http://www.brettschulte.net/ACWBooks/unithistmisc.htm
Army of the Potomac: McClellan Takes Command, September 1861-February
1862. Russel H. Beatie. Cambridge, MA: Da Capo Press (October 20,
2004). 636 pp. 21 maps.
This is a review and summary of Russel H. Beatie's book Army of the
Potomac: McClellan Takes Command, September 1861-February 1862. This
is the second volume in Beatie's potentially monumental multi-volume
effort attempting to cover the command decisions in the higher levels
of the Union's most famous Army. Volume 2 picks up where Volume 1
left off. George B. McClellan had been appointed to command the Army
of the Potomac after McDowell's less than stellar showing at First
Bull Run. Throughout this book, Beatie attempts to explain how
McClellan, his subordinates, the politicians, and everyone else
involved created an Army out of the ashes of the Manassas defeat.
Beatie argues that there was an unfair prejudice against West Pointers
and that political appointees many times were in over their heads at
various levels of command. He also details the events that led to
McClellan outmaneuvering the venerable Gen. Scott into a not-so-early
retirement and the interference of politicians in the day-to-day
workings of the Army of the Potomac, especially with regards to the
notorious Committee on the Conduct of the War, led by Radical
Republican Benjamin Wade, and late in the book when Edwin Stanton
became the Secretary of War, and McClellan's immediate enemy. But to
me, the most important contribution Beatie makes is his painstaking
recreation of the relationship between McClellan as General-in-Chief
and Lincoln as Commander-In-Chief. Beatie seems to be more tolerant
of McClellan's peculiarities and less impressed with Lincoln's
understanding of military affairs than the average writer. I do not
mind this at all because Beatie has done such an enormous amount of
research and has dug into so many manuscripts that we may be seeing
for the first time a fair and unbiased opinion on a very controversial
time in the Army's history.
The book starts out in September of 1861, and McClellan had been in
command of the AotP for only about a month. But he had already begun
to improve discipline, morale, and most importantly, the defenses of
Washington. In late September he advanced to Munson's Hill, several
miles southwest of Alexandria, Virginia and the Capital. This allowed
the Union Army to create an extended line of defense farther away from
the Potomac River, and it finally freed the North of the embarrassment
of having forward pickets of the Rebel Army within just a few miles of
the District of Columbia. At the outset, McClellan had many friends
within the government, but that soon changed for several reasons.
First, Little Mac was pretty naïve when it came to high level
politics, and he treated many potential future friends rudely, slowly
but surely driving them into the opposing camp. Secondly, McClellan
and many of his highest ranking subordinates and friends were
anti-abolitionist, anti-hard war, and staunch Democrats. This did not
sit well with the Radical Republicans and the Abolitionists, who soon
suspected the General of Southern and slaveholding sympathies.
Thirdly, McClellan (and through him Brig. General Charles P. Stone)
suffered a humiliating defeat at Ball's Bluff. This led to the
creation of the Committee on the Conduct of the War. These Radical
Senators led by Benjamin Wade wanted a scapegoat for the death of
their compatriot Edward Baker, who in reality was the main person
responsible for Ball's Bluff. Lastly, as the months ticked on,
McClellan refused to move forward, and the government, the newspapers,
and the general public clamored for an advance. All of these things
led to the slow fall of McClellan's standing in many eyes.
In the middle section of the book, Beatie discusses the various
"Pools" from which the General Officers of the Army of the Potomac
came. He explains that many men came from more than one pool. The
four pools he divides candidates into include the Bull Run Pool, the
West Point & Regular Officer Pool, the Foreigner & Politician Pool,
and the Gubernatorial Pool. The Bull Run Pool included such men as
Erasmus Keyes, William T. Sherman, and Samuel Heintzelman. They had
commanded large numbers of troops in combat at First Bull Run and had
come out of the experience invariably wiser, if not always with
enhanced reputations. The West Point & Regular Officer Pool was a
large pool and consisted, naturally enough, of men who had graduated
from the Military Academy at West Point and/or had served in the
Regular pre-war Army as officers and enlisted men. This group
included quite a few members of the Bull Run Pool, and contained
generally Democrats with more liberal views on how to prosecute the
war. Many politicians became suspicious of the West Point men and
thought they harbored treasonous men in their midst (for no good
reason, argues Beatie). The third pool consisted of foreigners and
pre-war politicians. Men such as Franz Sigel were very useful to the
Lincoln administration since they represented ethnic minorities
(German immigrants in Sigel's case) and could be counted on to raise
the patriotic fervor amongst their own countrymen. This class also
included men such as John "Black Jack" Logan, a politician from
southern Illinois. The quality of the men from this pool was less
than desirable in many cases, and would lead to disastrous results in
places. One need look no farther than Baker and Ball's Bluff for the
perfect example. Lincoln decided that the benefits outweighed the
risks at this early stage in the war, and many men received a spot due
to political or ethnic considerations. The last group was the
Gubernatorial Pool. Early in the war, the Governors of the individual
states raised regiments for the Union cause and appointed Generals to
lead them. This group was also of mixed quality, though some men such
as Philip Kearney became or already were excellent soldiers.
The next part of the book deals mainly with McClellan's struggles
against real and perceived enemies. General Winfield Scott was
General-In-Chief, and McClellan succeeded in getting the old soldier
to finally step down and give him the title. Beatie details the
events, and he doesn't paint McClellan's actions in an overly positive
light. Still, Beatie seems to believe that this was a necessary step
in order to further the development of the AotP. At this stage,
McClellan had started to build up enemies, for the reasons listed in
my introduction above. His seemingly overcautious nature, his
Democratic leanings and the same leanings by many of his officers, and
the disaster at Ball's Bluff had caused the Radical Republicans to
form the Committee on the Conduct of the War. Beatie pulls no punches
in his scathing remarks on this group. As a lawyer, Beatie knows the
judicial system in this country and is eminently qualified to remark
on the proceedings of Wade's Committee. He points out the obvious
fact that the Radical Republicans used the Committee as a group of
witch hunters, and they tried to get at McClellan through his
subordinates. First to fall (and the only one in this particular
volume, there will be others later, including Little Mac himself) was
Charles P. Stone for his role in the affair at Ball's Bluff. While
Beatie asserts that McClellan could have handled the situation better,
especially with regards to McCall's Division on Stone's left at
Dranesville, he takes great pains to point out that Stone was
essentially innocent of any charges against him and mentions that
Stone was never really directly accused of anything, and that he was
held as a prisoner illegally.
As 1861 ended, McClellan fell ill and Lincoln decided to try to
"borrow" (his phrase) the AotP for awhile. Lincoln read up on
strategy and tactics in the Library of Congress, and he conferred with
his Cabinet and Generals McDowell and Franklin. McDowell, anxious to
atone for his disaster at Bull Run, suggested a direct movement
forward to attack the Rebels near Manassas a second time. Franklin,
in whom McClellan had confided his plans, mentioned that the Young
Napoleon wanted to try taking his Army by ship to a point on
Virginia's coast near Richmond, and thus force the Confederates to
abandon their forward lines and come to the defense of their Capital.
In this way, he could avoid unnecessary bloodshed. McClellan
recovered and angrily took control again. Relations between Lincoln
and McClellan were never the same after that point, says Beatie. He
talked about the "new" Lincoln, more apt to interfere in military
matters, and the "new" McClellan, who grew more and more suspicious of
the politicians in his midst. This combination, along with the
appointment of Edwin Stanton as the new Secretary of War, boded ill as
McClellan finally decided on the amphibious attack plan as February
drew to a close.
Beatie is writing an excellent history of the Army of the Potomac so
far, IMHO. I enjoy his writing style, and while it admittedly does
not always flow as smoothly as some of the better story tellers like
Sears, Catton, and Foote, he keeps me interested and informed, the two
key points I have come to demand in any book I read on the Civil War.
I was VERY impressed with Beatie's bibliography in his first volume,
and this book brings more of the same. I would expect no less of a
man who has literally spent decades compiling evidence and sources for
his life's culminating masterwork. His knowledge and use of the many
manuscripts and diaries of the principal players involved continues to
amaze me. There are 21 maps in the book. They are more than adequate
for the topic of the book. Beatie is not rehashing the battles of
this Army. Rather, he is discussing the development and the decisions
of the upper level commanders (Brigade level and above) of the Army of
the Potomac. As such, the maps are more than sufficient to give the
reader a good idea of why certain decisions were made and where
important geographic features are in relation to one another. I know
of no better book on this subject, and from the looks of things, I
believe that this series will become the standard by which all others
are judged.
In conclusion, I believe Beatie accomplishes quite well what he set
out to do in this volume. Namely, he wants to detail the rise of
McClellan, his important role in the shaping of the Union's most
important Army and guardian of the Capital, and the relationships
among McClellan, his subordinates, and the politicians sustaining
them. He writes in what some might consider a sometimes awkward
style, changing indirect discourse to direct discourse, but these
slight shortcomings are more than made up for throughout the course of
the book by the author's vast knowledge of his subject. Anyone
remotely interested in the strategic aspects of the Civil War, of the
workings of Civil War Armies, and especially of the Army of the
Potomac in particular should own this book. I am eagerly looking
forward to volume 3.
-Brett Schulte
HPS Playtester
ACW Campaign Games Design Center:
http://www.brettschulte.net/ACWCGDC/index.html
My Civil War Book Collection:
http://www.brettschulte.net/ACWBooks/
ACWGC 
ACWGC Memorial
CSA HQ
VMI
Join CSA
Union HQ
Join Union 
Login
FAQ
Search
Members
