Comparing Picketts Charge w/ Charge up Missionary Ridge and Longstreet at Chickamauga

I agree wholeheartely that the duties of a CinC are many. In most cases when a battle occurs it is a spontaneous thing and the general has to assume that his subordinates have done their basic duties. Lookout Mt is a very different scenario. The Confederate position had been in place for months. There is no way that Bragg would not have noticed his artillery misplacement in that amount of time.

Last month I went on extended vacation eventually going from Augusta Ga to San Francisco. The first part of my trip I meandered through Tenn, Ky, Mo and Miss. visiting battlefields. I believe that in every single battlefield I've visited where Bragg was in charge that I've come across some reference to his failure to properly use his artillery.
Your claim that the reb's had had their artillery in position on Missionary Ridge for months is at best hyperbolic. (And what's that to do with Lookout Mtn or Lookout Valley, which was 2 miles and 2 mountains away from Bragg's headquarters?!) At best the Reb guns were "in position," or "out of position" for 6 wks, and that's a maximum. More likely it had been a few weeks at best. This notion that Bragg, commander in chief of the western army for much of this period, was to blame for poor artillery placement in a whole series of battles over a 2 yrs period is simply astonishing. He's been flogged for everything conceivable for 150 yrs, but I've never heard of this chronic artillery deficiency, and his primary role in it's occurrence, till this forum. Pretty ironic for a guy made famous in the Mexican War by Gen Taylor's nickname of "Give 'em more grape, Mr. Bragg," which Taylor said as he admired the manner with which Bragg was mowing down the charging lines of Mexican troops?!
 
Your claim that the reb's had had their artillery in position on Missionary Ridge for months is at best hyperbolic. (And what's that to do with Lookout Mtn or Lookout Valley, which was 2 miles and 2 mountains away from Bragg's headquarters?!) At best the Reb guns were "in position," or "out of position" for 6 wks, and that's a maximum. More likely it had been a few weeks at best. This notion that Bragg, commander in chief of the western army for much of this period, was to blame for poor artillery placement in a whole series of battles over a 2 yrs period is simply astonishing. He's been flogged for everything conceivable for 150 yrs, but I've never heard of this chronic artillery deficiency, and his primary role in it's occurrence, till this forum. Pretty ironic for a guy made famous in the Mexican War by Gen Taylor's nickname of "Give 'em more grape, Mr. Bragg," which Taylor said as he admired the manner with which Bragg was mowing down the charging lines of Mexican troops?!
Will you admit that they were in fact out of position? If so 6 hrs or 6 mos, no difference. The simple fact is that Bragg had sufficient artillery in place that if properly sighted should have easily repelled ANY Union attack up the mt.

If he failed to inspect the position, he is derelict. If he fails to note the improper positioning, he is derelict. Given Scott's well known disregard for any officer less than himself. His assessment of Bragg's performance could not be repeated in a grammar school.
 
Burnside and Hooker were gone from the US army at Gettysburg by the time the battle occurred. George Meade was in command. Grant stuck with him, despite the ups and downs, through the rest of the war. Meade made very few mistakes from Gettysburg onward.
Burnside and Hooker were in subordinate positions in Tennessee. George Thomas was in charge and Grant was taking responsibility. So by the time of Gettysburg the trend was established, unless the US commander got caught in an error, such as at Chickamauga, the US army was likely to win.
 
The Confederate army at Gettysburg was not large enough to find the flank of the US Army. Both flanks of the Army of the Potomac were stable by the third day. The opposite condition prevailed at Chattanooga. The three divisions under Hooker pulled apart the left flank of the Confederate army on the 24th of November. On the 25th, they had an enormous amount of room on the west end of Missionary Ridge to find a favorable point of attack. It set a pattern. Sherman did the same thing at the end of the Atlanta campaign. Sheridan did at Wincheter III. Thomas did at Nashville. Finally Sheridan and Griffin found a weak spot in the extended Confederate line at Five Forks.
 
Confederate artillery was relatively ineffective at both Gettysburg and Chattanooga. In most Civil War battles, the range at which the artillery was engaged mattered. But the US normally had the advantage in caissons, and could fire a large number of rounds and still keep firing.
 
The force of an attack most likely is dependent on its mass, and the square of its velocity. Both attacks had sufficient mass. But the Confederate attack at Gettysburg was losing mass and velocity to artillery casualties. At Chattanooga, the absence of artillery in the front line entrenchments, and the diminished fighting response of the Confederate infantry did little to slow down the speed of the US advance. The US attack on Chattanooga slowed down on the ridge and paused at the crest. But by that time the US probably had approximately 7 divisions involved. The linear component, shear numbers, was probably enough to collapse the Confederate line.
 
Will you admit that they were in fact out of position? If so 6 hrs or 6 mos, no difference. The simple fact is that Bragg had sufficient artillery in place that if properly sighted should have easily repelled ANY Union attack up the mt.

If he failed to inspect the position, he is derelict. If he fails to note the improper positioning, he is derelict. Given Scott's well known disregard for any officer less than himself. His assessment of Bragg's performance could not be repeated in a grammar school.
You lost me. Who the hell is Scott, & why is he mentioned? Did u mean Zachary Taylor? Dunno what grammar school has to do with anything either. Sorry, ur just too sharp for me to keep up?!
 
Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. I indeed intended to say Taylor not Scott (It's my mental state that I generally infer Winfield Scott to anything about the Mexican War.)

Let me make it simple. Bragg was the general in chief at Chatanooga. His specialty was artillery. Either he inspected the artillery cited at Lookout Mt or he grossly failed to inspect them. If he did inspect them he should immediately have realized that they were cited where they would be unable to fire DOWN on attacking Federal troops. In either case he allowed Union troops an easy avenue to total victory.

Can you imagine the stain on Grant's reputation had this attack where Sherman did not even attack the correct mountain, had Thomas been repulsed by savage artillery fire.
 
Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. I indeed intended to say Taylor not Scott (It's my mental state that I generally infer Winfield Scott to anything about the Mexican War.)

Let me make it simple. Bragg was the general in chief at Chatanooga. His specialty was artillery. Either he inspected the artillery cited at Lookout Mt or he grossly failed to inspect them. If he did inspect them he should immediately have realized that they were cited where they would be unable to fire DOWN on attacking Federal troops. In either case he allowed Union troops an easy avenue to total victory.

Can you imagine the stain on Grant's reputation had this attack where Sherman did not even attack the correct mountain, had Thomas been repulsed by savage artillery fire.
Grant didn't even order the assault on Missionary Ridge at Chat in the first place. It was supposed to be a demonstration to pull troops away from Sherman's attack, which was the main attack, which of course, failed miserably thanks the Cleburne. But, back to Bragg, your contention that it was a massive blunder for Bragg to have not inspected the rifle pit placements and the trenches at the top as well as the placement of artillery at the geographical crest is folly. No general with his vast responsibilities would have been expected to do such micro managing, esp at a location that was so difficult to access that they had trouble keeping the troops manning those lines FED!?
 
Grant didn't even order the assault on Missionary Ridge at Chat in the first place. It was supposed to be a demonstration to pull troops away from Sherman's attack, which was the main attack, which of course, failed miserably thanks the Cleburne. But, back to Bragg, your contention that it was a massive blunder for Bragg to have not inspected the rifle pit placements and the trenches at the top as well as the placement of artillery at the geographical crest is folly. No general with his vast responsibilities would have been expected to do such micro managing, esp at a location that was so difficult to access that they had trouble keeping the troops manning those lines FED!?
We have blogged about this extensively in Chattanooga topics. Most of what you have written is incorrect. Bragg's error was deciding to defend a position that had never been prepared as a defensive position.
 
We have blogged about this extensively in Chattanooga topics. Most of what you have written is incorrect. Bragg's error was deciding to defend a position that had never been prepared as a defensive position.
"We" haven't done any such thing, and, while ur certainly entitled to your opinion about my correctness, it's still only your opinion. I spent many years studying the OR and other sources about Bragg's decisions between Chicka and Chatta/Knox, and it seems unlikely that you could make a similar claim. The general consensus on both sides during the interim was that the ridge was impregnable - that it would be impossible to take the ridge - even before the ridge had been occupied by anyone! But, anyway, that wasn't the dispute?! Our dispute is over whether Bragg was to blame for the disposition of the artillery at or near the crest of the ridge. Since u keep throwing red herrings at the debate over whether the ridge was impregnable, it seems a stretch to blame Bragg for not micromanaging his artillery placements over 100s of yards of difficult ground, difficult both to walk, let alone find a good spot from which to get a good view?!
 
Grant didn't even order the assault on Missionary Ridge at Chat in the first place. It was supposed to be a demonstration to pull troops away from Sherman's attack, which was the main attack, which of course, failed miserably thanks the Cleburne. But, back to Bragg, your contention that it was a massive blunder for Bragg to have not inspected the rifle pit placements and the trenches at the top as well as the placement of artillery at the geographical crest is folly. No general with his vast responsibilities would have been expected to do such micro managing, esp at a location that was so difficult to access that they had trouble keeping the troops manning those lines FED!?
The very linchpin of Bragg's strategy was a successful defense of Lookout Mt., especially having failed to retain Missionary Ridge. Given the disparity in numbers his success relied absolutely on proper use of his artillery. It would have been the absolute priority of any general be it Lee, Jackson, Stuart, Johnson, Johnston, Forrest or BillyBob Buckwheat to personally inspect his artillery and correct any deviations. We're not talking about an onerous task which would have taken days. Had he taken the time it would have cost him less than an hour. Maybe less.

Lets put it another way. Suppose Napoleon had been magically transported to the CW and given command. His very first move would have been to personally supervise the positioning of his artillery, especially as that was his specialty as it was also of Bragg.

Imagine the consequences following Bragg's failure. With such a monumental failure at Chattanooga does Lincoln make the move to bring Grant east and make him CinC. Does Sherman also go down in flames after his monumental failure to even attack the proper hill. Is there ever a successful Atlanta campaign and following that a march to the Sea. Without Grant who commands the AoP and ruthlessly ignores massive casualties in another version of the Overland Campaign and finally finds a way to successfully invest Richmond via Petersburg.

So yes I maintain Bragg's failure is a monumental lapse in command.
 
The very linchpin of Bragg's strategy was a successful defense of Lookout Mt., especially having failed to retain Missionary Ridge. Given the disparity in numbers his success relied absolutely on proper use of his artillery. It would have been the absolute priority of any general be it Lee, Jackson, Stuart, Johnson, Johnston, Forrest or BillyBob Buckwheat to personally inspect his artillery and correct any deviations. We're not talking about an onerous task which would have taken days. Had he taken the time it would have cost him less than an hour. Maybe less.

Lets put it another way. Suppose Napoleon had been magically transported to the CW and given command. His very first move would have been to personally supervise the positioning of his artillery, especially as that was his specialty as it was also of Bragg.

Imagine the consequences following Bragg's failure. With such a monumental failure at Chattanooga does Lincoln make the move to bring Grant east and make him CinC. Does Sherman also go down in flames after his monumental failure to even attack the proper hill. Is there ever a successful Atlanta campaign and following that a march to the Sea. Without Grant who commands the AoP and ruthlessly ignores massive casualties in another version of the Overland Campaign and finally finds a way to successfully invest Richmond via Petersburg.

So yes I maintain Bragg's failure is a monumental lapse in command.
"Imagine" you had a sounder grip on the battle itself let alone the issues leading up to it?! And, btw, artillery was never the key in anyone's mind to maintaining the lines on Missionary Ridge?! Never. The key was defense vs offense. The Rule of thumb then was that the offense needed 3x the troops of anyone on the defensive to prevail. No artillery required for that calculation. As such, Bragg had plenty of troops, for maintaining a defensive on Missionary Ridge, at least temporarily. That this turned out to not be the case was as big a surprise to Grant as it was to Bragg! Grant even concedes the point in his memoirs, despite its being chock full of 20/20 hindsight-based 2nd guessing.
 
"Imagine" you had a sounder grip on the battle itself let alone the issues leading up to it?! And, btw, artillery was never the key in anyone's mind to maintaining the lines on Missionary Ridge?! Never. The key was defense vs offense. The Rule of thumb then was that the offense needed 3x the troops of anyone on the defensive to prevail. No artillery required for that calculation. As such, Bragg had plenty of troops, for maintaining a defensive on Missionary Ridge, at least temporarily. That this turned out to not be the case was as big a surprise to Grant as it was to Bragg! Grant even concedes the point in his memoirs, despite its being chock full of 20/20 hindsight-based 2nd guessing.
What would have been the outcome of the battle had the artillery been properly sited?
 
For me, I don’t see Chickamauga and Gettysburg as being similar at all. I don’t think that Chattanooga was similar to either of them, either and bearing almost no similarity to Chickamauga.
 
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