What army won the Battle of the Wilderness?

Answer 1

Neither the Union army nor the Confederate army can really be considered to have "won". The Union Army - consisting of the IX Corps under the command of General Ulysses Grant and the Army of the Potomac under the command of General George Meade - were able to withdraw in an orderly manner and then swing Southeast to continue the campaign elsewhere. The Confederate Army of Northern Virginia under the command of General Robert E. Lee stopped Grant's initial thrust and inflicted around 17,000 casualties on the Union army against around 10,000 of his own forces.

In actual effect it was a tactical Confederate victory, but a strategic victory for the Union army since the casualties of the Confederate army, while much less in number than the Union losses, still were a larger percentage of the Confederate forces than the Union losses and Grant's forces were able to withdraw and continue their offensive elsewhere. It was easier for Grant to replenish his losses than it was for Lee so his heavy losses had less impact than those suffered by Lee. It was Grant's intention from the beginning to grind down Lee's forces by virtue of superior numbers (a war-of-attrition strategy) and this battle was one of the first conducted under that strategy.