"With only one third of his army General Lee held back the entire Union army for two days and left Maryland unmolested but he is the loser?"

David

Len below summarized the situation pretty well. Lincoln was grasping for political straws so he could announce his forthcoming Emancipation Proclaimation. The only victory that the Union Army could reasonablely claim is that Lee did withdraw from Maryland after the Battle.

He did not loses the gunfight on the ground. But he could not hold his ground either in another fight. He was in a tactically poor position with his back to the Potomac River and any break in his lines in another battle would have meant the destruction of the Army of Northern Virginia.

He did the wise thing in withdrawing to preserve his army for the future. But technically he left the battleground in the control of his enemies, which is traditional the measure which govern such determinations.

Lee accomplished his objectives. That is true. But to have won the Maryland Campaign of 1862 he could not afford to have become so heavily engaged in a major battle like Sharpsburg. That Battle cost Lee and the Confederacy too much political and in the lives of the men in Lee's Army.

The heavy loss of men during the 1862 Campaign effectively ended any further attempts by lee to dictate the course of the War for the late spring of 1863. Even then he was in the defensive.

But the major "loss" for Lee and the Confederacy at Sharpsburg was not military, but political. and I know that you are aware of that.

One thing I have always wondered about is was Lee's Maryland campaign part of a larger operation. Was the Maryland campaign just one of a three prong attack against the Union. The other two prongs being Bragg's Kentucky Expedition and Maradukes Missiour Campaign of 1862.

Were these three advances timed so as to tied down the Union armies so as they would be able to shift reenforments to the east?