WI Battle of Cedar Creek is a decisive Confederate victory?

Anaxagoras

Banned
At the Battle of Cedar Creek, in October of 1864, Jubal Early very nearly pulled off a surprise victory against Phil Sheridan's larger army in the northern Shenandoah Valley. With any number of PODs, a decisive Confederate victory could have been achieved.

Suppose that the battle turned into a Confederate victory on the level with Second Manassas, with Sheridan's broken army fleeing northwards towards Harper's Ferry and leaving the Confederates in possession of the battlefield. Would this has had any serious repercussions? It might be too late to influence the presidential election, and the agricultural productivity of the Shenandoah Valley had already mostly gone up in smoke thanks to Sheridan's scorched earth tactics. Would a Southern victory have been essentially meaningless, or could it have had a significant impact?
 
I'm leery of being one, since my mind is failing to see how "any number of PODs" would do it and getting bogged down in tactical discussion wouldn't be very productive.

But to throw out my two cents so someone says something:

Let's say Sheridan's army does break. Somehow.

Early is in no position to take advantage of that (with his ineffective cavalry and the very effective Union cavalry handling rear guard work for the more battered infantry), which means Sheridan can reassemble his army somewhere. Which means a rematch.

So I'm leaning towards meaningless. Cedar Creek being a win was certainly a sign of "the tide is in the Union's favor and victory is inevitable", but it was a sign in a political sense rather than a military one (militarily, that had been established before Sheridan entered the Valley) - and how much it would count as a defeat in the other direction is beyond my knowledge of the Union electorate.

It seems like it would be at best something that would influence the indecisive or dampen the ardor of the less committed, but probably not enough to tip the electoral votes in McClellan's favor.
 
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