The above illustration shows the Union forces of George Thomas routing George Crittenden's Confederates at Mill Springs, Kentucky on January 19th, 1862.  In the foreground is an artillery shell bursting among the fighting soldiers.  The soldiers hit by fragments of the shell are shown in dramatic poses.  While the shock of the explosion would certainly topple men over as is shown, the jagged chunks of iron thrown about by the shell would cause horrific damage.  In reality body parts would have been mangled or removed, and the gore was something the editors might not have wished to display in their paper.  The Civil War, however, was a time of transition in many ways.  The was wars were documented was certainly in transition as photographers travelled to recent battlegrounds to capture the spectacle of what a battle would really leave behind.