Perryville: Bragg vs. Buell, Oct. 8, 1862

I think to lose Kentucky is nearly to lose the whole game. - Abraham Lincoln, September 1861

At the dawn of the Civil War, the Commonwealth of Kentucky was officially a “border state” (neither Union nor Confederate) by decree of the state legislature, but due to the state’s strategic location and the divided loyalties of its citizens neither side treated the state as neutral territory. By the fall of 1861, both Union and Confederate forces occupied Kentucky and, despite the fact that the state had not seceded from the Union, the Confederate States of America had set up a temporary state capital in Bowling Green, installed a governor and added a star representing the state to its flag. Not surprisingly, a campaign to wrest control of the state from the Union, the “Confederate Heartland Offensive,” was launched by Generals Kirby Smith and Braxton Bragg in the summer of 1862.

The small town of Perryville, located in the central portion of the state, was an unlikely site for the culmination of the campaign, but as the Union forces of General Don Carlos Buell pursued Bragg's Army of the Mississippi eastward under severe drought conditions in early October, both sides made their way to the town in search of the water promised by the Chaplin River and its tributaries. Once the forces collided near Doctor's Creek on October 8, the Battle of Perryville, the biggest battle fought in Kentucky and, for the number of soldiers involved, one of the bloodiest battles of the Civil War, had begun.

By nightfall, the Confederates had scored a tactical victory, as Bragg’s army had managed to push Buell’s forces back over a mile, but both sides had suffered extensive casualties (over 6,000 Union and Confederate soldiers were dead, wounded, captured or missing), and Bragg, having realized that the number of Union forces in Perryville had been greatly underestimated, would withdraw from the town that night as part of what would ultimately be a total withdrawal from the state. (Kentucky remained in the Union column for the remainder of the war.) Buell, roundly criticized for his failures in leadership during the battle (including his failure, due in part to a phenomenon known as an “acoustic shadow,” to recognize the severity of the battle until very late in the engagement and, therefore, to provide needed – and readily-available – reinforcements), found his military career effectively ruined at Perryville despite his strategic victory there.

Perryville: Bragg vs. Buell, Oct. 8, 1862, a card-driven war game, gives two players the chance to step into the shoes of these generals. The players must balance military tactics with hand management to determine the fate of the Commonwealth.