Evacuating the Peninsula

[Belfoured]

While I realize this is to some extent a matter of interpretation, what he actually says in his letter to Halleck is an urging that he be sent all the disposable troops. What he's doing is requesting everything that can be spared, because the Confederates have already concentrated everything that can be spared at Richmond to defend it.




"Allow me to urge most strongly that all the troops of Burnside and Hunter* together with all that can possibly be spared from other points**, be sent to me at once. I am sure that you will agree with me that the true defense of Washington consists in a rapid and heavy blow given by this army upon Richmond.

Can you not possibly draw 15,000 or 20,000 men from the West to re-enforce me temporarily***? They can return the moment we gain Richmond. Please give weight to this suggestion; I am sure it merits it."



* this is the stuff he was already promised and which Halleck said he could be given - Burnside and Hunter both contributed troops to what would become 9th Corps
** this might be anything from, say, Pope's force - Pope at this point has about 60,000 men and that's more than is needed to hold a strict defensive - or from, for example, the forces defending Baltimore which is dozens of miles behind the front lines
*** and this is anything from Halleck's army, because McClellan was originally promised 25,000 men from this army by Lincoln; Halleck refused because of the planned offensive into East Tennessee, but that offensive hasn't happened and it wouldn't happen. This is not an unrealistic suggestion.

However, notably, McClellan is not saying "I won't attack unless I get these troops" or anything like that. He is suggesting to Halleck - who is, after all, the person who should be asked - that this would help.

As we subsequently see in early August, McClellan is willing to attack even without reinforcement - but what he's not willing to do is to attack a stronger enemy when he has been promised reinforcements who will soon arrive.

Seriously? In "early August" - for most people August 4 qualifies - McClellan says [OR Vol. XI Part 1 at 81]:

"make it my imperative duty to urge in the strongest terms afforded by our language that this order may be rescinded, and that far from recalling this army, it may be promptly re-enforced to enable it to resume the offensive. It may be said that there are no re-enforcements available. I point to Burnside's force; to that of Pope, not necessary to maintain a strict defensive in front of Washington and Harper's Ferry; to those portions of the Army of the West not required for a strict defensive there. Here, directly in front of this army, is the heart of the rebellion. It is here that all our resources should be collected to strike the blow which will determine the fate of the nation. All points of secondary importance elsewhere should be abandoned, and every available man brought here; a decided victory here and the military strength of the rebellion is crushed. It matters not what partial reverses we may meet with elsewhere. Here is the true defense of Washington. It is here, on the banks of the James, that the fate of the Union should be decided."

He wasn't "willing to attack even without reinforcement". He wasn't "suggesting" that "this would help". He was using "the strongest terms afforded by our language" to urge that "every available man" be "brought" to him "to enable [his army] to resume the offensive".

Any historian who interpreted McClellan's August 4 message as less than that would be laughed out of a competent publisher's office. And if Halleck or anyone else reading the letter had interpreted it as you do he would have been an utter fool or badly in need of a lesson in reading plain English. Awfully inconvenient but the man wrote what he wrote. And stop just ignoring McClellan's other messages about the subject. That's how folks handle sources when their sole mission is coming up with arguments. It's not the approach of somebody who's interested in facts.

 

[tony_gunter]

While I realize this is to some extent a matter of interpretation, what he actually says in his letter to Halleck is an urging that he be sent all the disposable troops. What he's doing is requesting everything that can be spared, because the Confederates have already concentrated everything that can be spared at Richmond to defend it.




"Allow me to urge most strongly that all the troops of Burnside and Hunter* together with all that can possibly be spared from other points**, be sent to me at once. I am sure that you will agree with me that the true defense of Washington consists in a rapid and heavy blow given by this army upon Richmond.

Can you not possibly draw 15,000 or 20,000 men from the West to re-enforce me temporarily***? They can return the moment we gain Richmond. Please give weight to this suggestion; I am sure it merits it."



* this is the stuff he was already promised and which Halleck said he could be given - Burnside and Hunter both contributed troops to what would become 9th Corps
** this might be anything from, say, Pope's force - Pope at this point has about 60,000 men and that's more than is needed to hold a strict defensive - or from, for example, the forces defending Baltimore which is dozens of miles behind the front lines
*** and this is anything from Halleck's army, because McClellan was originally promised 25,000 men from this army by Lincoln; Halleck refused because of the planned offensive into East Tennessee, but that offensive hasn't happened and it wouldn't happen. This is not an unrealistic suggestion.

However, notably, McClellan is not saying "I won't attack unless I get these troops" or anything like that. He is suggesting to Halleck - who is, after all, the person who should be asked - that this would help.

As we subsequently see in early August, McClellan is willing to attack even without reinforcement - but what he's not willing to do is to attack a stronger enemy when he has been promised reinforcements who will soon arrive.

You may not call it an offensive, but there was definitely a campaign to take East Tennessee. Unfortunately it involved having Buell walk the 200 miles from Corinth to Chattanooga.