The Civil War - 150 Years Later - The North Gets A New General

In this and subsequent special editions of Hooves, Heels and Wheels, the blog will take a look at the 150th anniversary of the events of the Civil War, and reflect on how they came about, and what implications they have for today ...

The Civil War

150 years ago This Summer - The North Gets A New General

Summer-Autumn-Winter, 1861-1862

General George B McClellan

It was July of 1861. Only days before the Union and Confederate forces had clashed at Manassas Virginia. The human cost of the Battle of Manassas had staggered both North and South. In major cities across the cleft nation, newspaper men struggled to find accurate tallies of the dead. Families lined the offices of the pressmen waiting for the casualty lists to be published and released. For 3,000 families in the Union and 2,000 in the new Confederacy, the news would be bad – for some worse than others. 460 Yankee husbands, fathers, brothers, sons and sweethearts would remain forever on the battlefield – so too would 390 Rebel men. Thousands more were wounded – and 1,300 Union soldiers were now in Confederate Prison Camps.

The heartbroken families had the worst of course, but the battle affected everyone in the country. In the North, obviously all was gloom and trauma- for the defeat had not only been costly, but also disorderly, panicky and embarrassing. Abraham Lincoln was despondent. “It’s damned bad...” appraised the sixteenth president. For days after the rout, the scrambled divisions of the Union Army straggled back into the vulnerable and now all-but-defenseless capital of Washington DC. Indeed it was “Damned bad”.

The fault did not entirely lie with the defeated Union General Irvin McDowell, of course. He had been prodded into making a premature invasion with untried soldiers who had only enlisted for three months. The failure of a fellow Union general in his mission to pin down a Confederate force allowed two Confederate armies to gang up on his McDowell’s. Generals, however - like politicians and sports coaches -were lightning rods for blame and culpability. It was (and remains to this day) part of their job to accept responsibility for disappointments and disasters that had never been entirely under their control. McDowell’s days as field commander of the Union army were done with. And so the Union General of the Armies, Winfield Scott went to the telegraph office and flashed a cable west on July 24th, 1861.

The recipient of the message was Union General George B McClellan. It read “Circumstances make your presence here necessary – Come hither without delay”. McClellan had provided the North with its only victories thus far in the war – small, almost insignificant victories, but both Scott and Lincoln knew that times like this called for the finding of optimism where one could. McClellan wasted no time, arriving at the depressed capital on July 26th.



“Drill then drill again”
, McClellan quickly found out from President Lincoln himself that his new mission was to reorganize, refit, and recruit the Union army – all Federal forces in the vicinity of the capital. This included what would be known as the Army of The Potomac, the principal Union force that would carry the war into Virginia.

In the months that followed, McClellan threw himself to the task. And ambitious and energetic general, he went right to work on curing what ailed the defeated Union army. Fortresses were built around Washington DC to thwart any Confederate counterattack. Generals and colonels were reviewed and examined – incompetents were fired and worthies promoted. Hardcore discipline was clamped down onto the city, with 1000 US Regular soldiers acting as military police. They roared through the city and cleaned derelict soldiers out of gambling houses, brothels, and taverns. Liquor was forbidden in camps (officially anyway), and civilians were not allowed to visit camps except with special passes. Under McClellan’s tutelage, the troops would be too busy for visiting anyway.

“The first thing in the morning is drill, then drill, then drill again. Then drill, drill, a little more drill. Then drill, and lastly drill. Between drills, we drill, and sometimes stop to eat a little and have roll-call.” Oliver Norton 83rd PA Infantry

If McClellan had learned one thing from his McDowell, his hapless predecessor, it’s that very bad things happen when armies are under trained. McClellan would never let it be said of him that he tolerated a lack of discipline and drill. Troops would train and maneuver all day, every day, and the effort would be more massive than anything ever seen in America, for in the aftermath of the Manassas disaster, President Lincoln had sent out the call for more volunteers – many more – 500,000 nationwide. Trains chugged into Washington several times a day, and they hauled in 10,000 new recruits every week. McClellan was determined that each of these newbies would know their place in the military machine before his army ever saw the Confederates again.



New soldiers would first train and drill in squad teams, then by companies. Then all ten companies in a regiment would train together as one. In a matter of months, regiments were teaming up to train as brigades, and then brigades were working together as divisions. The spectacles were nothing like any American had ever seen.

Late summer came and went. Autumn brought the colder weather, and still the Union army practiced and drilled. McClellan’s evolutions created a powerful esprit de corps. Soldiers were now proud of themselves and units competed to be the snappiest at maneuvering. Regiments and brigades prided themselves on how infrequently commanders needed to bark orders, the men instead responding to the tap of the drums and the peal of the bugle. All units vied to be so well-trained that that every man could obey the “crack” of the drums … such troops were nicknamed “crack” troops.

For all the positive changes he was bringing to the Union army, McClellan was also cultivating opponents. McClellan would later go down in history as a slow-moving and cautious general … and this was already beginning to show. Northern politicians and the newspapers had been hoping that the new general would quickly move back into attack mode and bring about another battle before 1861 was over. This was no part of McClellan’s plans. He wanted months to train, not weeks, and grew embittered when well-meaning amateurs began to goad him into getting on with an attack. The training would go on, and New Year’s day of 1862 would see the Army of the Potomac planted right where it had been for the last few months… better trained and equipped, yes, but no further closer to victory then it had been when it staggered back home from Manassas.

One hundred and fifty years ago this winter, America began to learn some more realities of the war they were in. They had already learned of some horror and heartbreak – and would learn more- but now was also a time for boredom and frustration – factors that were just as real and challenging to a nation at war.