Book Review: The Cornfield, Antietam's Bloody Turning Point, by David A. Welker

Alongside Spotsylvania’s Bloody Angle and Shiloh’s Hornet’s Nest, the fighting in David Miller’s Cornfield on the Antietam battlefield ranks as one of the toughest Civil War landscapes to make any sense of. It should then come as no surprise that it has taken over 150 years since the Battle of Antietam for a micro tactical work detailing the Miller’s Cornfield fighting to be published.

David Welker’s The Cornfield seeks to make sense of the back-and-forth actions that swept across the Miller farm on September 17, 1862, and stake its importance in shaping the outcome of the Battle of Antietam. The book briefly recounts the events of the Maryland Campaign leading up to the Battle of Antietam before giving the Cornfield action of September 16 and 17, 1862 a detailed tactical treatment. Despite the depth of the fighting which the book delves into, Welker brings the intense combat and tragedy of the Cornfield to a personal level by interspersing the text with various human interest stories.

Aside from utilizing the usual suspect of sources to craft his tactical narrative, such as the Official Records, Welker made good use of Joseph Hooker’s military papers and some of the thousands of letters that veterans wrote to Antietam’s “Historical Expert” Ezra Carman and the Antietam Battlefield Board.

John Pope's Take on Joseph Mansfield

     John Pope's personality is often viewed negatively by historians. Quotes from Pope haters can be easily found and are often repeated in Civil War historiography. Sometimes, it reaches the point where one wonders if anyone could have gotten along with him or vice versa.
     Pope's Military Memoirs, edited by Peter Cozzens and Robert I. Girardi, offer an eye-opening look into this divisive general. One quote in particular though caught my attention. It was Pope's description of Joseph Mansfield and his personality, looks, and bravery. Quotes like this are revealing, especially when Pope ties Mansfield's personality traits to his fate at Antietam. The two served together in Mexico, Mansfield as Pope's superior officer. "Pope took to Mansfield at once," wrote Pope's biographer Peter Cozzens. It appears Pope's favorable view of Mansfield remained until his dying day.

Joseph K. F. Mansfield

General Mansfield was of middle height and robust figure. He had a broad and rather ruddy face, with a thick shock of white hair and beard. He was a man of kindly disposition and very just; but, as I have said before, he was rather fussy and fond of meddling with his subordinates, so that, although all of his officers exulted in his behavior in battle and were immensely proud of him for some time after the battle was over, he soon reduced them to their old feeling that he tormented and persecuted them unwarrantably. He was still a comparatively young man when he was killed at Antietam, but I think it may be said of him that his complete recklessness and his apparently irresistible inclination to seek the most exposed and most dangerous places on a field of battle, of necessity deprived him of the power to use his great military abilities and acquirements to the best advantage for the army or the government. He was a gallant soldier and a true and loyal man and will always be remembered with pride and respect by those who knew him in those old days.