Tennessee Battlefield Tour Day 9 : Kennesaw Mountain

For the third day at Chattanooga and with improving weather I chose to drive further south into Georgia (I think I forgot to mention in the last post that Chickamauga is in Georgia rather than Tennessee but the essence of the tour was of course Tennessee) to visit Kennesaw Mountain. It is a relatively easy drive of about and hour and a half pretty much main road all the way.

The battle is of course much later in the war in 1864 with Johnston and Hood attempting to hold back Sherman’s advance on Atlanta which is only another 20 or so miles south.

Having been to several locations where I hardly saw anybody this park was jammed, I think probably due to it proximity to Atlanta a mix of hikers and dog walkers and I am guessing that only about half there for the history. The park is in essence a large mountain/green space which has been pretty much surrounded by the urban development of Marietta

It was a treat to walk, the weather was great like a cool summer day in the Lake District with almost the whole area wooded

I chose to walk over the top of both Kennesaw and Little Kennesaw, this was a good walk of several hours the line of the walk heads along the crest and although the picture above doesn’t show it too well the Confederate defences are clear most of the way as a marked ditch

At the summit of Kennesaw they have recreated the 4 gun battery which was there

And you get great views of Altanta away to the south

Following the ridge line with Little Kennesaw in the distance

Not surprisingly the stretch between the two is the most heavily trenched with a really clear continuous line of trench’s just below the crest. This very helpful man pointed it out to me, it is quite a quiet location up on the ridge line away from the very summit of Kennesaw and you definately get a sense of the Rebels digging in

Another battery was placed on Little Kennesaw 

And the crest then drops down to Pigeon Hill, really and extension of the main mountains, still very steep on both sides. This was where Sherman sent one of his two main assaults

Very difficult terrain to attack across and it ultimately proved impossible to take the defences 

A period photo placed in the location it was taken from at Pigeon Hill

My walk then took me back to the car, so I then headed for Cheatham Hill the other most famous part of the battlefield, significant rebel defences including the battery above

This area is the site of the second main failed attack know as the ‘Dead Angle’

Union Forces attacked up this hill in the open and were cat down

The main rebel defence line is set back slightly

So as the history goes the remnants of the assault took cover in the dead ground around this sign, and started to dig a tunnel in an attempt to blow up the defences.

So a very pleasant day out in beautiful weather.....