Schematic plan · American Civil War

Battle of Spotsylvania Court House

8 May 1864
Virginia
Victory for Confederacy

All battles The event in the chronicle Wikipedia

A schematic plan, generated from the statistics of the CAA Database of Battles: the armies' size and width, the hours of fighting, the plan of attack and the outcome are as recorded; the ground and the positions are not.

USA (US Army of the Potomac, 90,000 men under Grant) attacked Confederacy (Cs Army of Northern Virginia, 50,000 men under Lee) in Virginia. The CAA Database of Battles records 240 hours of fighting on a front of 5.2 km, a frontal attack, double envelopment against hasty defense and prepared defense, and that Confederacy held. Losses: USA 18,399 (20%), Confederacy 10,000 (20%).

This plan is generated from those figures. It shows the shape of the battle the database describes: the size and width of the armies, the plan of attack and the outcome. It does not show where the units actually stood.

The armies

USA

Grant

Unit	Arm	Men
USA left wing	Infantry	17,734
USA centre	Infantry	23,645
USA right wing	Infantry	17,734
USA reserve	Infantry	14,778
USA cavalry of the left	Cavalry	6,000
USA cavalry of the right	Cavalry	6,000
USA artillery (274 guns)	Artillery	4,110
Grant	Commander	—
In this plan		90,001

Confederacy

Lee

Unit	Arm	Men
Confederacy left wing	Infantry	9,600
Confederacy centre	Infantry	12,800
Confederacy right wing	Infantry	9,600
Confederacy reserve	Infantry	8,000
Confederacy cavalry of the left	Cavalry	3,500
Confederacy cavalry of the right	Cavalry	3,500
Confederacy artillery (200 guns)	Artillery	3,000
Lee	Commander	—
In this plan		50,000

What the sources report

	USA	Confederacy
Strength, this plan	90,000	50,000
Losses, this plan	18,399	10,000

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 203, “Spotsylvania”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting: 240 hours
Winner: the defender
Terrain: Rolling, Mixed
Weather: Dry, Sunny, Temperate, Spring, Temperate
Defender’s posture: Hasty defense, Prepared defense
Front width: 5.2 km (attacker), 7.6 km (defender)

Force	Strength	Losses	Horse	Guns	Plan and outcome
USAattacker	90,000	18,399	12,000	274	Frontal attack; Double envelopment; Stalemate
Confederacydefender	50,000	10,000	7,000	200	Defensive/offensive plan; Stalemate; Withdrew

Attacker’s advantages initiative +1

CDB90 (US Army Concepts Analysis Agency, 1990), tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold; data under ODC-BY 1.0.

Notes

On this reconstruction

Generated automatically from the statistics in CDB90. Frontages, depths, distances, the order of events and the terrain are schematic: they follow the recorded strengths, front widths, hours of fighting, tactical plan and outcome, not maps or accounts of the battle. The sources give no hours; the timing is conjectural.

Sources

US Army Concepts Analysis Agency; tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold, CAA Database of Battles (CDB90), no. 203 · ODC-BY-1.0Strengths, losses, front widths, hours of fighting, tactics and outcome.
Wikipedia contributors, Battle of Spotsylvania Court House · CC-BY-SA-4.0

Facts gathered from Wikidata (CC0), Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0) and Wikimedia Commons (licence per file); the plan and its text are timeastra’s own.