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Schematic plan · American Civil War

Battle of Atlanta

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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.
Rolling, Mixed groundCentreCentreLeft wingRight wingLeft wingRight wingReserveReserveHorseHorse02 km4 kmN

Confederacy (Cs Army of Tennessee, 36,934 men under Hood) attacked USA (US Army of the Tennessee, 30,477 men under Mcpherson) in Georgia. The CAA Database of Battles records 7 hours of fighting on a front of 4.8 km, a frontal attack, single envelopment, left flank against hasty defense, and that USA held. Losses: Confederacy 8,000 (22%), USA 3,722 (12%).

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

Confederacy

Hood

UnitArmMen
Confederacy left wingInfantry7,148
Confederacy centreInfantry9,531
Confederacy right wingInfantry7,148
Confederacy reserveInfantry5,957
Confederacy cavalry of the leftCavalry3,575
Confederacy cavalry of the rightCavalry3,575
HoodCommander—
In this plan36,934

USA

Mcpherson

UnitArmMen
USA left wingInfantry7,314
USA centreInfantry9,753
USA right wingInfantry7,314
USA reserveInfantry6,095
McphersonCommander—
In this plan30,476

What the sources report

ConfederacyUSA
Strength, this plan36,93430,477
Losses, this plan8,0003,722

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 208, “Atlanta”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting
7 hours
Winner
the defender
Terrain
Rolling, Mixed
Weather
Dry, Sunny, Temperate, Summer, Temperate
Defender’s posture
Hasty defense
Front width
4.8 km (attacker), 6.4 km (defender)
ForceStrengthLossesHorseGunsPlan and outcome
Confederacyattacker36,9348,0007,150—Frontal attack; Single envelopment; Left flank; Repulse; Withdrew
USAdefender30,4773,722——Defensive plan

Attacker’s advantages initiative +1 · surprise +2

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

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.