Shiloh's losses created political pressure to find a commander to blame. Many observers were not prepared for the casualties produced by large modern armies, and the scale of later battles would make Shiloh's toll look less exceptional. The Vicksburg campaign, for example, produced about ten thousand Union casualties and nearly forty thousand Confederate casualties. Shiloh was an early warning that the war would not be won through a sequence of cheap, decisive victories. The public shock also helps explain why damaging stories about Grant's conduct found an audience after the battle.
Notable Point · 2:22:48-2:24:49
Shiloh and the shock of modern-war casualties
The battle's losses encouraged attacks on Grant because the public had not yet accepted how destructive the Civil War would become.