American Civil War Challenge

Well, two reasons: 1) because I sympathize with Bragg and him winning is a pleasant mental image.
2) I'm not sure only Grant could have done that. Grant certainly did it and did it well, however - anything removing him brings up the problem of who fills his shoes, so you have a good point.

1) Which is where we differ. IMHO Bragg symbolizes everything wrong with the Confederate war effort as much as Burnside did that of the Union.

2) I'm pretty sure Grant was in fact the only one who could. McClellan had the job first, Halleck had it second, neither did a fraction of what the 1864 campaigns accomplished.

Either way, the longer Tennessee is held, the better. Its not quite as critical as Virginia, but its a lot closer than Davis ever acknowledged.

As for Confederate manpower, I'm not sure how many additional recruits would be available - or if a Confederate win at Shiloh that means anything (as in, they actually drive off Buell and Grant's forces and they stay driven off for a period of time long enough to change anything - a week is not enough, for instance) is possible even with a dead Grant.

Actually I disagree that it is in fact possible because only Sherman was willing to fight on that second day. Had Buell seen what happened he probably would have withdrawn the Union forces back into middle Tennessee where he'd be a Western McClellan, aided fortunately by being against the less aggressive CS generals.

Not that you directed it at me, but somewhere I'd like to discuss with you on the issue of Lee's generalship as being like Hood's - I think Hood wanted to copy Lee but was sloppier, would be the brief response here.

PMs always work for that.....
 

67th Tigers

Banned
This is like reading Johnston's defense of how Davis sabotaged him, but less irritating.

Of course, there is some grounding in fact in that argument, but then we'd have to look at the relationship between Grand Strategy and War Aims which is yet another level of argument.

Something to the effect of:
Claim all critics of McClellan are biased. Take the largest possible figures for the ANV. Take the smallest figures for the Army of the Potomac. Give endless excuses and justifications for how McClellan failed to destroy Lee's army.

Since the first part of that means that anything presented to counter the idea that - for instance - the Army of Northern Virginia had some mighty host - will be rejected, I'm not giving your post the response it otherwise deserves.

Of course everyone is biased. I'm biased. You're biased. T.B. Buell (the author of the Warrior Generals) is biased. Getting past your own bias takes a lot of effort.

However, I will simply state that is known. On 2nd September 1862 Lee committed to crossing the Potomac with ca. 75,528 officers and men with the Colours. This did not include non-whites with the army. All historians since have tried to lowball his strength, usually by ignoring his reinforcement by GW Smith's Corps from Richmond after 2nd Bull Run (Harsh, J; Sounding the Shallows, Kent State, p138-140 (2000)). When they took the next regular state eight or nine days after Lee finally broke off the campaign they were back up to this sort of numbers, after accounting for combat losses.

There is an interesting discussion at TOCWOC you should read.

Out of curiosity, have you read The Warrior Generals? Wondering because of the author's take on the Maryland Campaign.

I own it but couldn't complete it. I found it trite. I have read that section and it was inaccurate.

Fir example, I flip it open now to page 120 and read about the decision to not send in the 2 spare brigades from 6th Corps (of course, in this book these 2 brigades are simply "6th Corps"). In this book McClellan is simply a remote character at his command post in the Pry House.

In fact when word reached McClellan (ISTR he was not at the Pry House but was in fact over the Middle Bridge watching Sykes' division) of the dispute he dispatched another officer to hurry Burnside (this time Col. Thomas Key (the JAG), possibly with orders to relieve Burnside if he disobeyed again - whatever, Key finally got Burnside to move) and rode over to Sumner with the stated intent of taking personal command of the right wing and forcing them to attack. When he met Sumner in the West Woods and was so disturbed by the situation that he ordered the assault to be cancelled and in fact the bulk of his remaining reserves (2 of Morell's brigades) moved to reinforce the defence of the right wing. He was correct, Lee in fact was moving to counterattack here.

Thus I find the whole of Buell script suspect in the extreme.

I'm not entirely in agreement with it, but I find it rather absurd that both Lee's admirerers ("Lee could win with thirty five thousand men against eighty thousand or more because he was just that good!" sorts of things from everyone's favorite ANV historian) and his detractors (the author of said book) use the argument that Lee went in with an army far from the mighty host that only McClellan's prudence and genius defeated argued by McClellan's admirers if that argument is supposedly so wrong.

I suppose its possible that they'd both be so agenda-driven as to use the same documents blindly, but I wouldn't want to argue that myself.

Can I recommend the following: http://www.amazon.com/Taken-Flood-C...6310/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1297980606&sr=8-1


Maybe the change that the Confederacy needed was to have McClellan never be given command of the Army of the Potomac. That seems to be 67th's argument.

Or at least a logical conclusion from it.

No McClellan would be a major change. It would open a window of opportunity by perhaps seeing a series of failed invasions in late 1861....
 

67th Tigers

Banned
YOUR BOOK IS BAD BECAUSE IT DOESN'T SUPPORT MY VIEWS. TO PROVE MY POINT, HERE IS ANOTHER BOOK. WE KNOW THIS ONE IS RIGHT BECAUSE IT DOES SUPPORT MY VIEWS.

One is a major scholarly work written by a major academic in the field and was published by a university press. The other is a novel like narrative written by a retired sailor published by Random House. Nothing wrong with that, it is what it is. It is unfortunate that whilst Buell may say "Much of the war's history is biased and distorted" he does not do more than simply stump up his opinions, such as referencing. Not that it isn't a good read, but it is not reliable as a source.
 
And once again 67th Tigers offers not one shred of evidence to justify his claims although insulting a respected historian for the crime of not entirely agreeing with his own widely questioned version of history is a new low.
 
Of course, there is some grounding in fact in that argument, but then we'd have to look at the relationship between Grand Strategy and War Aims which is yet another level of argument.

Of course everyone is biased. I'm biased. You're biased. T.B. Buell (the author of the Warrior Generals) is biased. Getting past your own bias takes a lot of effort.

However, I will simply state that is known. On 2nd September 1862 Lee committed to crossing the Potomac with ca. 75,528 officers and men with the Colours. This did not include non-whites with the army. All historians since have tried to lowball his strength, usually by ignoring his reinforcement by GW Smith's Corps from Richmond after 2nd Bull Run (Harsh, J; Sounding the Shallows, Kent State, p138-140 (2000)). When they took the next regular state eight or nine days after Lee finally broke off the campaign they were back up to this sort of numbers, after accounting for combat losses.

Or maybe (some) historians since then have used a more accurate count than that.

There is an interesting discussion at TOCWOC you should read.
Quite interesting.

I own it but couldn't complete it. I found it trite. I have read that section and it was inaccurate.

Fir example, I flip it open now to page 120 and read about the decision to not send in the 2 spare brigades from 6th Corps (of course, in this book these 2 brigades are simply "6th Corps"). In this book McClellan is simply a remote character at his command post in the Pry House.

In fact when word reached McClellan (ISTR he was not at the Pry House but was in fact over the Middle Bridge watching Sykes' division) of the dispute he dispatched another officer to hurry Burnside (this time Col. Thomas Key (the JAG), possibly with orders to relieve Burnside if he disobeyed again - whatever, Key finally got Burnside to move) and rode over to Sumner with the stated intent of taking personal command of the right wing and forcing them to attack. When he met Sumner in the West Woods and was so disturbed by the situation that he ordered the assault to be cancelled and in fact the bulk of his remaining reserves (2 of Morell's brigades) moved to reinforce the defence of the right wing. He was correct, Lee in fact was moving to counterattack here.

Thus I find the whole of Buell script suspect in the extreme.
So he was disturbed by the fact one division had been mauled (Sedgewick's) hopelessly and the other troops there had fought hard and suffered accordingly because of attacks that went in (referring to the overall assault, if that term can be used, of the Army of the Potomac) piecemeal. No wonder he couldn't force Lee from the field, his concern is so focused on not being forced from the field himself that even an army in the shape Lee's is in can take on the Army of the Potomac.

In either case, I should have clarified - I had more his comments on Lee's army being a wreck.

Now, you could say that if he can't be trusted on what you just quoted he's wrong on that too, but they are two different things (meaning he may have better sources for one than the other).


You can recommend anything you think is well researched, but I'd like to know why the numbers here are more reliable than other numbers if you're going to use it as proof of Lee having so many men.

No McClellan would be a major change. It would open a window of opportunity by perhaps seeing a series of failed invasions in late 1861....
Or maybe the Army of the Potomac would actually get off to a vigorous start like the Army of the Tennessee.

Its not as if the Army of Northern Virginia (not sure if this was used at that particular time, but its the name we know the Virginia army under) is in great shape to face an offense.
 

67th Tigers

Banned
Or maybe (some) historians since then have used a more accurate count than that.

No. These figures derive from a proper search of the Confederate records, filtering out Lee's special pleading.

So he was disturbed by the fact one division had been mauled (Sedgewick's) hopelessly and the other troops there had fought hard and suffered accordingly because of attacks that went in (referring to the overall assault, if that term can be used, of the Army of the Potomac) piecemeal. No wonder he couldn't force Lee from the field, his concern is so focused on not being forced from the field himself that even an army in the shape Lee's is in can take on the Army of the Potomac.

Well, the attack wasn't really piecemeal. The attack was a proper en echelon attack reasonably well done apart from French's division getting lost, hitting the wrong location and then being reinforced in their mistaken attack on DH Hill. The blame there lies with Sumner, he lost 2 of his divisions when they wandered off. Remember each attack (except Sedgwicks) was successful, and was countered by Lee committing fresh reserves.

In either case, I should have clarified - I had more his comments on Lee's army being a wreck.

This is overblown special pleading by the Confederate commanders (inc. Lee) who ballsed up.

The figures, such as they are, do not show an even distribution of straggling as might be expected. Hood, Walker, DH Hill and Ewell's divisions show little straggling compared to others. What we must do is disambiguate various different straggling events:

1. How many refused to cross the Potomac? (Answer: none of significance, observations of Lee's force in Frederick are consistent with 76,000 combatants)

2. How many dropped out in the slow movements up to the 13th? (Answer: none of significance, or they'd have been swept up by the advancing Federals).

3. How many dropped out in Jackson's march to Harper's Ferry (Answer: possibly some, but they'd have been swept up by Longstreet's forces as the day of rapid marching was north of the Potomac)

4. How many dropped out in the concentration at Sharpsburg (Answer: probably a lot, these were rapid marches, conducted in friendly territory which would have allowed dropouts)

5. How many made it to Sharpsburg but hung around at the back of the field (Answer: again probably a lot).

The men Lee couldn't get into line of battle weren't scattered over western Maryland or cooling their heals at Leesburg. They were scattered around Harper's Ferry and Boteler's Ford.

You can recommend anything you think is well researched, but I'd like to know why the numbers here are more reliable than other numbers if you're going to use it as proof of Lee having so many men.

The number he had on the field are an unresolved mystery. These are the numbers he took into Maryland by Confederate returns.

Or maybe the Army of the Potomac would actually get off to a vigorous start like the Army of the Tennessee.

The Army of West Tennessee (as Grant's force was called) doesn't exist until March 1862. It spends 1861 occupying Missouri (it was formed by the mergers of the districts of SE Missouri and Cairo) and then in the Union invasion of Kentucky (indeed precipitates it when Foote's gunboats entered Paducah with troop steamers from Grant's force already en route before the Confederates invade). It doesn't really do much until February 1862, when involved in an amphibious desant, and is soundly beaten in April and then stuck in a pointless siege until 30th May (i.e. the time of Seven Pines/ Fair Oaks in Virginia). In fact the western armies are no more active than the Eastern ones, in fact less so, but this is explainable by the low priority the west got before summer 1862 (http://67thtigers.blogspot.com/2010/08/strength-of-army-in-east-and-west.html )


Its not as if the Army of Northern Virginia (not sure if this was used at that particular time, but its the name we know the Virginia army under) is in great shape to face an offense.

Yes, it was the ANV, but it was one of many armies in the east. They hadn't yet been merged into a single unified force. They held a pretty strong position and were pretty strong, but Davis' policies of dispersion robbed them of the strategic initiative.
 
Getting Bragg out of the picture one way or the other can only help the south. Your best bet would be for Davis and Johnston to get over their little pissing contest with each other.

Though I suppose having Bragg slip on his tea or something or maybe stop a bullet at Shiloh would do. Or if you really want to go overboard have him fight for the Union somehow. ;)
 
Personally I'd say an event that would lead to the US attacking the CS rather than IOTL with the Battle of Fort Sumter. I think this would probably push Kentucky further from the US that simply seems to be the aggressor who doesn't want to listen to the Souths problems, more people in Missouri would be pro-Confederacy and less pro-Union rebels within the Confederacy.

Also abroad this would be better as in Victorian England it'd be romanticized as the South merely being pushed only so far, at which point the Union simply attacked. Thus they seem like the underdogs and defenders of small-government much more while the Union is an overbearing government that's willing to use fore on its own people.

Alongside this Emperor Napoleon III of France would likely declare his support for the Confederate cause and if Britain declares war (likely after a 'Trent Affair') then France isn't going to hang about with the ability to weaken the US, create an ally in the CS and have an excuse for pouring more troops into Mexico.
 
No. These figures derive from a proper search of the Confederate records, filtering out Lee's special pleading.

So whose records are we relying on if we're not trusting the guys saying things like what Harvey Hill said about his division?

Well, the attack wasn't really piecemeal. The attack was a proper en echelon attack reasonably well done apart from French's division getting lost, hitting the wrong location and then being reinforced in their mistaken attack on DH Hill. The blame there lies with Sumner, he lost 2 of his divisions when they wandered off. Remember each attack (except Sedgwicks) was successful, and was countered by Lee committing fresh reserves.
And McClellan naturally reinforced Richardson and French and the Confederate counter was broken.

Being a guy concerned about winning rather than a guy who thinks Lee is going to attack him with those hordes of troops not present on the field.

This is overblown special pleading by the Confederate commanders (inc. Lee) who ballsed up.

The figures, such as they are, do not show an even distribution of straggling as might be expected. Hood, Walker, DH Hill and Ewell's divisions show little straggling compared to others. What we must do is disambiguate various different straggling events:

1. How many refused to cross the Potomac? (Answer: none of significance, observations of Lee's force in Frederick are consistent with 76,000 combatants)
How many of those observations are by people who are qualified to estimate those things?

2. How many dropped out in the slow movements up to the 13th? (Answer: none of significance, or they'd have been swept up by the advancing Federals).
Because the Federals were aggressively on the tail of the Rebels and would have captured anyone who lagged. Wait, are we talking about the same timeline?

3. How many dropped out in Jackson's march to Harper's Ferry (Answer: possibly some, but they'd have been swept up by Longstreet's forces as the day of rapid marching was north of the Potomac)
More believable, but not entirely convincing.

4. How many dropped out in the concentration at Sharpsburg (Answer: probably a lot, these were rapid marches, conducted in friendly territory which would have allowed dropouts)

5. How many made it to Sharpsburg but hung around at the back of the field (Answer: again probably a lot).

The men Lee couldn't get into line of battle weren't scattered over western Maryland or cooling their heals at Leesburg. They were scattered around Harper's Ferry and Boteler's Ford.

The number he had on the field are an unresolved mystery. These are the numbers he took into Maryland by Confederate returns.
Which returns?

The Army of West Tennessee (as Grant's force was called) doesn't exist until March 1862. It spends 1861 occupying Missouri (it was formed by the mergers of the districts of SE Missouri and Cairo) and then in the Union invasion of Kentucky (indeed precipitates it when Foote's gunboats entered Paducah with troop steamers from Grant's force already en route before the Confederates invade). It doesn't really do much until February 1862, when involved in an amphibious desant, and is soundly beaten in April and then stuck in a pointless siege until 30th May (i.e. the time of Seven Pines/ Fair Oaks in Virginia). In fact the western armies are no more active than the Eastern ones, in fact less so, but this is explainable by the low priority the west got before summer 1862 (http://67thtigers.blogspot.com/2010/08/strength-of-army-in-east-and-west.html )
February vs. April. How is this LESS active?

Yes, it was the ANV, but it was one of many armies in the east. They hadn't yet been merged into a single unified force. They held a pretty strong position and were pretty strong, but Davis' policies of dispersion robbed them of the strategic initiative.
Not that Johnston showed any willingness to take it at any point in the war or McClellan any willingness to test whether or not the Confederates weren't as strong as he claimed they were.

Getting Bragg out of the picture one way or the other can only help the south. Your best bet would be for Davis and Johnston to get over their little pissing contest with each other.

Though I suppose having Bragg slip on his tea or something or maybe stop a bullet at Shiloh would do. Or if you really want to go overboard have him fight for the Union somehow. ;)

Why does everyone blame Bragg for the fact the Army of Tennessee couldn't' get its act together when guys like Polk are deliberately disobeying Bragg's orders and stabbing him in the back?

I'm not saying Bragg is a great general, but anyone with subordinates like that would have a lousy record. And Kirby-Smith being an independent minded ----- didn't help things in Kentucky.
 
Why does everyone blame Bragg for the fact the Army of Tennessee couldn't' get its act together when guys like Polk are deliberately disobeying Bragg's orders and stabbing him in the back?

I'm not saying Bragg is a great general, but anyone with subordinates like that would have a lousy record. And Kirby-Smith being an independent minded ----- didn't help things in Kentucky.

You're right there. Polk did the Army as much harm as Bragg. Kirby-Smith... well he was the perfect man for the Trans-Mississippi once he finally ended up there. Though seriously, if you had someone like Lee in command of the AoT, think Polk would have been an issue more than once?

Bragg's main faults were, he was an average strategist and tactician at best, quite indecisive, and his ailments and disposition made him hard to work with at best.
 
You're right there. Polk did the Army as much harm as Bragg. Kirby-Smith... well he was the perfect man for the Trans-Mississippi once he finally ended up there. Though seriously, if you had someone like Lee in command of the AoT, think Polk would have been an issue more than once?

Yes. Polk was an issue because Davis refused to accept that he was an issue.

I'd like to think Lee's skill at getting rid of people he didn't want in his army would help here, but I'm not optimistic, particularly when under the weather.

Bragg's main faults were, he was an average strategist and tactician at best, quite indecisive, and his ailments and disposition made him hard to work with at best.
I'd say a slightly above average strategist and below average tactician. Bragg's inability to be moderate between "indecisive" and "rigid" is appalling - either he was just plain inept (Peter Principle?) or stressed past the ability of clear thought.

And stressed all the time does not speak well of him, though it may not be his fault in the sense of oh, a bad temper.

Sufficient to say, serving as one of his staff officers must have felt like doing penance. Even if he's not lashing out at you, he has Bad Boss written all over his character.
 
No. These figures derive from a proper search of the Confederate records, filtering out Lee's special pleading.

Lee started complaining to Jefferson Davis about straggling over a week before the Battle occurred. In another report to Davis before the battle, Lee believed he had lost at least 1/3rd of his force to straggling.

So it can't have been an excuse made up by Lee to excuse is loss in a battle that's hadn't occurred yet.
 
You're right there. Polk did the Army as much harm as Bragg. Kirby-Smith... well he was the perfect man for the Trans-Mississippi once he finally ended up there. Though seriously, if you had someone like Lee in command of the AoT, think Polk would have been an issue more than once?

Bragg's main faults were, he was an average strategist and tactician at best, quite indecisive, and his ailments and disposition made him hard to work with at best.

Which with an army structure depending on charisma, as opposed to bureaucracy, is the most fatal handicap of them all. The Confederate army never developed a system that could work with switching generals, which was a fatal weakness for the Confederacy as a whole. There were charismatic Union generals, too, but they were not entirely inseparable from the existence of their armies the way the Confederate generals were with theirs.
 

67th Tigers

Banned
Lee started complaining to Jefferson Davis about straggling over a week before the Battle occurred. In another report to Davis before the battle, Lee believed he had lost at least 1/3rd of his force to straggling.

So it can't have been an excuse made up by Lee to excuse is loss in a battle that's hadn't occurred yet.

Part of a long line of complaints about the missing 1/3rd of his ~160,000 men. Yes, Lee's army at the time had a paper strength of ca. 160,000 (and the paper strength of the force McClellan had was 180,000).

You're not taking the context into account. Lee had been making these complaints essentially since taking command, and they were directed at the gap between his Grand Aggregate and his actual number of combat effectives. By removing the context of it being one of a long line of letters in the same vein you are implying a different meaning.
 
I haven't read the whole thread because I couldn't get past the first page. On the issue of the Trent Affiar. I'm not a historian but I am a bullshitter, or salesmen as its commonly known.

People get other people to think the way they want all the time. If not I would never have sex...and yes I have lot. Its called marketing, politics, and many other names. I'm sure that if certain people (and yes I don't know who they would be) wanted England in the war, events could be constructed and public opinion swayed to make it happen. No ASB.
 
People get other people to think the way they want all the time. If not I would never have sex...and yes I have lot. Its called marketing, politics, and many other names. I'm sure that if certain people (and yes I don't know who they would be) wanted England in the war, events could be constructed and public opinion swayed to make it happen. No ASB.

Not really. Most of the elite didn't really want war. There were just preparations because they thought that America might start a war. And yes, a few people wanted war, but that's about it. It's overstated because it's an interesting "Hey, random historical figure x wanted to intervene in the ACW!" historical flashpoint. America starting a war is ASB. Britain starting a war is almost ASB. Therefore, a Trent Affair War is pretty much ASB.

This isn't something like if Fox News and some high level people in the Republican Party wanted a war in Iraq, and manipulated public opinion. This is like Michelle Bachmann wanting a war in Russia and trying to manipulate public opinion.
 
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