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moved forward against Lee’s main line.x Despite their numerical advantage on the left, it was the Union
forces who gave ground and retreated to their initial positions.
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Lee’s army from destruction.x The battle of Antietam was the single bloodiest day in the entire
Civil War. Stunned by the carnage, the next day, the two armies
did nothing, and that night, Lee began withdrawing his forces back
toward Virginia. Despite his substantial numerical superiority, his
unused reserves, and yet another contingent of 14,000 fresh troops,
McClellan let Lee go unmolested.Outcomes
x Who won the Battle of Antietam? In tactical terms, Lee certainly
outmaneuvered McClellan, but in the end, Lee was the one who had
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importance of the battle emerges as perhaps the decisive turning
point of the war.
x Antietam broke the South’s string of victories and gave the
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Lincoln’s position and ensured his party’s control of Congress, thus
guaranteeing the continued vigorous prosecution of the war. It also
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Confederacy, which on its own may have doomed the southern cause.x Finally, Antietam provided the victory that Lincoln had been
waiting for to issue the Emancipation Proclamation. Although
mainly symbolic, this act fundamentally transformed the nature
of the war from a struggle about states’ rights or economics into a
moral crusade being fought for the very soul of the nation.