McClellans's folly

That agrees with everything I've read. Jomini's tactics favored the idea of winning battles without firing a shot due to maneuver and all that. But if you have large armies of essentially civilian soldiers, the Napoleonic way of doing things can be dispensed with. There's no need to conserve those small 18th century armies that were so hard to raise and train, as well as expensive to maintain.

Though ironically, the Napoleonic way of doing things is both aggressive and using large armies (more conscripts, I think, but still).

The word "fail" comes to mind for those who sought to use such armies in other ways.
 
Though ironically, the Napoleonic way of doing things is both aggressive and using large armies (more conscripts, I think, but still).

The word "fail" comes to mind for those who sought to use such armies in other ways.
Napoleon did have large armies that could be supplied by better means than the Brits had against us. Someone even invented a way to boil soup and put it in a wine bottle to keep it from spoiling. So Napoleon could play fast and loose with lives the way no Brit could in America. One of their shortcomings in the Revolution was that they almost never moved without a huge supply train following in their wake. It really slowed them down. But they also broke with the rules and frontally assaulted at Breed's Hill (Bunker Hill), and the results almost ruined them. The Brits in America far better reflect the sort of thing McClellan wanted to do, than say, Napoleon in Russia.
 
Unfortunately, McClellan was operating in vastly different circumstances.

I wouldn't mind if he wasn't "free with lives" if he just spent sweat instead of blood.
 
Unfortunately, McClellan was operating in vastly different circumstances.

I wouldn't mind if he wasn't "free with lives" if he just spent sweat instead of blood.
There's just something about his personality or mindset that won't allow him to innovate.
 
The strangest thing about it is that it didn't prevent him from coming up with...fantastic...ideas.

I will never get over the idea of him finding an army of 273,000 as the army for the main army of operations to be a good idea. That's just so mind numbing...something.
 
The strangest thing about it is that it didn't prevent him from coming up with...fantastic...ideas.

I will never get over the idea of him finding an army of 273,000 as the army for the main army of operations to be a good idea. That's just so mind numbing...something.
With an army that big, he thinks the imaginary huge army he faces will be compelled to retire without a fight. Problem is, at some point his opponent MUST fight.
 
I'm not even sure it was involving without a fight. I should dig out the link to where McClellan is going on about it. It seems...fantastic, and not in the praiseworthy sense.

The enemy even reacting seems to be neglected.
 
I understand that in ancient Rome, during it's days as a Republic, Victorious Roman generals were allowed a great parade before the citizens of Rome, and traditionally,at the victorious general's side was placed a slave who whispered in the victor's ear something to the effect that 'this too shall pass away' as a prediction and warning.
McClellan, seemed to have had someone around him, who always asked 'But, General, are you sure?'
 
I understand that in ancient Rome, during it's days as a Republic, Victorious Roman generals were allowed a great parade before the citizens of Rome, and traditionally,at the victorious general's side was placed a slave who whispered in the victor's ear something to the effect that 'this too shall pass away' as a prediction and warning.
McClellan, seemed to have had someone around him, who always asked 'But, General, are you sure?'
"Remember, thou art mortal," was the way I heard it.
 
At least the roman general would have had to have done something to earn a parade. Someone here said that he couldn't innovate, I would have to argue that point. He invented a much improved saddle and he wrote some very well recieved and thoughtful accounts from Europe on how to organize and equip an army in the field. The man built a beatiful weapon, he just couldn't bring himself to pull the trigger.
 
McClellan did lead to the fall of Norfolk. That does have to count for something.

But given how the rest of his campaigning sees lives thrown away because when it comes time to press home, there's always a reason to hold back, I can't really say that deserved a triumph in the old sense.
 
McClellan did lead to the fall of Norfolk. That does have to count for something.

No, the movement against Norfolk was by Wool and was ordered by Lincoln directly. The troops that carried it out were originally promised to McClellan but were not in fact under his command.

McClellan had however been pressing Washington to do exactly this, although he suggested Burnside rather than Wool have the honour.
 
Well, that leaves McClellan's great expedition to the Peninsula as entirely profitless. Except possibly for the attrition and knocking out a potentially good general (Elzey).

I liked the idea that he at least had some role in the fall of Norfolk better.

Incidentally, what of these troops were originally assigned to the Army of the Potomac (as distinct from McClellan's all-Union-forces overall command): http://ehistory.osu.edu/osu/sources/recordview.cfm?content=/014/0054 ?
 
If Burnside that been tasked with the occupation of Norfolk we would be discussing the "Bloody Battle of Norfolk".
 
In fairness, Burnside seems to have handled small independent command reasonably well. Also, why would the Confederates put up more of a fight vs. Burnside than Wool?
 
He intended and he actually had them specifically assigned are two different things.

Also, given McClellan, him moving more swiftly seems...well, let me put it this way. McClellan's whole Civil War career is a litany of excuses against swiftness.
 
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