I suggest you to go with first one a. there was heavy damage only within a mile of the bomb's impact. There're no closer description than that.
Both sides were suffering many casualities and the fact that to move from trench to trench it may take months made it very difficult to make any progress in the war
Most of the American soldiers had not been paid in months and many of the promised pensions never came.
The American revoluntionary war was fought by a lot of paid militias who were being paid a good salary.
Once the war was coming to a close, these soldiers were not paid on time and many of the injured and veterans never got the pension funds they were promised.
Eventually, this was creating unease among the soldiers. There were even talks of a coup d'etat against the United States Congress. The event is also known as the Newburgh Conspiracy.
George Washington personally stepped in to ensure that the young democracy was derailed. He gave an emotional speech on the importance of the congress and eventually reached a settlement where paid some of the unsettled salaries and instead of offering half-pay pensions, settled on paying full salary for 5 years.
The north and the south where divided in many ways one of the more common known being the north was really against slavery another was actually taxes which caused the south to threaten succession and another was the election of Abraham Lincoln and so on
