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Above: a "day into night" rendition of the view south toward Sharpsburg from Antietam's infamous Sunken Road, AKA "Bloody Lane", a ditch, more or less between fields, and on the day of the battle filled every yard with the dead and dying of the North and South.
It's not clear whether man will succumb to war like he used to, but out of the ages of Napoleon and symphony both, the conceits with which the generals worked, and, it may be mentioned, the manner of civilian witness, bespeak the then overarching relationship between a dawning holistic consciousness as to the nature of nature, of humans and their institutions, of the power of machines, machinery, and machine-like expressions of will, and, ultimately, the most natural of man's artifice: music.
My submission: any composer or conductor with a baton and a bit of fire in the belly would understand the wells out of which the generals of the day organized, more or less, the agony and mayhem played before God on September 17, 1862.
From an account of the Battle of Bull Run preceding the engagement at Antietam.
"The wealthy elite of nearby Washington, including congressmen and their families, expecting an easy Union victory, had come to picnic and watch the battle. When the Union army was driven back in a running disorder, the roads back to Washington were blocked by panicked civilians attempting to flee in their carriages." [5]
For Lee's route of Union forces at the Battle of Bull Run, producing momentum and motivation both for marching into western Maryland, gentry had gathered to watch the show.
War as music; war as spectacle; war as sport: the living symphonies have been stilled, and thanks be to God or nature for that, and knock on wood for uncertainty courses through all lives, but in spirit, one may look on the more contemporary tunings--i.e., the "Flight of the Katyushas", the "Dancing Kalashnikovs", the duets and trios of Somali hit squads, the "Solo Blast of the Ball Bearings" as another form of the familiar storm and lightning brought to life by the analogs of guitar hero egos and producers with vision.
Antietam National Battlefield Park lies just 20 or so driving minutes south of my apartment, so I expect I'll be out there often taking pictures, walking out the roads, listening.
2. "Why Lee Invaded Maryland." National Park Service, last updated April 1, 2005.
3. "Lee's Lost Dispatch." National Park Service.
4. "Casualties at Antietam." National Park Service, updated October 3, 2001.
5. "First Battle of Bull Run." Wikipedia, as experienced February 11, 2008.
Correspondence: James S. Oppenheim
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