The Model 1859 Sharps military rifle...

No, he understood that killing was necessary. It is not however desirable. Like all officers of the time he was steeped in Jomini and maneuverist doctrines. Hence we get fluid campaigns of maneuver which are ignored because they never involved huge and exciting battles (TM).

He also failed to take Richmond where it was the patron Civil War saint of blood battles who did. :rolleyes:

I think you'll find he was expecting them to do exactly what they did - concentrate everything at the schwerpunkt, and was calling on the Union to do the same (from whence much of the criticism of him derives).

If this were so he surely would never have divided his army to give Joe Johnston and Lee both the tactical opportunity they both attempted to seize.

No I am at a loss. Surely Grant and his perchant for futile attacks against entrenchments is far more of a "donkey" in the Clarkist sense (although I don't subscribe to Clark's theories).

Nope, Grant got to Richmond's gates in six weeks and Lee never got him out of there, while Lee was unable to fight with dramatic maneuvers and send Grant out like he did all the generals before Grant. The moment Lee failed to do that was the moment the Confederacy was dead. They chose the manner of their death and were compelled to choose the most terrible.
 
The same McClellan who was brevetted twice for bravery whilst an observing officer (i.e. what is now Special Forces) in Mexico?

Little Mac is the man you want for your Chief of Staff; he's a great organizer and trainer. He's personally brave, intelligent, and thorough. What he lacks is moral bravery; the willingness to risk failure for the sake of a greater success.

That fault is not his alone; very few generals possess the combination of sound judgement and guts required for successful battlefield leadership. Even those who do, like Lee and Grant, occasionally misjudge the situation, as Malvern Hill and Cold Harbor show.
 
The same McClellan who was brevetted twice for bravery whilst an observing officer (i.e. what is now Special Forces) in Mexico?

Which proves nothing about his generalship. I can think of numerous examples of brave officers who were terrible leaders. As dgharis said, what McClellan lacked was Moral Bravery. He was a terrific organizer, but he failed to realize that war involves the risk of failure.
 
No, he understood that killing was necessary. It is not however desirable. Like all officers of the time he was steeped in Jomini and maneuverist doctrines. Hence we get fluid campaigns of maneuver which are ignored because they never involved huge and exciting battles (TM).

So basically, he maneuvered around trying to avoid conflict. No wonder he accomplished little of worth.
 
Ignoring other issues, there is one pressing concern. How do we build these weapons? They are much more complicated than a Springfield and very roughly you're cutting output by a factor of 4 or 5.

Now I can certainly see the carbine getting adopted by the cavalry. This was the contemporary trend. The British had already acquired the P1855 Sharps carbine* and they were carried by the 2nd Dragoon Guards, 7th Hussars and 8th Hussars during the 1857-8 Jihad in India. The infantry though, it's asking a lot. I'm fairly sure that the US couldn't build enough to equip the large volunteer force, and may have had to adopt one of the suggested approaches of only giving them to the flank companies and leaving the battalion companies with old smoothbores etc.


* They'd been trying to acquire a breechloader since the 1840's. They came close to adopting an improved version of the Dreyse in 1849, but the problems with the weapon were too great. The improvements the British made were largely incorporated into the M1862 Dreyse, a significantly better weapon than the M1848.

True; and has been said here, the peacetime US Army is not likely to adopt an expensive new weapon which only promises incremental advantages over the existing one.

If they do they'll build enough for the existing peacetime army, which means forty to fifty thousand; when war comes they'll have to increase production by a factor of ten, which would probably take at least a year. The Sharps will not come into widespread use until 1862 at least, and it will be a year or more before the effects cause a change in tactics. We could see trench warfare in Virginia in 1863, as opposed to OTL's 1864.
 
The truely weird part about this WI is that a version of it could have happened. Breach loading rifles firing rimfire cartridges had been around since 1831. There were several compeating designs, the Sharps rifle was just one of them. It seems that the reason that no such design was fielded prior to the Springfield 1866 trapdoor had more to do with infighting and resistance at the US Ordnance Dept. than any logistical or technical hurdles.

The idea of the WI that has them in the hands of both sides of the ACW is not likely, not having them in the hands of the Union side was the result of happenstance. If this event had happened it would have shortened the war but not for the reasons stated so far. The ACW was one of the few wars where both sides could use each others ammo. If the Union had switched to a different rifle using a different type and caliber of ammunition it would have cut the South off from one of their main sources of ammo, scouring battlefields after the battles.
 
The truely weird part about this WI is that a version of it could have happened. Breach loading rifles firing rimfire cartridges had been around since 1831. There were several compeating designs, the Sharps rifle was just one of them. It seems that the reason that no such design was fielded prior to the Springfield 1866 trapdoor had more to do with infighting and resistance at the US Ordnance Dept. than any logistical or technical hurdles.

The idea of the WI that has them in the hands of both sides of the ACW is not likely, not having them in the hands of the Union side was the result of happenstance. If this event had happened it would have shortened the war but not for the reasons stated so far. The ACW was one of the few wars where both sides could use each others ammo. If the Union had switched to a different rifle using a different type and caliber of ammunition it would have cut the South off from one of their main sources of ammo, scouring battlefields after the battles.

Meaning this is an awesome POD.....for the Union. ;):D:cool:
 
The first such conversion was the Allin, in 1866, which suffered from poor gas sealing and an inferior extractor; the Sharps is a superior weapon.
If one were to believe the Wiki, James Paris Lee, would invent a 'breechloading cartridge conversion for the Springfield Model 1861 Rifled Musket' that only had the issue of a bore diameter error.

...reminds me when engineers tried to redesign the MG42 for the 30-06 and goofed on the measurements when redesigning it.

* They'd been trying to acquire a breechloader since the 1840's. They came close to adopting an improved version of the Dreyse in 1849, but the problems with the weapon were too great. The improvements the British made were largely incorporated into the M1862 Dreyse, a significantly better weapon than the M1848.
What problems with the weapon that the US wouldn't accept the weapon despite the fact that the Prussia did adopt the weapon?
 
The trapdoor conversion came as a result of a desire to use parts from existing rifles. The 1871 Springfield was still in service during the Spanish/American War decades later not really replaced until the 1903 Springfield was adopted. What if better choices had been made in the 1860-61 time frame before tens of thousands of 1855 Springfield rifles had been built?
 

67th Tigers

Banned
What problems with the weapon that the US wouldn't accept the weapon despite the fact that the Prussia did adopt the weapon?

ISTR The British tests showed extreme leakiness at the breech, low muzzle velocity and a lack of accuracy. The very problems the Prussians had (the leakiness was so bad that only Prussian NCO's and Jaegers were allowed to aim). It was a long time ago I read about it though, but see CH Roads, The British Soldier's Firearm 1850 -1864 for details of the tests (which led to the adoption of the P1851 Minie Rifle and then the P1853 Enfield).
 
Like all officers of the time he was steeped in Jomini and maneuverist doctrines. Hence we get fluid campaigns of maneuver which are ignored because they never involved huge and exciting battles (TM).

There were fluid campaigns of maneuver in the ACW – Jackson in the Valley, Grant’s Vicksburg Campaign, or Sherman and Johnston in the Union advance on Atlanta. Jackson ‘s Valley Campaign is not ignored. Sherman and Grant are only ignored by people who believe Lost Cause myths, like claiming Grant had a “perchant for futile attacks against entrenchments”.

None of these fluid campaigns of maneuver were provided by McClellan. As historian Keith Poulter put it, “McClellan understood deliberate, “scientific” warfare, but never grasped the importance of those battle-winning concepts—initiative and momentum.”

I think you'll find he was expecting them to do exactly what they did - concentrate everything at the schwerpunkt, and was calling on the Union to do the same (from whence much of the criticism of him derives).

Actually, McClellan's military career shows he had no understanding of "schwerpunkt", whether the way the German army came to use the term or the way Clauswitz originally intended.
 
McClellan's campaign on the Peninsula seems the antithesis of "fluid manuever warfare" - grinding siege warfare, making maximum use of material.
 

67th Tigers

Banned
McClellan's campaign on the Peninsula seems the antithesis of "fluid manuever warfare" - grinding siege warfare, making maximum use of material.

Not as he envisioned it. Have you read Reed's Combined Operations in the Civil War? (Link) It is worth reading -it discusses the differences between planning and the problems that developed (especially wrt the Navy)
 
Not as he envisioned it. Have you read Reed's Combined Operations in the Civil War? (Link) It is worth reading -it discusses the differences between planning and the problems that developed (especially wrt the Navy)

If he really and truly had a problem with a siege, resorting to it instead of breaking through Magruder's overly thin lines shows a remarkable unwillingness to take chances when his original plan went awry.

So I stand by saying it was a grinding siege campaign because of his decisions in response to reality as opposed to having everything go as planned.

Not saying its All His Fault - but regardless of what the navy did or didn't do, McClellan was faced with the choices of attacking Magruder's thin lines and hoping to penetrate or bringing up siege artillery and hoping to overcome it in that way. He chose the path that would consume time rather than lives.
 

67th Tigers

Banned
If he really and truly had a problem with a siege, resorting to it instead of breaking through Magruder's overly thin lines shows a remarkable unwillingness to take chances when his original plan went awry.

So I stand by saying it was a grinding siege campaign because of his decisions in response to reality as opposed to having everything go as planned.

Not saying its All His Fault - but regardless of what the navy did or didn't do, McClellan was faced with the choices of attacking Magruder's thin lines and hoping to penetrate or bringing up siege artillery and hoping to overcome it in that way. He chose the path that would consume time rather than lives.

He didn't commit to building position batteries (siege implies "starving them out" - which he never intended to do) until the 16th April. Less than three weeks later he would have blasted them out. However, even that was part of a more complex plan involving an attempt to get Franklin to make an amphibious desant at West Point.

I don't understand this notion of Magruder having a "thin line". He had some 20-30,000 men in position in early April and had very strong entrenchments (frontally at least, they could be swept from the rear if the navy could be persueded to run the batteries), an unfordable river and a very high density of artillery guns. The only chink in the armour was Dam No. 2, which is where McClellan tried to assault only to fail.
 
He didn't commit to building position batteries (siege implies "starving them out" - which he never intended to do) until the 16th April. Less than three weeks later he would have blasted them out. However, even that was part of a more complex plan involving an attempt to get Franklin to make an amphibious desant at West Point.

Siege: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/siege

Starving them out optional.

He didn't try very hard to assault prior to that. And again, I'm looking at what he actually did - having a plan for an amphibious assault is all well and good, but what was executed? Bring up the siege guns and allow the Confederates two weeks to plan what to do.

I don't understand this notion of Magruder having a "thin line". He had some 20-30,000 men in position in early April and had very strong entrenchments (frontally at least, they could be swept from the rear if the navy could be persueded to run the batteries), an unfordable river and a very high density of artillery guns. The only chink in the armour was Dam No. 2, which is where McClellan tried to assault only to fail.
According to your own source: "But Magruder disobeyed orders. Although he had only eleven thousand men to hold the entire Confedreate line from Mulberry Island on the right to Yorktown and the detached work at Gloucester on the left, he had prepared his defenses with great skill." (page 135). This is in the first third of April.

""By the 15th Yorktown's defenders had received only 16,000 reinforcements from Johnston's army - D.H. Hill's command which had arrived on the 11th - but MCClellan was puzzled by the delay and knew the remainder would be arriving at any moment.

Daily reconnaissances of Magruder's line along the Warwick revealed that the weakest point was in the center at Dam Number One. On 16 April, the 2nd Division of Keyes's Corps assualted this position. It was a close battle - the Federals never knew how close - but the attack was repulsed. The next day McClellan bowed to the inevitable and began constructing siege Battery Number One on the right of the first parallel." (page 147)

And of course, the reason McClellan waits until the 15th to attack is attempting to get the navy to cooperate before the army does something.

Was the navy doing all it could? Hardly. On the other hand, that doesn't mean McClellan was doing all he could, either.
 
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Not as he envisioned it. Have you read Reed's Combined Operations in the Civil War? (Link) It is worth reading -it discusses the differences between planning and the problems that developed (especially wrt the Navy)

If vision qualifies for that then Grant's Overland Campaign must surely also qualify given his vision was the exact opposite of what he planned. Or is it only St. George who gets a pass on the difference between planning and execution, the same St. George who couldn't master cavalry and who kept making basic tactical errors to his last battle?

He didn't commit to building position batteries (siege implies "starving them out" - which he never intended to do) until the 16th April. Less than three weeks later he would have blasted them out. However, even that was part of a more complex plan involving an attempt to get Franklin to make an amphibious desant at West Point.

I don't understand this notion of Magruder having a "thin line". He had some 20-30,000 men in position in early April and had very strong entrenchments (frontally at least, they could be swept from the rear if the navy could be persueded to run the batteries), an unfordable river and a very high density of artillery guns. The only chink in the armour was Dam No. 2, which is where McClellan tried to assault only to fail.

McClellan actually fighting would require as drastic a personality change as the one to turn Hitler into a Judaeophilic tree-hugging pacifist. He had a strategic vision, but tactically he's underwhelming and his battles never had him even bother with basic co-ordination of them. When Braxton Bragg looks a model general by comparison, something went wrong somewhere.
 

Swordman

Banned
The Question:

Had the United States Army adopted the weapon for service in 1859, as it's standard infantry rifle, and the muzzle loaders cycled out of regular service entirely by the end of 1860, never to be produced again, from that point on, all U.S. contracts would be for the 1859 Sharps until something better came along (a repeater of some sort for example) how would this impact the ACW?

The Sharps had a lot going for it:

It's a breach loader with a simple falling block mechanism with a percussion cap ignition that could also use a pellet primer feed; the feed held a stack of pellets, flipping one over, onto the nipple each time the trigger was pulled and the hammer fell.

RoF: 8-10 shots per minute, compared to the 2-3 shots per minute of the muzzle loaders

Muzzle velocity: 1,200 ft/s (370 m/s), compared to the 1,000 ft/s of the average muzzle loader

Effective range: 500 yd (460 m) compared to the 200-300 yd effective range of the muzzle loaders

Maximum range: 1,000 yd (910 m). Only place the muzzle loaders produced prior to it ever matched up...sometimes.

So, what happens if the two armies that faced off at First Bull Run had been entirely equipped with these on the fateful day in spring of 1861?

Do we see a battle similar to what happened OTL or is it a far, far bloodier affair, the kind that makes both sides reconsider just what they're getting into?

What impact does it have on infantry tactics going forward?

Opinions?

Sigma7:

To my knowledge, the Sharps pellet-primer didn't see much use in the ACW, due to its mechanical complexity. Those Sharps models that used the Maynard tape primer were also withdrawn from service because of the fragility of the tape under battlefield conditions.
The use of the Sharps in the early battles of the war would have meant an even more monstrous casualty list. Accordingly, I think that there would be a more widespread use of skirmisher tactics.

Mike Garrity
 
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