Deleted member 9338
Would Hooker of done a better job at Gettysburg than Meade? His organizational experience would of come in handy on the second day.
First of all, if Hooker retained command of the Army of the Potomac, there would be no Battle of Gettysburg at all. Hooker was planning to organize the Harper's Ferry Garrison and Twelfth Corps into an expeditionary force of 25,000 men, and throw them into Lee's rear, and disrupt Lee's supply lines and then reunite with the main army for battle. There is evidence to indicate that Hooker was insecure at the thought of fighting Lee again in a head-on collision.Would Hooker of done a better job at Gettysburg than Meade? His organizational experience would of come in handy on the second day.
Did I ruin the possibility of discussion? Or are you referring to how Hooker would perform? If it is the former, I apologize but my assessment of Hooker during the Chancellorsville and Gettysburg Campaign caused me to doubt his ability to command an army.Ok, this was dissapointing.
Did I ruin the possibility of discussion? Or are you referring to how Hooker would perform? If it is the former, I apologize but my assessment of Hooker during the Chancellorsville and Gettysburg Campaign caused me to doubt his ability to command an army.
Hooker's plans in the Chancellorsville campaign were excellent but the execution was terrible and serves as evidence that Hooker could not hack army command.Hooker can command an army. Before Chancellorsville, he hold 3,000 soldiers from 3 different units (he talked to brigade commanders instead of his corps ones) and said "watch that direction." They then promptly ignored his orders and the attack came from exactly the same spot. His biggest mistake was not using Hazel Grove as a rallying point when the battle went south
Hooker's plans in the Chancellorsville campaign were excellent but the execution was terrible and serves as evidence that Hooker could not hack army command.
Hooker was confused and uncertain when Lee didn't do what Hooker expected him to, which was to fall back. After meeting relatively light resistance, instead of pushing out of the Wilderness onto open ground where he would hold the advantage, he instead fell back into the Wilderness. Despite a heavy advantage, he went from the offensive to being entirely passive, giving the initiative to Lee without any fuss.
Then there is Jackson's flank attack on May 2. While Howard did fail to follow instructions from Hooker, given how woefully outnumbered the XI Corps was by Jackson's Corps, he was likely getting thrown back in any case. Blaming the loss of the battle on Howard is unfair. While Howard was behaving like an idiot at the battle, Jackson's flank attack didn't actually decide anything. Hooker still held almost all the cards. He had the key central position, he had the Confederates divided, he had large reserves perfectly positioned to deal with Jackson's forces. Grant or Meade would have killed to be given such a perfect opportunity as Hooker had. Yet Hooker abandoned key ground at Hazel Grove, allowing the Confederates to reunite their divided army and conceding a key tactical advantage; Confederate artillery on this ground dominated the rest of the battle.
After the engagement on May 3, Hooker's new position was quite strong and couldn't be turned. Hooker had given tactical control of his artillery first to Wainwright then to Hunt, enabling its more effective use from that point forward. His army, though battered, was far from broken, and the I and V Corps were virtually undamaged. Hooker should have brought I and V Corps into the fight on May 3rd, and hammered Lee's army. He should, at the very least on that day, have continued engaging Lee so as to enable Sedgwick to make his advance. He could have attacked on May 4th as well, but instead continued to sit on his hands. On the morning he withdrew, Lee was about to potentially throw away nearly everything he had gained and launch a foolish frontal attack on Hooker in his determination to not let the Union army get away.
Huh? Couch's two divisions had joined Hooker at 10:00 P.M. on May 30, and Sickles' entire III Corps had arrived at Chandler's house at 9:00 A.M. on May 1.On May 1, Hooker had amassed the V, XI, and XII corps at Chancellorsville. 2 divisions of the II corps and the entire III corps were on the way across but not yet arrived. Lee, by this point, had already turned his entire army except Early's division and Barksdale's brigade west to face Hooker. A stand-up fight on May 1, wherever it took place, would be between numerically equal forces. And Hooker arguably (again, depending on the reliability of Sears' narrative) was not planning any offensive action on May 1 anyway, but rather wanted to let Lee bash his army against Hooker's defensive position, compared to the numerous tactical frontal assaults the Army of the Potomac had made and failed at for the past year - as a strategy this may be arguable but is not demonstrably bad.
I suppose so. But wasn't Butterfield already warning Hooker that there may be a communication issue with the telegraphs? My memory is a bit shady here on the matter.Not only did Howard fail to follow Hooker's directions to refuse his flank, but the telegraph also let Hooker down at the worst time. Early in the day on May 2 he had ordered the I corps to join the main body at Chancellorsville and take position on the XI corps flank, fronting west, and with its flank resting on the river. I concede that even a prepared XI corps may be beaten by Jackson's attack, but not a prepared XI + I corps. But the telegraph line was faulty and the message arrived late, so the I corps was marching and not yet in position by late afternoon.
Well, Stuart seemed to appreciate the importance of Hazel Grove as an artillery position. Aside from that, I would agree with your points.As for Hazel Grove, Porter Alexander himself was unaware of the importance of Hazel Grove until it was already safely in Confederate hands. He was, as a good artillerist may do, having batteries follow behind Confederate lines on the 3rd and take up the best firing positions possible in the Wilderness as they arrived, reinforcing a point once it was shown to be good. Hazel Grove showed itself immediately to be very good indeed, but this was not known in advance. Even then, the Fairview artillery position the Union occupied held its own and was ultimately rendered ineffective not because (or not *primarily* because) of Confederate counter-battery fire, but because the Union artillery ran out of ammunition. For this Hooker does receive blame for decentralizing his artillery and so not letting Hunt rotate batteries in on the 3rd. But this is very easy to see in hindsight - his arguments for giving local commanders greater control and coordination with their batteries were, AFAIK, not strongly argued against at the time.
There is evidence for this, Governeur K. Warren claimed that Hooker planned to do just that. If so however, he never put such plans into action.Sears' claims that Hooker was planning to have the I and V corps hit Stuart (Jackson) in the flank at the height of the engagement, and this plan was ruined when he was concussed and temporarily removed from the battle.
While John Sedgwick deserves criticism for his sluggish pace, he is not completely at fault. Hooker never clearly explained his intentions and plans to Sedgwick before the campaign, preferring to play things close to the vest. Hooker gave no indication to Sedgwick that he wanted aggressive action except under certain circumstances (the weakening of Lee's forces at Fredericksburg) that by nature, Sedgwick would not very easily be able to determine. Hooker's orders, even on May 2nd when it was certainly clear that Lee's main body faced Hooker, didn't clearly indicate the need for aggressive action in the direction of Chancellorsville in Sedgwick until late that evening. Communication delays played into this, but this was a problem Hooker could and should have predicted. Dealing with Marye's Heights was no easy task, and was naturally going to take Sedgwick some time.Sedgewick did in fact make his attack against Marye's Heights on May 3, concurrently with (or a couple hours later than) the main fighting around Chancellorsville, and no unit in either army fought on both fronts. Sedgewick, being prudent-bordering-on-overcautious, and with confusing telegrams (again delayed by the faulty wire and machines) decided on his own initiative to move slowly once the heights were carried.
I completely disagree. By May 4, Hooker has 6 Army Corps facing against Stuart's 3 Divisions. Stuart's Corps (formerly Jackson's) is already exhausted from constant fighting while Hooker has the I and V Corps which were relatively intact. There have been a number of instances in the Wilderness that the attackers beat the defenders quite handily. Hancock's II Corps nearly routed A.P. Hill's Corps before being saved by Longstreet's intervention. In return, Longstreet drove the disorganized and exhausted Federals back. In this case, Hooker has all the cards to defeat Lee on May 4.Hooker could indeed have attacked on May 4th. Considered the history of OTL fighting in the Wilderness, especially when the attacker's attack was not a surprise and more-or-less a frontal assault, the outcome would probably be a Union victory but a very bloody one with disproportional casualties - not contributing anything to the overall campaign - and could also be a stalemate-like bloodbath due to confusion and loss of unit cohesion. It would not be a significant Union victory, and could not be beneficial unless it made Lee front more of his army against Hooker rather than Sedgewick - for window of time on the 4th this may be true. It would be unnecessary anyway, considering that despite Lee sending half his army to fight Sedgewick, the Union won anyway at Salem Church. By letting Lee bash himself against Union defenses Hooker (and Sedgewick) were gaining more, at this point in the war, than they could by any frontal assault on the terrain they OTL occupied. The fact that Sedgewick withdrew after Salem Church is due again to his prudence-bordering-on-overcautiousness and again to telegrams going wrong.
But Hooker did not send Buford to Gettysburg. Hooker did wire Butterfield to "direct that the cavalry be sent well to the advance of Frederick, in the direction of Gettysburg and Emmitsburg, and see what they can of the movements of the enemy."I disagree that there would be no battle at Gettysburg as Buford's troops were in position in the town because of Hooker sending them there.