Battle of Antietam: Hooker's Attack

 

Antietam diorama in 1/72 scale. This is an amazing piece of work and
regrettably I can not recall the name of the individual's work so that I can give him credit.

CLICK PICTURES TO ENLARGE

I have been watching Bill Molyneaux's Battle of Antietam wargame on YouTube in recent days and it has gotten me interested in developing my own scenario for the opening battle in the Miller Cornfield. The game will be conducted using the large 54mm toy soldier figures that I painted over the past year for my Pickett's Charge game.

The Miller Cornfield at Antietam in June.

The Confederate Texas Brigade counter-attacks through the Miller Cornfield
Figures from my former 28mm ACW set of armies.

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Miller's Wheatfield? 54mm figures.

Here are a pair of links to Bill's YouTube battle of Antietam, Parts 1 and 2

Antietam Part 1

Bill's War Game World

Confederate artillery battery fires at Union troops in the Cornfield.
54mm Britains Deetail figures

Confederate artillery at Antietam, also known as "Artillery Hell".
Britain's Ltd. 1/32 scale soldiers

Antietam is a huge battle, but it can easily be broken down into a series of individual corps actions over the course of the day:

(1) Hooker's opening attack through the Miller Cornfield

(2) Mansfield's XII Corps supporting attack for Hooker's attack 

(3) Sumner's Union II Corps attack

(4) Union VI Corps attack by Sedgewick 

(5) French & Richardson's attack on the Sunken Lane

(6) Burnside's IX Corps attack across "the bridge"

(7) Arrival of A.P. Hill's division saves the day

Each of these phases of the battle could be developed into a fun and interesting scenario that reduces the scope and the number of wargame figures that one would need rather than trying to fight the whole, larger battle.

I decided to gin up a scenario for Hooker's Attack In The Cornfield suitable for my 54mm ACW figures. The Union attack by Hooker's I Corps is one of the iconic pieces of fighting in the Civil War and appears to be evenly matched so that either side, Union or Confederate, could win the game. Presenting the game at the regimental level would be a huge undertaking in the number of troops that would be needed and, more importantly, would require more table space than I have in my basement wargaming room.

So I decided that one of my 30-figure regiments would stand in for one brigade of soldiers. With approximately 3 brigades per division in Hooker's I Corps, and 3 divisions, I would need 9 of my painted "regiments" to represent the Union side.

The Confederate side is a little more difficult to understand because brigades were scattered all over Stonewall Jackson's battle line, rather than finding all of the brigades in a Confederate division deployed in an orderly side by side formation. 

Here is the order of battle for the Confederate forces on the left wing of the army, commanded by Stonewall Jackson. Some of the original brigade commanders have been replaced either from becoming a casualty during the fight, or in the cases of J.R. Jones (for Jackson) and Lawton (for Ewell), elevated to division command. Ewell was back in Richmond, VA recovering from his leg amputation suffered at the Battle of Groveton while Lawton was elevated to replace Stonewall Jackson when the latter moved up to wing command. Note: each battery of artillery will be represented by one cannon model with crew.

Stonewall Jackson's Left Wing Command

Jackson's Division (J. R. Jones commanding)

Jones's Brigade (Grigsby commanding)

Starke's Brigade

Taliferro's Brigade (J. Jackson commanding)

Jones' Brigade (Penn commanding)

Division Artillery (6 batteries)

Ewell's Division (Lawton commanding)

Early's Brigade

Hays' Brigade

Lawton's Brigade (Douglass commanding)

Trimble's Brigade (James Walker commanding)

Division Artillery (6 batteries)

Reinforcements - Hood's Brigade

Wofford's Texas Brigade

Law's Brigade

Ripley's Brigade (from D.H. Hill's division)

Thus Stonewall Jackson's command begins the game with 8 brigades of infantry and 12 batteries of artillery, represented by 12 cannon models. You could make the arrival of Hood's two brigades and the detachment of Ripley's brigade from D.H. Hill's division to Jackson's command optional.

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Hooker's Union I Corps

Hatch's Division (Doubleday commanding)

Hoffmans' Brigade (replacing Doubleday)

Gibbon's Iron Brigade

Patrick's Brigade

Phelps' Brigade

Division Artillery (4 batteries)

Rickett's Division

Duryee's Brigade

Christian's Brigade (Lyle commanding)

Hartsuff's Brigade

Division Artillery (2 batteries)

Meade's Division

Seymour's Brigade

Magilton's Brigade

Gallagher's Brigade (Anderson commanding)

Division Artillery ( 3 batteries)

So Hooker's I Corps will have 10 brigades of infantry, each represented by one of my "regiments" of painted figures. There will be 9 cannon models, each representing one battery in the I Corps.

The Game Table and Battle Map

I based my scenario and game table map using the map that I found on Wikipedia, which I believe uses the map created by The American Battlefield Trust. I hope that I got the citation correct. I enlarged this map as much as I needed on my desktop computer and put a piece of light see-through tracing paper over the screen. Then I traced the terrain features onto the paper and used the drawing to create my game table map.

Here is a crude map of the Cornfield terrain features that I will transform into a table top map. The Union I Corps attack will  deploy in the north at the top of the map and attack south towards the "V-shaped" intersection of the Hagerstown Pike (running north to south) and the Smoketown Road (running diagonally from NE to SW). Where the two roads meet lies the iconic Dunker Church which was a landmark that became the focus of both armies during the battle.

Map depicting the terrain for my table top layout.

Other terrain features are the North Woods at the top of the map; the East Woods at the right side of the map; the West Woods on the lower center left part of the map. The Miller Cornfield is in the center of the map surrounded by the North, East and West Woods.

Here are two photos of the Dunker Church, one taken just after the battle and the a more contemporary image.

Contemporary photo of the Dunker Church after the battle. Confederate casualties are shown.
Union forces wouldhave attacked from the right and moving to the left in this picture. You can
just barely make out the position of the Hagerstown Pike by the location of the fences.

The Dunker Church at Antietam National Military Park
Sharpsburg, Maryland. Photo: NPS
The Hagerstown Pike is in the foreground.

Brigade Deployments

Brigade deployments are shown in the map below. Union brigades are in blue and Confederate brigades are in red.

I haven't finalized the map of my game table layout, but I would imagine that on the lefthand side, I will not have Nicodemus Heights on the table. The righthand table edge will probably be at the eastern edge of the East Woods. My game table is 6ft wide by 15ft long and I can, and probably will, use a parallel table measuring 5ft wide by 12ft long so that I can have more table width. The Hagerstown Pike will probably mark the edge of both tables with the aisle running in between along that road. And then imagine that the map will tilt or rotate several degrees to the right. Of the two game tables, the smaller 5ft by 12ft table will be on the left side of the maps above and the larger 6ft by 15ft table will be on the righthand side.

Here is the math with respect to the width of the tables:

Each regiment of mine is 15 to 18 inches in frontage. I don't have the exact measurements in front of me because the figures are packed away into their storage containers at the present. But my recollection from my Pickett's Charge set up was that a brigade of two regiments in the front and one supporting regiment in a second line took up approximately 36 inches of space. 

Another table layout to consider is to play the game out on the horizontal axis. A 15ft wide by 6ft deep front table could encompass the entire Miller Cornfield and the East Woods. The back table would have most of the West Woods, the Dunker Church and the intersection of the Hagerstown Pike and the Smoketown Road. I find myself leaning towards this option because (1) I can place the entire frontage of Hooker's attack on one table and (2) the fighting in the West Woods and the Dunker Church are really not the focus of my game.

Comments on deployment, below, relate to the table option of playing the game on the vertical axis with two parallel game tables.

Union Deployment

In my Antietam game the brigade will now be represented by just one of my painted regiments and three regiments will now represent the three brigades of one division. So Doubleday's Union division, comprised ob Gibbon and Phelps' brigade in the front, supported by Patrick's brigade in the second line, will take up a frontage of approximately 36 inches or 3 feet. This includes a little bit of spacing between units so that the brigades are not lined up end to end in a perfect linear formation with no maneuvering space. Next to Doubleday, we have Rickett's Division comprised of the brigades of Duryee, Hartsuff and Christian. Meade's third division has the brigades of Magilton, Anderson and Seymour and it would be lined up behind Doubleday's and Ricketts' divisions on the tabletop. Thus a two division frontage takes up 6ft, which is the width of my primary game table.

Now I am going to make a slight change to the Union order of battle that will facilitate the play of the game. You will note that one of Meade's 3rd Division brigades, Seymour, is located far away from the rest of the division as it is deployed in the East Woods whereas the other two brigades are positioned in the North Woods at the start of the battle. At the same time, one of Meade's other brigades, Magilton, managed to slide its way into the front line of the ICorps' attack. So I am going to give Rickett's 2nd Division the brigades of Magilton, Duryee and Seymour and Meade's 3rd Division will now own Anderson, Hartsuff and Christian. This places brigades under a command closer together and thus easier to manage during the game.

Just kind of eyeballing things, Doubleday's 1st Division on the right of the I Corps line will have Gibbon's brigade and Patrick's supporting brigade deployed on the smaller 5ft by 12ft table on the left table. Phelps' brigade will be on the larger 6ft by 15ft right table, just above the Cornfield. Rickett's Division will see  Duryee lined up north of the Cornfield, with Magilton's brigade behind him; while Seymour's brigade will start in the East Woods. 

Thus the larger righthand table will have Phelps, Duryee and Seymour in the front line and taking up a frontage of 54 inches out of a total of 72 inches of table width. This should allow room for Union artillery to deploy and give the infantry some space to maneuver on the table. Magilton will line up behind Duryee. Meade's three brigades will form a third battle line behind Magilton.

On the smaller lefthand table we will deploy Gibbon's Iron Brigade on the front line with Patrick's brigade deployed behind him. This table has 60 inches of width with only one brigade in the front occupying 18 inches of space. This provides a lot of maneuvering area for Patrick to move forward and line up to the right of Gibbon and present a two brigade frontage on the smaller table.

So far it looks like we will have plenty of table space for the opening attack on the Cornfield. Of course, the Confederates have a say in all of this too.

Confederate Deployment

The Confederates will have three player commands in the game consisting of Jones' Division on the left and Ewell's (Lawton) Division on the right, with Hood's Division in reserve. As with Hooker's Union I Corps, I need to make some adjustments to the CSA order of battle to keep proximity of brigades in a division. The main problem is that Lawton's Division has Early's brigade is deployed on the far left while the rest of Lawton's Division is deployed on the center and right of the table. So I will add Early's brigade to Jones' Division (deployed on the left table) and transfer Starke's brigade to Lawton's Division. Thus the CSA has two division commands on the front line with a third division command under Hood in the rear. Since Hood only has two brigades (Wofford and Law) I will add Ripley's brigade to Hood's division.

Conclusions and Summary

I am looking forward to setting up my game tables and giving this scenario a go. I will use my 54mm ACW armies and employ the set of rules that I used in my Pickett's Charge war game at Historicon. I have never set up a game where a regiment/battalion takes the place of a brigade so I am keen on seeing how this mechanism works out.

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