Battle Casualties at Antietam

Summary Statistics

Here is a summary of the casualty data available for the battle.

"Casualties" include people killed, wounded, missing, or captured. The casualty numbers below include all of these, and are approximations of the casualties that occurred in each phase of the battle. The chaos of battle makes it exceedingly difficult to develop precise numbers, but overall, 1 in 4 soldiers involved in battle on September 17, 1862 were killed, wounded, or missing.

Over many years of gathering information on thousands of the individual soldiers at the battle, I've compiled fairly comprehensive lists of those killed outright or who died of wounds at Sharpsburg (and elsewhere on the Campaign). They are not perfect or absolutely complete, of course, but are the only such lists I know of, anywhere.

Also, as I research individual military units, I add detailed statistics, when available, for their battle strength and casualties. I post this information on each unit's page [see the 11th Georgia Infantry, for example]. If I can establish reasonable numbers for most or all units, we will attempt to present roll-up or summary numbers derived unit-by-unit. This may be a very long time coming however, and may not actually be practical at all - but I'll give it a try.

In the meantime, the numbers below provide a top-level summary, as published on the National Park Service's Battlefield site.

Confederate dead along the Hagerstown Pike