Grant also in 1864 would keep a full third of his army in reserve
although it was usually involuntarily waiting for Burnside's IX Corps to
move. Keeping troops in reserve is what I would consider a prudent move
although Hooker at Chancellorsville is an example of carrying it to
disastrous extremes.
> Given, Lee is possibly one of the best generals in our history, and the
> Confederate soldier is by all accounts extremely proficient; but can you truly
> believe that it was necessary for McClellan to hold back that many troops from
> the battle? Don't you think it could have drastically shortened the war if
> he'd trounced Lee's army? I don't think he could've totally annihilated the
> army and ended the war then and there, but it certainly seems possible that
> the course of the war could've been affected in positive manner had McClellan
> been a little more aggressive...
It is on this point that I find Sears somewhat contradictory. He chastises
McClellan for not doing what you advise:
"...The 12,000 men of these two divisions, when added to the four
divisions under Franklin and Porter that saw almost no action on
September 17, would give him better than 32,000 fresh troops to put
into action. To at least support such an offensive there were
approximately 30,000 available from the four corps that had done
the fighting the day before. McClellan had committed only some
50,000 men, two thirds of his available forces, to battle on the
seventeenth; he had substantially more than that number with
which to give battle on the eighteenth." (Sears: 319)
Sears assumes that McClellan had a credible fighting force of 60,000
troops on the 18th to attack Lee's weakened forces that had their backs
to the Potomac. However, Sears then deflates McClellan's claims of
victory:
"His claim was the traditional one that to the army that holds the
battlefield goes the victory. In that long day's struggle,
however, the Confederate line had been pressed back but never
broken, and the casualties Lee inflicted were one fifth greater
than those he suffered, 12,400 against 10,300. The campaign as
a whole cost the Federals 27,000 men, including the Harper's
Ferry captives, compared with the Confederates 14,000...."
My question is if the Confederates got the better of the battle, what were
the chances of an attack on fortified positions on the 18th? (Confederate
officers thought no time for entrenchment was disastrous the 17th) Burnside's
attack with superior numbers a few months later proved disastrous under
similar conditions (or were they similar?) And was Lee's retreat across
the Potomac one of desperation or more in the nature of being satisfied
with a campaign that included the capture of a huge cache of arms at
Harper's Ferry along with 11,00 Federals? These questions in my mind
raise enough doubts to counter an assertion that McClellan was somehow
responsible for the war's long duration for lack of aggressive battlefield
posture.
If McClellan is to be blamed using the numbers game, what of Grant on
May 7th, 1864 not using his superior numbers to continue the Wilderness
into its third day? I think the answer lies in the state of an army after
battle and the exhausted attitude of officers and men at the prospect of
continued carnage. You can only ask so much of soldiers. Their is a
great difference between asking troops to hold a position where the
battle is forced upon them and asking troops to take an offensive attack
attitude after taking heavy casualties. The officers at the company,
regimental and brigade level knew when their men were not capable of
what was asked of them. This knowledge filters up to the general staff
during overnight lulls in battle. A good commander heeds this knowledge.
Kelly Richter U59611@UICVM
> Aric Watson (Watson_A@CC.Denison.Edu)