The Forgotten Battle of Pickett’s Mill

Unless you’re a history or Civil War buff, there’s little reason for you to know about or have cause to visit the Pickett’s Mill Historic Battlefield Site. But if you do find yourself off the beaten path or exploring Northwest Georgia, you can discover some little-known history, enjoy good hiking and perhaps even learn why Union soldiers and their families were determined to keep the memory of this battle alive even though it was one of the last Union defeats of the war.

For those a little rusty on Civil War history, this battle was part of General William T. Sherman’s campaign from April to September, 1863, to capture Atlanta and destroy the South’s railroad, supply and manufacturing hub. Sherman’s army followed the Western and Atlantic railroad line, which ran approximately 130 miles through the dense forest hill country. In late May, with General Joe Johnston’s Confederate forces in a commanding position at the narrow Allatoona Pass, Sherman sent part of his army west away from the railroad and through the thick forest to bypass the Confederates. The Battles of New Hope Church (May 25, 1863) and Pickett’s Mill (May 27, 1863) resulted from this decision, and both battles were lost by the Union Army.

Pickett’s Mill is referred to as the forgotten battle as General Sherman didn’t include any account of the loss in his official reports or in his published memoirs.

Pickett’s Mill often is referred to as the forgotten battle as Sherman didn’t include any account of the loss in his official reports to Washington, nor did he include any mention of it in his published memoirs. No significant news of the battle was included in Northern newspapers, which tended to cover the largest battles, battles for large cities, or — by this point in the war — glorious Union victories. Word of the Confederate victory was but a whisper in the South, lost among the mounting defeats, declining morale and near panic of Atlanta’s impending doom. And despite the scarred landscape left behind, the battlefield largely was forgotten in the years following the war, with the exact location known by only a few local historians and some determined relic hunters.

If you’re into Civil War history and want a detailed account of the battle, you can read The Battle of Pickett’s Mill: Along the Dead Line, by Brad Butkovich. (I linked to Amazon, but is available from other outlets if you share a presidential disdain for the Jeff Bezos empire.) Capturing the detailed facts and descriptions of the battle, it’s a thorough account but a bit of a dry read (Sorry, Brad!).

Hiking the Battle Site

For nearly three years, we’ve lived a mere two miles from the state park and battlefield site, driving past neighborhoods, businesses, schools and directional signs all bearing witness to the battlefield’s proximity. Finally, on a sunny afternoon in April and in search of a short hike, we drove to the state park. After watching the well-done video at the Visitor’s Center and taking a few minutes in the small museum, we set out on the wooded and hilly trails.

The park now is mostly wooded in secondary forest, with just under four miles of hiking trails that generally follow Civil War-era roads and the major battle lines. The well-marked Red, White and Blue trails each trace a significant part of the battle, and join together where the main fight occurred. The Confederates were heavily entrenched here, and along the trails you’ll see some well-preserved battle earthworks. That said, unless you’re a Civil War or military history buff, they’ll look like overgrown trenches — not the kind of stuff you’ll feature in your Facebook posts or highlight in your online vacation photo album.

Historical sites are marked along the way with numbers, but the trail map provided doesn’t include any written details. So, unless you memorized the map and writing while in the the Visitor’s Center or found an online guide, these markers won’t mean much. Other options include this GeorgiaTrails.com link with some descriptions or a more complete version including GPS waypoints at Backpacker.com.

History aside, we enjoyed hiking the trails for our short afternoon walk. The trails meander down into the ravine, along and across Pickett’s Mill Creek, and up the steep approach toward the commanding Confederate positions on high ground. Along the creek, the original mill site is marked with an informational sign that describes the mill and small community. At the time of the war, the creek was named Little Pumpkinvine Creek, and Malichi Pickett and his family operated an overshot-style grist mill here to support local farmers.

Remembrance and Reenactments

If you haven’t done any history homework before arriving, the Visitor’s Center provides a good starting point and thorough orientation. The video includes a fairly comprehensive overview of the arrival of troops, battle preparations and the chronology of the fight itself. It includes basic facts about the 1,500 Union and 500 Confederate soldiers who died here, and describes the flow of the battle in an understandable manner. Much is made in the video about the ratio of Union-to-Confederates killed, and that is one of the reasons Pickett’s Mill is considered the last great Confederate victory of the war. However, by that point in the war and with increasing disenchantment and desertion among the Confederates, the Southern Army likely was weakened more significantly by its losses.

The small museum at the Visitor’s Center includes displays of Civil War arms and the usual description of the battle. In today’s controversial political atmosphere related to immigration, it was interesting to find a permanent display of the role of immigrants in the Civil War and this battle. Using war records and personal letters, it recounts the roles of individual immigrant soldiers who fought for their new countries on both sides of the battle.

If you enjoy re-enactments, you’ll generally find one during the annual anniversary weekend at the park. The battle dates were May 25-27, but commemorations shift each year to avoid conflicts with Memorial Day weekend travel and activities.

As Pickett’s Mill was the site of one of the few nighttime battles of the Civil War and also home to several local ghost stories. The park is closed at night, and the rangers no longer offer the periodic candlelight night tour of the battlefield that always caused shivers. To preview some of Pickett’s Mill battlefield ghost stories, check out The Moonlit Road’s night time visit to the battlefield and be prepared to feel the hair on the back of your neck stand up.

Pickett’s Mill included one of the few nighttime battles of the Civil War, leading to several local ghost stories sure to cause shivers.

The history of the park itself includes some interesting twists and turns. It was surveyed and mapped in the 1930s, but otherwise largely forgotten until the centennial celebration of the war in the 1960s. Eventually, the land was purchased from the Georgia Craft Paper Company by a group of amateur historians in 1972, who, in turn, sold it to the State of Georgia in 1974. Perhaps contributing to its reputation as the lost battle, the park was finally opened in 1992, making it one of Georgia’s newer state parks.

The Crime at Pickett’s Mill 

Ambrose Bierce was a post-war journalist, poet and short story writer. While in the Union Army, his job as topographical engineer was to plot territory for battle planning. His post-war essay about Pickett’s Mill, with the inflammatory title, “The Crime at Pickett’s Mill, speaks plainly of the tactical planning and battlefield blunders committed by Union leadership. Aside from personal letters recovered by historians and the scattered battle reports of individual leaders, much of the generally-accepted information about the battle is taken from Bierce’s account.

While Bierce’s account of the battle received great attention, there was a determined effort by Union soldiers to keep the memory of the battle alive. Part of the motivation was to honor their fallen comrades, where some units lost more than 50% of their members. Others felt that Sherman’s omission of the battle from his records and memoirs was an insult to the Union soldiers who fought and died there. And still others sought to call attention to a perceived injustice toward the Union dead by the Southern army, which was accused of stripping the dead for valuables then burying them in shallow, unmarked mass graves. For a comprehensive and moving account of the disillusionment of Union survivors with the battle’s memory, check out the Emerging Civil War website and an essay entitled, “History Hides the Lies of Our Civil War: The Forgotten Battle of Pickett’s Mill,” by Angela M. Zombek, Ph.D.

Louisiana and Ohio Connections

I’m always intrigued by the seemingly random crisscrossing of people and events that creates history. Pickett’s Mill brought that particularly close to home, given my own history. Having grown up in Louisiana, lived in Ohio for nearly 20 years, and now a Georgia resident, my attention was drawn to the large number of Ohio units who comprised Sherman’s army. Even more compelling was the presence of two Louisiana Confederate divisions which fought at Pickett’s Mill, the 4th and 30th Regiments of Louisiana Infantry. The 30th Regiment was formed in New Orleans, and included many enrollees from the “Saint” parishes along the Mississippi River north of the city. While I didn’t find specific reference to which of these individuals fought in Georgia, the roster of the Louisiana 30th Regiment is filled with French and German immigrant names and reads like the phone book from my Louisiana childhood home: Arceneaux, Breaux, Babin, Becnel, Bourgeois, Boudreaux, Champagne, (pronounced at my house as Shau-pine) Dufrene, Dufresne, Haydel, Hebert (with the French pronunciation, A-bear), Gautreaux, Guidry, Guillot, LeBlanc, LeBoeuf, LeJuene, Lorio, Loupe, Matherne, Naquin, Oubre, Poche, Richard (in French, REE-chard), Rodrigue, Roussel, Schexnaydre and more.

The Louisiana 30th Regiment included soldiers from the “Saint” parishes along the Mississippi River, and is filled with French and German immigrant names that read like the phone book from my Louisiana childhood home.

In the museum’s immigrant display, I found the interesting story of Father Isidore Francois Turgis, a Roman Catholic priest from France. He had been in the French Army and served in Crimea, Italy and (today’s) Vietnam, then moved to New Orleans in 1860 and joined the 30th Regiment of Louisiana Infantry in New Orleans in 1863.

Final Notes

Here’s a special “shout-out” to the Georgia State Parks, National Park Service and US Corp of Engineers. We do lots of hiking at facilities operated by these entities, and always appreciate their conservation, preservation and sustainability efforts.  Most people know about our National Park System and some of the crown jewels parks like Yellowstone and Grand Canyon. We recently did a blog about the Senior Pass which provides lifetime access to National Parks and more than 2,000 federally-managed locations.

It’s less known that there are more than 10,000 state parks across the US that attract more than 750 million visits annually. That’s an average of more than two visits by each American. State parks capture local and regional history, provide great recreational opportunities and serve the public with lots of special programs. To find, visit and enjoy a state park near you or wherever you’re travelling, you can use the state park locator offered by StateParks.org.

For my Georgia friends, you can keep up with all the activities in Georgia State Parks by subscribing to the the Georgia State Parks e-newsletter

Atlanta Campaign Chronology: It took Sherman 5 months to travel the 130 miles from Chattanooga to capture Atlanta. Here’s the detailed chronological account. Neither this chronology nor this blog post include the account of The General and the Great Locomotive Chase, which started in nearby Kennesaw where The General now resides at the Southern Locomotive Museum.  But that’s a story and a blog for another day.