The largest and most decisive battle of Grant's Vicksburg campaign. Champion Hill is part of Grant's Campaigns in Civy War, on the Confederate chief engineer's own map of the field.
One scenario, playable from either side. Every battle runs five minutes on the clock against a Green, Regular or Veteran enemy: the attacker has to break the line before nightfall, the defender has to hold.
Champion Hill
Grant's Campaigns
May 16, 1863 · 1 p.m.
As the Union, retake the hill and the crossroads behind it. Hovey's division, McGinnis's and Slack's brigades, has just been thrown back down the slope. Logan's brigades are working around the Confederate left, Osterhaus and Carr are coming up the Middle and Raymond roads, and Crocker's division, Boomer's and Holmes's brigades, arrives during the fight.
As the Confederacy, hold the hill and keep the road to Vicksburg open. Stevenson's division holds the crest and the Jackson Road crossroads with Cumming's, S. D. Lee's and Barton's brigades, and Bowen's division, Cockrell's Missourians and Green's brigade, has just driven the Federals back. Loring's division sits on the Raymond Road, ignoring orders to come north.
The battle
In the spring of 1863 Grant crossed the Mississippi below Vicksburg, cut loose from his supply line and marched inland, living off the country. He won five battles in seventeen days. On May 16 John C. Pemberton finally came out to meet him between Jackson and Vicksburg, and the armies collided on Champion Hill, above Baker's Creek.
The hill changed hands three times as Grant fed in fresh divisions. When Logan's men reached the road behind Pemberton's left, the Confederate army broke. Loring's division was cut off and marched away east to join Joseph E. Johnston; the rest fell back across Baker's Creek and into the Vicksburg defenses. The soldiers called it the Hill of Death.
Champion Hill decided the campaign. Six days later Grant assaulted the city's works, and in July Vicksburg surrendered. The lesson the game draws from it: an army that moves fast enough can beat its enemy in pieces before the pieces can join.
Free or paid
Paid: part of Grant's Campaigns, a one-time purchase of six battles from Champion Hill to Appomattox (Fort Donelson, the first, is free). The map is Major S. H. Lockett's map of the battlefield of Baker's Creek, drawn by Pemberton's chief engineer.
Thirteen battles, the Drill Field and the Field Manual are free. The Historical Campaigns, Grant's Campaigns and The Western Campaigns are optional one-time purchases that restore on every device signed in to the same Apple ID.