The Battle of Gilgal Church (June 15, 1864) was an action during the Atlanta campaign in the American Civil War. The Union army of William Tecumseh Sherman and the Confederate army led by Joseph E. Johnston fought a series of battles between June 10 and 19 along a front stretching northeast from Lost Mountain to Pine Mountain to Brushy Mountain. At Gilgal Church, attacks by the divisions of John W. Geary and Daniel Butterfield from Joseph Hooker's XX Corps were repulsed with about 700 casualties by Confederates from William J. Hardee's corps. That day in a separate action, other Union troops overran a Confederate skirmish line, capturing about 300 men. Gilgal Church was part of a series of minor actions that included the Battle of Latimer's Farm on June 17–18.
After the Battle of Dallas on May 28, Sherman moved northeast until he reached the Western and Atlantic Railroad at Acworth. On June 4, Johnston abandoned his defensive positions near Dallas and New Hope Church and withdrew to a new line of entrenchments. Sherman was reinforced by Francis Preston Blair Jr.'s XVII Corps, and on June 10 he resumed his offensive. Confederate corps commander Leonidas Polk was killed by an artillery round on June 14 at Pine Mountain. That evening, Johnston withdrew from Pine Mountain and Sherman's forces followed, bringing on the clashes near Gilgal Church. Shortly after the Union attacks failed, Johnston pulled Hardee's corps back to a new line behind Mud Creek. At Latimer's Farm, Union troops from Oliver Otis Howard's IV Corps gained a foothold in the Confederate line. On June 19, Johnston's Army of Tennessee fell back to fresh defenses based on Kennesaw Mountain.
Background Union Army
William T. Sherman directed parts of three armies drawn from the Military Division of the Mississippi in the Atlanta campaign. On April 30, 1864, the Army of the Cumberland commanded by George H. Thomas numbered 73,000 troops and 130 guns, the Army of the Tennessee led by James B. McPherson counted 24,500 soldiers and 96 guns, and the Army of the Ohio under John Schofield fielded 11,362 infantry, 2,197 cavalry, and 28 guns. Sherman's forces were supported by 25,000 non-combatants including railroad employees and repair crews, teamsters, medical staff, and Black camp servants. Thomas' army included Howard's IV Corps, John M. Palmer's XIV Corps, Hooker's XX Corps, and three cavalry divisions led by Edward M. McCook, Kenner Garrard, and Hugh Judson Kilpatrick. McPherson's army was made up of John A. Logan's XV Corps and Grenville M. Dodge's Left Wing of the XVI Corps. Blair's XVII Corps joined McPherson's army on June 8. Schofield's army consisted of his own XXIII Corps and a cavalry division under George Stoneman. The IV and XX Corps each numbered 20,000 soldiers, the XIV Corps counted 22,000, the XV Corps had 11,500, and the XVI and XVII Corps each counted about 10,000 men.
Confederate Army
Johnston's Army of Tennessee included two infantry corps led by William J. Hardee and John Bell Hood, and a cavalry corps under Joseph Wheeler. The army was soon joined by the corps of Leonidas Polk and the cavalry division of William Hicks Jackson from the Army of Mississippi. Hardee's corps consisted of the divisions of William B. Bate, Benjamin F. Cheatham, Patrick Cleburne, and William H. T. Walker. Hood's corps was made up of the divisions of Thomas C. Hindman, Carter L. Stevenson, and Alexander P. Stewart. Polk's corps included the divisions of James Cantey, Samuel Gibbs French, and William Wing Loring. On April 30, 1864, Johnston's Army of Tennessee reported 41,279 infantry, 8,436 cavalry, and 3,227 artillerymen serving 144 guns. Battles and Leaders calculated Johnston's reinforcements as follows: Hugh W. Mercer's brigade (2,800) on May 2, Cantey's division (5,300) on May 7, Loring's division (5,145) on May 10–12, French's detachment (550) on May 12, Jackson's cavalry (4,477) on May 17, French's division (4,174) on May 19, William Andrew Quarles' brigade (2,200) on May 26, and a 643-man detachment of Jackson's cavalry on June 10. Other reinforcements came from two Georgia state regiments (1,200), men returned from furlough, recruits, and returned deserters. There were about 8,000 non-combatants supporting the army, mostly men unfit for combat.
Operations
General-in-chief of the Union Army Ulysses S. Grant instructed Sherman, "to move against Johnston's army, to break it up, and to get into the interior of the enemy's country as far as you can, inflicting all the damage you can against their war resources". Atlanta was a key Confederate railroad hub, supply point, and manufacturing center, so Sherman selected it as his geographic objective. The Atlanta campaign began with the Battle of Rocky Face Ridge on May 5–9, 1864 when Sherman sent McPherson's army to envelop Johnston's west flank and the Confederate commander withdrew to Resaca. The Battle of Resaca was fought on 13–16 May and ended when Johnston retreated. Meanwhile, Polk's corps began arriving in the theater. In the Battle of Adairsville on May 18, Johnston planned to strike at part of Sherman's forces. The attempt miscarried and the Confederate army fell back on the night of May 19 to a strong position at Allatoona. Declining to attack the Confederate position frontally, Sherman attempted a wide sweep around Johnston's western flank with McPherson on the right, Thomas in the center, and Schofield on the left. This resulted in the battles of New Hope Church, Pickett's Mill, and Dallas in late May.
Blocked by Johnston's defenses, Sherman ordered McPherson's two corps to carefully pull back from their position on the right flank near Dallas during the night of May 31. This started a move to shift the Union forces eastward toward Acworth. On June 1, Logan's XV Corps occupied the trenches of Hooker's XX Corps, and Hooker's men marched northeast. The same day at 5 pm, Stoneman's cavalry reached Allatoona which was not defended. This meant that Sherman's railroad repair crews were finally able to work on the track from Kingston to the Etowah River. On June 2, supported by Hooker, Schofield's corps moved north and east and gained a foothold across Allatoona Creek before encountering a newly dug line of Confederate entrenchments. At the same time, two divisions of Palmer's corps filled in the gap between Schofield and the rest of Sherman's forces. On the morning of June 2, it began to rain, beginning an unusually wet month. When Hooker's corps and McCook's cavalry began extending the Union left flank on June 3, Johnston decided that he needed to abandon the defense lines around New Hope Church. On the night of June 4, the Confederate army pulled back into a new line of entrenchments that ran from Lost Mountain on the southwest to Brushy Mountain on the northeast. In the center, Johnston's troops held a salient at Pine Mountain.
In two weeks of fighting around Dallas and New Hope Church, Sherman's forces suffered 4,500 casualties while Johnston's army lost 3,000. Confederate morale, which declined after the earlier retreats, was boosted by Johnston's successful defensive moves. Since the start of the campaign, Sherman's three armies sustained about 12,000 casualties out of a total of 100,000 men, while Johnston's army lost about 9,000 out of an estimated 65,000–75,000 men. The problem for Johnston was that Sherman advanced about into Georgia and that the Union forces were relatively stronger than they were at Resaca. Also, Sherman was about to be reinforced by the XVII Corps and other units while Johnston could only look for help from the Georgia militia.
June 10–19 fighting Pine Mountain
Sherman rearranged his forces when it was clear that Johnston's army had withdrawn to a new line of defenses. While Schofield's corps held its position, Thomas' army moved into position on its left. Meanwhile, McPherson's army moved behind both Schofield and Thomas to take a position on the railroad at Acworth. While on June 2, Schofield's corps marked Sherman's left flank, by June 7, Schofield was on Sherman's right flank, Thomas held the center, and McPherson was on the left flank. The rain continued, the increasingly muddy roads making it difficult to bring up supplies by wagon. Therefore, it was timely for Sherman's force to be able to establish itself on its railroad supply line. On June 8, two divisions of Blair's XVII Corps reached Acworth with 9,000 veteran soldiers, after leaving 2,000 men to garrison Rome and 1,500 more to garrison Allatoona. One of Schofield's division commanders, Alvin Peterson Hovey, disgruntled at being passed over for promotion, resigned his command and went home. Consequently, the XXIII Corps was consolidated into two divisions under Jacob Dolson Cox and Milo Smith Hascall, both competent generals.
On June 6, Union repair crews began rebuilding the railroad bridge across the Etowah River. On June 9, Railroad Construction and Repair Corps chief William Wierman Wright assured Sherman that the bridge would be finished on June 12. With this information, Sherman ordered his forces to start a fresh advance on the morning of June 10. Johnston believed he was outnumbered two-to-one by Sherman; the true ratio was three-to-two. At first, Johnston concentrated his strength on the left between Lost Mountain and Gilgal Church, but he shifted his strength to the right between Gilgal Church and Brushy Mountain when Sherman moved north to the railroad. On June 10, Sherman advanced his forces with Stoneman's cavalry covering the right, Garrard's horsemen on the left flank, and McCook's cavalry in the rear, watching the Etowah crossings. McPherson's army marched down the main road, occupied Big Shanty, and came into contact with the Confederates holding Brushy Mountain. Blair's corps was on the left while Logan's and Dodge's corps were on the right. Thomas deployed his army into three columns with Palmer's corps on the left heading for Newton's Mills. Howard's corps in the center and Hooker's corps on the right marched toward Pine Mountain. Schofield's corps moved from Mount Olivet Church toward Gilgal Church with Hascall's division on the left and Cox's on the right.
Each Union infantry column was headed by a swarm of skirmishers supported by a battery of rifled artillery. By late morning, the advancing Federals bumped into Confederate skirmishers near Pine Mountain. This feature was long and above the surrounding terrain, and was held by William B. Bate's division and four artillery batteries. Johnston's army deployed with Hood's corps on the right flank at Brushy Mountain and behind Noonday Creek, Hardee's corps on the left flank between Gilgal Church and Pine Mountain, and Polk's corps in the center. Wheeler's cavalry guarded the Confederate right flank and Jackson's cavalry the left flank, manning trenches as far south as Lost Mountain. Johnston wanted the Federals to attack Pine Mountain, but Thomas only ordered his troops to dig entrenchments opposite the height. Schofield's advance came to a halt north of Gilgal Church when it encountered a line of entrenchments. June 11 was the ninth consecutive day of rain and the sodden condition of the ground made it difficult to get supplies to the Union troops. On that day, Wright's crews finished the Etowah bridge and a locomotive reached Sherman's headquarters at Big Shanty. At Sherman's request, the engineer took the locomotive almost to the skirmish line, tooting its whistle loudly to taunt the Confederates.