The last of my Antietam Battlefield pictures for now. First is Burnside's Bridge. Defended by 450 - 500 Georgians from the wooded bluff (were the picture is taken from) General Ambrose Burnside's 12,000 men tried for three hours to cross this bridge over the Antietam Creek. The bridge today, looks much like it did on September 17, 1862.
The second picture is the sunken road. A marker nearby tells that CSA Colonel John B. Gordon told General Lee that, "These men are going to stay here, General, till the sun goes down or victory is won." Years later he wrote "Alas! Many of the brave fellows are there now". The marker continues "In this road there lay so many dead rebels that they formed a line which one might have walked upon as far as I could see. They lay just as they had been killed apparently amid the blood which was soaking the earth." The sunken road is often called Blood Lane.
The confederate defeat at Antietam stalled the British and French's acceptance of the south as an independent Confederacy and allowed the opportunity for President Lincoln to issue the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863.
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