I don't disagree with much of what you said.
I will emphasize "one mistake" it really would have doomed McClellan. In the Peninsula if you lose one battle his supply lines get cut, as happened at Gaines' Mill and at Glendale for instance if he lost the battle his army would have been destroyed...
As I see it an Overland Campaign in 62 would probably run into the same problem as the Peninsula campaign. The Confederates have a larger reserve pool than 64 and the Union political situation is more toxic impacting generals.
In my opinion, the famed Lost Orders are a tad overrated. They were a few days old when McClellan received them and a few hours prior he had already issued orders to attack at South Mountain. I don't think it actually contributed much to the campaign other than giving McClellan more confidence...
Well he was 90% of the time, take a look yourself....
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Seven_Pines
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Beaver_Dam_Creek
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Gaines's_Mill
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Glendale...
Here's my thoughts. According to many the two major mistakes McClellan made in the Peninsula were not attacking Yorktown earlier and not withdrawing Porter's Corps from North of the Chickahominy. Yorktown is interesting, had McClellan known the enemy had only a few thousand troops he might have...
Everyone always makes fun of McClellan over the numbers but he was actually outnumbered mid way through the campaign.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peninsula_Campaign
Interesting. If McClellan had McDowell from the beginning and they attempted that turning movement on Yorktown from Gloucester Point could you see the siege ending much earlier? How much impact would this have had in the weeks ahead.
Very good points, thanks for the balanced analysis.
Yeah I agree, It is not the job of the commander to charge head first into the battle, same mistake Sumner made at Antietam. A.S. Johnston added momentum to the attack but it was so disorganized.
In the above scenario doesn't please you and since everyone holds Grant in such high regard, I was thinking lets have Grant arrive on the scene after the Seven Days and taken overall command with McClellan still leading AoP. In my opinion he would have immediately agreed with McClellan that...
Thanks for the response and very good questions. I'll let Dandan give a response at his leisure but here what i'll add. Take your time getting back no rush.
I don't know how many men McClellan could logistically support north of the River from his main force. He put roughly 28,000 in OTL I...
Man you guys are too much. I find this situation really weird and frankly never seen it before on this site. It seems like everything about about McClellan was been reduced to popular history laughter. The comments section on youtube normally posts stuff like this.....
I still haven't seen...
McClellan studied Saxe, Frederick the Great and Napoleon I'm not sure about Alexander. The thing about Alexander though is I think A.S. Johnston was the Alexander of American Civil War and that didn't seem to work. You charge into battle, get yourself killed or lose control over the battle. I...
I concur, though the move to Harrison's landing did save the army AoP according to Lee. The AoP was somewhat exposed and Lee was concentrating against weaker points in Seven Days. I see no problem with pulling back to supply base, digging in on high ground, concentrating his men and preparing...
Hmm Sherman was very good. I think he had an edge in strategy/planning over most of the other generals. I'm not sure he was that good with tactics, see Kennesaw Mountain, when compared with say Thomas or Lee. I've also heard the criticism though that he gave let the AoT off too many times and...