Sunken Road / Bloody Lane

For several hours on the afternoon of Sept. 17, 1862, wave after wave of Union troops to dislodge a much smaller force of Confederates solidly entrenched in the Sunken Road, used by Sharpsburg, Md., to reach their fields. Finally, the men in gray were pushed back to Piper Farm. A famous photograph shows piles of bodies in Bloody Lane a couple days after the battle. I walked the road on a recent rainy weekday. I was alone, deep in thought about the lives lost that desperate day at Antietam.