Was McClellan (and the Union war effort) sabotaged for pure political reasons in Spring of 1862?

[SgtTB]

I am examining the events that frame the Seven Days Battles and Peninsula Campaign of 1862. Prior, you see the administration removing McDowell's command from McClellan under the auspices of supplementing weak DC defenses, something that McClellan is only informed of 2 days after he has arrived on the peninsula. Then you see McDowell not allowed to reenforce McClellan. (Reenforce is the wrong term, McDowell was to be a whole other pincer moving in, no?) Finally, on the other end, we see McDowell's army given to John Pope, who is aligned with hard line Republican policy fully, acting as a parallel independent command.

How is this just not blatant sabotage of one political faction by another? I don't believe there's an outright smoking gun in a telegram or letter, but the coincidences pile up.

 

[rpkennedy]

Which was left and not a problem until a politically motivated Stanton made it one.

Are you arguing that McClellan didn't manipulate the numbers to exaggerate how many troops were defending Washington, as stipulated by the government?

Ryan

 

[DanSBHawk]

I didn't. I pointed out that what he wrote was more likely for Lincoln's consumption, because by 8th May he told Halleck that, rather than chasing after "his objective" of Lee's Army, he was going to march to the James and besiege Richmond.

So, why do you ignore what Grant said he was doing and, in fact, actually did. Grant was trying to reach Butler to besiege Richmond, and Lee kept getting in the way.

BTW: What "common centre" are they working towards? The eastern armies are all aimed at taking Richmond. He gives no real instructions to Sherman. The Red River force Grant has ideas about sending to Mobile, but indicates he's likely rather going to gut it to reinforce the Richmond movement... and ultimately did.

Indeed, the observations of many that Sherman just did his own thing without Grant. Ludwell Johnston wrote:

"The portrait of Grant as a general-in-chief who coordinated the movements
of the Union armies is even less convincing than the picture of
Grant, the master strategist. In the first place, Grant, like McClellan,
chose to make his headquarters in the field. It is impossible to explain
away this obvious mistake by saying that Grant kept himself fully informed
of events in other theaters and really permitted Meade to run the
Army of the Potomac, thus freeing himself to fulfill the functions of general-
in-chief. According to Meade, early in the 1864 campaign Grant
took over direction of the Army of the Potomac. "I told [Senators Sherman
and Sprague]," Meade wrote his wife on May 19, "that at first I had
maneuvered the army, but that gradually, and from the very nature of
things, Grant had taken the control. . . ."29 However good his information
about operations elsewhere, Grant simply did not have the time,
especially during the crucial first three months of fighting, to run the rest
of the war. As Grant said, he and Sherman started off together and then
each had done his best.30

In fact, it was Sherman who really ran the war, if anyone did, not the
general-in-chief. The march to the sea was his conception. Much of his
correspondence with Grant during the fall of 1864 is an argument for
the movement, as opposed to Grant's idea of pursuing and destroying
Hood. On October 11, for example, the general-in-chief said: "If there
is any way of getting at Hood's army, I would prefer that, but I must
trust to your own judgment. I find I shall not be able to send a force
from here to act with you on Savannah. Your movements, therefore, will
be independent of mine, at least until the fall of Richmond takes
place."*1 This scarcely sounds like coordination. Furthermore, unbelievable
as it sounds, when Sherman finally did win permission for his
march and set out from Atlanta, neither Grant nor Halleck knew
whether he would come out on the Atlantic Ocean or on the Gulf of
Mexico. Half of the supplies originally sent to the depot at Hilton Head
on the assumption that Sherman would make for Savannah were transferred
to Pensacola in case "Cump" went thataway.32"

- Ludwell H. Johnson; Civil War Military History: A Few Revisions in Need of Revising; Civil War History, Volume 17, Number 2, June 1971, pp. 115-130

In other words, you don't have a single primary source which states that Richmond was the campaign objective for the Army of the Potomac.

On the other hand, Grant explicitly named Lee's army as the objective of the AotP in several of the primary source documents.

It's very obvious and easy to comprehend what Grant wrote. So this is just another example of you trying to fabricate fake history.

 

[SgtTB]

Are you arguing that McClellan didn't manipulate the numbers to exaggerate how many troops were defending Washington, as stipulated by the government?

Ryan

I am suggesting enough were left and it was a bureaucratic play by Stanton the minute Mac was gone.

 

[rpkennedy]

I am suggesting enough were left and it was a bureaucratic play by Stanton the minute Mac was gone.

It was far fewer than agreed upon and McClellan blatantly lied about how many troops were available. Lincoln was understandably perturbed when he found out.

How was it a play by Stanton if it was accurate?

Ryan

 

[SgtTB]

How was it a play by Stanton if it was accurate?

Ryan

It was not accurate. Stanton and the Warboard misrepresented it to Lincoln.

Keep in mind that if this was the only thing they did, okay, but its one of a dozen actions they took against him.

 

[67th Tigers]

In other words, you don't have a single primary source which states that Richmond was the campaign objective for the Army of the Potomac.

On the other hand, Grant explicitly named Lee's army as the objective of the AotP in several of the primary source documents.

It's very obvious and easy to comprehend what Grant wrote. So this is just another example of you trying to fabricate fake history.

That's cherry-picking. On the 8th May, Grant stated that rather than pursuing Lee, he was marching to the James to join up with Butler and thus besiege Richmond. He attempted to do exactly that. Look at what he does rather than what he says.

As I've said to you before, with complex data you need to analyse the totality of it. You shouldn't pick the bits that confirm your biases and declare them to be true, and dismiss those bits that contradict your biases. In this case Grant may have said several times "Lee's army is my objective point," but then what he actually did was something different. Thus we're left with the conundrum as to whether he changed his mind literally on day 1, or whether the whole thing was purely to make a show of saying what Lincoln wanted to hear...

 

[67th Tigers]

As a whole, the corps commanders recommended leaving 40,000 men to defend Washington, of whom 25,000 were the covering force (Banks' Corps) and 15,000 were in Washington proper to man the works. McClellan left considerably more than this.

Wadsworth and Thomas wanted a much larger force left than the corps commanders had stipulated. They convinced Hitchcock of this, but then the shortfall was only 5-10,000 infantry by their inflated figures (and none by the agreed figures). Stanton then grabbed 40,000 troops thus:

• 1st Corps complete (with 2 cav regts)
• 5 regiments of cavalry belonging to the 2nd, 3rd and 4th Corps (1st NJ, 1st and 5th PA, and 3rd and 4th NY)
• The volunteer engineer brigade

At a stroke, Stanton grabbed three strong divisions, half the AoP's cavalry designated for the field,* and almost all the engineer troops. McClellan argued to get the engineers back, and was quickly successful. The loss of half the cavalry regiments had a huge effect.

* In round terms there were about 22 mounted cavalry regiments. Ca. 8 were left covering Washington, leaving 7 that joined the army in the field, and another 7 that remained at Washington uselessly.

 

[Saphroneth]

And, of course, the argument that was used was that the defences of Washington specifically (and, more specifically, the forts north of the Potomac) were insufficiently manned. Posting the kept-back troops north of the Potomac in garrison would have been consistent; posting them south of the Potomac would have meant they could move to cover the deficiency if needed.

Posting them at Fredericksburg, as was quickly done, and stripping down both garrison and covering force to bulk out the Fredericksburg force, is nonsense. It makes immediately apparent that the cited deficiencies were being used as an excuse, not a reason; the only real question is who was the one using them falsely as a lever.

 

[Saphroneth]

It was far fewer than agreed upon and McClellan blatantly lied about how many troops were available. Lincoln was understandably perturbed when he found out.

It is not a blatant lie; it is an error, yes. What appears to have happened is very specifically a double count of the units at Manassas that were from Banks' corps, because McClellan counted those units at Manassas and also gave the whole of Banks' corps as being in the Shenandoah.

However, if you remove this error, McClellan has still complied with the instructions (once movements are complete, it is 22,000 in Washington, 18,600 at Manassas, 18,700 in the Valley, and 1,350 at Fredericksburg; total covering force is 13,000 larger than the agreements and total Washington garrison is 7,000 larger than the agreements). He has no reason to lie because the truth is sufficient to meet with the agreements, which is why this appears to be an honest error; notably, the error was not identified until after 1st Corps was witheld.

As for how such an error could take place? The situation is very complex. There are many moving parts:

- A regiment and some cavalry for the lower Potomac
- Banks' corps is split between the Valley and Manassas and is still moving into position
- The Railroad Bde is being sent to Manassas
- Troops which have not yet arrived are en route to Manassas and Washington
- Troops are en route from Washington to Manassas
- Blenker's division is being retained temporarily, first at Manassas and then shifting by brigades to the Valley, and can be kept more permanently if there is a need for it
- The rest of 2nd Corps is mounting a recce mission south to Warrenton and the Rappahannock and will come north again afterwards

And in the last week or so McClellan has been arranging all of this, and sorting out the logistics of a rapid move to the Peninsula, and trying to pin down the Navy about support bombarding Yorktown. And he's just got news that Heintzelman has bollixed up the job down on the Peninsula and raised the alarm, so now he's replanning again. And in the process, he (presumably) copies Banks' strength down as in the Valley.

That a double count occurred is understandable. Lincoln has asked for haste (setting the departure date for the Peninsula as 18th March, I believe!) and McClellan is providing haste. But some things get dropped.

 

[67th Tigers]

And, of course, the argument that was used was that the defences of Washington specifically (and, more specifically, the forts north of the Potomac) were insufficiently manned. Posting the kept-back troops north of the Potomac in garrison would have been consistent; posting them south of the Potomac would have meant they could move to cover the deficiency if needed.

This is intrinsic in the corps commanders recommendations; the fortifications north of the Potomac only need a maintenance level of manning, because in an emergency in Maryland, the covering force would fall back into Washington.

 

[Saphroneth]

This is intrinsic in the corps commanders recommendations; the fortifications north of the Potomac only need a maintenance level of manning, because in an emergency in Maryland, the covering force would fall back into Washington.

Right, but what I mean is that the argument that they were worried about something and took steps to abrogate those concerns is exploded by what happened to those troops.

 

[JerryD]

I mean they gave T Harry Williams a pulitzer and a tenured history position.

It would be more accurate to say such views have fallen out of favor. The histrocity is there.

I think you are seriously misreading Williams. From a book review of his book on the Lincoln/McClellan relationship:

"Williams devoted almost half the book to the Lincoln-McClellan relationship. In his view, Lincoln was probably America's greatest war president and a better natural strategist than any of his generals, Ulysses S. Grant included. Lincoln was also a thoroughly decent man with thoroughly decent motives, as well as a fount of homespun wisdom. McClellan, on the other hand, was, in Williams's withering phrase, "the problem child of the Civil War." In essence, Williams argued that Lincoln did his best to create a strong working relationship with McClellan and McClellan did his toxic worst to sabotage that relationship. Because Williams was an intelligent historian with an irresistible writing style and an air of vast certainty about everything—judging by his prose he seems never to have been blessed by a moment of self-doubt—Williams demolished McClellan with a combination of accuracy (McClellan assuredly had flaws), acid observations, rhetorical sleight of hand, and a heads-I-win-tails-you-lose narrative strategy whereby Lincoln (who also had flaws) emerged unscathed, notwithstanding the fact that he plainly allowed McClellan to undertake an operation, the Peninsula Campaign, in which he had no confidence and which he dramatically undermined at several junctures. A great war president who felt that way should not have allowed McClellan to undertake the operation in the first place."

Did Lincoln undermine the campaign. I think most would say yes. But its because he had no faith in the campaign and told McClellan that upfront, but allowed him to proceed only with certain conditions. Conditions that McClellan did not, in Lincoln's opinion, satisfy.

But you take the bizarre approach that he undermined him because he thought Mac might actually be successful and he had to stop that! When, of course, he could have stopped him by just removing him and not sacrificing thousands of lives in an effort to force Mac to lose battles and lose the campaign.

If that is the best you got, you kind of just proved my point that no professional historian thinks Mac was undermined for political reasons.

 

[Saphroneth]

If that is the best you got, you kind of just proved my point that no professional historian thinks Mac was undermined for political reasons.

That Lincoln didn't do something specific to deliberately undermine McClellan is not the same as McClellan not being undermined for political reasons. If Stanton gaslights Lincoln into allowing Stanton to strip a corps from McClellan, then that's still McClellan being politically undermined.

 

[JerryD]

It is not a blatant lie; it is an error, yes. What appears to have happened is very specifically a double count of the units at Manassas that were from Banks' corps, because McClellan counted those units at Manassas and also gave the whole of Banks' corps as being in the Shenandoah.

However, if you remove this error, McClellan has still complied with the instructions (once movements are complete, it is 22,000 in Washington, 18,600 at Manassas, 18,700 in the Valley, and 1,350 at Fredericksburg; total covering force is 13,000 larger than the agreements and total Washington garrison is 7,000 larger than the agreements). He has no reason to lie because the truth is sufficient to meet with the agreements, which is why this appears to be an honest error; notably, the error was not identified until after 1st Corps was witheld.

As for how such an error could take place? The situation is very complex. There are many moving parts:

- A regiment and some cavalry for the lower Potomac
- Banks' corps is split between the Valley and Manassas and is still moving into position
- The Railroad Bde is being sent to Manassas
- Troops which have not yet arrived are en route to Manassas and Washington
- Troops are en route from Washington to Manassas
- Blenker's division is being retained temporarily, first at Manassas and then shifting by brigades to the Valley, and can be kept more permanently if there is a need for it
- The rest of 2nd Corps is mounting a recce mission south to Warrenton and the Rappahannock and will come north again afterwards

And in the last week or so McClellan has been arranging all of this, and sorting out the logistics of a rapid move to the Peninsula, and trying to pin down the Navy about support bombarding Yorktown. And he's just got news that Heintzelman has bollixed up the job down on the Peninsula and raised the alarm, so now he's replanning again. And in the process, he (presumably) copies Banks' strength down as in the Valley.

That a double count occurred is understandable. Lincoln has asked for haste (setting the departure date for the Peninsula as 18th March, I believe!) and McClellan is providing haste. But some things get dropped.

Wasn't the issue that the troops in the Valley were deemed not available?

 

[JerryD]

That Lincoln didn't do something specific to deliberately undermine McClellan is not the same as McClellan not being undermined for political reasons. If Stanton gaslights Lincoln into allowing Stanton to strip a corps from McClellan, then that's still McClellan being politically undermined.

You keep saying that with no real evidence Lincoln was fooled. Lincoln was not an idiot. In fact, he was probably a lot smarter than Stanton, and Stanton was a very sharp guy. I don't for a second think he was fooled and there is no evidence he was fooled. That is pure speculation on your part. And it kind of flies in the face of what we know about Lincoln.

Essentially you are parroting what McClellan wrote in his autobiography where he accuses Stanton of treason and treats Lincoln like a kindly but kind of stupid hick who was a puppet of his advisors. Which anyone who has seriously studied this period knows is ridiculous.

It kind of feels like a real reach that makes no sense in order to match your preferred narrative, rather than an assessment of the facts.

 

[JerryD]

Wasn't the issue that the troops in the Valley were deemed not available?

My understanding is that Stanton had officers look over Mac's numbers and they found many mistakes. Blenker was included, even though he was scheduled to go to Fremont. About 19,000 troops did not exist and were double counted, and the troops in the Valley were deemed too far away to be effective. If this is the opinion of those officers, how did Stanton gaslight Lincoln?

 

[Saphroneth]

Wasn't the issue that the troops in the Valley were deemed not available?

Not really. They deemed that the Confederates couldn't retake Manassas, and refused to say if troops in the Valley counted, but their determination of troops lacking was based on the Washington garrison itself being less than 30,000 strong.

You keep saying that with no real evidence Lincoln was fooled. Lincoln was not an idiot. In fact, he was probably a lot smarter than Stanton, and Stanton was a very sharp guy. I don't for a second think he was fooled and there is no evidence he was fooled. That is pure speculation on your part. And it kind of flies in the face of what we know about Lincoln.

My understanding is that Stanton had officers look over Mac's numbers and they found many mistakes. Blenker was included, even though he was scheduled to go to Fremont. About 19,000 troops did not exist and were double counted, and the troops in the Valley were deemed too far away to be effective. If this is the opinion of those officers, how did Stanton gaslight Lincoln?

So here's the problem with this understanding.

Firstly - if Stanton found "mistakes", then cite those mistakes being pointed out before 1st Corps was removed. It is my understanding that no such mistakes were found before 1st Corps was removed.

The issue of troops in the Valley being too far away to be effective was not used as part of the argument to remove 1st Corps, and nor should it have been. If the troops in the Valley are too far away, then move them - McClellan left more than 25,000 men in the covering force, and if the problem is that it was decided that troops in the Valley don't count for the covering force, move them to Manassas.

As an aside, McClellan counted Blenker because that was where Blenker was going to be moved to, and because he had secured the option to retain Blenker unless Blenker was not needed. Also, it's not "19,000" troops not existing or double counted - instead, 7,780 men are double counted and troops who are en route but have not yet arrived are counted where they will be once they have arrived; as those troops arrive, Blenker will be moved from Manassas to the Valley and then finally released to Fremont if the situation is secure without him.

Secondly, though - and the reason why I say that Lincoln was fooled - is what was subsequently done with those troops. There is no way whatsoever that Washington is more secure like this:

Actual configuration in May

Than like this:

McClellan's defence scheme, actual numbers, no new troops counted, no Blenker

(Note: this discounts all the new troops scheduled to arrive, some 9,000 of them, and also removes Blenker. It is the smallest possible amount under McClellan's scheme. Any smaller than this and you're not counting troops which were already present.)


So - what about the actual configuration as of May meets the requirements, in a way that McClellan's defence scheme does not?

 

[atlantis]

There is a certain amount of office politics at general grade rank, perhaps musing that the Commander in Chief is a genial primate is where things began to go awry.
Bottom line McCellan was not skilled in politics if he had been he would have understood he had a constituency of one-THE PRESIDENT.
To carry out his military assignment he needed to invest effort in gaining the full trust and support of the president, he did not and thus was sidelined. There is no sabotage here just the usual office politics that go on at high level of gov't both civil and military.
McCellan was without doubt a man of great ability and would have made an outstanding Adjunct and inspector general.

 

[Saphroneth]

To carry out his military assignment he needed to invest effort in gaining the full trust and support of the president, he did not and thus was sidelined.

Part of the issue here is that this is presented as solely a fault of McClellan - McClellan had in fact by March 13 got Lincoln's approval for the Urbana plan about three separate times, but Lincoln kept changing his mind. How many times does McClellan need to get Lincoln's approval for a plan before he can be sure that it's been accepted?

 

[Saphroneth]

Actual configuration in May

Than like this:

McClellan's defence scheme, actual numbers, no new troops counted, no Blenker

(Note: this discounts all the new troops scheduled to arrive, some 9,000 of them, and also removes Blenker. It is the smallest possible amount under McClellan's scheme. Any smaller than this and you're not counting troops which were already present.)


So - what about the actual configuration as of May meets the requirements, in a way that McClellan's defence scheme does not?

Notes:


By my count, the de minimis version of McClellan's defensive scheme has 3,000 more men in Washington than the miminum the corps commanders argued for, and 9,000 more men in the covering force than the minimum the corps commanders argued for. Total: 12,000 excess over the corps commander requirements.

The actual May configuration has a covering force of <14,000 (11,000 less than the minimum) and 2,000 fewer men in Washington than the minimum the corps commanders argued for.

Total: 13,000 deficit over the corps commander requirements.

Despite having 14,000 more men it has actually got 25,000 fewer men defending Washington - what a waste!