History
All of the storylines and writings of the project center around one singular event: the Battle of Shiloh.
The Battle of Shiloh took place at Pittsburg Landing in the state of Tennessee from April 6-7, 1862. One of the defining moments of the Western Theater, this two-day clash saw more casualties than every American war fought to that date combined. The two days of horrific fighting between the 65,085 Union troops and the 44,968 Confederate troops ended with 23,746 casualties, one of which being the death of Confederate General Albert Sidney Johnston. The initial success of the Confederacy turned by the end of the second day, when Union troops under Major General Ulysses S. Grant pushed the Confederates under General P.G.T. Beauregard to retreat.
This battle was particularly important heading into the rest of the war because it was the victory that allowed he Union to push further southward into Corinth, Mississippi. Corinth, a small town near the Tennessee border and Pittsburg Landing, was the location at which General Albert Sidney Johnston marshalled his troops. Corinth was a crucial transportation hub for the Confederacy, housing a major railway crossroads that essentially lead to the entirety of the South in one way or another. Should Corinth fall into the hands of the Federal Army, the Confederacy would be critically impacted.
The Battle of Shiloh has come to be one of the most well-known of the Civil War battles, and its details remain to many the stuff of legend. Shiloh is a Hebrew word mentioned in Genesis 49:10, describing a Biblical place meaning "peace." Some claim that Shiloh is a name applied to the Messiah within this context, while others still hold different interpretation from either of these. The contradiction between the actions that occurred in this bloody battle and its peaceful name make this historical event an excellent venue for the discussion which this project hopes to foster: how does perception change depending on the perspective?