What if McClellan had died?

[trice]

Indeed, McClellan accepted Halleck's correction without comment. The matter was obviously clear cut. Sometime people just make mistakes.

So McClellan was wrong, proving the matter was unclear, and you are trying to wish it away by saying it was "obviously clear cut". Once again, it was obviously not clear to McClellan.

I don't think Eicher and Eicher really support the idea that matters weren't clear cut. This was essentially decided in 1806, and was in place before that.

You certainly are wrong about what Eicher and Eicher say in Civil War High Commands:

"From the very start of the war, this precedence of Regular Army generals over all volunteer and militia generals of the same grade became a very touchy subject."​

​

"Controversy raged over the relationship of brevet rank relative to substantive rank."​

As to your Halleck-McClellan misconception above, here is what Eicher and Eicher say:

"Thus, Halleck understood the regulation (which must have been a departmental rather than Congressional), which was also reiterated by Simon Cameron and which was spelled out in Appendix B of the Revised United States Army Regulations of 1861, published in 1863."​

On the Wool-McClellan situation in March 1862:

"Realizing that Wool was legally correct, the President transferred him to the command of the Middle Department on 9 June 1862, and Maj. Gen. John A. Dix was assigned to command the Department of Virginia on 17 June 1862. Dix was the senior Maj. Gen. of Volunteers, and was outranked by McClellan, who was the senior Maj. Gen. U.S.A."​

How about we just stop all this silly nonsense about trivial matters and get back to the topic of the thread?

 

[Hoplite]

So McClellan was wrong, proving the matter was unclear, and you are trying to wish it away by saying it was "obviously clear cut". Once again, it was obviously not clear to McClellan.


You certainly are wrong about what Eicher and Eicher say in Civil War High Commands:

"From the very start of the war, this precedence of Regular Army generals over all volunteer and militia generals of the same grade became a very touchy subject."​

​

"Controversy raged over the relationship of brevet rank relative to substantive rank."​

As to your Halleck-McClellan misconception above, here is what Eicher and Eicher say:

"Thus, Halleck understood the regulation (which must have been a departmental rather than Congressional), which was also reiterated by Simon Cameron and which was spelled out in Appendix B of the Revised United States Army Regulations of 1861, published in 1863."​

On the Wool-McClellan situation in March 1862:

"Realizing that Wool was legally correct, the President transferred him to the command of the Middle Department on 9 June 1862, and Maj. Gen. John A. Dix was assigned to command the Department of Virginia on 17 June 1862. Dix was the senior Maj. Gen. of Volunteers, and was outranked by McClellan, who was the senior Maj. Gen. U.S.A."​

How about we just stop all this silly nonsense about trivial matters and get back to the topic of the thread?

So the second part of the question was if he had died, would the Peninsula Campaign still have proceeded the same way, or would it have been altered or abandoned altogether- overland to Richmond maybe?

 

[67th Tigers]

So the second part of the question was if he had died, would the Peninsula Campaign still have proceeded the same way, or would it have been altered or abandoned altogether- overland to Richmond maybe?

An amphibious movement had already been proposed and McClellan had discussed the idea with Lincoln in mid-December. Franklin knew about it, but McDowell didn't. Various IPB activities were underway, including James Shields analysing the Peninsular route and noting that it would take six weeks to reduce Yorktown. Hence the Peninsula had already been discounted, and the question was Urbana, or a much less ambitious movement.

If McDowell assumed command, which is what Congress wanted, then it would be another attack on Centreville. If this was successful, then a slow overland movement using the railroad. Given the speed the railroad was historically repaired, it may be that the AoP doesn't reach Richmond in summer 1862 at all.

 

[Josh The Lighthouse Guy]

If McDowell assumed command, which is what Congress wanted, then it would be another attack on Centreville.

First Bull Run wasn't a bad battle plan, but it expected too much of green troops in brutal summer heat. And it still might have succeeded without Confederate reinforcements from the Shenandoah and some reckless tactical placement of artillery (was that McDowell decision?) .

 

[trice]

So the second part of the question was if he had died, would the Peninsula Campaign still have proceeded the same way, or would it have been altered or abandoned altogether- overland to Richmond maybe?

If McClellan had died in early 1862, what happens next will be strongly shaped by whoever ends up in command. That might be:

• a single individual as General-in-Chief
• two individuals as General-in-Chief and commander of the Army of the Potomac
• no General-in-Chief and a commander of the Army of the Potomac (the actual situation from March-July of 1862 with Lincoln-Stanton filling the void)

I believe that Halleck might have been the choice for a General-in-Chief. Any candidate for that spot will almost certainly be a high-ranking Regular Army officer, almost certainly a West Point graduate. Anyone who isn't will almost certainly be a disaster.

Halleck looks more likely to stay in Washington and use someone else to command the AoP instead of taking the field himself, IMHO. If Halleck takes the field, well, he moved like a snail: determined but really slow. Halleck's commands can move fast and aggressively -- but then we are talking about the actual field command being Grant, Pope, etc. with Halleck well back from the front.

If Halleck is in command, I would think the Spring campaign in Virginia would be an overland effort, probably very similar to the plan Lincoln had and McClellan opposed. Halleck's record of using water routes on the Cumberland/Tennessee/Mississippi shows that he would be willing to consider those operations, but I believe Halleck would be very concerned with using most of the AoP between the enemy and Washington. He was the sort of commander who favored concentration of mass (it is his biggest objection to McClellan's ideas in July 1862 -- Halleck wants to unite McClellan with Pope, McClellan did not want that).

Halleck might have considered using an amphibious operation like the ones McClellan proposed as part of the main operation, but I doubt he would have made it the main thrust of the offensive. That pretty much rules out the Peninsula Campaign as McClellan actually fought it. Some version of the Urbanna or Mobjack Bay plans might have been seen in co-operation with an overland advance by the main force. They would have been much smaller than the moves McClellan was considering.

When McClellan presented his Urbanna Plan on February 3rd, Lincoln had 5 questions for him:

• 1st. Does not your plan involve a greatly larger expenditure of time, and money than mine?
• 2d. Wherein is a victory more certain by your plan than mine?
• 3d. Wherein is a victory more valuable by your plan than mine?
• 4th. In fact, would it not be less valuable, in this, that it would break no great line of the enemy's communications, while mine would?
• 5th. In case of disaster, would not a safe retreat be more difficult by your plan than by mine?

Any commander in McClellan's place would have needed to satisfy Lincoln on those points.

 

[trice]

First Bull Run wasn't a bad battle plan, but it expected too much of green troops in brutal summer heat. And it still might have succeeded without Confederate reinforcements from the Shenandoah and some reckless tactical placement of artillery (was that McDowell decision?) .

I would generally agree. I think Beauregard would get badly beaten at 1st Bull Run without Joe Johnston and his troops. Not sure who made the artillery placement decision.

 

[Belfoured]

I would generally agree. I think Beauregard would get badly beaten at 1st Bull Run without Joe Johnston and his troops. Not sure who made the artillery placement decision.

"Not sure who made the artillery placement decision."

You have inadvertently walked into a contentious issue.

I don't have access to all my sources at the moment but I believe the correct place to lay the blame is McDowell's Chief of Artillery, then-Col. William F. Barry (who became McClellan's Chief of Artillery and, later, Sherman's Chief in Georgia). There are accounts blaming McDowell and/or Griffin and Ricketts, but Barry seems to be the guy who ordered those batteries forward.

 

[Belfoured]

First Bull Run wasn't a bad battle plan, but it expected too much of green troops in brutal summer heat. And it still might have succeeded without Confederate reinforcements from the Shenandoah and some reckless tactical placement of artillery (was that McDowell decision?) .

I missed this when I replied to @trice in post #27. The decision was probably made by Barry.