Saturday, November 8, 2008

The Battle of Utoy Creek

The battle of Utoy Creek occured on the dates August 5-7, 1864 and was located in Georgia. Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman's Union armies had partially encircled the city of Atlanta, Georgia, which was being held by Confederate forces under the command of Lt. Gen. John Bell Hood. Sherman had at this point adopted a strategy of attacking the railroad lines into Atlanta, hoping to cut off his enemies' supplies.
After failing to envelop Hood's left flank at the Battle of Ezra Church, Sherman still wanted to extend his right flank to hit the railroad between East Point and Atlanta. He transferred Maj. Gen. John M. Schofield's Army of the Ohio from his left to his right flank and sent him to the north bank of Utoy Creek. Although Schofield’s troops were at Utoy Creek on August 2, they, along with the XIV Corps, Army of the Cumberland, did not cross until August 4. Schofield's force began its movement to exploit this situation on the morning of August 5. Although initially successful, Schofield had to regroup his forces, which took the rest of the day. The delay allowed the Confederates to strengthen their defenses with abatis, which slowed the Union attack when it restarted on the morning of August 6. The Federals were repulsed with heavy losses by William B. Bate's division and failed in an attempt to break the railroad. On August 7, the Union troops moved toward the Confederate main line and entrenched. Here they remained until late August. The winner of this battle was the Union army.

I found this work on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Utoy_Creek


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