Zombies in St. Elmo

Firstly, I've got no military experience. What I "know" is what I've read from books and what I've heard from my father, brother-in-law, and other combat experienced aquaintances. An important thing I've heard all around is the importance of information/intelligence. You want to know where the badguys/zombies are and you want clear lines of fire along with a good view of the terrain around you. In other words "the high ground". Given that they're zombies and "flanking" of any kind while unlikely to occur in any tactical fashion, it also still important (and very helpful) to have good approaches & choke points.
Zombies are stupid and can be lead into these types of scenarios rather easily.

Since I'm in St. Elmo/Chattanooga, my options for the high-ground are rather apparent. I've got Missionary Ridge, Signal Mountain, Lookout Mtn, Racoon Mtn, and Moccasin Bend (while not technically "the high ground" it is rather defensible in a Zombie situation).

Missionary Ridge at first seems like a good idea. A great view of the whole city with plenty of homes for scavaging for supplies. But its also undefensible for a number of reasons. Firstly, any Zombies approaching from the East would be largely concealed due to the curvy roads, hilly terrain, and trees. While to the west you have an open view of the city, your view to the rear would be largely obscured. We'd be up to our necks shooting the thousands of zombies approaching from the Civil War Cemetery to the West. The highground is only good if you can cover your rear.

Signal Mtn. suffers from different problems. Great, narrow approaches but a ton of space to the rear. Further, low population (few supplies) and a number of cemeteries. Plus, do get there I'd have to make it all the way through the downtown across the river. Unless I got a boat.

Moccasin Bend has lots of space for future agrarian efforts (society is collapsing, after all) and possesses a decent choke point with hills to the east to view both the city across the river and the choke point. Further, for zombies to get to the Bend they'd have to cross the bridges downtown and make their way around the river. The Bend's problems are that again, without a boat to get to it means going through the downtown. Further, it's lacking in supplies for the present (unless you've got a boat). Finally, Zombies are one thing, mentally insane Zombies are another. Though the hospital, once empty, would provide a good base of operations.

My plan were I to wake up tomorrow to Zombies wandering the streets would be to head up lookout Mountain. It's got a small enough town with few enough cemeteries to provide decent supplies, and I happen to know a few homes up there are pretty much small ammo dumps.

I don't care how persistent the zombies are, there's only two (three counting the OCHS cutoff) ways up the mountain on the north end and both of those are miles-long bottlenecks, providing ample opportunity to both see the Zombies coming and to pick away at them.

Further, given the low population of the south/west end of the mountain (its largely country with a few "townships") it gives us a ton of room to expand for new agrarian based society.

The only other option I can think of is heading south into Northwest Georgia away from the cities, but I don't know the terrain or the area at all. Heck, I'm not even sure where in NWGA I'd go.

well, there goes 15 minutes of my life

This is the best story I've ever read.
You're insane, but in a good way.

"There's Zombies...Up in St. Elmo..."
"Every dead and undead's feeling mellow...wo-woho..."

Hey, its not like I think about this during the day or anything, just in the 15 or so minutes before I fall asleep.

Bill, you just made me laugh out loud with the Matt Turner song reference. I've always longed for a good zombie scourge, but I think I'll just stick to cheesy simulations.

It occurred to me that General Longstreet probably thought the same thing about the same places during the Battle of Chattanooga.

Moccasin Bend is not worth consideration. It contains an old hospital building, of 1970s archetecture, and we all know what bad things happen to people in movies when they hole up in those creepy old hospitals, mental or otherwise.

Lookout Mountain seems like the best immediate plan to me as well. But have we considered population density as a factor here? I would think we'd want to find a location with the smallest living population, not just the least cemetaries. After all, within a week, most living humans will be zombified. If you could get to the river, access a boat, and drift downstream (all longshots, I realize, but perhaps you could begin building a raft now, before the Sickness), you could quickly reach the Tennessee River Gorge, and there are some very nice houses at the west end, with a population density I would imagine is much lower than that of Lookout. The ammo is still a selling point for Lookout but, again, you could begin stocking up now.

Just wanted to pursue another option for a minute. I will now return to the world of people who are not batshit crazy.

it also occurs to me that since there are so many civil war veterans buried in the fecund fields you could be dealing with some pretty wily zombies w/ an intimate knowledge of warfare and whatnot - and they'll all have the patented blue/grey skin that zombies tend to have so you can't really count on them turning on each other - so if it were me in that situation and i was being hunted by the undead i would probably choose the covenant college chapel as my hiding spot - because seriously...no one is going to go in there unless they absolutely have to.

CAN I JUST SAY..."Plans to test the technique on humans should be realised within a year, according to the Safar Centre. " i'd love a little saline transfusion quick-freeze every once in a while.

I will have to ponder and consult with my fellow brethren on how to properly deal with them. I would recommend that you use maneuver warfare which should give you a huge advantage over the Civil War tactics of your zombies. You could effectually eliminate a very numerical force using long range marksmanship with the Lee-Enfield and "skirmishers" type fighting based on small unit leadership and initiative based decisions(IBD). I would also recommend the purchase of a DPMS M4 style AR15. Extremely light, cheap, easy to use and maintain and legal now that BJ Bill's gun ban is over. Also body armor will allow you to lessen your casualties. Also with the miracle of modern medicine, if you can get casualties to a medical fiacility within 60-90 minutes, 90% will survive most injuries. ZZIINGG!

Bandukwala/Nathan,

I'll look into the AR15 and try to do some reading on small unit maneuvers and IBD.

The primary method in which Zombies "attack" and inflict wounds is through biting, most often on the kneck, arms, and legs. Does the military have body armor designed specifically for those areas? I'm unfamiliar with military body armor, but as best as I can recall it focuses primarily on protecting the vital organs in the center of the body, as opposed to the extremeties in the limbs.

While modern battlefield medicine is awesome with Zombie's its more or less one bit one kill. There isn't any known treatment. If you recall Dawn of the Dead, the pregnant woman who was bitten by a zombie had both herself and her unborn child become a zombie.

I have to say, I am going with physicalpants on this one!

I'm betting that Civil War zombies (with the possible exception of those in mausoleums) would probably be too decomposed to be effective. Two Civil War soldiers were exhumed in Port Gibson, MS, a few years ago because erosion threatened their grave sites, and their remains consisted of nothing more than bones surrounded by a few scraps of cloth and buttons.

Ron, I'm going to have to do some research into what the relative cut-off date in terms of "how long have they been dead" for a dead body to become a zombie. I dont' recall too many fully skeletal zombies. So there's got to be a line somewhere.

If its the case that after a certain point a dead body can-not become a Zombie, then that bodes very very well for us.

Further, I need to do some research into whether or not after the initial "Zombie Event" people who die of natural 'cause become Zombies. Basically, if we can develop secure graveyards post-the Zombie event then we can cut off a major source of new Zombies (assuming we've manage to quarantine and largely contain the Zombie problem as a whole).

William Bass would be a great resource. I think we're gonna need him to weigh in on this.