The battle for South Mountain was fought on September 14, 1862, as a series of engagements at three mountain passes. The southernmost, Crampton's Gap, pitted Franklin's VI Corps against three Confederate infantry brigades under McLaws' direct command plus a brigade of cavalry from J.E.B. Stuart's division. Despite tremendous numerical superiority, Franklin's two divisions were unable to force their way through in time to rescue the garrison at Harper's Ferry.

To the north, the National Pike traversed a prominent feature known as Turner's Gap. Approximately one mile to the south, the Old Sharpsburg Road traversed the smaller Fox's Gap. To defend these two passes, Lee sent General D.H. Hill and his division of five brigades. General Stuart was to assist in defending Fox's Gap, but to this end Stuart detached only one cavalry regiment and a section of horse artillery. 
As the morning sun rose on the 14th, a panoramic spectacle became visible to the Confederate defenders along the crest of Turner's Gap: below them and to the east was McClellan's army.

McClellan showed extreme caution in committing his army at South Mountain. Those engaged there witnessed ferocious hand-to-hand fighting, which at times seemingly became demonic blood-lust contests. 
The first clash occurred around 9 a.m. about half a mile below the summit of Fox's Gap. 
Here General Jacob D. Cox's Kanawha Division of the IX Corps attacked a thinly spread Confederate brigade commanded by General Samuel Garland. Short of total success, Cox waited for reinforcements to come up. After a mid-afternoon lull, the contest re-opened at both gaps as the remainder of Reno's IX Corps and the whole of Hooker's I Corps converged on the mountain passes.

In the end, the Confederates withdrew from their precarious positions on South Mountain under the cover of darkness and moved west to consolidate in Sharpsburg. McClellan did not cross the passes until 8 a.m. the next morning. Although the Confederate defenders had suffered heavier casualties than the Federals at South Mountain, and were defeated tactically, strategically they were successful in holding back a vastly superior Union force for the entire day, thus buying the time necessary for Jackson to complete his siege of Harper's Ferry and join Lee at Sharpsburg.
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This version has been edited to fix small problems. New buildings, Jackson's forest texture, a randomization line, listmap and blank overview maps have been added.

To install: (unless you are short of hard disk space) make a copy of your Gettysburg folder and rename it as SharpsburgSMG.  Unzip into the SharpsburgSMG folder with "Use Folder Names" and "Overwrite Existing Files" checked.  Say "yes" if asked to overwrite any read only files.

If your operating system is using the default of "hide common extensions" you will not see ".exe" etc.  Make a shortcut on the desktop by right clicking on lee.exe, "send to" then "Desktop (create shortcut)".  When you have had enough SharpsburgSMG, delete the SharpsburgSMG folder & shortcut, no need to restore. Choose historical on the options screen if you wish to ensure a programmed scenario.



13 April 2011
Palette for Scenario List Map changed to suit XP & latter Windows Colours.


Graeme

http://smgettysburg.webs.com/SMG.htm