Who is general mcclellan

He was a workaholic and superb organizer who had the unquestioned loyalty of his troops. Unfortunately, he understood how to generate loyalty only from those below his authority, not from those above himself. The result was friction between himself and the President, the Secretary of War and the congressional Committee on the Conduct of the War.

McClellan was again given command of the Army of the Potomac before the Battle of Antietam on September 17, —despite strong opposition to him within Congress and the cabinet. Historian Stephen R.

A few days later, Lincoln peremptorily ordered the Army of the Potomac to advance, but McClellan responded with his usual litany of excuses. On 13 October, Lincoln admonished McClellan for his excessive timidity in a private letter designed to spur him on, but this tactic proved no more fruitful than his more direct approach the previous weeks.

Instead, McClellan continued to demand more equipment, supplies, and men. McClellan was relieved of command on November 5, for his failure to pursue Confederate Army. But I begin to believe that he will never get ready to go forward! He is an admirable engineer, but he seems to have a special talent for a stationary engine.

But I begin to feel as if he would never get ready to fight! McClellan opposed emancipation and his loyalty to the Union was questioned by members of the Joint Committee on Conduct of the War. He told me that General Scott had recommended McClellan as an officer who had studied the science of war, and had been in the Crimea during the war against Russia, and that he told Scott that he knew nothing about the science of war, and it was very important to have just such a person to organize the raw recruits of the republic around Washington.

After the war, McClellan earned a living as an engineering consultant before election as Governor of New Jersey Democrat, Halleck John Pope Ambrose E.

He just didn't want to use it. McClellan was better at organizing than fighting. He was highly intelligent, but couldn't wage a successful campaign. He always had an excuse for not engaging the enemy: his men were outnumbered actually, they were not ; he needed more troops; and it wasn't a good time or place or season for a battle.

Once, Lincoln was so frustrated at McClellan's failure to act that he sent the general a telegram that read, "If General McClellan does not want to use the Army, I would like to borrow it for a time, provided I could see how it could be made to do something. He resigned from the army to work as chief engineer for a railroad company, and he was very successful. When the Civil War broke out, McClellan reentered the military. He held several important military positions, and soon after the disaster at Bull Run, he was second in command under General Winfield Scott.

In the fall of , his army was again on the move, pursuing an invading Confederate force under General Robert E. McClellan intercepted it at South Mountain and turned it back at Antietam, Maryland but at a terrible cost.

After the battle, he failed to pursue Lee across the Potomac River and this, combined with his generally strained relationship with President Lincoln, cost him his position as General-in-Chief of the Army and then Commander of the Army of the Potomac. McClellan opposed Lincoln as the Democratic Party candidate in the presidential election, advocating a peace platform, but was soundly defeated.

He never received another military command, spending the post-war years as president of the Atlantic and Great Western Railroad, chief engineer of New York City, and governor of New Jersey, among other positions, before a premature death from a heart attack at age Explore This Park.