The Battle of Antietam, also called the Battle of Sharpsburg, fought September 17, 1862, was one of the most crucial events in the American Civil War. In addition to being the costliest single day in our nation’s history, with some 23,000 casualties suffered by the Union and Confederate forces engaged, Antietam marked the end of Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s first invasion of the North. The results of the Battle and the entire 1862 Maryland Campaign also provided U.S. President Abraham Lincoln with the strategic Union victory he needed, giving him the opportunity to issue the famous Emancipation Proclamation, a document that changed the whole nature of the Civil War and the history of our country.

To visit the Battlefield of Antietam is to step back in time. Considered one of the most pristine, unspoiled battlefields, visitors to Antietam often comment how they can practically hear the din of battle, see the massed ranks of soldiers in Blue and Gray, and smell the gunpowder. And that is precisely what the Antietam Battlefield Guides try to do: paint a vivid picture of the Battle of Antietam so our clients walk away having had a taste of what it may have been like that terrible day of September 17, 1862.