General George McClellan was one of the most controversial figures of the Civil War. He commanded the Union's Army of the Potomac early in the conflict and was enormously popular with the soldiers and the public.
Yet his inability to aggressively engage the Confederate Army came to frustrate President Abraham Lincoln as well as influential members of Congress. Following his refusal to pursue the forces of Robert E.
Lee after the Battle of Antietam, Lincoln relieved him of command in November 1862.
McClellan became the Democratic nominee for president in the wartime election of 1864. And throughout 1864 it appeared that McClellan would win. However, he was forced into a political corner from which he could not escape, and Lincoln did eventually win reelection.
In the years following the war McClellan served as governor of New Jersey. He remains a puzzling figure in American history. Though supremely confident of his own abilities, he was overly cautious as a commander. And debates about his abilities and strategic decisions in 1862 continue to resonate.
Early Life of George B. McClellan
George Brinton McClellan was born in Philadelphia on December 3, 1826. His father was a physician, and an ancestor had served as a general in the Continental Army in the Revolutionary War.
As a child McClellan received a good education and he entered the University of Pennsylvania in 1840 before accepting a commission to the U.S.
Military Academy at West Point in 1842. He graduated second in his class at West Point in 1846.
The Mexican War
As the Mexican War began, McClellan was assigned to an engineering unit that built roads and bridges used by American forces. He gained notice in the Army for his engineering talent and obvious intelligence.
When the war ended he was assigned to West Point, and served there for several years as an instructor.
In the early 1850s McClellan was assigned to military engineering tasks in the West, which led to work surveying and assessing possible routes for railroads. Jefferson Davis, serving as secretary of war, was impressed with McClellan's work.
McClellan became something of a protege of Davis, who had graduated from West Point himself. The men socialized in Washington. As Davis thought the American military should learn from the war being fought by European powers in the Crimean War, he bestowed a great favor on McClellan: a year-long trip to Europe.
The Crimean War
Placed as the youngest member of a three-man contingent of American officers, McClellan left for Europe in April 1855. The American commission, 29-year-old Captain McClellan and two much older majors, first went to London, then to the Russian capital of St. Petersburg.
There were problems arranging travel to view the Russian lines in the Crimea, and by the time the Americans were able to travel to the battlefront the great siege of Sevastopol had ended. But McClellan was able to view battlefields, including the site where the British Light Cavalry Brigade made its charge against Russian guns.
After returning to America in the spring of 1856, McClellan wrote a book-length report on what he had seen in Europe. It was published in January 1857 and secured his reputation as an expert on military strategy and fortifications.
Despite his prominence as a rising star in the U.S. Army, McClellan resigned his commission in early 1857 and took a job as a railroad executive. He never fully explained his thinking, but it was always assumed he was frustrated in the Army and saw no chance to accomplish anything meaningful.
The Army of the Potomac
McClellan settled into civilian life, and married Ellen Marcy, the daughter of a general, on May 22, 1860. He seemed destined for a successful career in railroading, but national events changed all that. After the rebellion of the slave states accelerated with the attack on Fort Sumter, McClellan was suddenly in demand as a known expert on military matters.
McClellan accepted an offer from the governor of Ohio to command the state's volunteer troops. He began training troops in May 1861, and in June he successfully commanded an operation which cleared Confederate troops from western Virginia.
Following the disastrous Battle of Bull Run, McClellan was summoned to Washington in late July 1861 and placed in command of the Army of the Potomac. His orders were to defend Washington, D.C., against any Confederate attacks, and to also attack and defeat the enemy.
At first, McClellan was inspiring to the soldiers who had recently enlisted and also to the general public in the North. He trained and built what appeared to be a formidable army, and he instilled a sense of morale which had been obliterated with the defeat at Bull Run.
However, he did not seem to be in any hurry to attack the South, and that made Lincoln, and influential figures on Capitol Hill, both puzzled and disappointed.
The Peninsula Campaign
In early 1862 McClellan finally began to take action. He had convinced Lincoln that he could move the Army of the Potomac onto a peninsula in Virginia from which it could head west to attack Richmond, the Confederate capital.
The Peninsula Campaign turned into a slow-moving disaster. While McClellan's forces fought well in some engagements, he was often convinced, wrongly, that he was outnumbered and about to be defeated. His lack of confidence essentially undermined the campaign and after a summer of frustration in Virginia, the Army of the Potomac abandoned its plan to drive onward to Richmond.
McClellan was relieved of command. By the end of the summer of 1862, he was without an Army, and his military career seemed as if it could be over.
The Battle of Antietam
After the Union Army, under the command of Gen. John Pope, was defeated at the Battle of Second Manassas, McClellan was put back in command by Lincoln in early September 1862. Soon after, Robert E. Lee's rebel army invaded the North, crossing the Potomac into Maryland.
McClellan set off in pursuit, and boasted to Lincoln that he would finally defeat Lee. Moving into western Maryland, McClellan, thanks to an amazing stroke of luck, got a copy of Lee's secret orders to his commanders. But McClellan, despite knowing Lee's plans, moved slowly and did not take full advantage of the astounding windfall of intelligence.
On September 17, 1862, the armies of McClellan and Lee met at the epic Battle of Antietam. The fighting became known as the bloodiest day in American history, but after the vicious fighting Lee was able to withdraw back into Virginia.
McClellan, and the Union, were able to claim a victory on the grounds that Lee's invasion had been turned back. But Lincoln was impatient and kept prodding McClellan to pursue Lee into Virginia and destroy his army.
In late September Lincoln traveled to western Maryland and visited the army. He met with McClellan, and the two men were photographed by Alexander Gardner having a discussion in McClellan's command tent.
After McClellan kept finding excuses not to move into Virginia and attack Lee, Lincoln relieved him of command. His military career came to an end. Though he remained in the U.S. Army, McClellan was given no assignment. He moved to New York City, and then to New Jersey.
The 1864 Presidential Campaign
In 1864 the Democratic Party nominated McClellan as its candidate for president. For much of the summer of 1864 it was expected that the voters of the North, tired of years of war, would vote Lincoln out of office. Even Lincoln expected to lose.
By November several battlefield victories suddenly made Lincoln seem a much stronger candidate, and McClellan was defeated. He traveled to Europe afterward, and eventually returned to America and worked in business. He served as governor of New Jersey from 1878 to 1881. He died in Orange, New Jersey, on October 29, 1885.
McClellan's Legacy
The Civil War service of George McClellan remains controversial. In his own time his behavior while in command was questioned widely, and his decisions are still puzzling. He has gone down in history as someone who seemed supremely confident of himself, yet was somehow overly cautious to the point of crippling indecisiveness.