Chuck Roots
11 December 2017
www.chuckroots.com
The Ripon Bulletin
He Won’t Fight!
Recently, I wrote an article about
General Robert E. Lee, commanding officer of the Confederate Army during our American
Civil War. Lee very nearly pulled off the upset of American history by
outmaneuvering the apparently hapless Union generals called upon by President
Abraham Lincoln to carry the fight to the outnumbered Southern forces. By most
historical accounts, the Civil War should have been over in a matter of months,
not the four long years and 700 thousand deaths it extolled from a war-weary
nation.
My sister Joy, came over for
Thanksgiving last month, bringing me a couple of magazines she ran across that
she knew I would treasure. As a Civil War buff, I have accumulated over the
years a small library of books, magazines and other items pertaining to this
horrific war. The two magazines Joy acquired for me are both copies of The
Civil War Times: one dated August 1968, and the other August 1962. A section in
the 1962 edition focused on the centennial edition of the Battle of Antietam.
The summer months of 1862 are considered the high summer of the Confederacy.
Never again would the cause of the South and her fight for independence come as
close to success as it did under the leadership of Lee, Stonewall Jackson, Jeb
Stuart, and other notable Southern generals.
Historians argue over the ineptness
of Union (or Northern) military leaders. In my research, I have found two primary
reasons for the Union army failing repeatedly to secure major victories in the
early stages of the war. First, the Northern forces were not defending their
homeland against an aggressor the same way the Southern forces were. This is
one of the reasons the war was referred to by southerners as the “War of
Northern Aggression.”
Second, the Union general selected
to head the Army of the Potomac (later to be called the Union army) was not
willing to fight. General George B. McClellan, like his counterpart of the
Confederate army, General Robert E. Lee, was second in his class at West Point.
And like Lee, McClellan was a military engineer. He never commanded troops in
the field against an enemy until the Civil War. And this was his undoing.
McClellan, referred to as “Little
Mac”, attended West Point from 1842-46. Shortly after graduation he was
assigned to fight in the Mexican-American War. It was during this time that he
contracted what he called his, “Mexican disease,” better known to us today as,
“Montezuma’s Revenge.”
McClellan was viewed as an
up-and-comer as a military officer, serving successfully in every command
during his eleven years of service. During his time in the army, he used his fluency
in French to publish a manual on bayonet tactics that he had translated from
the original French. He also wrote a manual on cavalry tactics based upon
Russian cavalry regulations. The Army also adopted McClellan’s design for a
cavalry saddle, known as the McClellan Saddle. It became standard issue for as
long as the Army had a cavalry, and is still used today in ceremonial events.
Little Mac resigned his commission from
the Army in 1857. He was married to Mary Ellen Marcy in New York City in 1860.
During this time, he was the chief engineer and vice president of the Illinois
Central Railroad, and then president of the Ohio and Mississippi Railroad.
Civilian life simply did not suit him.
He continued to study battlefield tactics which bolstered his adeptness at
training and preparing soldiers for combat when he rejoined the Army. Prior to
the outbreak of the Civil War, McClellan decided to try his hand at politics.
He supported the Democrat Party’s presidential candidate, Stephen A. Douglas in
the 1860 election. Later, he would run for president as a Democrat in 1864, in
hopes of defeating President Lincoln. He re-entered the Army in the spring of
1861.
One of McClellan’s shortcomings was
his impatience and impertinence toward those who were his superiors. He was
referred to in the press as a “Young Napoleon.” He valued only career military
men, showing utter disdain for volunteers. He often refused to obey political
and military leaders, a tactic that would put him at odds with President
Lincoln early in the war. He snubbed and insulted Lincoln, referring to him as
“nothing more than a well-meaning baboon.”
Oddly enough, McClellan did not come
from the abolitionist point of view, as did many of his fellow officers in the
Union Army. He believed the South should be allowed to practice slavery if that
was their choice. He was vehemently opposed to federal interference in slavery.
But he was just as opposed to states seceding from the Union.
But his unwillingness to commit
troops in the field, always believing that Lee had superior numbers, caused him
to be viewed as an inept battlefield commander. Sadly, he spent the remainder
of his life attempting to rewrite his legacy. He died in 1885.
Lincoln’s frustration with McClellan
could be summed up in this phrase: “He won’t fight!” General Ulysses S. Grant referred
to Little Mac as “one of the great enigmas of the war.”
General George B. McClellan simply did
not have the heart of a warrior. And that cost the lives of countless men, both
for the North and the South.
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