The War in the Northwest 397 



in the battles of the Revolution with those suffered 

 in the battles of the Civil War is sufficient to show 

 the superiority of the soldiers who fought in the 

 latter (and a comparison of the tactics and other 

 features of the conflicts will make the fact even 

 clearer). No Revolutionary regiment or brigade 

 suffered such a loss as befell the ist Minnesota at 

 Gettysburg, where it lost 215 out of 263 men, 82 

 per cent ; the 9th Illinois at Shiloh, where it lost 366 

 out of 578 men, 63 per cent ; the ist Maine at Peters- 

 burg, which lost 632 out of 950 men, 67 per cent; 

 or Caldwell's brigade of New York, New Hamp- 

 shire, and Pennsylvania troops, which, in Hancock's 

 attack at Fredericksburg, lost 949 out of 1,947 men, 

 48 per cent; or, turning to the Southern soldiers, 

 such a loss as that of the ist Texas atAntietam, when 

 1 86 out of 226 men fell, 82 per cent; or of the 26th 

 North Carolina, which, at Gettysburg, lost 588 out 

 of 820 men, 72 per cent; or the 8th Tennessee, at 

 Murfreesboro, which lost 306 out of 444 men, or 

 68 per cent; or Garnett's brigade of Virginians, 

 which, in Pickett's charge, lost 941 men out of 1,427, 

 or 65 per cent. 



There were over a hundred regiments, and not a 

 few brigades, in the Union and Confederate armies, 

 each of which in some one action suffered losses 

 averaging as heavy as the above. The Revolution- 

 ary armies can not show such a roll of honor as 

 this. Still, it is hardly fair to judge them by this 

 comparison, for the Civil War saw the most bloody 

 and desperate fighting that has occurred of late 



