Ambrose Bierce’s story of “What I Saw at Shiloh” was a piece of literature that I found extraordinary. The acute detail Bierce had in depicting that battle was beautiful as it was grotesque. According to various reviews written by critics spanning over the years “What I Saw at Shiloh” is revered as Bierce’s best work. I would agree to those opinions. Bierce uses his perspective as a Civil War Officer to demonstrate the horror and insanity of the bloodiest war that America has, to date, ever been a part of. The Civil War was anything but civil. The fact that Bierce even survived the conflict to write about it is astonishing in itself, let alone to write and publish pieces, praised by many, of his own personal accounts. When reading Bierce’s detailed description of the camps made me focus on just how brutal the conditions in the camps were and how barbaric the soldiers had to be to survive. Bierce’s opening depiction of the camp April 6, 1862 was as if it was a living breathing thing. Like a bee hive, everyone doing their job in a harmonious rhythm. The account of the flag that morning was as if it were alive. “Presently the flag hanging limp and lifeless at the headquarters was seen to lift itself spiritedly from the staff. At the same instant was heard a dull, distant sound like the heavy breathing of some great animal below the horizon. The flag had lifted its head to listen. There was a momentary lull in the hum of the human swarm; then, as the flag dropped the hush passed away.” [CITATION Amb94 p 1 l 1033 ]. Bierce will then portray the camp as a completely different place as if it was a different war at a different time, transcending the camp from a beautiful living thing to a place without remorse. As Bierce wrote, “These tents were constantly receiving the wounded, yet were never full; they were continually ejecting the dead, yet were never empty. It was if the helpless had been carried in and murdered,