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QUESTION: A US built steamer, transferred to Mexican ownership, was captured in the Mexican-American War. Among its missions for the US was to carry a party of officers to reconnoiter Vera Cruz. In that party were six officers who would command armies in the Civil War.

1) What was the ship?

2) Who were the six officers who later commanded armies?

credit: @hughes

Edit - This question calls for seven different answers. According to the rules, a question can ask for no more than six. Therefore, any answer that correctly identifies the ship and at least five of the six officers will be considered correct.

hoosier
 
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1. USS Petrita 2. R E Lee, P G T Beauregard, Joe Johnston, George Meade, Gideon Pillow, Robert Patterson, and a seventh, David E Twiggs who served briefly as a CS general and another source has George McClellan present

Edit - Twiggs did serve briefly as a Confederate general but did not command an army during the Civil War. Since you named seven other generals who did command armies during the Civil War, you get credit for a correct answer.

hoosier
 
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1) What was the ship? USS Petrita.
2) Who were the six officers who later commanded armies? P.G.T. Beauregard, Joseph E. Johnston, Robert E. Lee, George G. Meade, George B. McClellan, Robert Patterson.

 
1. USS Petrita
2. Robert E. Lee (Army of Northern VA), Joe Johnston (Multiple army commands), PGT Beauregard (Army of Mississippi), Winfield Scott (Senior officer of US Army), George Meade (Army of the Potomac), Robert Patterson (Army of the Shenandoah). Gideon Pillow commanded something called the "Army of Liberation," but not typically considered a true "Army." https://civilwartalk.com/threads/10-9-19.162853/#post-2137735
 
1) USS Petrita

2)
a) Robert E. Lee
b) Joseph E. Johnston
c) Pierre G. T. Beauregard
d) George Meade
e) Winfield Scott
f) George McClellan
Regards
David


Source
25 Major John Smith, Captain R.E. Lee, and Lieutenants P.G.T. Beauregard and George McClellan were with Totten as regular engineers (Corps of Engineers). Among those at Veracruz in the Corps of Topographical Engineers were Major William Turnbull; Scott’s chief “topog,” Captain Joseph E. Johnston; and Lieutenant George G. Meade. See Adrian George Traas, From the Golden Gate to Mexico City: The U.S. Army Topographical Engineers in the Mexican War, 1846–1848 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1993), pp. 5, 6, 182–84. Also see Gustavus W. Smith, “Company A Engineers in Mexico, 1846–1847,” The Military Engineer, vol. 56, no. 373 (September–October 1964), pp. 336–40.
D-Day Veracruz, 1847 - A Grand Design
 
QUESTION: A US built steamer, transferred to Mexican ownership, was captured in the Mexican-American War. Among its missions for the US was to carry a party of officers to reconnoiter Vera Cruz. In that party were six officers who would command armies in the Civil War.

1) What was the ship?

2) Who were the six officers who later commanded armies?

credit: @hughes
(1) Sources differ. Most say that Commodore David Connor with Scott and his entourage were in USS Petrita. Hitchcock's first-hand account says it was USS Champion.
(2) Aboard were "General Scott with Generals [Robert] Patterson, [Gideon] Pillow, [William J.] Worth and their respective Staffs."
These included Brigadier General Persifor F. Smith, Col. Joseph G. Totten, Lt. Col. Ethan A. Hitchcock; Captains Joseph E. Johnston and Robert E. Lee; First Lieutenant P. G. T. Beauregard; Second Lieutenant George G. Meade; Second Lieutenant Zealous B. Tower.
During the American Civil War:

  • Patterson served as Major General of Pennsylvania Volunteers and commanded the Department of Pennsylvania and the Army of the Shenandoah.
  • Totten served as Chief Engineer of the U. S. Army, achieving the rank of Brigadier General and Brevet Major General.
  • Hitchcock was commissioned Major General in 1861 and served in various administrative positions, including advisor to the Secretary of War and Chairman of the War Board.
  • Meade rose to command the Army of the Potomac, achieving the rank of Major General.
  • Tower served as a Brigadier General in the U. S. Army and, while convalescing from wounds suffered in Second Bull Run, as Superintendent of West Point. As an Engineer, he supervised the building of the defensive works at Nashville in 1864. He was breveted Major General of Volunteers.
  • Pillow, it may be recalled, served as a rebel Brigadier General under various commanders, chiefly in the Western Theater.
  • Most here are familiar with rebels Johnston, Lee, and Beauregard: Johnston and Beauregard achieved the rank of General; Lee became General in Chief.
<"Petrita", Naval History and Heritage Command. https://www.history.navy.mil/conten...histories/ship-histories/danfs/p/petrita.html>
<Ethan A. Hitchcock, Fifty Years in Camp and Field (New York" George Putnam's Sons, 1909), p. 237.>
<George G. Meade, The Life and Letters of George Gordon Meade. (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1913), Vol. I, p. 187.>


Edit - You will get credit for a correct response. I note, however, that a similar question, posed by the same player and based on the same source, was used in the game during 2019. At that time, I researched the issue of whether the ship in question could have been the USS Champion, and found that while there have been four vessels known by that name, none of them were in service during the Mexican war. I'm not sure who Hitchcock was, but his recollection of the ship's name may have been faulty.

hoosier
 
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1) Petrita

2) Robert E. Lee (Army of Northern Virginia), P. G. T. Beauregard (Army of Mississippi), Joseph E. Johnston (Army of Tennessee), George G. Meade (Army of the Potomac), Gideon Johnson Pillow (Provisional Army of Tennessee, Army of Liberation), Robert Patterson (Army of the Shenandoah) - and Winfield Scott (Commanding General of the United States Army),
 
1) The ship was USS Petrita

2) The six future commanders of Civil War armies were
  • Winfield Scott himself
  • Robert E. Lee
  • Joseph E. Johnston
  • Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard
  • George Meade
  • George Brinton McClellan

Snip-it_1614206514239.jpg
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Source

Snip-it_1614207236315.jpg

Source
 
  • USS Petrita
  • Winfield Scott, Robert Lee, George Meade, Joe Johnston, P.G.T. Beauregard
SOURCE:
So Far From God, John Eisenhower

Edit - I am at a loss to understand why the question asked for the names of six men who were aboard the Petrita and later commanded armies during the Civil War, and then the official answer only names five.

It appears that, according to various sources, there were at least three more: George McClellan, Robert Patterson, and Gideon Pillow. Any answer that named at least five of the eight was counted as correct.

hoosier
 
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