ABSTRACT
Union and Confederate soldiers may have had unequal numbers but they all faced the same conditions while they were on the march, in camp, and in battle. They all shivered in the rain and snow, trudged through dust and mud, and saw their regiments’ fortunes change when they suddenly came upon a mucky slough or a ravine in the middle of a battlefield. Northern and southern soldiers, in every theater of the war, sought to gain the environmental advantage by making sure they had shelter, and by taking high ground and securing waterways. In order to combat the elements, soldiers turned to the fields and forests of the South, seeking to remake their relationship with nature in order to prevail in their struggle with one another. Nature’s resources moved armies, housed them, gave them a sense of place and camaraderie, and protected them during battles. Domesticated and wild animals provided entertainment and valuable food sources for tired, ailing troops. The forces of nature made them cold, wet, hot, and sick. The hills, valleys, ravines, rivers, and swamps of the South dictated their movements and played an important role in shaping battle tactics. And the stumps and ghost forests left in the wake of these armies during the Civil War suggest the many ways that the technologies of warfare shaped southern landscapes and transformed their meanings. Almost every wartime activity consumed natural resources and, for the most part, soldiers and civilians saw this as a wartime necessity.
