McClellan was a political threat to Lincoln. This is likely why he got less troops. Lincoln trusted grant.

Many good points here. Thanks for these ideas!

You are closer to the truth, historical perception was managed by the entities who managed the war and won in the end.

Nitro; yours is the first LONG comment that I have read to the end. Most of the time it’s “TL;DR”! Thanks.

​​@rickstalentedtongue910 Not all the time, the prevalence of the Lost Cause Myth by the South is proven otherwise, that history is written by the loudest of writers. McClellan was unfortunately both disliked by the losers and the victors, dragging his reputation down the mud than most.

Also hammers the need for high quality intel.

But did McClellan *really* believe he was outnumbered? Could he have been so delusional that he truly believed the Confederacy was capable of putting 200,000 men in the field?

Pinkerton was a reb plant or at least his actions helped them.

@@paulnicholson1906 The Founder of the Pinkerton's, Allan Pinkerton, was an abolitionist. That crosses out any theory that the Pinkertons were rebel spies.

Thank you!

Thanks! That means a lot to me.

So he would have been an excellent quartermaster general or even secretary of war. But should not have been let into the field.

I also like the theory from the video that he didn't like Lincoln riding his ass, and let Lee escape to show that he could win, but he would do it on his own terms. A sort of insubordination.

@@shorewall He really detested Lincoln. Thought Lincoln was his Social Inferior, and a Country Bumkin. McClellan was a thorough Snob. They certainly had a difficult relationship.

Lee was also a trained engineer (Mexican-American War). Lee could also be described as patrician. So, I think the focus is on the personality/character approach. McClellan just could not “close the deal.” It seems he was too enthralled by the maneuver rather than the engagement. Form over function.

Marsha Bonforte, please name one of McClellan's defensive-minded battles that he lost because of his "defensive-minded nature. How about Gaines Mill?

Great analysis. Thank you.

Grant had the luxury of having all the chips already. He could afford losses that McClellan couldn't. The confederate army was every bit the equal of the US army when McClellan's tenure started, so he had to play smart and use maneuver to ensure that he only engaged on the best possible terms for himself. He wasn't just risking some extra lives like Grant was when he attacked recklessly. He was risking the Union itself. You're criticizing McClellan for not going all like Grant. McClellan had two pair. Grant had a full house. The idea that "McClellan could have 360 noscoped Lee and ended the war in a single blow if he had only just tried harder but we're totally gonna win right away now that he's gone" is political propaganda to keep congress and the populace from turning against the war effort (justified IMO but should be discarded now that its purpose has been served). In reality, essentially every major battle in the East that McClellan wasn't involved in was a complete disaster all the way up until Gettysburg. McClellan's decisive shutdown of the invasion of Maryland and his close but unsuccessful approach to and clean disengagement from the enemy capital were the brightest points of the first half of the war in the east against a very dark backdrop.

Holy hell, that was very well said.

@@jtofgc you’re ignoring what Grant was doing in 1862 while McClellan was approaching Richmond and then cleanly disengaging, and that he was doing it with far less resources than what McClellan had. If Grant had approached Fort Donelson and then cleanly disengaged when the fighting got hot, the war would have gone very differently, and we wouldn’t have Grant on the fifty dollar bill. And yes, Grant got caught unaware at Shiloh and almost got destroyed, but he counter attacked the next day. If he had cleanly disengaged after the first day and declared a great victory and then blamed Lincoln for not giving him enough troops, he would have been cashiered and we’d scorn him to this day. If Grant could attack on the second day at Shiloh, why couldn’t McClellan attack the second day at Antietam? McClellan refused to budge after Antietam in part because his men’s uniforms were worn out. Consider this anecdote from the west: at Wilson’s Creek, the First Iowa was wearing reverse aprons made out of flour sacks. Why reverse aprons? Because the seats of their trousers were worn through and they needed something to cover their bare butts. They still fought bravely and well against heavy odds. McClellan and Grant were fundamentally different men. One was a modest yet bold, optimistic problem solver who kept his cool and fought through difficult situations. The other was grandiose yet nervous, whiny, and constantly blaming everyone else for his challenges.

MONDAY MORNING QUARTERBACK, EASY TO DO, I AM GUILTY OF IT TOO. QUESTION ABOUT McCLELLAN. TAKES A LOT MORE THAN A CASUAL GLANCE BY AN UNTRAINED EYE TO DETERMINE THOSE ANSWERS. DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A WORKING KNOWLEDGE AND A PHD. I AM SURE WEST POINT HAS GONE THROUGH THIS AND COME UP WITH SOLID ANSWERS. I DO NOT KNOW YOU DO NOT EITHER

It's funny that you think a green, exhausted army that has just been completely rebuilt from near the ground up would be capable of exploiting such gains by the end of that battle.

@@Gustav_Kuriga Well, McClellan had two whole corps in reserve which were commanded by Fitz John Porter and William B. Franklin who with Hooker were the best of the Army of the Potomac's corps commanders. If McClellan had committed his forces more aggressively, theirs especially, things may have been different.

Much appreciated!

Woefully under equipped compared to who? They were fighting the guys who served as an illustration for the concept of 'under equipped'.

If they relied on standardized exams, then he would have an A+ average.

@@anathardayaldar Indeed, as theoretically, everything the general planned and strategized works brilliantly on paper. But life, war and invention dont play out on paper.

Was it recognized as a handicap in Caesar?

@@jtofgc are you comparing McClellan to Ceasar?

@@jtofgc firstly Caesar didn‘t have the advantage of a military academy secondly Caesar was arguably a pretty bold commander who often took risks, _and_ he was also someone who risked his own life repeatedly on the frontline, by going to crucial points in the line that had to be held and inspiring the men by getting into line with them and helping them to push (Roman tactics involved a lot of shield pushing); from the back of the line, to be sure, but it was still brave and recognized as such. Yes Caesar could be cautious when it was necessary but he also moved audaciously when he spotted an advantage; very different to Mac.

How would the war have been lost without McClellan?

@@mjfleming319 McClellan was essentail in organizing a basically non existent Federal army into not just a functioning force, but a rock of defense for the NE. Couple that with his mastery of logistics, that allowed for the rapid evolution of the Federal forces, you end up with an once in a lifetime general.

@@thecocktailian2091 nonsense. There were plenty of other capable or even brilliant organizers. Grant and Thomas come quickly to mind, and both of them knew how to fight battles as well. If Thomas had been from New York or Massachusetts instead of Virginia, the war would have been over in 1862.

@@mjfleming319 there were 18k troops in the Non army poor to the civil war, most of them being in the west. Grant served as QM early in his career, but never did he display the acumen of MclLellen. I dont know much of General Henry Thomas, other than the basics, so as such I can speak to his logistical abilities. You suggest just plugging any old officer to form an army and defense in a flash I find that highly suspect.

@@thecocktailian2091 I don’t suggest any such thing. I’m suggesting you do some deeper digging into Grant and Thomas. Of course neither of them was given as much responsibility - Grant because he was known as a drunk who washed out, Thomas because he was a Virginian - but they both showed every bit as much organizational capacity as McClellan. With far fewer resources, they trained and disciplined regiments, then brigades, then armies. The difference between them and McClellan is that before McClellan had made a single move, Grant had seized Paducah, blooded his troops at Belmont, and the won stunning victories at Forts Henry and Donnelson. Thomas utterly crushed a Confederate army at Mill Springs already in 1861, unhinging the whole Confederate defensive line in Kentucky. This means that, with less resources, Grant and Thomas both trained and organized armies AND successfully won both tactical and strategic victories well before McClellan moved an inch...and they did it all without making a nuisance of themselves to the government. Grant’s speed and success was part of what made Lincoln so impatient with McClellan. Mac was telling Lincoln all the treasons he couldn’t do this or that, while Grant was proving him wrong on almost a daily basis.

I wonder when Lee said that, because if it was after the war then it was sour grapes or illustrating Booby was more of a fool than we generally regard him to be. In the field; it is obvious the general that gave him the most trouble; the one that took his army; and ultimately his country from him; Grant.

@@philliplarose8570 I have never looked at Robert E. Lee as a fool, but I have also dismissed any notions of him being a genius. His greatest gift, I think, was in knowing his opposite number in command better than that general knew himself. This skill came from someone who had high social standing, but with an asterisk: Lee's father, Revolutionary hero "Lighthorse Harry" Lee, had squandered the majority of the family's money before Robert was out of short pants. The Lees lived in a sort of aristocratic poverty. Lee's appointment to West Point brought him the opportunity to be a net contributor to the family's accounts. He watched others keenly, and developed a level of discernment that would have made him an outstanding psychoanalyst in our current time. As a general he was more limited than his admirers suppose. He viewed everything through a narrow prism. The South was to him Virginia. He knew that not to be true in the literal sense, but to him it was the heart and soul of the South, and it was the heart and soul in him. That said, the alleged quote occurred in 1869, I think, well after the Civil War. Lee was President of Washington College in Lexington, Virginia. His nephew Fitzhugh Lee was visiting, and he asked the question: which Union commander worried him the most? Lee answered, "It was always McClellan." Lee knew Grant and McClellan. He probably thought he could predict Grant. Grant was hardly infallible. He always regretted the charges he ordered on May 22, 1863, at Vicksburg, and at Cold Harbor, Virginia. They were pointless assaults on impregnable positions. Grant's overland campaign was as simple as his Vicksburg plan was complex. In Virginia, Lee forced Grant into a series of battles against prepared positions. These revived accusations of Grant as a drunken butcher, something he had dealt with in the aftermath of Shiloh. Grant followed Lee, dogging him down the railroad line toward Richmond. Grant and Lee knew one thing; Grant would take more casualties, but Lee could not replace his smaller losses as easily as Grant could replace his much higher losses. The campaign had an inevitability about it. Lee could bleed Grant, but he couldn't stop him. There was a set pattern to events. It did not inspire imagination so much as require attention to detail. When Grant took on Lee's Army of Northern Virginia, it was a rather battered formation. It was replacing combat losses with boys and old men. Coastal garrisons were stripped to minimum numbers to send Marse Robert soldiers. Raw militia that had spent the was watching interior areas with scarcely a hostile shot fired found themselves sent to Lee to defend Richmond. In June of 1862 it was very different. The Army of Northern Virginia, which received that name on the first day of Lee's command, was 85,000 strong. It had fought one major battle and a handful of smaller ones, and had pretty much won them all. McClellan had been sparring with the Army of the Peninsula, a small formation under General "Prince John" Magruder, who slowed the Army of the Potomac to a crawl, which seemed fine with General McClellan, its commander. Still, though the progress was slow and tedious, the largest army ever seen in North America to that time, some 120,000 men, had pushed the Southern force back to the vicinity of Richmond, where the Army of the Peninsula folded into the Army under Johnston. When the union forces pressed into Boatswain's Swamp, the Rebels fell back. Joseph E. Johnston, a patient engineer like McClellan, was wounded. Lee took command the next day. The forward elements of McClellan's army were 4 miles from downtown Richmond. Soldiers could clearly hear the church bells calling the Southern capital to worship. And that is why I think Lee always remembered McClellan as his greatest challenge: he took over command of the Confederacy's largest army with its back against the wall. His previous command had been a small one in western Virginia that had not gone very well. Here was a mammoth army, much farther from flank to flank than its center was from the Southern Capitol building. Desperate times call for desperate measures. Lee hastened to cut off a tentative advance by the Union III Corps at Oak Grove. McClellan's force still loomed near Richmond. Lee had to think of something fast. He noted the Union II Corps was isolated from the rest of the Yankee army by a badly flooded Chickahominy River. Hastily he laid out a plan for battle. He left a bare few regiments facing the majority of McClellan's force. The rest of the Army of Northern Virginia he hurled at the Union II Corps. The II Corps fought off the numerically superior enemy all day long as reinforcements shuttled across the Chickahominy one person at a time. And so went the Seven Days. McClellan got the II Corps back to his side of the river and began moving south, though Richmond was to the west. Lee kept attacking, and he kept losing. He lost, tactically speaking, the majority of the battles of the Seven Days. He could have known little sleep. Constantly in the saddle, goading his troops forward in a way no one had done before, another attack, another Union riposte. Finally the Yankees were ensconced on the James River some 25 miles from Richmond. Lee made one last attack at Malvern Hill and got a lot of Rebels killed for nothing. Lee had to have strained himself to the last nerve and the last brain cell. He would lose and then have another bash. He took more casualties. In some ways he was acting out Grant's part in the Overland campaign in miniature. Forcing McClellan back away from the Capital as Grant would push toward it in 1864. Only in 1862 the armies were larger and much greener. Commanders did not know their jobs as thoroughly. Orders were more likely to be poorly worded of misconstrued by subordinates. No American generals had ever led such large forces. Lee knew McClellan from their time in the old Army, especially in Mexico. McClellan was actually subordinated to Lee once or twice. People spoke of Lee as the next Winfield Scott. They spoke of McClellan as the next Robert E. Lee. Lee knew he had ability. And McClellan was not always the "Virginia Creeper," as General Keyes called him. Left with the rump of his army on the James, Lincoln gave half of his troops to General Pope for the disastrous Second Bull Run Campaign. In the aftermath of the debacle, Lincoln turned to McClellan in desperation. McClellan moved with amazing speed , getting his remaining troops up to Washington and into pursuit of Lee, who had decided on an invasion of the North. Lee was surprised by McClellan's sudden appearance nearby. And that is why McClellan worried Lee more than even Grant. In 1862 there were still a lot of uncertainties as to how the other side would fight. Lee knew McClellan could and sometimes would surprise him in a way that might turn disastrous. Lee survived the Battle of Antietam, but only just. I believe he was very glad to see McClellan exit the scene. Sorry for the length and rambling nature of this but I was trying to characterize why McClellan was more of a conundrum to Lee than Grant. Hope this helps.

@@marksnyder8022 Well put sir; you back your point with facts and conviction. I would still posit that Lee's complimentary attitude towards McClellan was based on their past history and a very human feeling of being kind in victory and bitter in defeat. Much like the US talking up the genius of many German generals; I think Lee could be magnanimous towards a general he had beaten; while hesitant to admit that Grant's strategy effectively canceled out any tactics Lee could bring to bear. Lee always would have needed to be ground down; he understood what Grant was doing; yet he still fought, and his men (and Grant's) died for it. I think the civil war needed to be bought with blood and broken will; the rancor involved outpaced the "gentlemanly" war of previous generations; it was brother vs brother. I really appreciate the work into your post, and see your passion in the subject, but I think the United State would be a much poorer country should have McClellan won. Could he; like Grant, Washington, Eisenhower and other lesser Generals; have road his Military victory to the presidency? His apologist attitudes echo the damage later done by Woodrow Wilson. Might McClellan have won the war earlier and with less bloodshed; perhaps; but I think a McClellan victory in 1863 would have more closely resembled WW1, with the South as Weimar Germany. But I also digress; I do agree with Lee, for different reasons. Grant is easier to understand from my viewpoint. McClellan is more a conundrum. Thank you for sharing; you haven't changed my emotional opinion of McClellan; but you have made me try to think how I would describe him; whereas before I thought I knew. In that, I hope you will take heart. I'm still not sure he deserves such an ardent defender; but you have made your point well. Thank you again.

@@philliplarose8570 Well, I thank you for the compliment. I do not doubt that a McClelln victory would have been less devastating, for the South would have been less devastated. My aim is to point out that McClellan seldom made a mistake on the battlefield, but was rather misunderstanding in how Washington politics worked. His hesitation at times was understandable. He acted swiftly and smartly when necessary.

@@philliplarose8570 I think Lee always thought of Grant as only having won because of overwhelming numbers. Just look at the differences between Lee's battles against McClellan and Lee's battles against Grant. McClellan only fought two major battles against Lee, the Seven Days battles and Antietam. The Seven Days battles were a virtual disaster for Lee. Lack of coordination in his army combined with extremely well positioned defenses by McClellan made the Seven Days probably the worst battle that Lee fought during the civil war. Just look at the casualty ratios, 2100 killed and 8000 wounded for the Union, 3200 killed and 15,700 wounded for the Confederacy. What Lee did during the Seven Days battles is exactly what Grant is often accused of. Slaughtering his troops. Then you have Antietam, where McClellan rapidly (rapidly for McClellan) attacks Lee while Lee's forces are divided and vulnerable. This is Lee's greatest fear, and McClellan not only pulls it off, he pulls it off at the worst possible time for Lee, when the parts of his army are furthest apart and some are engaged in a battle. Then he attacks Lee at Sharpsburg and for 12 hours Lee is on the verge of having his lines broken and overrun and his army destroyed, something which has not happened before and will not happen again until 1865. So, from Lee's perspective, McClellan was an opponent that he was never able to exploit an opening or weakness to flank and maul his army, McClellan was was the only army commander that gave Lee such a mauling as to seriously reverse the usual Union-Confederacy casualty ratio, McClellan was the only one to ever seriously threaten Lee with absolute defeat until Grant, and McClellan was the only one to ever catch Lee in a serious mistake (dividing his army prior to Antietam). In contrast, Lee's battles against Grant were of an entirely different nature. They were siege-like, where Lee defended from entrenchments and never had a major breakthrough of his lines until the end of the war. Grant never caught Lee making a major mistake. Lee's army was never under threat of immediate destruction until it had been attritioned down to the point of ineffectiveness and cornered near Appomattox. Is it any wonder then that Lee considered McClellan the general that troubled him the most?

You are right. Lincoln sabotaged McClellan at times. Intentionally? I don't think so, but the jury is still out. When you understand what happened between those two, you can realize how many people died who didn't have to.

Or the same political party. McClellan showing loyalty and friendship with Lincoln years before would've helped a lot.

Yes...but the Richmond defenses by the time Grant came along were truly formidable, and were greater in depth than during the Peninsula Campaign.

It's an interesting point, but I think is kind of irrelevant: winning the war required destroying or capturing the Confederate field armies. Richmond itself was valuable only insofar as it either was used as fixed point upon which the Confederate armies could be brought to battle or as a morale-breaking symbolic victory. But unless you believe the South would have surrendered with intact and unbeaten armies but an occupied city (one at the extreme north edge of their 'country', no less), it's hard to see how it would have mattered all that much.

@@mjxw Richmond was a logistical and industrial center for the Confederacy. Its loss would have been crippling. HOWEVER, Richmond's defenses were such that sieging it would require a substantial force not only to take the city, but to fend off attacks from Lee's army as well.

It is probably an iron law that no general that is not bold can ever act boldly

As Danton said in French fight against the first coalition, "De l'audace, encore de l'audace, et toujours de l'audace."

Of course, there's something to be said about being too bold. Lee was bold to the point of being reckless. He used up the offensive power of his army within the space of 13 months, from June '62 to July '63. After that, it was good only for defense. Look at Bristow Station as an example.

Blackjack Pershing said "I like my Generals so bold they are dangerous."

General Heintzelman actually went up in the Intrepid to scout out the Rebel positions. Don't know of any time McClellan did the same. Your comment is very spot-on!

"failure to develop his cavalry arm and instead using detectives and spies is cowardice" is such a bizarre claim.

He seemed to trust Pinkerton more than he did his own subordinates. Lowe fed into this a great deal as well, but it's believed that Lowe's interpretations of the Confederate numbers were guided by Pinkerton himself. Some have asserted that Pinkerton and Lowe were using the hypothetical numbers for a full strength regiment for each potential unit they saw, but those numbers don't add up to what was being fed to McClellan, nor does the same add up to McClellan's own personal calculations. No one, save for Little Mac himself seems to know or even understand where the numbers he was reporting facing were coming from. Especially as various dispatches he sent back during the Peninsula campaign seem to reek of him just pulling number out of no where. For instance, during one of the early battles of the Seven Days, he sent a telegram to Washington that he was being attacked by at least 3 Divisions, when in reality there were maybe 4 Brigades in total involved on both sides combined. Further, as you've pointed out, he was nowhere even near the front and a messenger had told him they were involved in a skirmish. He somehow interpreted that to mean an entire Army Corp was falling on his flank. McClellan is a tough nut to crack, he was only at the front during one of the Seven Days and that was the first one at Oak Swamp, where he was there to stop it from happening, then he decided to let it continue before leaving and then ordering it stopped again. Further to his belief that he was facing more troops than the Confederacy even had in the field in all theaters, he seemed to believe that when Lee ultimately defeated his army he would be killed, yet he never came anywhere close to any of the action. Other General were removed from command for less than what McClellan was doing during the Peninsula, Rosecrans at Chickamauga comes to mind. He was advised by his Generals to fall back to rally his men that had retreated and get them reformed and he was accused of cowardice and relieved. Little Mac was a genius level Logistician, but he was not at all suited to field command, or really any command at all. He may even have been suffering from some form of Bi-polarism or Manic Depression.

@@Fitch93 great comment, thank you!

@@dsmonington that’s not my claim. I admit it is a slightly garbled paragraph, but my claim is that his chronic and unhinged overinflation of enemy strength smacks of cowardice. His failure to develop competent intelligence services is a separate claim and may or may not be related (did he subconsciously WANT to be fed outlandish information?) but is a gross failure in any case.

Thank you!

Thank you for the nice comments. I am also interested in the details of McClellan's decisions during the Peninsular campaign. I have not yet had a chance to go through the primary documents, but I will in the future. From what I understand before reading primary sources is this: 1) McClellan believes he is outnumbered. From our perspective, this seems paranoid. From his perspective, Pinkerton detectives are giving him big numbers of rebel forces. Also, I think he is aware that he is the invader. He is deep in enemy territory, and the populace is against him. 2) Halleck recalls him. Halleck wants him near the capital. 3) Most curiously, McClellan beats Lee multiple times, but then withdraws backward. He is the only Union general until Meade that can stand his ground to Lee. I am--more and more--liking McClellan to Lord Howe in the American Revolution. Howe, if he chose to, could walk out of Philadelphia and thrash Washington. But for some reason, he decides not to. If McClellan wanted to, he could have probably held his ground against Lee, and slowly advanced on to Richmond as the rebel lines thinned. McClellan's withdraw following a victory could also be the result of his desire to refit his army after a battle, even a victory. He wanted to make sure his supplies were secure, and his army was supplied. I will get to the Peninsular campaign, and I imagine the primary documents will shed some more light on this.

Yes, throwing one corp forward at a time is not a useful kind of caution. This is a work of a general who is hoping blind luck will deliver victory into his hands. Useful caution is taking an extra hour to get a couple brigades in position to protect a flank, something that failed to happen over and over. Useful caution is riding over to the left flank to assess a realistic schedule that will allow coordination with the attack on the right. Useful caution is giving your attacking commanders reserves so they can man good follow up positions and plug holes if the need arises. What McClellan actually accomplished were amateurish attacks that wasted soldiers' lives.

Remember that by the time that the Army of the Potomac reaches Antietam on the 16th of September, Lee's plan is a week old (issued on 9 September, found on 13 September). McClellan thus knows Lee's plan, but not what might have changed in the intervening week, including when the forces battling at Harper's Ferry might reach Lee. As for throwing men at the rebel defenses with complete lack of caution, I can't see how that's true at all (hell, we're talking about MCCLELLAN after all, the paragon of caution). These are not the fortress-like entrenchments of the 64-65 battles, they're lines of infantry and guns, sometimes hidden from view inside wooded areas or behind hills. The Union right wasn't sent in without any caution, it advanced to attack just like all armies of this time had to do, marching through trees, corn, or whatever other terrain was in between it and the enemy. The biggest problem with Antietam was exactly the same problem that would plague army commanders of both sides throughout the war. Failure of their subordinates. Burnside not getting across the bridge in time, a division commander getting his division caught while in marching formation, sending brigades and divisions to attack in a piecemeal fashion, etc. And as the video pointed out, McClellan was overly cautious, not committing his reserve to another attack that might fail and expose him to a counterattack without any reserves. The worst thing that could happen to the army was a repeat of either of the two Bull Run battles, where the entire army is routed, this time in Union territory.

He had to also consider that finding Lee's plan was bait, and had to be conflicted knowing his cautious nature.

Nobody captured Lee, all the commanders failed at this for years, but McClellan gets roasted for not capturing the enemy and ending the war. More Lincoln horse shit justification. Lincoln wanted casualties, and he was not getting that from McClellan.

He has days old information that is completely out of date, his troops are ALREADY moving before he has those orders. All of his troops are green, and already exhausted from marching such a long distance so quickly, let alone the fighting. And let me remind you, these are green troops.

Yes, McClellan was eyeing politics... against his commander in chief.

Thanks!

Melburn Hill was a Union victory. Lee's army was smashed by the artillery and musket fire deployed by General McClellan. You are not interested in factual history, your purpose is to attack the character of McClellan. Porter did not need McClellan's physical presence to direct the enfilading fire upon the charging Rebels. In fact, jpavvs, Mac was directing naval gunboat fire onto Melburn Hill while aboard the Galina. Read the O. R. and you will see that Mac was not enjoying himself while his boys fought for their lives. Reference Antietam, that was a Union Victory also, but the Mac haters brigade want to believe otherwise. McClellan had 30,000 newly enlisted troops with him at Antietam. Cox's IX Corps used a brigade of them during the general assault at approximately 3pm. Those poor devils endured the flank attack of AP Hill's assault on the Union left. The 30,000 untrained Union troop were issued their rifle on the march to South Mountain. They had little knowledge of the manual of arms or what to do in combat. Is it any wonder that Mac was reluctant to use them!

To be fair to Hooker, he was injured in the opening hours of the battle but not enough to sideline him so he was making decisions while suffering from a concussion. However his injuries were not such to make it look like he was not able to act as needed of a field commander causing him to make orders that did not benefit his army in battle. If he'd been knocked unconscious better calls might have been made and it could have gone much better for the union.

Knowing what we know now about concussions, our evaluation of Hooker needs to be re-examined. His decisions were still wrong, but it was certainly much more a matter of a major brain injury, not a failure of nerves or some sort of moral failing.

@@mjfleming319 Well he did fine as a corps commander under Thomas and Grant later in the war so such reevaluation is probably fair.

@@mjfleming319 That's a fair point. But--and I say this as something of a Hooker apologist; the guy doesn't get enough credit for pulling the AotP back together after Fredericksburg and the Mud March, and no one at all remembers his later service out west--his big tactical mistake and failure of nerve, as Hooker himself later admitted, was halting the army in the middle of the Wilderness instead of continuing to push east toward the the town of Fredericksburg, the Confederate army, and the open ground where the superior Union artillery and overall numbers might have made a difference. That move was what all the subordinate Union commanders wanted and expected once they'd gotten across the Potomac, and it was the scenario Lee had spent all winter worrying about. But instead, Hooker ordered the army to stop and dig in around Chancellorsville, which lead to them fighting under much less favorable conditions, and allowed Jackson to sneak around onto his flank. And Hooker made that decison to wait to be attacked in the woods instead of delivering an attack of his own before he got blasted off the porch and concussed.

@@hatuletoh you’re right on all counts. He should also be remembered for reforming the cavalry and bringing it up to par with the confederate cavalry.

Indeed.

He wasn't too cautious, that's propaganda from Republican politicians that has survived the war.

"the South could concentrate adequate forces for the overland defense even when vastly outnumbered." I mean, in theory yes, but they never actually really did this. The only time they strategically transferred troops for the purposes of achieving local superiority was Longstreet's trip out west for Chicamauga. They really didn't have the rails or roads to do it well, either

@@adamkoslin9302 chancellorsville Union 115,000 Confederate 60,000. Wilderness. Wilderness 115,000 to 65,000. Spotlevania Union 108,000 -115,000 vs 52,000- 63,000. All Confederate victories. I can give you more. Find me large battles in other theaters where the Union lost with anywhere near this kind of manpower advantage, even small manpower advantages led to victories for either army. Virginia lacked the space to maneuver and the rivers were formidable barriers. Out west the rivers gave the Union transportation routes.

@@jamesbarton1969 If you look at the number of troops actually engaged on each side, the disparities for most of the big eastern theater battles vanishes - the Union almost always had a significant reserve component that barely fired a shot, while the confederates threw just about every man they had into every battle. The first time the Union actually *used* that advantage in numbers - the Overland campaign, including both Wilderness and Spotsylvania, the end result was the Confederate capital in flames several months later, notwithstanding those "victories."

@@adamkoslin9302 Both battles were union defeats causing Grant to change his plans. Because of the short distances the Confederates were always able to bring adequate numbers to stop the Union army At Chanslorville wherever combat happened the South was able to concentrate adequate forces. The point remains the same. in Virginia the ground was more defensible and the South, although vastly outnumbered, was able to Chickamauga,uthern general not name Robert E Lee

Well put and quite true.

McClellan was within 5 miles of Richmond, and then ran away after WINNING a series of tactical engagements. At Antietam, Lee was anything but fresh...nearly 25% of his army had straggled or deserted in the last two weeks and was ripe for the crushing.

@@aaronfleming9426 That you fail to understand tactical =/= strategic is the biggest part of the issue here. You can win as many tactical battles as you want, but if you're outmaneuvered such that your supply lines are cut off or you can't attack a city without getting flanked, then that's all pointless.

@@Gustav_Kuriga You fail to understand that McClellan's passivity continually surrendered the initiative to the enemy. He was more worried about what Lee was going to do to him than about what he was going to do to Lee. And part of that was because he lived in a fantasy world where the Confederacy - with a fifth of the population and a tenth of the industrial power of the Union - had raised an army of 200,000. Compare McClellan with Grant, who said: "The art of war is simple enough. Find out where your enemy is. Get at him as soon as you can. Strike him as hard as you can, and keep moving on." Grant's philosophy led to several occasions of haste and mistakes, but in the end, one of those two generals won the war and became president; the other got sacked and got crushed in a presidential election. I think you know which was which.

To be fair Lincoln was a rather colorful person. We remember him fondly but at the time he was a dark horse candidate enacting sweeping powers

This probably never happened. None of the principals in the story ever mention it. If it did happen, then it came off different to how it was reported. By the etiquette of the day, if McClellan did exactly what Hay accused him off, it would not have been rude.

It surprises a lot of people, but after the war, Lee was asked which Union general was his greatest opponent. Without flinching he said, "McClellan."

@@JeffreytheLibrarian And at the same time, Lee also said that he had never found Grant’s superior as a general. And the word ‘best’ might not have meant ‘strongest’ or ‘greatest’.

⁠@@Ares99999. At least Grant and Sherman finished the job off. If it was left to McClellan the war could have dragged on for 20 years or more. One of the worst Generals ever. If he’d done his damn job effectively and properly the war would have been over in a few months.

I will do a series on the Peninsular Campaign in the future. It's a fascinating campaign. I always thought it was an interesting approach. I believe I have read that Halleck wanted the Army of the Potomac closer to Washington, but I need to dig into the primary documents.

@@JeffreytheLibrarian iirc, Sean Chick has even argued that Grant initially considered a repeat of the Peninsula Campaign when he took overall command, but it was Halleck who sort of pushed him into the Overland Campaign. Apparently neither he nor Meade were too keen on slowly chasing Lee across Virginia (understandable, given the outcome), but it‘s what Halleck wanted.

Not really. A great general, be it in battle or organizational is a rare breed. It takes both sorts to win an empire.

McClellan showed he could be the decisive battle leader too. But he had "fetters" on him that limited him. Look at how other commanders of that army fared. Grant benefitted from the Union government finally learning it's role in the war.

@@marksnyder8189 Grant also benefitted from understanding the strategic goals of the government and not being an obnoxious brat. And it's not really true that Lincoln put fetters on McClellan. He gave him a great deal of strategic, operational, and tactical freedom. He DID require that McClellan pursue the war aims of the government, which were to conquer the rebels and restore the Union. That required offensive action, which McClellan was extraordinarily reluctant to perform. Remember, while McClellan was making excuses, demanding more men, absurdly insisting that the Confederate army was 200,000 strong, etc....all that time, Grant (and others) were moving forward and winning battles.

I agree completely....until you get to Sherman winning the war. Sherman is by far the most over-hyped general of the war. Super quotable, but dude couldn't win a battle and his biggest claim to fame is making war on civilians in his virtually unopposed march to the sea.

McClellan had more than enough men available for Gaines Mill...just a few more brigades would have been sufficient, and left McClellan with plenty of men to crush Magruder and walk into Richmond. McClellan's problem was twofold: 1. He never came near the battlefield at Gaines Mill, as indeed would be his pattern for the whole of the Seven Days battles and Antietam. 2. He chronically and drastically overestimated the size of the Confederate army. He appears to have pulled the numbers out of thin air, because his estimates were utterly absurd. Both problems have a simple explanation: For all his bluster, McClellan was a coward.

@@aaronfleming9426 Not the point. Had he had those units Jackson would not have hit Porter in the flank and Mac would have had more confidence to do the rest. Mac's plan was compromised when those troops were withheld and rather than his supply coming from the north they had to come by sea thus mandating the change of base.

@@ramona14220 Oh but it is the point. He COULD have won. He didn't. Even when he did win (or rather, when his subordinates won while he was miles away) he kept on running. Winners find ways to win. Losers whine, complain, blame other people, make excuses, and exaggerate the difficulties. You figure out from Mac's consistent patterns of behavior which he was.

Plenty of Generals, including Lee and Grant, would have won with what forces Lil Mac had. Stop trying to excuse him.

@@Ares99999 Grant won with the strategies he did because his forces actually outnumbered Confederate forces when he took over the East. McClellans almost never did. That you think he did has more to do with the difference in how the North and South counted army size than actual men in the fight.

He never really won except in the first campaign.

I believe McClellan was for slavery... and yet, also for the north to abolish it. He was content with two Countries and the longer the war drew out, he knew the better chance of that happening. One proof was his running for President.

The way McClellan moved it would have been longer no doubt.

McClellan also never won on the battlefield. His corps commanders did pretty well while he hid miles behind the front lines, but he himself was rarely close to anything resembling combat.

I believe McClellan was for slavery... and yet, also for the north to abolish it. He was content with two Countries and the longer the war drew out, he knew the better chance of that happening. One proof was his running for President.

@@jonlanier_ "i will not fight for the abolitionists if they expect me to fight to free the slaves they would be mistaken for i will not do it" - George McClellan 1861

He was just grossly outmatched by Lee in every way, both strategically and tactically. Lee knew that McClellan feared losing his army to a trap most of all, and thus he regularly bluffed the appearance of one when there was none. This kind of shallow posturing worked so well on McClellan because he foolishly trusted the Pinkertons to do his intel gathering for him, and they invariably gave worst-case figures for Confederate numbers that matched his own worst fears (to justify their continued services, one might assume).

I find it interesting that the most widespread criticism against McClellan is his caution. Other Union generals we usually talk about their absolute incompetency, the utter disasters that their battles against Lee (and other Confederate commanders, like Jackson in the valley campaign) turned into. Even Grant's battles against Lee are often viewed extremely negatively (despite the sheer difficulty that all armies faced in assaulting a defending foe in entrenchments in the 64-65 battles). Yet all we can really say about McClellan has to do with "what might have been".

@@curlus Oh, there's plenty of incompetence to talk about with McClellan.

Not correctly stated. It could be said that Grant peaked at overall command of the Union armies, since he didn't do well as president. As for McClellan, maybe Antietam, in spite of his failure to destroy the Army of Northern Virginia. The Peter Principle says that someone is promoted to a position of incompetence. McClellan really never reached that point.

@@genes.3285 Please help. My understanding is the Peter Principle is observed when a person rises to their level of incompetence. In the case of McClellan it was as General-In-Chief of the Union Army. Lincoln ruled he was incompetent and fired him. Similarly, according to contemporary historical thought the presidency of U.S. Grant was bereft with allegations of scandal, corruption, and difficulties with Reconstruction. Grant could be said to have risen to his level of incompetence. By any account he rose to be a successful general. However, in contemporary historical judgement, he was an unsuccessful US President. Am I inaccurately applying the Peter Principle?

@@genes.3285 Grant had many enemies who wrote criticisms of his Presidency that turn out to be unwarranted. I read his reports from the Western Theater and he was a real genius and organizer.

We live under the reign of the Peter Principle. How many people in government are even slightly competent at their jobs? Everybody smoodges enough to get a leg up and Here We Are!

His troops fought their own brothers for crying out loud! They didn't balk at the order to advance or charge. they did their duty. The senior officers went to the Point at roughly the same time and then served together in the Mexican War. That didn't stop Grant, Mead or even Hooker from attacking enemy units. Rule of thumb for Armies is to shoot them before they shoot you.

@@tbolt2948 your opinion means nothing to me I have my own beliefs u must have never served

That's my impression, especially when looking into his correspondences and writings. Little Mac placed a higher priority on his public image, and keeping other rival generals on his own side from overshadowing him, it would repeatedly cost the Union. Seems to me he wasn't looking to win the war so much as portray himself as the preeminent political and military leader of the future.

@@NefariousKoel Ah yes, let's trust personal letters more than actual orders given. Always the best history analysis.