Yankees claimed they won the Battle of Franklin; the Confederates believed they were the victors. Each side displayed courage (and in some cases cowardice) amid appalling slaughter, while employing outstanding tactical maneuvers and committing elementary strategical errors. These facts raise numerous important questions.
Why, for example, did Union Gen. Wagner disobey orders at a crucial point in the battle, and why did Confederate Gen. Hood place his most brilliant fighter, Nathan Bedford Forrest, on the far right where he knew he would have almost no impact? Why did Union Gen. Schofield callously leave his dead and wounded on the battlefield the following day, and why, strangely, did Gen. Hood attempt to renew the battle on the morning of December 1? Why did Federal soldiers wantonly shoot down and kill Confederate Gen. John Adams when they could have easily captured him instead, and why at Franklin was the casualty rate for Confederate officers and infantrymen the highest of any known modern battle? These and a thousand other issues have long perplexed those with a sincere interest in both this particular battle and American Civil War history.
What then is the full and true story of the sanguinary conflict that took place in Middle Tennessee on November 30, 1864, the day after the mysterious Battle of Spring Hill and two weeks before the one-sided Battle of Nashville? What really happened during this violent engagement on the Plain of Franklin, rightly called by soldiers the "Valley of Death," where the earth was so "red with blood" that it poured over the fields in "rivulets," where in some places the bodies lay three layers deep, and where one could walk across the entire battlefield upon corpses without one's feet ever touching the ground?
Award-winning author, historian, and Franklin resident Colonel Lochlainn Seabrook addresses these concerns in his captivating book The Battle of Franklin: Recollections of Confederate and Union Soldiers, a detailed chronicle of nearly 30 eyewitness accounts by military men who were on the field of action that brisk Autumn day. Col. Seabrook, some of whose Confederate cousins were present, also furnishes narratives by civilians, clergy, women, and even children who lived through the conflict, providing additional context to a battle which, like Nashville, neither side had intended to fight.
The author-editor includes nearly 200 rare illustrations and photos to accompany the footnoted text, along with