Giuseppe Garibaldi fights for the Union

[Strategos' Risk]

This would be pretty cool.

 

[SilverPhantom2]

A good POD would be that Lincoln waits till say October 1862 to ask Garibaldi to take command of the army. Say perhaps, Lincoln issues the Emancipation Proclamation, one of his generals screws up badly enough and Lincoln's preparing to switch him out as he did all the way up until he finally relinquished it to Grant.

That way, Garibaldi wouldn't even have to ask for the terms of the war to be to end slavery, it would already be seen that way in Europe.

The war would be very interesting. I sense a close American-Italian future.

 

[Derek Jackson]

A good POD would be that Lincoln waits till say October 1862 to ask Garibaldi to take command of the army. Say perhaps, Lincoln issues the Emancipation Proclamation, one of his generals screws up badly enough and Lincoln's preparing to switch him out as he did all the way up until he finally relinquished it to Grant.

That way, Garibaldi wouldn't even have to ask for the terms of the war to be to end slavery, it would already be seen that way in Europe.

The war would be very interesting. I sense a close American-Italian future.

I also have heard the view that McLellan had rather screwed up in letting Lee's army escape after Antietham.

 

[Jason]

Was Garibaldi actually a good enough commander to be put in charge? I always thought the main reason for his success in Naples was due to the poor quality and morale of the government forces rather than his own leadership skills.

 

[Strategos' Risk]

He was a man who could rally the troops. The question is whether or not he could have fought a modern war such as the ACW.

 

[Andrew Hudson]

Taking the biscuit

There is some circumstantial evidence that Lincoln actually did ask Garibaldi to become the head of the Union Army as the union generals seemed to be incapable of fighting wars however Garibaldi rejected the offer as Lincoln didn't go far enough towards abolition at the time. Maybe if the emancipation proclamation had come earlier? Then what? I think Garibaldi would have been less ruthless than Grant and certainly than Sherman.

Lee was offered the job at the start of the war but decided his primary allegiance was to the state of Virginia

 

[Broz]

what could well happen is that he ider dies nelle lontane americe or the events of the second unification war like the march of the thousand get butterflyed away

arguably this was the main reason there is an Italy, even if there would be more wars later and possibly Napoli would still fall, there could be later a break up similar to the last yugoslavian war, especially if the unification happens later, closer to the 1900eds, wich could be if theres no garibaldi and his thousand redshirts

this could then afect the 20th century in ways that are too numerous for one thread

 

[Alexius]

Could the presence of Garibaldi make people in the border states more sympathetic towards the Confederates? In other words, an army led by Garibaldi might be seen as a foreign occupation force- especially since he may have brought some Italians with him, and there was very little Italian immigration to the antebellum US.

And the effects on Italy might be more interesting than those on the US- Garibaldi's expedition against Rome may well never happen!