Battle of Chickamauga in the context of "Confederate States Army"

American Civil War reenactment is an effort to recreate the appearance of a particular battle or other event associated with the American Civil War by hobbyists known (in the United States) as Civil War reenactors, or living historians.

Although most common in the United States, there are also American Civil War reenactors in Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, Australia, Italy, Denmark, Sweden, and Poland.

Georgia was one of the original seven slave states that formed the Confederate States of America in February 1861, triggering the U.S. Civil War. The state governor, Democrat Joseph E. Brown, wanted locally raised troops to be used only for the defense of Georgia, in defiance of Confederate president Jefferson Davis, who wanted to deploy them on other battlefronts. When the Union blockade prevented Georgia from exporting its plentiful cotton in exchange for key imports, Brown ordered farmers to grow food instead, but the breakdown of transport systems led to desperate shortages.

There was not much fighting in Georgia until September 1863, when Confederates under Braxton Bragg defeated William S. Rosecrans at Chickamauga Creek. In May 1864, William T. Sherman started pursuing the Confederates towards Atlanta, which he captured in September, in advance of his March to the Sea. This six-week campaign destroyed much of the civilian infrastructure of Georgia, decisively shortening the war. When news of the march reached Robert E. Lee's army in Virginia, whole Georgian regiments deserted, feeling they were needed at home. The Battle of Columbus, fought on the Georgia-Alabama border on April 16, 1865, is reckoned by some criteria to have been the last battle of the war.

James Abram Garfield (November 19, 1831 – September 19, 1881) was the 20th president of the United States, serving from March 1881 until his death in September that year after being shot in July. A preacher, lawyer, and Civil War general, Garfield served nine terms in the United States House of Representatives and is the only sitting member of the House to be elected president. Before running for the presidency, he had been elected to the U.S. Senate by the Ohio General Assembly—a position he declined when he became president-elect.

Garfield was born into poverty in a log cabin and grew up in northeast Ohio. After graduating from Williams College in 1856, he studied law and became an attorney. He was a preacher in the Restoration Movement and president of the Western Reserve Eclectic Institute, affiliated with the Disciples. Garfield was elected as a Republican member of the Ohio State Senate in 1859, serving until 1861. He opposed Confederate secession, was a major general in the Union Army during the American Civil War, and fought in the battles of Middle Creek, Shiloh, and Chickamauga. He was elected to Congress in 1862 to represent Ohio's 19th district. Throughout his congressional service, he firmly supported the gold standard and gained a reputation as a skilled orator. He initially agreed with Radical Republican views on Reconstruction but later favored a Moderate Republican–aligned approach to civil rights enforcement for freedmen. Garfield's aptitude for mathematics extended to his own proof of the Pythagorean theorem, published in 1876, and his advocacy of using statistics to inform government policy.

34°36′21.9″N 83°58′46.17″W / 34.606083°N 83.9794917°W / 34.606083; -83.9794917

North Georgia is the northern hilly/mountainous region in the U.S. state of Georgia. At the time of the arrival of settlers from Europe, it was inhabited largely by the Cherokee. The counties of north Georgia were often scenes of important events in the history of Georgia. It was the site of many American Civil War battles, including the Battle of Lookout Mountain and the Battle of Chickamauga, leading up to the Atlanta campaign. Today, particularly in the northeast portion of the region, tourism sustains the local economy.

William Starke Rosecrans (September 6, 1819 – March 11, 1898) was an American inventor, coal-oil company executive, diplomat, politician, and U.S. Army officer. He gained fame for his role as a Union general during the American Civil War. He was the victor at prominent battles in the Western theater of the American Civil War. However, his military career ended after his disastrous defeat at the Battle of Chickamauga in 1863.

Rosecrans graduated in 1842 from the United States Military Academy, where he served in engineering assignments and was a professor before leaving the Army to pursue a career in civil engineering. At the start of the Civil War, he led troops from Ohio and achieved early combat success in western Virginia. In 1862, in the Western theater, he won the Battle of Iuka and the Second Battle of Corinth while under the command of Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant. His brusque, outspoken manner and willingness to quarrel openly with superiors caused a professional rivalry with Grant (as well as with Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton) that would adversely affect Rosecrans' career.

George Henry Thomas (July 31, 1816 – March 28, 1870) was an American general in the Union Army during the American Civil War and one of the principal commanders in the Western Theater.

Thomas served in the Mexican–American War, and despite being a Virginian whose home state would join the Confederate States of America during the Civil War, he was a Southern Unionist who chose to remain in the U.S. Army. Thomas won one of the first Union victories in the war, at Mill Springs in Kentucky, and served in important subordinate commands at Perryville and Stones River. His stout defense at the Battle of Chickamauga in 1863 saved the Union Army from being completely routed, earning him his most famous nickname, "the Rock of Chickamauga." He followed soon after with a dramatic breakthrough on Missionary Ridge in the Battle of Chattanooga. In the Franklin–Nashville Campaign of 1864, he achieved one of the most decisive victories of the war, destroying the army of Confederate General John Bell Hood, his former student at West Point, at the Battle of Nashville.

John Bell Hood (June 1 or June 29, 1831 – August 30, 1879) was a Confederate general during the American Civil War.

Hood's education at the United States Military Academy led to a career as a junior officer in the infantry and cavalry of the antebellum U.S. Army in California and Texas. At the start of the Civil War, he offered his services to his adopted state of Texas. He achieved his reputation for aggressive leadership as a brigade commander in the army of Robert E. Lee during the Seven Days Battles in 1862, after which he was promoted to division command. He led a division under James Longstreet in the campaigns of 1862–63. At the Battle of Gettysburg, he was severely wounded, rendering his left arm mostly useless for the rest of his life. Transferred with many of Longstreet's troops to the Western Theater, Hood led a massive assault into a gap in the Union line at the Battle of Chickamauga but was wounded again, requiring the amputation of his right leg.

Gordon Granger (November 6, 1821 – January 10, 1876) was a career U.S. Army officer, and a Union general during the American Civil War, where he distinguished himself at the Battle of Chickamauga.

Granger is best remembered for his part in the Battle of Chickamauga and the Battle of Chattanooga and for issuing General Order No. 3 on June 19, 1865, in Galveston, Texas, further informing residents of, and enforcing, Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation which set all Confederate states' slaves free on January 1, 1863. Since 2021, June 19 has been commemorated by the federal holiday of Juneteenth.