Snake Creek Gap was a narrow, three-mile passage between two ridges, beginning one mile south and ending at the fork of Sugar Valley and Resaca roads. On May 8, 1864, while Geary’s Division of the 20th Army Corps (US) stormed Rocky Face Ridge at Dug Gap, five miles northeast, McPherson’s Army of the Tennessee, the 15th and 16th Army Corps (US), gained a lodgment in Snake Creek Gap and held it while the 14th, 20th, and 23d Corps (US) left the Dalton front and marched through the gap. Outflanked in his position at Dalton, Johnston (CS) evacuated it on May 12 and withdrew to Resaca, which he defended against Sherman’s forces in two days of battle on May 14 and 15.