Grant Ulysses S. Grant: Overrated or Underrated?

For the rebels they likely are accurate. Young used the methodology of Busey and Martin, and others have used the same methodology to determine rebel strength in the Seven Days (Tenney) and at Antietam (Allen). You have rejected these studies in the past, because they show much larger rebel forces than commonly supposed.

How the numbers are used is the issue.
I'm not sure I've rejected these studies. I have rejected your numbers though. As I've said before, your numbers always skew from the traditionally accepted numbers in a way that's meant to elevate McClellan and diminish Grant.
 
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A discussion of numbers is not that interesting. Most people here have seen various numbers on Grant's casualties. In May, June and July of 1864 casualties were heavy. How many of those people had recoverable wounds, or simply stayed missing until their enlistments expired is not knowable.
Grant was under rated because no politician or journalist realized the potential the US had to create combined arms campaigns. Grant stayed with potential and fully developed it.
Grant won the two biggest operations of the war. He made the siege of Vicksburg so tight the Confederate soldiers had to choose between starvation and surrender.
By design or accident, he declined to completely surround the Confederates at Petersburg/Richmond. Once they began retreating they always thought relief lay over the next hill. Instead it was a classic harried retreat. The advancing US troops picked up stragglers and cut off the rear guards. Most likely, spies had infiltrated the Confederate quartermaster ranks, and misrouted the Confederate provisions. It was the Confederates who were retreating like Napoleon trying to get back to France, not Sherman. There was no other harried pursuit quit like it in the Civil War. And it saved thousands of lives.
 
Anyone with the slightest understanding of strategy, tactics and logistics knows that if you continue to stretch an opponents undermanned, undersupplied line that sooner or later you're gonna either break it or flank it. Does that make him a great General, or one who just used common sense ? I think the latter .
 
Just thought of one other aspect of Grant that was truly great, and perhaps the greatest form of greatness (to be horridly redundant)...and that is the compassion and generosity he displayed toward the armies he vanquished at Vicksburg and Appomattox. In both cases, he had waged long, exhausting efforts against stubborn foes and he treated them kindness and respect. With Grant, unconditional surrender did not lead to retribution but rather a gentle letting down. I have to believe this did much to mitigate animosity at the conclusion of the war.
 
Anyone with the slightest understanding of strategy, tactics and logistics knows that if you continue to stretch an opponents undermanned, undersupplied line that sooner or later you're gonna either break it or flank it. Does that make him a great General, or one who just used common sense ? I think the latter .

That's true enough, what really sets Grant apart in terms of how these particular campaigns went down was that he wouldn't give up if his current plans failed (for any number of reasons) knowing that persistence would inevitably lead to victory as long as the public supported the war. That obviously leaves scars on his record, a nonetheless ultimately successful one, but where I see Grant as underrated was that he knew how to maximize the effectiveness of having superior numbers, resources and logistical capabilities to root out an opponent who was heavily entrenched in familiar country without a grinding war of attrition being necessary, but was prevented from doing so primarily for the sake of political considerations. This, of course, leads to (easily disproven) allegations that "the only thing Grant knew how to do was to attack frontally over and over again until his opponent ran out of men", based on absolutely nothing except the fact that casualties were unusually heavy in a relatively short amount of time during the Overland Campaign, an extremely narrow and incomplete "analysis".

I do find it irksome at times when the Union Army's significant disadvantages to overcome during the Overland/Petersburg campaigns are glossed over based solely on the fact that the Union had superior numbers and resources, which some seem to think are the only important factors in war (the demands of soldiers attacking a heavily entrenched and determined enemy are far greater than those of the defenders, just ask our D-Day and Okinawa veterans). If Grant could have had it his way, both in terms of planning and freedom to choose subordinates, then Lee wouldn't have been able to take advantage of his own strengths to nearly the same extent and there would have been far fewer bloodbaths as well as a much quicker resolution.
 
Just thought of one other aspect of Grant that was truly great, and perhaps the greatest form of greatness (to be horridly redundant)...and that is the compassion and generosity he displayed toward the armies he vanquished at Vicksburg and Appomattox. In both cases, he had waged long, exhausting efforts against stubborn foes and he treated them kindness and respect. With Grant, unconditional surrender did not lead to retribution but rather a gentle letting down. I have to believe this did much to mitigate animosity at the conclusion of the war.
At Vicksburg dispersing the defeated Confederates undermined the moral of the Confederates in the west. Dispersing the surrendering Confederates in Virginia, was risky. But since the men were disarmed and facing desperate hunger, at least for a few months they were a good risk.
We don't know how long the Confederates would have been held in POW camps if they had not been dispersed before the death of Lincoln.
 
Just thought of one other aspect of Grant that was truly great, and perhaps the greatest form of greatness (to be horridly redundant)...and that is the compassion and generosity he displayed toward the armies he vanquished at Vicksburg and Appomattox. In both cases, he had waged long, exhausting efforts against stubborn foes and he treated them kindness and respect. With Grant, unconditional surrender did not lead to retribution but rather a gentle letting down. I have to believe this did much to mitigate animosity at the conclusion of the war.

What's impressive about that to me is the fact that this kind of behavior is actually quite rare in civil wars. All too often when a rebellion or revolution fails, the defeated are rounded up, imprisoned (sometimes their families as well), and sometimes systematically exterminated as a means of exacting "vengeance" and sending a message to other potential dissidents. One of the biggest reasons why, in most cases, "the winners write the history" as the losers are no longer around. All I can say is that I'm extremely proud of the fact that ours didn't go down a similar dark path, much the same as how our revolution didn't devour itself at the end once it had been successful at achieving independence.
 
Just thought of one other aspect of Grant that was truly great, and perhaps the greatest form of greatness (to be horridly redundant)...and that is the compassion and generosity he displayed toward the armies he vanquished at Vicksburg and Appomattox. In both cases, he had waged long, exhausting efforts against stubborn foes and he treated them kindness and respect. With Grant, unconditional surrender did not lead to retribution but rather a gentle letting down. I have to believe this did much to mitigate animosity at the conclusion of the war.
Along those lines @cash posted from the ORs that the Overland Campaign was not Grant's idea but Lincoln's. Grant wanted to invade Virginia via North Carolina. The Union already occupied New Berne so it was certainly a viable option.
Leftyhunter
 
The strength of Grant's Army is interesting.

The Army of the Potomac used a different reporting system than the others, having moved special duty etc. men out of the PFD column. Other units did not do this. Hence the strength on 30th April was:

Army of the Potomac: 121,964 PFD on 30th April
9th Corps: 19,250 PFD on 30th April
= 141,214 PFD (vs 66,140, but rebel PFD is reckoned differently by not including slaves with the army)

As for reinforcements, on 30th April the District of SE Virginia, i.e. the forces Grant would absorb ca. Cold Harbor and the attempt at Petersburg, numbered 45,007 on the 30th April 1864 return.

On 15th June, Halleck write he's sent 55,178 reinforcements to Grant, and listed them by regiment. This includes a recent draft of 5,000. The depots reported more than 34,645* at Belle Plain or Port Royal and 12,181 arriving at White House prior to the 10th June. Thus Halleck's figure is reasonable.

* a veteran battalion, 6 batteries and a cavalry detachment are not enumerated.

This excludes direct recruiting recruits, of which Humphreys says only 2,453 were received.

Reinforcements:
From Washington: 55,178
From SE Va: 45,007
By Recruiting: 2,453
= 102,683

Total troops available (in PFD): 243,852

There is a claim that 36-7 regiments were due to muster out, and left by 12th June. This comes from Humphreys, but is repeated by Rhea. Only regiments enlisted for three years right at the beginning of the war were due for muster out (indeed, one regiment that did was the 1st Massachusetts, the "First Defenders of Washington"). I could only find six regiments that mustered out, and the two brigades of Pennsylvania Reserves with the army consolidated into two regiments. The total loss to the army was less than 2,000 men.

If anyone can find regiments that mustered out, please let me known.
 
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Assuming the figures cited by @67th Tigers is accurate that still means Grant had just over a 2 to 1 manpower advantage over Lee while having to fight on the offensive and guard vulnerable logistics lines. Beating an entrenched enemy with only a 2 to 1 manpower superiority ratio is not altogether bad. It certainly wouldn't support the argument that Grant was overly wasteful of his men's lives for if Grant was then Grant would of lost.
Leftyhunter

Assuming Lee was never aggressive during the Overland Campaign and the Petersburg siege. :unsure:
 
Note that the "3:1" is at the point of contact; most of the subtlety of manoeuvering an army is based around concentrating decisive force at the point of contact while using the rest of your army to hold off the rest of the enemy army. Obviously if one has a 3:1 numerical superiority of the whole army one can simply attack everywhere and expect to be successful somewhere (it's mathematically impossible not to have at least 3:1 superiority somewhere if you have it army-wide).

It's also "combat power", not raw numbers, and heavy artillery can act as a force multiplier or can neutralize the enemy force multiplier of defences.

The final element is turning the enemy by getting behind their lines, which can force them to abandon a defensive line without fighting.


This is the basic concept behind a lot of the Napoleonic maxims. For example, Napoleon's attack at the junction of two allied armies was intended to hit part of an extended line of defence by surprise and with a corps-scale attack. Not only would this generally involve mustering more force than the defender could successfully resist with what they had on hand (since the enemy line of defence was extended, meaning they were spread over a wide frontage and were thus not dense) but each constituent force would naturally recoil on their own force and that would open a gap between the armies.

The larger your force, the less subtle you "need" to be in manoeuvering, but the more of a chance you have for a total victory if you can manoeuvre subtly. If Grant could have used 70,000 of his 140,000 (say) to hold 50,000 of Lee's troops in place by threatening a vital point, and then manoeuvred the other 70,000 around on a flank where only 20,000 (say) of Lee's troops could effectively react, then Grant's gained 3:1 superiority in part of the engagement.



Since Clausewitz was quoted, I think this may be useful:




Frederick the Great beat 80,000 Austrians at Leuthen with about 30,000 men, and at Rosbach with 25,000 some 50,000 allies; these are however the only instances of victories gained against an enemy double, or more than double in numbers. Charles XII., in the battle of Narva, we cannot well quote, the Russians were at that time hardly to be regarded as Europeans, also the principal circumstances even of the battle, are but too little known. Buonaparte had at Dresden 120,000 against 220,000, therefore not the double. At Collin, Frederick the Great did not succeed, with 30,000 against 50,000 Austrians, neither Buonaparte in the desperate battle of Leipsic, where he was 160,000 strong, against 280,000, the superiority therefore considerably less than double.

From this we may infer, that it is very difficult in the present state of Europe, for the most talented general to gain a victory over an enemy double his strength. Now if we see double numbers, such a weight in the scale against the greatest generals, we may be sure, that in ordinary cases, in small as well as great combats, an important superiority of numbers, but which need not be over two to one, will be sufficient to ensure the victory, however disadvantageous other circumstances may be. Certainly, we may imagine a defile which even tenfold would not suffice to force, but in such a case it can be no question of a battle at all.




In this (which is part of On War book 3 chapter 8) Clausewitz notes that in cases where armies are mostly quite similar in composition and training - he's talking about "European" armies as being broadly similar to one another, and ACW armies were much more so - it is extremely rare for even the most talented general to be able to win with a 2:1 disadvantage or more.

Grant may or may not have quite had "the double", but he was certainly close; thus, a reading of Clausewitz would suggest to us that Grant was in a significantly advantageous position. He didn't need to be a great general to beat Lee with those odds; it was sufficient to be good enough that Lee could not "great general" him to the kind of defeat which Clausewitz said happened very rarely.
 
The larger your force, the less subtle you "need" to be in manoeuvering, but the more of a chance you have for a total victory if you can manoeuvre subtly. If Grant could have used 70,000 of his 140,000 (say) to hold 50,000 of Lee's troops in place by threatening a vital point, and then manoeuvred the other 70,000 around on a flank where only 20,000 (say) of Lee's troops could effectively react, then Grant's gained 3:1 superiority in part of the engagement.

Which, as we all know, is precisely what Grant would have preferred to do. Place Lee in between two separate Union armies of comparable size to his own, one of which would have been actively tearing up his supply lines, the other being positioned to both defend Washington and threaten Richmond. It's difficult to see an effective solution to that problem from Lee's perspective, other than to abandon Richmond and attempt to carry on the war in a more guerrilla-style fashion.
 
Which, as we all know, is precisely what Grant would have preferred to do. Place Lee in between two separate Union armies of comparable size to his own, one of which would have been actively tearing up his supply lines, the other being positioned to both defend Washington and threaten Richmond. It's difficult to see an effective solution to that problem from Lee's perspective, other than to abandon Richmond and attempt to carry on the war in a more guerrilla-style fashion.
By the time Grant had an army of confrontation at Petersburg, with Sherman moving north in So. Carolina and Schofield landing at Wilmington, Lee had no counter at all. Johnston obstructed Sherman somewhat, but South Carolina and North Carolina were occupied.
If Grant had done something similar in 1864, which is what he suggested to Halleck, Lee would have had to make a choice between Richmond and North Carolina.
 
Which, as we all know, is precisely what Grant would have preferred to do. Place Lee in between two separate Union armies of comparable size to his own, one of which would have been actively tearing up his supply lines, the other being positioned to both defend Washington and threaten Richmond. It's difficult to see an effective solution to that problem from Lee's perspective, other than to abandon Richmond and attempt to carry on the war in a more guerrilla-style fashion.
Perhaps that's what Grant would have preferred to do, but if so he didn't manage it.

The single biggest criticism of Grant's style of generalship in the Overland is the full-court attacks he made against positions that were clearly well entrenched. Assuming the overland route is to be followed you can't really blame him for the Wilderness, as such - he wasn't on the tactical offensive there - but the major attacks at Spotsylvania and Cold Harbor, and to a lesser extent at the North Anna, could have been avoided and it wouldn't have impeded his movement around on the flank to reach the James. In that sense, the big attacks at Spotsylvania to Cold Harbor were more-or-less unnecessary except in political terms.

Of course, the superior way of getting to the James is more or less just to sail up the James with an army of 150,000 PFD and have the (large) remainder stay to hold the Washington area.



Without the big attacks at Spotsylvania and the North Anna tiring out his army, it's possible to conceptualize half of Grant's army staying at the North Anna and the other half moving south to the Cold Harbor area. At that point he's at least got the chance to give Lee two independent routes into Richmond to defend at the same time - Cold Harbor and coming down the rail line - and the only way for Lee to avoid those being two independent routes is pretty much to withdraw behind the Chickahominy.

(Admittedly at that point Grant has the problem of "how do you take Richmond with your supply base north of the Chickahominy", but McClellan was faced with the same problem in 1862 and it doesn't seem completely insoluble.)
 
When Grant started the Overland campaign, politicians were involved in the operational design and going overland was the only available political option in the east.
It took Grant about 1 year to create the strategy that won the war. In the end he never borrowed through Lee's entrenchments. He fought outside Virginia, and then went around the fortifications, not through them.
Lincoln and Halleck were running the war in 1864 and Grant took over control one branch, one corp at a time.
 
Perhaps that's what Grant would have preferred to do, but if so he didn't manage it.

The single biggest criticism of Grant's style of generalship in the Overland is the full-court attacks he made against positions that were clearly well entrenched. Assuming the overland route is to be followed you can't really blame him for the Wilderness, as such - he wasn't on the tactical offensive there - but the major attacks at Spotsylvania and Cold Harbor, and to a lesser extent at the North Anna, could have been avoided and it wouldn't have impeded his movement around on the flank to reach the James. In that sense, the big attacks at Spotsylvania to Cold Harbor were more-or-less unnecessary except in political terms.

Of course, the superior way of getting to the James is more or less just to sail up the James with an army of 150,000 PFD and have the (large) remainder stay to hold the Washington area.



Without the big attacks at Spotsylvania and the North Anna tiring out his army, it's possible to conceptualize half of Grant's army staying at the North Anna and the other half moving south to the Cold Harbor area. At that point he's at least got the chance to give Lee two independent routes into Richmond to defend at the same time - Cold Harbor and coming down the rail line - and the only way for Lee to avoid those being two independent routes is pretty much to withdraw behind the Chickahominy.

(Admittedly at that point Grant has the problem of "how do you take Richmond with your supply base north of the Chickahominy", but McClellan was faced with the same problem in 1862 and it doesn't seem completely insoluble.)
Grants main objective was to defeat Lee's army, not to take Richmond.
 
Grants main objective was to defeat Lee's army, not to take Richmond.

Actually it was to take Richmond. How do you destroy an army? How did Napoleon do it? He destroyed the base of operations of the enemy army. Indeed, Grant was trying to get Richmond, which would lead to the destruction of Lee's army. Simply hammering Lee's army a la Spottsylvania showed itself to be a recipe for the destruction of Grant's army.
 
Actually it was to take Richmond. How do you destroy an army? How did Napoleon do it? He destroyed the base of operations of the enemy army. Indeed, Grant was trying to get Richmond, which would lead to the destruction of Lee's army. Simply hammering Lee's army a la Spottsylvania showed itself to be a recipe for the destruction of Grant's army.
Actually no. The goal was Lee's Army. Here's Gordon Rhea:
"But if the campaign is viewed in its entirety, Grant comes out ahead. Although he sustained multiple tactical reverses, he never considered himself defeated, and he continued to advance his strategic goal through maneuver. The Rebel commander’s grand objective was to hold the line of the Rapidan, and he failed; Grant’s goal was to negate Lee’s army as an effective fighting force, and in that he largely succeeded. By the end of the campaign, Grant had pinned Lee into defensive earthworks around Richmond and Petersburg. While he had not destroyed Lee’s army, he had gutted the Rebel force’s offensive capacity and seriously diminished its ability to affect the outcome of the war."
 
Lee's army had quartermaster problems in 1863. After a few months of campaigning in 1864, Lee's army lost the ability to move at any distance from Richmond. It no longer could sustain the horses and mules needed for offensive operations.
The war was one elsewhere.
Mobile Bay was closed, so that ended a year of advocacy by Grant.
The direct railroad to Weldon and Wilmington, NC was broken.
Grant and Sherman co-ordinated successfully enough to get Sherman to rotate his army to right, off Sherman's rail connections, and Atlanta fell.
Finally, Sheridan simply overwhelmed that part of the Army of No. Virginia that was isolated under Early.
No doubt Grant's original attempt to fight the way Lincoln wanted him to fight, did not work.
But as Lincoln allowed Grant greater strategic control, because he had no other choice, Grant's second plan worked.
The third plan ended the war in 3 1/4 months in 1865. It was that plan that wiped away the failures of 1864.
 
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