Nov 1862–America’s Little Napoleon Meets His Waterloo

By Gary Far­row, Danville His­tor­i­cal Society

November 15, 1862 North Star–Removal of Gen. McClellan

General George B McClellan, America's little Napoleon
Gen­er­al George B McClel­lan, Amer­i­ca’s lit­tle Napoleon

The lat­est mil­i­tary change is the removal of Gen. McClel­lan from the army of the Potomac, and the appoint­ment of Gen. Burn­side in his stead. The order was deliv­ered last week Fri­day night; and it took the army by sur­prise. He was relieved of his com­mand and ordered to report him­self at Tren­ton N.J., where his fam­i­ly now is. His last offi­cial act was the issu­ing of an address to his sol­diers inform­ing them in a few words that the com­mand had devolved on Gen. Burn­side and took affec­tion­ate leave of them. He imme­di­ate­ly depart­ed for Trenton.

This change will per­haps take many of our read­ers by sur­prise. It is claimed to have been a mil­i­tary neces­si­ty, which means we sup­pose that the best good of the army and its future suc­cess, required the change. If this is true, and the only motive for removal, no one should com­plain, for it is no worse for Gen. McClel­lan to be super­seded for these impor­tant rea­sons, than for many oth­er mil­i­tary offi­cers, who have shared the same fate.

Every­thing should yield to mil­i­tary suc­cess and fit­ness for the place, so far as army appoint­ments are con­cerned, not with­stand­ing many of these offices have been and still are, con­ferred as a mat­ter of favoritism, rather than mer­it. Gen McClel­lan, we have believed, to be an able Gen­er­al — a man of ster­ling per­son­al pro­bity, and unwa­ver­ing loy­al­ty. And while he has, as we believe tried to do his work con­sci­en­tious­ly and sure­ly, in meet­ing the ene­my in front, almost from first to last, he has had ene­mies in his rear, who have tried to thwart his plans and secure his down­fall. There have been polit­i­cal, if not per­son­al, plots and coun­ter­plots against him and although Pres­i­dent Lin­coln has not been engaged in them, but has always defend­ed and sus­tained McClel­lan, yet his oppo­nents have at last tri­umphed in his removal, and they are now glo­ri­fy­ing the change.

General Burnside replaced McClellan
Gen­er­al Burn­side replaced McClellan

We sin­cere­ly trust, that as a mil­i­tary mea­sure, the removal may prove high­ly ben­e­fi­cial to the Fed­er­al cause and that the gal­lant Gen­er­al Burn­side will secure speedy and bril­liant suc­cess, and that the noble McClel­lan, whether he entire­ly retires from mil­i­tary life or accepts some oth­er com­mand, will live long enough to over­come those polit­i­cal and envi­ous con­spir­a­tors who have been instru­men­tal in his removal.

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Plots and coun­ter­plots” weren’t the half of it. As evi­denced by the Civ­il War itself, the Repub­lic was frag­ile, only some 85 years removed from the Amer­i­can Rev­o­lu­tion. Today the notion that our mil­i­tary exists to serve civ­il author­i­ty is a bedrock assump­tion; one hun­dred and fifty years ago with the nation com­ing apart at the seams, the bound­aries between civil­ian gov­ern­ment and the mil­i­tary weren’t so clear.

At the out­break of the war, the stand­ing army was so small that Lin­coln had to call upon the states for vol­un­teers. In many instances, the men in com­mand were polit­i­cal appointees. A gen­er­al might be a Rad­i­cal (abo­li­tion­ist), Repub­li­can, or a Demo­c­rat. In order to mol­li­fy dif­fer­ent con­stituen­cies, Lin­coln had to fig­ure par­ty affil­i­a­tion into his polit­i­cal cal­cu­lus when mak­ing his mil­i­tary appointments

Advo­cat­ed by some, the prospect of a mil­i­tary coup was not that far fetched, cer­tain­ly not in Gen­er­al McClellan’s imag­i­na­tion. After some ear­ly suc­cess in West Vir­ginia, the nation’s lead­ing Demo­c­ra­t­ic Gen­er­al was appoint­ed by Lin­coln in July 1861 to be the Com­man­der of the Army of the Potomac. Soon after he wrote the fol­low­ing to his wife:

I find myself in a new and strange posi­tion here—Presdt, Cab­i­net, Genl Scott & all defer­ring to me—by some strange oper­a­tion of mag­ic I seem to have become the pow­er of the land. … I almost think that were I to win some small suc­cess now I could become Dic­ta­tor or any­thing else that might please me—but noth­ing of that kind would please me—therefore I won’t be Dictator.”

Lincoln often visited the war front. In this photo, he is with General McClellan in the field.
Lin­coln often vis­it­ed the war front. In this pho­to, he is with Gen­er­al McClel­lan in the field.

Beloved by his troops, who called him Lit­tle Mac” and “Young Napoleon,” McClel­lan was a genius at orga­niz­ing and train­ing an army — on the field of bat­tle, not so much. He was pre­oc­cu­pied with the fear that his troops were out­num­bered, which made him timid. After his failed Penin­su­lar cam­paign to take Rich­mond, Lin­coln ordered the troops back the capi­tol and called a meet­ing with his gen­er­al. If he expect­ed McClel­lan to be con­trite, he couldn’t have been more wrong. Instead he hand­ed Lin­coln a let­ter which called on him to pro­vide the coun­try with an author­i­ta­tive state­ment of “civ­il and mil­i­tary pol­i­cy, cov­er­ing the whole ground of our nation­al trouble.”

 

McClel­lan told Lin­coln that:

The U.S. gov­ern­ment couldn’t legal­ly make war to sub­ju­gate the peo­ple of any state and that con­cil­i­a­tion, includ­ing aban­don­ing all attempts to abol­ish slav­ery, was the only way to end the con­flict. As a mat­ter of prin­ci­ple, Lin­coln had refused to rec­og­nize the Con­fed­er­a­cy. South­ern­ers were enti­tled to their polit­i­cal rights which allowed them to elect whom they pleased. Gen McClel­lan well knew that the restora­tion of an unre­con­struct­ed South would restore the Demo­c­ra­t­ic Party’s nation­al majority.Lincoln should repu­di­ate the anti-slav­ery ele­ment of his own Repub­li­can Par­ty by pro­tect­ing slav­ery. McClel­lan warned that “a dec­la­ra­tion of rad­i­cal views, upon slav­ery, will rapid­ly dis­in­te­grate our present Armies.”

Lin­coln read the let­ter and said nothing.

Richard Slotkin’s book, The Long Road to Anti­etam, describes the polit­i­cal facts con­fronting the Pres­i­dent. “Thus despite his defeat in the [Penin­su­lar Cam­paign], McClel­lan still enjoyed very broad sup­port, not only in the army but with the pub­lic and in the press. He and his polit­i­cal allies had been extra­or­di­nar­i­ly effec­tive in per­suad­ing much of the pub­lic and the press that Stan­ton and the War Depart­ment were to blame for McClellan’s defeat — and that McClel­lan was the man best suit­ed to pros­e­cute the more vig­or­ous war the pub­lic now demanded.”

War Sec­re­tary Stan­ton want­ed McClel­lan shot for trea­son. Lin­coln explored replac­ing the Gen­er­al; how­ev­er, the Repub­lic was in a pre­car­i­ous posi­tion polit­i­cal­ly and mil­i­tar­i­ly. He had to sit tight.

Iron­i­cal­ly, the President’s oppor­tu­ni­ty to relieve McClel­lan came when the gen­er­al “defeat­ed” Lee at Anti­etam. The rebels were repelled from Union soil back to Vir­ginia. How­ev­er, pub­lic sup­port for McClel­lan ebbed when he did not attempt to pur­sue Lee’s army and destroy it. After the midterm fall elec­tions, where Democ­rats made sub­stan­tial gains but the Repub­li­cans remained in con­trol of con­gress and key gov­er­nor­ships, Lin­coln relieved McClel­lan of com­mand and com­mit­ted him­self to wag­ing total war on the South.

October 15, 1862 North Star–Gen McClellan and the Army

Farewell Vis­it to Sev­er­al Corps — Enthu­si­asm of the Sol­diers, etc.

…Gen. McClel­lan and staff, accom­pa­nied by Gen. Burn­side, today bid farewell to this army, vis­it­ing in suc­ces­sion the sev­er­al army corps. As the Gen­er­al rode through the ranks, the 33 bat­tered ban­ners of the vet­er­an reg­i­ments were dipped to greet him, while the thou­sands of sol­diers gave vent to their feel­ings in con­tin­u­ous rounds of cheers and applause.

… The fol­low­ing farewell order was read to the troops com­pos­ing the Army of Potomac on dress parade.

Offi­cers and Sol­diers of the Army of the Potomac — An order of the Pres­i­dent devolves upon Major Gen. Burn­side the com­mand of this Army. In part­ing with you, I can­not express the love and grat­i­tude I bear to you. As an Army, you have grown under my care. In you I have nev­er found doubt or cold­ness. The bat­tles you have fought under my com­mand will proud­ly live in our Nation’s his­to­ry. The glo­ry you have achieved — our mutu­al per­ils and fatigues — the graves of our com­rades fall­en in bat­tle and by dis­ease — the bro­ken forms of those whom wounds and sick­ness have dis­abled — the strongest asso­ci­a­tions which can exist among men — unite us still by an indis­sol­u­ble tie. We shall ever be com­rades in sup­port­ing the Con­sti­tu­tion and the Nation­al­i­ty of its People.

Geo. B. McClel­lan, Major Gen. U.S. Army

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