Swaping Middle Tennessee for Vicksburg

[Elennsar]

Elennsar,
Middle Tennessee was not as much as important as the Mississippi. If Tullahoma was occupied by the Federals, but Vicksburg relieved, the force Bragg ought to detach, alongside the bulk of Pemberton's force, would return to him and force the Federals back and accomplish something in the Ohio at the very moment Lee's army was into Pennsylvania.
Civil War Scholar.

Middle Tennessee was considerably more valuable to the Confederacy than a city that provided little if anything by this point in the war except the illusion that the Mississippi was not lost to the Confederacy.

But this falls apart on logistical grounds even if we grant Vicksburg superior importance to Tennessee.

Let's do some math.

http://ebooks.library.cornell.edu/cgi/t/text/pageviewer-idx?c=moawar;cc=moawar;q1=present for duty;rgn=full text;idno=waro0035;didno=waro0035;view=image;seq=0831

Johnston is ordered to go to Mississippi with 3,000 infantry on the 9th.

Let's say Bragg sends Polk's entire corps on the 9th.

That gives Johnston 20,457 infantry and artillery from Bragg (assuming that the troops historically sent from McCown's division are included in that)

They will very probably take longer than Stevenson's division took to reach Jackson back in December (three weeks) but in the interests of the most optimistic scenario, let's say it doesn't.

So they arrive on May 30.

It will take as long to send them back as it took to get them there - again, most likely longer if you add "the bulk of Pemberton's forces" to those needing to be sent, and presumably if you want Bragg able to take these troops into a campaign into Ohio the troops from Pembeton need their trains, which further delays their arrival.

But again, let's ignore that. And the time to relieve Vicksburg.

Rosecrans started the Tullahoma campaign on June 23. If Bragg has stripped his army of nearly half his infantry to reinforce Vicksburg, it is a pretty safe assumption that Rosecrans will move sooner than historically.

Even under the very best case scenario, that means that there is no chance of Bragg even being in Kentucky (even assuming he defeats Rosecrans) before Lee has left Pennsylvania - let alone "accomplishing something in Ohio".

So all this does is - at best - swap Middle Tennessee for Vicksburg. What gain is it to the Confederacy to lose Middle Tennessee, and very possibly East Tennessee with (among other things) valuable copper mines in exchange for limited at best control of a narrow stretch of the Mississippi?

It's all well and good to say "Vicksburg is important", but actually relieving it requires risking a great deal elsewhere - and in an area that is at least as threatened, as opposed to plans for stripping North Carolina to aid Lee or other secondary fronts.



Trice explains a lot about the logistics of moving troops around like this, if in a slightly different situation than you're proposing, here: http://civilwartalk.com/threads/confederate-strategy-in-may-june-1863-the-what-ifs.10013/

 

[Mark F. Jenkins]

Assuming that Union forces detected the move (and there's no reason to believe they wouldn't, as they were watching carefully for exactly this sort of thing), no matter if the Confederates attempted to shift troops to Vicksburg from Tennessee, or from Tennessee to Vicksburg, the Union could have done the same, and more rapidly. With the advantage of river transportation, the Union effectively held the interior lines. A zero-sum game at best.

 

[BelleBlackburn]

Got some battleground recognition here: http://press.tnvacation.com/news-ar...amed-top-10-southern-civil-war-battlegrounds/

 

[Civil War Scholar]

Elennsar,
Vicksburg and Port Hudson, when in Confederate hands, were keeping the Mississippi open to Confederate navigation. They could construct ships which would run the Union blockade or even challenge the blockaders.
If 20457 troops under Johnston arrived at the outskirts of Vicksburg on May 30, Pemberton has just over 30000 inside the city. Johnston's arrival gives him more than 50000, enough to drive Grant back.
Meanwhile, let's assume that Bragg is charged with the task to hold Rosecrans where he is, or yield the less ground he can. He orders a cavalry raid which keeps Rosecrans' attention for some days (in actual history, the raids in early 1863 kept Rosecrans from advancing for weeks). When Rosecrans turns again his attention to Bragg's main body, he withdraws to Chattanooga, where Rosecrans besieges him (an inversion of the actual Chattanooga siege).
Let's say that, by June 23, Bragg is ready to fall back, but Grant's threat has been minimized. Most of Pemberton's force and the detachments go to reinforce Bragg, while the rest of Pemberton's soldiers are diverting and feinting to keep Grant's eye fixed upon them.
The Army of the Cumberland would be surprised and forced back at the end of June, while Lee is in Pennsylvania.
Lincoln, seeing an imminent collapse of his western army, orders Meade to send heavy reinforcements. Lee goes forward and crushes Meade at Gettysburg, before the Union reinforcements reach Rosecrans.
The war would be over- with a CSA victory.
Civil War Scholar.

 

[Mark F. Jenkins]

Vicksburg and Port Hudson, when in Confederate hands, were keeping the Mississippi open to Confederate navigation. They could construct ships which would run the Union blockade or even challenge the blockaders.

I'll take this part. Neither Vicksburg nor Port Hudson had extensive shipbuilding facilities, and both were closely pressed by Union naval forces. They could not have constructed ships for either purpose.

Yazoo City up the Yazoo, and Shreveport up the Red River had limited shipbuilding capabilities, but not to the level of successfully competing with Union construction.

 

[Civil War Scholar]

Mark F. Jenkins,
Having the Confederates constructed ships in ports like Shreveport and Yazoo City, alongside the ones being made in English and French shipyards, a fleet enough to compete with the Union blockade would have been created.
Even if the Confederates didn't build ships after securing Vicksburg, having all the other points outlined in my previous post come into existence, England and France would have joined the war on the Confederate side. The Royal Navy would inflict a terrible wound on the US one, thus ending the Union blockade.
Civil War Scholar.

 

[Mark F. Jenkins]

You're making a large number of assumptions in a small number of sentences.

1. The Confederacy could not out-build the Union in ships to challenge the Union blockade. This was recognized from the outset, when Navy Secretary Mallory proposed armored vessels, to attempt to match quality against quantity.

2. In any case, the only vessels that could be built at shallow-water sites such as Shreveport and Yazoo City were river craft, which would not be capable of taking on the deepwater blockaders.

3. The deficit in Confederate shipbuilding was not merely in construction sites; it was in craftsmen, basic industry and transportation. Before the war, the vast majority of craft, both seagoing and riverine, were constructed in the North; the South simply did not have the infrastructure. It's frankly astonishing that the Southern Navy did all it in fact did; I recommend reading Myron J. Smith's book about the CSS Arkansas or Robert G. Elliott's book about the CSS Albemarle to get an appreciation of what challenges had to be surmounted to get a warship built... and for those two successful examples, there were dozens of unsuccessful ones.

4. Britain and France had many reasons not to directly interfere in the war; it's simplistic to assume that a few more Confederate victories in 1863 would have tipped the balance. Noninterference was never guaranteed, but one has to posit something occurring that would have directly influenced the self-interest of Britain, really, and that's quite a stretch. (And France was not going to take the lead in that scenario against British wishes. The two of them were too closely locked in an arms race to take their eyes off each other.)

 

[Eric Wittenberg]

Elennsar,
Vicksburg and Port Hudson, when in Confederate hands, were keeping the Mississippi open to Confederate navigation. They could construct ships which would run the Union blockade or even challenge the blockaders.
If 20457 troops under Johnston arrived at the outskirts of Vicksburg on May 30, Pemberton has just over 30000 inside the city. Johnston's arrival gives him more than 50000, enough to drive Grant back.
Meanwhile, let's assume that Bragg is charged with the task to hold Rosecrans where he is, or yield the less ground he can. He orders a cavalry raid which keeps Rosecrans' attention for some days (in actual history, the raids in early 1863 kept Rosecrans from advancing for weeks). When Rosecrans turns again his attention to Bragg's main body, he withdraws to Chattanooga, where Rosecrans besieges him (an inversion of the actual Chattanooga siege).
Let's say that, by June 23, Bragg is ready to fall back, but Grant's threat has been minimized. Most of Pemberton's force and the detachments go to reinforce Bragg, while the rest of Pemberton's soldiers are diverting and feinting to keep Grant's eye fixed upon them.
The Army of the Cumberland would be surprised and forced back at the end of June, while Lee is in Pennsylvania.
Lincoln, seeing an imminent collapse of his western army, orders Meade to send heavy reinforcements. Lee goes forward and crushes Meade at Gettysburg, before the Union reinforcements reach Rosecrans.
The war would be over- with a CSA victory.
Civil War Scholar.

All I can say is wow.

This kind of unfounded science fiction, which is not based on any semblance or premise of reality and which makes all kinds of outrageous assumptions, is precisely the reason why I don't play the what-if game. Where are the B-1 bombers and Stealth fighters? You might as well include them in your bucket of outrageous and unrealistic assumptions.

If Lee had AK47's at Spotsylvania, he would have won the war. Oh, yeah--I forgot--that really horrific, awful book has already been written. Sorry....

 

[Elennsar]

Elennsar,
Vicksburg and Port Hudson, when in Confederate hands, were keeping the Mississippi open to Confederate navigation. They could construct ships which would run the Union blockade or even challenge the blockaders.

Edit: I see Mark has addressed this better than I can.

If 20457 troops under Johnston arrived at the outskirts of Vicksburg on May 30, Pemberton has just over 30000 inside the city. Johnston's arrival gives him more than 50000, enough to drive Grant back.
Meanwhile, let's assume that Bragg is charged with the task to hold Rosecrans where he is, or yield the less ground he can. He orders a cavalry raid which keeps Rosecrans' attention for some days (in actual history, the raids in early 1863 kept Rosecrans from advancing for weeks).

When Rosecrans turns again his attention to Bragg's main body, he withdraws to Chattanooga, where Rosecrans besieges him (an inversion of the actual Chattanooga siege).
Let's say that, by June 23, Bragg is ready to fall back, but Grant's threat has been minimized. Most of Pemberton's force and the detachments go to reinforce Bragg, while the rest of Pemberton's soldiers are diverting and feinting to keep Grant's eye fixed upon them.

Let's stop and think for a moment. 20,457 troops are arriving at Jackson, not "the outskirts of Vicksburg" - about forty five miles away in fact. That is three days of marching - two if you push it - at best.

That means that Johnston is not going to even be able to launch an attack any earlier than June 2nd.

Assuming a one day battle, and two days to march back to Jackson, that means that they're not arriving until at least three weeks after June 5th - or June 26th.

This is making the highly optimistic assumption that three times the number of troops that were moved back in mid-December can move in the same period of time that it took one division to reach Vicksburg, assuming that (say) five times the number can move to Chattanooga in three weeks is even more optimistic.

Even if Bragg does everything one could possibly hope for (and given what he has to work with, I question that he can), the troops to do anything to the AotC are not arriving until after Bragg is being pushed out of Chattanooga.

The Army of the Cumberland would be surprised and forced back at the end of June, while Lee is in Pennsylvania.
Lincoln, seeing an imminent collapse of his western army, orders Meade to send heavy reinforcements. Lee goes forward and crushes Meade at Gettysburg, before the Union reinforcements reach Rosecrans.
The war would be over- with a CSA victory.
Civil War Scholar.

You have taken no consideration of logistics and made no effort to explain how the Confederates prevail against Rosecrans (66,492 men independent of the Reserve Corps at this point: http://ebooks.library.cornell.edu/cgi/t/text/pageviewer-idx?c=moawar;cc=moawar;q1=Army of the Cumberland;rgn=full text;idno=waro0034;didno=waro0034;view=image;seq=427;page=root;size=100) when Bragg has (http://ebooks.library.cornell.edu/cgi/t/text/pageviewer-idx?c=moawar;cc=moawar;q1=present for duty;rgn=full text;idno=waro0034;didno=waro0034;view=image;seq=0601 about 35,000 plus whatever is sent from Mississippi plus the three brigades from Breckinridge that were historically detached but not in this case - call it perhaps five thousand, so 40,000+Mississippi troops and Polk, which are going to be reduced by however many causalities have been suffered defeating Grant and losses from sick and deserters and so on). Admittedly if East Tennessee is surrendered you might add Buckner's men, but you definitely need to take into account reinforcements called for by Rosecrans before the Battle of I Don't Know Where.
This before even addressing that its not very likely Meade would be asked to send troops to Rosecrans instead of Burnside (much closer and not busy at the moment) being asked to do so or any other Union response other than the basic assumption that Rosecrans is not a complete moron who will be destroyed by Bragg because . . . I guess it'll just happen.

You can't just ignore the logistical considerations involved or the opening you have given Rosecrans by stripping Bragg of so much of his infantry (likely, even with Bragg sending cavalry raids, to speed up his preparations because he has less to worry about) and say that the Union just crumbles because you want it to.

Well, technically you can, but if you want to present a convincing argument and not something that couldn't get much more fantastic if you sent Bragg's troops by pegasi instead of by railroad, that absolutely must be addressed with at least some pretense towards understanding what the heck you're talking about.

 

[Mark F. Jenkins]

If Lee had AK47's at Spotsylvania, he would have won the war. Oh, yeah--I forgot--that really horrific, awful book has already been written. Sorry....

LOL... actually, the short story that Turtledove began that with is pretty good; I suppose because it's more concerned with the emotions of an 'alternative' Confederate victory than it is with the 'Maguffin' of the AK-47s. (It's anthologized in The Fantastic Civil War, which I've referred to a few times, a great little collection.)

 

[Elennsar]

All I can say is wow.

This kind of unfounded science fiction, which is not based on any semblance or premise of reality and which makes all kinds of outrageous assumptions, is precisely the reason why I don't play the what-if game.

If Lee had AK47's at Spotsylvania, he would have won the war. Oh, yeah--I forgot--that really horrific, awful book has already been written. Sorry....

It gives the genuine study of alternatives a bad name.

"What if Lee was given the troops he wanted from Harvey Hill?" can be addressed as rigorously as say, what Stuart did on his cavalry ride in late June. Maybe not with as much certainty - we can only speculate on what would be done in response, not rely accounts of what actually did - but it can at least be addressed in a scholarly fashion.

Our latest dilettante is not even trying to with his proposed "reinforce Johnston from Bragg even more than was done historically", and I'm not sure whether to weep with regret or frustration.

 

[Mark F. Jenkins]

Our latest dilettante is not even trying to with his proposed "reinforce Johnston from Bragg even more than was done historically", and I'm not sure whether to weep with regret or frustration.

I'd say it's a valid question to ask, since we know the decisions that were made historically. What would have happened if the Confederates had made the decision to fully support either Johnston or Bragg at the expense of the other?

From the Vicksburg angle, I think what you mainly get from pulling Pemberton and Johnston's troops out and adding them to Bragg (* assuming that could be done at all, which is a huge assumption, but we'll skip it for the moment) is you get Grant and Sherman with a secure base on the Mississippi, plowing eastward.

 

[Elennsar]

I'd say it's a valid question to ask, since we know the decisions that were made historically. What would have happened if the Confederates had made the decision to fully support either Johnston or Bragg at the expense of the other?

From the Vicksburg angle, I think what you mainly get from pulling Pemberton and Johnston's troops out and adding them to Bragg (* assuming that could be done at all, which is a huge assumption, but we'll skip it for the moment) is you get Grant and Sherman with a secure base on the Mississippi, plowing eastward.

Yeah. The Confederacy in May-June of 1863 did not sufficiently reinforce any of the three main areas (Lee, Bragg, or Mississippi), which makes the issue of "but what if it had?" for any one of them inherently fascinating. There are enough troops to do more SOMEWHERE, maybe even in two of three areas depending on how you do it.

But CWS is not doing anything beyond "somehow the Confederates win and win big".

On the Vicksburg angle (as in, strip Vicksburg): I think it runs into the fact there's just not a lot in Tennessee that even the most decisive possible victory would provide as a gain. Nashville can be (re)retaken, and there's no realistic hope of reaching the Ohio.

So sacrificing Vicksburg for Tennessee means saying that Vicksburg isn't really that valued in the first place, which would have been nice to decide a few months earlier if that's the course the Confederacy intends to take. Doing it at this point just means what you said, IMO.

Edited to make sense.

 

[Civil War Scholar]

Elennsar,
Let's say that, after being victorious at Vicksburg, Confederate troops are returning to Tennessee. Meanwhile, Bragg is in Chattanooga. He has withdrawn to Chattanooga and is holding the heights. Rosecrans, historically not one of the most energetic generals and not one who would press an opponent to the wall, would pause for a few days, group his outfits properly and then attacked. Bragg's defenses being in good shape, until the end of June, he could hold. Let's say that, on June 27, the troops from Mississippi, 40000, arrive. Combined with Bragg's force inside Chattanooga, they launch a double assault and rout Rosecrans. The AotC retreats. Buckner makes vigorous probes against Burnside, preventing him from relieving Rosecrans. Given the late Union reverses in the West and with Lee's army being in Pennsylvania, Lincoln would summon Burnside join one of the two forces. If Burnside was ordered to rejoin Rosecrans, Buckner would continue probing against him, preventing his escape. If Burnside was ordered to join Meade, Buckner would join Lee or Stuart and either stop Burnside or reach Lee before Burnside reaches Meade. Subsequently, the Battle of Gettysburg resulting in a Confederate victory, the North would be pressed in the utmost. Lee's victory, alongside the Union reverses in the West and the cotton famine in England would result in England and France aiding the Confederacy and crushing the blockade. The war would be over, with a CSA victory.
Civil War Scholar.

 

[Mark F. Jenkins]

Yeah. The Confederacy in May-June of 1863 did not sufficiently reinforce any of the three main areas (Lee, Bragg, or Mississippi), which makes the issue of "but what if it had?" for any one of them inherently fascinating. There are enough troops to do more SOMEWHERE, maybe even in two of three areas depending on how you do it.

I concur.

The question reminds me more than a bit of the resource/command allocation decision in the old Victory Games wargame "The Civil War," where both the Union and Confederate players have to allocate their primary, secondary, and tertiary efforts to the East, the West, and the Trans-Mississippi... the "real world" of limited resources.

 

[Eric Wittenberg]

Elennsar,
Let's say that, after being victorious at Vicksburg, Confederate troops are returning to Tennessee. Meanwhile, Bragg is in Chattanooga. He has withdrawn to Chattanooga and is holding the heights. Rosecrans, historically not one of the most energetic generals and not one who would press an opponent to the wall, would pause for a few days, group his outfits properly and then attacked. Bragg's defenses being in good shape, until the end of June, he could hold. Let's say that, on June 27, the troops from Mississippi, 40000, arrive. Combined with Bragg's force inside Chattanooga, they launch a double assault and rout Rosecrans. The AotC retreats. Buckner makes vigorous probes against Burnside, preventing him from relieving Rosecrans. Given the late Union reverses in the West and with Lee's army being in Pennsylvania, Lincoln would summon Burnside join one of the two forces. If Burnside was ordered to rejoin Rosecrans, Buckner would continue probing against him, preventing his escape. If Burnside was ordered to join Meade, Buckner would join Lee or Stuart and either stop Burnside or reach Lee before Burnside reaches Meade. Subsequently, the Battle of Gettysburg resulting in a Confederate victory, the North would be pressed in the utmost. Lee's victory, alongside the Union reverses in the West and the cotton famine in England would result in England and France aiding the Confederacy and crushing the blockade. The war would be over, with a CSA victory.
Civil War Scholar.

Double wow.

This is even farther out into the realm of outrageousness than the first post. Keep going. Soon, the Martians and Darth Vader will be arriving....

 

[Mark F. Jenkins]

Wait... how did they get that victory at Vicksburg? And how are those troops suddenly freed up, as opposed to being pinned there maintaining its defense?

 

[Mark F. Jenkins]

Soon, the Martians and Darth Vader will be arriving....

"That makes me sooooooo angry!"

 

[Elennsar]

Double wow.

This is even farther out into the realm of outrageousness than the first post. Keep going. Soon, the Martians and Darth Vader will be arriving....

Nothing I can say in reply to his second post could possibly address it as well as this does.

 

[Elennsar]

I concur.

The question reminds me more than a bit of the resource/command allocation decision in the old Victory Games wargame "The Civil War," where both the Union and Confederate players have to allocate their primary, secondary, and tertiary efforts to the East, the West, and the Trans-Mississippi... the "real world" of limited resources.

Yeah. To make things worse, "Virginia" and "the East" can be used more or less interchangeably, but "Tennessee" and "the West" cannot.

Between that and the various minor departments (Mobile, East Tennessee, Southwest Virginia . . .) using manpower that may have been arguably needed there but which was therefore not available to the big areas - there's no way to find a winning strategy that doesn't change that system.