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Am currently rereading McWhiney's 1st volume. The source you mentioned, Sam, states (tongue in cheek) that McWhiney was so disgusted with Bragg that he turned the second volume over to a grad student.
Bragg began his argumentative career at West Point. He argued with everyone, (including himself) beginning with his instructors at the Point and continuing throughout his military career and, presumably, through his following civilian life when nobody cared anymore. He had a nasty habit of writing insolent letters to his superiors.
Aside from his people skills, Bragg had an additional fault: he was incapable of dealing with the fluid situations that develop when a battle is in progress. If things didn't go as he planned, he couldn't adapt. The classic, and final example is Chickamauga when he gave up and went back to his headquarters, leaving Longstreet to fight on.
He was like McClellan in a way: a superb organizer and disciplinarian, his troops were usually the best trained and organized. Unlike Mac he was pugnacious to a fault.
Ran across one interesting item. In the Mexican war as the captain of artillery, George Thomas, John Reynolds, and D.H. Hill served under him.
Ole
__________________ I never knew a man who wished to be himself a slave. Consider if you know any good thing that no man desires for himself. A. Lincoln
Burnside made one colossal series of blunders in one battle and he remains the picture in the dictionary beside "egregious." Bragg stretched his mistakes over a considerably longer period and we remember him for his eyebrows. Go figure!
Ole
__________________ I never knew a man who wished to be himself a slave. Consider if you know any good thing that no man desires for himself. A. Lincoln
I think that Ole has got this 100% right (post #72), Bragg was a administration general, not a battle field general, and this type of general is born, you can’t train these guys in any academy. Grant had it, Jackson had it, and Bragg never did and never would. It makes him a bad field general, but still a capable administration general.
I'd say that pretty well answers the question. But was he worse than Burnside?
In many ways he was worse than Burnside. Bragg was a better military strategist but if forced to choose I would still go with Burnside. Burnsides real weekness was his lack of Logistical ability/knowledge. He fought good defensive battles as long as someone else kept his army fed and supplied. His forces usually fought well and cooperated. Mac hung him out to dry at Antietam and Grant and Meade interfered with his Petersburg Mine disaster. He did very well against Longstreet at Knoxville. Other than Fredricksburg he did an average job. Bragg was his own worst enemy.
__________________ "We made a great mistake in the beginning of our struggle.... We appointed all our worst generals to command our armies, and all our best generals to edit the newspapers"
- Robert E. Lee
The Battle Flag of The Madison Light Artillery (Louisiana) MOODY'S BATTERY - 24 Pound Howitzers
Alexander's Battalion
Longstreets Corps
In many ways he was worse than Burnside. Bragg was a better military strategist but if forced to choose I would still go with Burnside. Burnsides real weekness was his lack of Logistical ability/knowledge. He fought good defensive battles as long as someone else kept his army fed and supplied. His forces usually fought well and cooperated. Mac hung him out to dry at Antietam and Grant and Meade interfered with his Petersburg Mine disaster. He did very well against Longstreet at Knoxville. Other than Fredricksburg he did an average job. Bragg was his own worst enemy.
Without taking the discussion too far off course, Burnside was a man with lots of minuses as well as pluses.
He hammered Jackson pretty good at Cedar Mt., something maybe only one other Union officer did. He defended Knoxville, and he had the good graces to doubt he should command the AoP when Lincoln put him in charge.
However, he was not always someone you could rely on.
For example, in September 1863 when the Confederates are concentrating against Rosecrans for Chickamauga, Lincoln, Halleck and Stanton are all calling on him to move SW from Knoxville to join with Rosecrans down near Chattanooga. Yes, certainly, says Burnside -- as he continues to move NE. Not the sort of guy you wanted to have as your flank guard and support.
For example, in his defense of Knoxville, his entreaties for relief are so piteous that Grant breaks off his pursuit of Bragg's shattered army to send Sherman to Knoxville (particularly after a hint from the President). When he gets there, he discovers the town securely held, and so well supplied and fortified that there was no realistic danger Longstreet could take the place.
Am currently rereading McWhiney's 1st volume. The source you mentioned, Sam, states (tongue in cheek) that McWhiney was so disgusted with Bragg that he turned the second volume over to a grad student.
Bragg began his argumentative career at West Point. He argued with everyone, (including himself) beginning with his instructors at the Point and continuing throughout his military career and, presumably, through his following civilian life when nobody cared anymore. He had a nasty habit of writing insolent letters to his superiors.
As a newly graduated 2nd Lieutenant in the 3rd Artillery, Bragg began a letter-writing feud with the head of the Artillery branch. He later extended this to the commanding general of the Army, Winfield Scott. He kept this up for some 18 years (i.e., until he resigned from the Army)
In the 1850s, he struck up a long feud with Jefferson Davis, then Secretary of War. These men were the two heroes of Buena Vista in the Mexican War, where Davis commanded an infantry regiment and Bragg an artillery battery. Davis, respecting Bragg's ability, tried to make him a major in the new 2nd Cavalry towards the end of it. Bragg, newly married, refused and resigned instead to become a successful LA planter with his wife's money.
The story Grant tells in his Memoirs of Bragg arguing with everyone in the army, including himself, was apparently just the common opinion of his comrades in arms.
[quote=ole]Aside from his people skills, Bragg had an additional fault: he was incapable of dealing with the fluid situations that develop when a battle is in progress. If things didn't go as he planned, he couldn't adapt. The classic, and final example is Chickamauga when he gave up and went back to his headquarters, leaving Longstreet to fight on.[quote]
This complaint about Bragg is often noted. He seemed quite good at making plans, but unable to adjust on the battlefield. If the enemy did something unexpected, he simply could not adjust. This, combined with the finger-pointing, feuds, and vendettas of a Bragg-led army, crushed initiative and made commanders halt and wait for orders when they should have acted.
So the idea of the turning movement to invade KY in 1862 is brilliant, the early execution excellent -- and the reality of getting there, finding Kirby Smith unco-operative and insubordinate, the KY people unresponsive and the situation unsettled and muddled leads to the quick expulsion from KY and the mess that was Perryville.
His grudge/feud against Breckinridge, who had been unable to get his troops from LA to join Bragg in time in KY through no fault of his own, leads to Bragg's rather foolish and unforgivable assault with the Kentuckians at Stones river on January 2, 1863.
While I don't think Bragg could have held Rosecrans off at Tullahoma in June 1863 after the troop transfer to Vicksburg, I also think Bragg's army was not prepared -- after six months in place -- for the assault that hit them. I think that is a major criticism of any officer.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ole
Ran across one interesting item. In the Mexican war as the captain of artillery, George Thomas, John Reynolds, and D.H. Hill served under him.
Yes. D. H. Hill even was anxious to serve under his old Captain again, volunteered for it, and was glad when the assignment came through. After a week or two under Bragg before Chickamauga, he was fit to be tied. Bragg had apparently gotten much worse with the strain of the war.
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