At the Battle of Olustee, Colquitt's brigade gradually advanced until it was nearly on the enemy's left flank, and when the whole line moved as directed, Union forces gave way in confusion and were pursued for several miles until night ended the fighting. Before the day ended, casualties were staggering: the Union suffered 1,861 killed, wounded, and missing, and the Confederates suffered 946 casualties. The defeat at Olustee ended Union efforts to organize a loyal Florida government in time for the 1864 election. The Confederates won the battle but would eventually lose the Civil War, and the battlefield afterward was remembered as a distressing scene of grievously mangled and stripped bodies.