Preserved 1864 Civil War Battlefield
4432 Mt Tabor Church Road, Dallas, GA 30157
Age
All Ages
Cost
$
Standard Georgia State Park admission. Check venue website for current fees.
Access
Wheelchair OK
Mixed: paved visitor center, dirt and root trails through the battlefield
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1864 · Civil War Battlefield · Atlanta Campaign · State Historic Site
On the afternoon of May 27, 1864, two days after the Battle of New Hope Church, Major General Oliver O. Howard led roughly 14,000 Union troops in an attempt to outflank the Confederate right near Pickett's Mill, in what is now Paulding County, Georgia. Confederate Major General Patrick Cleburne, with about 10,000 men, anticipated the move and fortified positions in the dense terrain. The resulting engagement was short and one-sided: Union forces sustained approximately 1,600 casualties; Confederate losses were near 500.
The defeat slowed Sherman's drive toward Atlanta and remained a sore subject in Union memory. Veteran and author Ambrose Bierce, who fought at Pickett's Mill, later wrote the bitter essay "The Crime at Pickett's Mill," which preserved the engagement in literary memory at a time when the battle was being deliberately overlooked in official accounts.
The battlefield remained largely undeveloped for more than a century. Beginning in 1973 the State of Georgia gradually acquired the 765-acre site, and the park opened to the public as the Pickett's Mill Battlefield Historic Site in 1990. Surviving earthworks, original troop roads, and an 1800s pioneer cabin are still visible. The visitor center includes exhibits and a short film, and the surrounding terrain remains close to its 1864 condition.
Sources
The original Shadowlands report on Pickett's Mill Battlefield is brief: a misty figure runs between two trees and disappears. Beyond that single description, available sources do not contain corroborated witness accounts, named entities, or media coverage tied specifically to paranormal activity at the site.
This is consistent with how Civil War battlefields tend to register in regional folklore. The atmosphere of preserved engagement ground — silent earthworks, an undisturbed forest floor, the knowledge that more than two thousand casualties fell in a single afternoon — generates ambient ghost stories that rarely cohere into specific named figures or recurring incidents. Park interpretation focuses entirely on the documented battle, the topography, and the experience of the soldiers who fought there.
Walk the 765-acre site that preserves the May 27, 1864 battlefield, including original Union and Confederate troop roads, surviving earthwork battlements, and an 1800s pioneer cabin. The trail system traces the ground where 14,000 Union troops under General Howard advanced against 10,000 Confederates under General Cleburne.
Visit the museum's exhibits on the Atlanta Campaign and the brief, lopsided engagement that produced 1,600 Union and approximately 500 Confederate casualties in a single afternoon. A short film orients visitors before they walk the field.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
Kennesaw, GA
Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park preserves 2,965 acres of the June 1864 Atlanta Campaign battleground in Cobb County, Georgia. Union General William T. Sherman's frontal assault on Confederate General Joseph E. Johnston's defensive line failed on June 27, 1864. The park was authorized in 1917 and transferred to the National Park Service in 1933.
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Andersonville National Historic Site preserves Camp Sumter, the largest Confederate military prison of the Civil War, where nearly 13,000 of approximately 45,000 Union prisoners died in 14 months from disease, starvation, and exposure. The site also encompasses Andersonville National Cemetery and the National Prisoner of War Museum, the only National Park unit dedicated to all American POWs.
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