With Jackson tied up before Harper's Ferry, Lee's defeat is sure, unless he retreats across the Potomac, and that would be equivalent to a defeat.

Good Heavens, why don't we push on ?" He had not yet heard of the fall of Harper's Ferry, and that Jackson with picked brigades was already on the way to join Lee.

Had he known these two vital facts his anger would have burned to a white heat.
Surely no day lost was ever lost at a greater cost than the one McClellan lost after the finding of Orders No.

191.
"Do you know anything about the Antietam, colonel ?" asked Dick.
"It's a narrow stream, but deep, and crossed by several stone bridges.
It will be hard to force a crossing here, but further up it can be done with ease since we outnumber Lee so much that we can overlap him by far.
I have my information from Shepard, and he makes no mistakes.

There is a church, too, on the upper part of the peninsula, a little church belonging to an order called the Dunkards." "Ah," murmured Dick, "the little church of Shiloh!" "What do you mean by that ?" "There was a little church at Shiloh, too.