for the defense (where I draw the comparison to the Killzone/Killbox), and Chickamuaga for the offense. I have not done much with 1864 to research any mention by Longstreet in using this formation specifically later. What he did to roll the Union flank at Wilderness has similarity in formation. i.e. to land on a narrow spot hard, but it was used to roll the flank (tactical level), not split a force like the German intention and drive into the distance (operational level of war). I agree with Robertson that there is nothing in the memior or the ORs. If there is something in a letter he wrote, or an observation by someone else, I have not found it yet - that makes a clear link to later 1864/65 battles. 
There is another attack he did on a small scale which failed at Knoxville - right on that corner of Ft. Sanders - which in my opinion was the correct angle to attack because the defenders would less than a clean shot until they were close and it would be hard to mass fires as opposed to targets right out in front. The attack failed for several reasons, such as Longstreet thought the parapet was not as high as it actually was (due to the moat) and ice on the slope, but I think the Union Army improved upon this attack at Spotsylvania; using a greater force ratio to break into the Confederate fortification in the same angle Longstreet used at Ft. Sanders. So it was an improvement in that it achieved rupturing the defense line, but the next step had not been thought through - the reinforcement of that success. How to exploit it. In my mind this could be another attempt, maybe a linkage, at the narrow column idea (knoxville) then picked up on my Col Upton who made it more robust with 12 regiments. Don't know for sure without the research.  
How does Robertson say the formation at Chickamauga was happenstance? Its true the OR and the memior does not cover it, does Longstreet say this somewhere? Do you know? That would be a helpful piece of this puzzle.
To me the clues in his thinking this through intentionally are the fact he wanted to know if there was a trail that led through the woods into the open area behind the Union line in his talking to private Tom Brotherton who's cabin was right there, and so he used the trail/road as a guide for the formation like I have so many times in keeping a unit togther in wooded terrain. Its what we call a control measure. Another piece of evidence is he moved one division to close the flank with Polk, so this division's job was flank security of the attack formation, and then he lined up the 5 Virginia units behind Johnson's 3  and put the whole thing under Hood for command and control. That was very intentional too. It proves he wanted the formation to stay together for an indefinate amount of time. THis is what my experience and intution help tell me about his troop leading procedures. And what evidence there is. 
Longstreet's memior is a very important historical record, but the original manuscript went up in flames in his house fire in Gainesville in the 1880s along with a lot of war correspondences, etc. So he started all over again by memory, and worked on it as an old man decades removed from the war. So unfortunately the book is much harder to read than what his prose and clarity of thought he had and demonstrated in articles in did in Century in the 1870s. In instances like this, where the hisorian tried to really drill down and find evidence of somehting the memior just does not provide it. Does not mean it did not happen, but a key primary source does not make mention. But as Ed Bearss says - you have to look at the ground at the sites. The ground helps fill in the blanks, and for me as a trained soldier the ground, the existing records, and experience of like formations/actions helps as well to know the actions in time not necesarily covered in a a record.  
Anyway, if you have some insight on Mr. Robertson's point that would be helpfull.
Regards, HKHarold Knudsen (talk) 16:29, 17 September 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: The quotation from Robertson about happenstance is from his article in Blue and Gray Magazine, Summer 2008, page 26. Hal Jespersen (talk) 22:09, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

text: This is also from Robertson, although I think I need to adjust the citation because the place I just found it was in the Woodworth compilation of essays, The Chickamauga Campaign, which previously had been listed as a Further Reading entry. Robertson's essay is entitled "Bull of the Woods?" I will fix this after I post the updated talk page. Hal Jespersen (talk) 22:09, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

text: As these are judgments on his part, which is a prime responsibility of a secondary source author, there is no explicit citation for this judgment, it is a result of his analysis of a variety of sources. To give you an example that I'm very familiar with, Stephen W. Sears renders the judgment in his book Gettysburg that (paraphrasing) "Meade outgeneraled Robert E. Lee." He places no footnote on that statement, but it is perfectly acceptable for Wikipedia to report his judgment, along with those of other secondary source authors. Hal Jespersen (talk) 16:09, 22 September 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Longstreet questions 

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message: Is there a list of casualties for the Battle of Chickamauga for CSA Units?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gdon20 (talk • contribs) 19:53, 4 October 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  List of CSA Casualities