AHC: Bigger than Gettysburg

[River of Death]

With as small and germane a PoD as possible, make a Civil War battle have greater casualty figures than OTL Gettysburg. That is, have the killed, wounded, missing, and captured, for both sides, total more than ~51,000.

This has the caveat that "captured" must be as part of the battle, not as part of a longer siege (and this is very ill-defined, I know). As a benchmark, the OTL Battle of Fort Donelson *does* include the Confederate prisoners from the surrender as part of the battle casualty figures (the surrender and the main fighting occurred 24 hours apart). The OTL Siege of Vicksburg does not.

And just to eliminate the trivial solution, making Gettysburg worse than OTL does not count.

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As a parallel challenge, make a Civil War battle have greater casualty figures on a single day than OTL Antietam. That is, greater than ~23,000 between 2 consecutive midnights.

(*NOT* within any 24-hour period, because then I imagine 4 PM July 2 to 4 PM July 3 at OTL Gettysburg would win. Or else a snapshot of afternoon May 5 to morning May 6 at The Wilderness - or possibly afternoon May 2 to morning May 3 at Chancellorsville - actually that makes for a third interesting question...)

 

[seraphim74]

I'm not an expert as far as ACW goes, but what about the Battle of Chickamauga? IIRC Bragg had a real chance to destroy the Federal Army of Cumberland if he had sent forces to close road leading to Chattanooga.
Or perhaps general Thomas is hit by a stray bullet, his death causes panic among his men and the Federal defence breaks. Or Granger waits for orders and does not send his troops to support Thomas.
Anyway, Thomas's wing is anihilated, Bragg encouraged by his success storms forward and the Army of Cumberland is completely destroyed.

 

[Snake Featherston]

It's possible to either turn Spotsylvania into this or alternately to have Grant and Lee fight a massive set-piece battle in open space with 60,000 Confederates up against 120,000 Yankees. Open-space linear warfare is extremely bloody, and while I'd give Grant that over Lee any day it'll be a bloodbath in all the worst ways imaginable.