The high ground area around the Dunker Church saw massive and deadly fighting during the battle of Antietam on September 17, 1862. The most deadly one-day battle ever fought on American soil. An account from a member of Stonewall Jackson’s staff Henry K. Douglas gave this account of the action around the peaceful little country church

"On my way to (General) Early, I went off the (Hagerstown) Pike and was compelled to go through a field in the rear of Dunker Church, over which, to and fro, the pendulum of battle had swung several times that day. It was a dreadful scene, a veritable field of blood. The dead and dying lay as thick over it as harvest sheaves. The pitiable cries for water and appeals for help were much more horrible to listen to than the deadliest sounds of battle. Silent were the dead, and motionless. But here and there were raised stiffened arms; heads made a last effort to lift themselves from the ground; prayers were mingles with oaths, the oaths of delirium; men were wriggling over the earth; and midnight hid all distinction between the blue and the gray. My horse trembled under me in terror, looking down at the ground, sniffing the scent of blood, stepping falteringly as a horse will over or by the side of human flesh; afraid to stand still, hesitating to go on, his animal instinct shuddering at this cruel human mystery. Once his foot slid into a little shallow filled with blood and spurted a little stream on his legs and my boots. I had a surfeit of blood that day and I couldn't stand this. I dismounted and giving the reins to my courier, I started on foot into the wood of Dunker Church."

This first hand account of the individuals that were fortunate enough to survive the hell that transpired on those hallowed fields on that horrible day in September can do a far better job than any meager writing I could manage to explain! The high area around the “Little Dunker Church” was the dying place for some 8000 troops on that infamous day of death.

The quote from Henry K. Douglas comes from an article written by Ronald J. Gordon Published March 2002