American Civil War Game Club (ACWGC)

I have been reading quite a bit on the Eastern Theater of the War this year and just finished the Antietam Campaign and have finally "finished" with McClellan's tenure as General of the Army of the Potomac. Poor McClellan. It doesn't seem to matter who the historian is they all just tear him apart - and for so many, many, reasons. About the only positive thing said about him is that he was a great organizer and kept up Army morale. Otherwise he is picked apart into a thousand pieces. It didn't help his cause that his wife saved all of his letters which he claimed, and believed, history would prove him a great general who saved the Union Army from destruction at Antietam against an enemy far larger than his own army. In every campaign he was a part of he displayed the same talent for envisioning doom behind each ridge and seeing legions where they did not exist. Other historians pointed out he never commanded an actual battle (and was never even near the fighting except for Antietam) but left it to his subordinates who were often working at cross-purposes to one another and unable to call for support to McClellan who always wanted the largest part of his army in reserve.

I just can't think of any other major General in the Civil War so universally panned as McClellan. Even Pope gets credit for some western victories, Burnside has success on the Carolina coast and later in the west, Hooker is a great commander before Chancellorsville and then goes west, McDowell... well, okay, maybe McDowell, but he was a more a victim of Lincoln pushing him forward and later of Pope's ineptness.

McClellan just had nobody to blame but himself (but goodness knows he didn't see it like that!). He was his own worst enemy and had almost anyone else commanded the AotP in early 1862 it is hard imagine the war not ending that year. But McClellan's failures helped make legends of Lee, Stuart, Jackson, and Longstreet and set in motion events which would carry the war on for three more years.

Just my two cents as always.

Butler seems to match although Mac basically white anted his way to being named General of the Armies without having much of an actual record to put on his CV at the time. In other words - he was a great general because he said that he was (so Lincoln should replace Winfield Scott and give Mac the role of general in charge of all of the armies - over and above simply the Army of the Potomac). Otoh - this is also the role that Halleck was given -and he thought that he was a genius as well (which of course was based upon the same record of having done nothing much in the actual war ....).

Hooker and Burnside helped make legends of the ANV as well - in fact, you could argue Hooker might have done more managing to lose a battle for apparently recreational purposes ... Burnside was just an idiot (imo)... as I think his record shows.

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~Retired~

I haven't found the original quote just repeats of it but supposedly Lee said that McClellan was the ablest general he fought. As an article on this quote said this isn't because he was as good as Lee just better at handling his army than the rest of them.

McClellan couldn't win a battle because he wouldn't risk all to do it. But he really never lost one either. Every battle in the Seven Days would have been considered a Union victory if he had stood his ground afterward instead of retreating. Ultimately Richmond was taken more or less using McClellan's ideas. Grant just had the trust of Lincoln that allowed him to do it while McClellan didn't (and deservingly so).

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General Kennon Whitehead
Chatham Grays
AoT II/1/3 (CSA)

Hi,

McClellan's main claim to fame, and what got him the promotion to commander of the AoP, was the campaign in West Virginia. That was really the first Union victory of the war. Of course, there wasn't a whole lot of fighting in that campaign, and in the battle at Rich Mountain the Confederates were woefully outnumbered and the battle was planned and executed by Rosecrans, or so I have read. Nevertheless, McClellan deserves credit for rapidly moving troops down into western Virginia and approving Rosecrans' plan.

I finished a book on the Fort Henry-Fort Donelson campaign recently, and noted that the thing that stood out about Grant was that he acted while everyone else involved dithered. He did get Halleck's approval and support, and I think that Grant's success won Halleck the promotion to succeed McClellan as Union Commander in Chief. Note the similarities between Halleck's career and McClellan's.

The promotion I can't figure out was Banks. Did he get a pass because his opponent was Stonewall Jackson?

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MG Mike Mihalik
Forrest's Cavalry Corps
AoWest/CSA

In Peter Cozzens book Shenandoah 1862 he presents a much different picture of Banks than the one customarily seen. He reminds us that Banks was a popular general with his men and was one of the "self-made" men of the north and a regular rags to riches success. Banks, and every other Union general, made the error of assuming Jackson had abandoned the Valley after his defeat at Kernstown. Banks was left with a single division to hold the Upper Valley while everyone headed east to join McClellan/McDowell. Once Banks realized he was being outflanked by Jackson at Front Royal he abandoned the Upper Valley and hauled his division up to Winchester where they fought an effective rear guard action before recrossing into Maryland. Banks kept his command together and managed to keep them from being captured en masse (no small feat). Banks maintained the confidence of his men and then re-entered the Valley as one of Lincoln's Armies set on capturing Jackson.

Banks's war record is hardly shining apart from his ability to extricate himself from Jackson's grasp in 1862. But, hey, if you were part of that force he led out I am sure you were happy he was leading you that week! Banks gets beaten around at Cedar Mountain, plays no appreciable part at Second Manassas, and then heads west for more misadventures.

Overall a rather lackluster General forever to be clumped with Fremont, Shields, and Patterson.

Why was he promoted?

Come on now... he was a Republican! The high command of the Union was no place for soft-war Democrats

.... like Butler (former Speaker of the House), and a war Democrat -whose position was secured by the fact that he was a ... well, a war Democrat.

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~Retired~

Something I came across about a year ago brings something into the mix on Banks. I'm afraid I can't cite the source as it was one of the several books on the Red River Campaign and was loaned to me by a friend. Shouldn't be difficult to find the info, though.

It seems that during the time leading up to Banks moving north with his army, there was a deal between him and Kirby Smith, the Confederate departmental commander, that made possible the continued shipping of cotton from the north of Louisiana down to New Orleans for sale. Both men got a cut of the money. When Banks army and the navy got as far as Alexandria there was a conflict between the army and navy as to which one had rights to the cotton stockpiled there.

It was all about the money.

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Brigadier General Robert Webb
> 3nd Brigade, Edward C. Walthall Division (2nd)
> II Corps, Army of the West
> "Gator Alley"

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