Braxton Bragg

[vernon13]

Poor Bragg maybe should have picked another profession. In Mexico, his men tried to kill him twice by rolling shells under his bed while he slept. Lost a couple beds that way!

check My Life in the Old Army: The Reminiscences of Abner Doubleday. In the back notes pg 293 a letter dated June 24, 1851 where Samuel R. Church, boosted he was the man who attempted to kill Braxton Bragg by placing those artillery shells under his bunk. He was a deserter, horse thief and spend most of his army career in the stockade, and eventually hung on 12 February 1852 in Stockton Ca.

 

[AndyHall]

Collapsed in the street, right near where that manhole cover is now, and died soon after.

 

[vernon13]

Thanks Great picture!!!!

 

[JeffBrooks]

In fairness to Bragg, he did have Leonidas Polk as a corps commander. I'm pretty sure even Lee would have found that hard to deal with.

 

[Cumpston1862]

So I was reading about Chickamauga and Bragg while the kids were watching a show and I look up and who do I see...?



Expired Image Removed

 

[BillO]

In fairness to Bragg, he did have Leonidas Polk as a corps commander. I'm pretty sure even Lee would have found that hard to deal with.

If Polk had been under Lee he might have fared better but if he still acted poorly in short order he would be the new district commander in lower east bumtoss.

 

[AndyHall]

Lee made Magruder the new district commander in lower east bumtoss Texas, and that worked out rather well.

 

[James N.]

If Polk had been under Lee he might have fared better but if he still acted poorly in short order he would be the new district commander in lower east bumtoss.

Lee made Magruder the new district commander in lower east bumtoss Texas, and that worked out rather well.

He also got rid of Benjamin Huger and Theopholis H. Holmes in similar fashion, and in at least Holmes' case as commander of the Department of Arkansas it didn't work out too well!

 

[diane]

Lol! Sometimes I think the west suffered a good deal from being Lee's trash can! Seemed every screwball he got rid of landed out west just in time to do the most damage. Bragg had to work with a lot of Lee's rejects and they more often than not used their own heads or ignored orders altogether. Polk, however, was a burden no one should have had to bear. His continued presence with Bragg was entirely Davis' fault. Davis simply could not or would not see that his good pal was not good for the Confederate cause. (At least Lincoln had a far western Siberia he could send his screwballs to - they could always fight Indians someplace!)

 

[Mike Serpa]

Not to be confused with Commander McBragg

 

[rbasin]

Positive things about Bragg: he did no worse than break even against Buell and Rosecrans. Lost to Grant and parts of 3 armies.

Not the most revered guy, but what was he going to do against the 3 Federal Armies in the west?

 

[Zuzah]

Positive things about Bragg: he did no worse than break even against Buell and Rosecrans. Lost to Grant and parts of 3 armies.

Not the most revered guy, but what was he going to do against the 3 Federal Armies in the west?

Like Clinton and Burgoyne 90 years earlier, surrender to a superior fighting force, or lose devastatingly.

 

[rbasin]

Bragg got somewhat of a raw deal. Though he did not help himself.

 

[Zuzah]

Bragg got somewhat of a raw deal. Though he did not help himself.

Yeah, well, can't always pick your own battles. I'm sure Jefferson Davis had complete faith in his abilities at one point.

 

[rbasin]

On paper, he had the experience, and he had some skill. Maybe he was in that McClellan mold, in that he was good at strategy, but should not have been in command of an army. He maybe could have been a General-in-Chief. Though that would have been hard to do with Davis.

 

[rhp6033]

I get some take on Bragg's leadership style at Chickamauga. During the first day's battle he pushes into combat just as Longstreet's two divisions are ariving - one at a time, which he feeds piecemeal into the fray. He re-organizes the army during the night of the cruicial combat. Then he claims that Longstreet will have the "left wing" of the army to command, but sends no guides or horses for them (Longstreet and staff horses were still in Atlanta). Finally Longstreet wrangles horses in the darkness and heads off to find Bragg's headquarters - on the Confederate side of the creek, in a spot where even their own messengers could not find them. After almost getting captured stumbling into Union lines, Longstreet finds Bragg's headquarters, where he has already gone to bed. After awakening Bragg the army commander gives a swift layout of the lines at the end of the day and says he is to lead the left flank, but he then goes to bed.

I can't imagine Lee or Grant or Meade leaving things up in the air like that - they would have had headquarters staff persons waiting for each train, telling infantry units where to march, and when Longstreet arrived they would have mounts and led them to Bragg's headquarters.

 

[James N.]

I get some take on Bragg's leadership style at Chickamauga...

Chattanooga's even worse - Bragg ( a trained artilleryman ) did almost nothing to improve the initial position he'd taken up in September at the beginning of the siege when all he faced was Rosecrans' defeated and demoralized army. Instead, he weakened his army by a third, sending his nemesis Longstreet to Knoxville on a fool's errand just to get rid of him. He complained about his cavalry doing little to keep him informed but did nothing to correct the problem. When the attack came, most of his troops were improperly positioned ( including and especially the artillery ) to recieve it. At a council of war held immediately prior he grasped at straws accepting Breckinridge's overly confident apprasial that they could successfully repel an attack with no evidence to confirm such wishful thinking. Instead, he decided to further weaken his position by sending Cleburne's Division to Longstreet. ( Fortunately that didn't happen. ) He was almost overtaken and captured at his own headquarters and jeered by his fleeing troops.

It couldn'tve happened to a nicer, more deserving guy - it's just too bad it was such a disaster for his army and the Confederacy.

 

[rhp6033]

Chattanooga's even worse - Bragg ( a trained artilleryman ) did almost nothing to improve the initial position he'd taken up in September at the beginning of the siege when all he faced was Rosecrans' defeated and demoralized army. Instead, he weakened his army by a third, sending his nemesis Longstreet to Knoxville on a fool's errand just to get rid of him. He complained about his cavalry doing little to keep him informed but did nothing to correct the problem. When the attack came, most of his troops were improperly positioned ( including and especially the artillery ) to recieve it. At a council of war held immediately prior he grasped at straws accepting Breckinridge's overly confident apprasial that they could successfully repel an attack with no evidence to confirm such wishful thinking. Instead, he decided to further weaken his position by sending Cleburne's Division to Longstreet. ( Fortunately that didn't happen. ) He was almost overtaken and captured at his own headquarters and jeered by his fleeing troops.

It couldn'tve happened to a nicer, more deserving guy - it's just too bad it was such a disaster for his army and the Confederacy.

Yes, I didn't even get into the management (or mis-management) at Chickamauga, the seige of Chattanooga which really wasn't a seige, or the failure to use Missionary Ridge as anything more than a long-range artillary platform. He didn't even order positions and entrenchements on the ridge until the night before the attack, and the soldier's couldn't dig in the granite boulders - they just piled them up, which made them projectiles when the attack began.

As the army retreated from Missionary Ridge, they passed the supply depot. These soldiers had been on less than half-rations for months, and were enraged to see the bacon, etc. being consumed in a fire, and under guard. Bragg could have at least let the units take what they could carry with them, but he was too much a disciplinarian for that - better the soldiers starve than an unauthorized distribution of food occur!

 

[rbasin]

I get some take on Bragg's leadership style at Chickamauga. During the first day's battle he pushes into combat just as Longstreet's two divisions are ariving - one at a time, which he feeds piecemeal into the fray. He re-organizes the army during the night of the cruicial combat. Then he claims that Longstreet will have the "left wing" of the army to command, but sends no guides or horses for them (Longstreet and staff horses were still in Atlanta). Finally Longstreet wrangles horses in the darkness and heads off to find Bragg's headquarters - on the Confederate side of the creek, in a spot where even their own messengers could not find them. After almost getting captured stumbling into Union lines, Longstreet finds Bragg's headquarters, where he has already gone to bed. After awakening Bragg the army commander gives a swift layout of the lines at the end of the day and says he is to lead the left flank, but he then goes to bed.

I can't imagine Lee or Grant or Meade leaving things up in the air like that - they would have had headquarters staff persons waiting for each train, telling infantry units where to march, and when Longstreet arrived they would have mounts and led them to Bragg's headquarters.

I get some take on Bragg's leadership style at Chickamauga. During the first day's battle he pushes into combat just as Longstreet's two divisions are ariving - one at a time, which he feeds piecemeal into the fray. He re-organizes the army during the night of the cruicial combat. Then he claims that Longstreet will have the "left wing" of the army to command, but sends no guides or horses for them (Longstreet and staff horses were still in Atlanta). Finally Longstreet wrangles horses in the darkness and heads off to find Bragg's headquarters - on the Confederate side of the creek, in a spot where even their own messengers could not find them. After almost getting captured stumbling into Union lines, Longstreet finds Bragg's headquarters, where he has already gone to bed. After awakening Bragg the army commander gives a swift layout of the lines at the end of the day and says he is to lead the left flank, but he then goes to bed.

I can't imagine Lee or Grant or Meade leaving things up in the air like that - they would have had headquarters staff persons waiting for each train, telling infantry units where to march, and when Longstreet arrived they would have mounts and led them to Bragg's headquarters.

But didn't Lee do basically the same thing at Gettysburg. And Grant wasn't far off at Shiloh.

 

[rhp6033]

Lee and Grant fed men piece-meal into the fighting. It's best to be avoided, but sometimes you have no other choice. Grant's experience is the most similar, in that Buell's men were involved, causing some problems with unit cohesion.

But I think the rest of it is evidence of Bragg's failure as a leader. You have to wonder if he wanted Longstreet's men, but not Longstreet - he might have been satisfied if Longstreet had been captured while looking for Bragg's headquarters. Maybe he didn't want to share the credit with others?