General+George+McCellan

=General George McClellan = (Dec 3, 1826 - Oct 29, 1885)

General George McClellan Started his early military career in West Point, graduating second in his class and assigned to the army engineers. Then served the calavry, and dispatched to study the methods of European armies and document them. The stratigies he learned while in Europe were extensively used by him in the Civil War. He also created an incredibly useful military used in the army He was very successful in this field, but was happy to reenter the military in 1861. When he came back in he was rapidly promoted to major general. He first gained notice from the government by winning a few small victories in the western theater, though much of the credit remained with his subordinate officers. He was then called to take command at Washington after the humiliating defeat at the first Battle of Bull Run. He was soon awarded the command of the Army of the Potomac because of his inpressive organizeing and engineering skills. He was also extermly arrogant and timid. In November 1861, he Decided to strike at the south's capital, Richmond, whild seizeing other important Confederate cities. Using a massive army of 273,000 Men he was giong to push into Virginia. Also he made it clear that he would not interfere with any slaves and help put down slave slave rebellions to minimize resistance to his army. McClellan then empoyed a man named Allan Pinkerton along with his spies. Allan's spies falsely reported the size of the Confederate Forces thus McClellan was unwilling to attack until he had more men available. Abraham finally got fed up with his sananagians and ordered McClellan to appear before a commitee to question his ways of fighting the war. Benjamin Wade and Zachariah Chandler interogated him and found him guilty of being a coward. Abe Lincoln forced McClellan into action by ordering General War Order Number One, which ordered McClellan to attack before Febuary 22nd, 1861. But before he could do that, Lincoln and him had a few more disagreements and was promptly removed from command of the union army. On his way out, he was to leave 30,000 soldiers to defend Washington, which he neglected to do before. This was yet another futial attempt to capture Richmond by the north. McClellan and his 115,000 met the south at Williamsburg May 5th, 1862. A quick battle ensued with the Confederates retreating. He then moved his troops in to the Shenandoah Valley, the breadbasket of the south, Surronded Stonewall Jackson's Army along with the help of other generals. Jackson moved his soldiers east to join up with Joseph Johnston. The Confederates counter-attacked and were pushed back. Johnston was horribly wounded during the battle and Robert E. Lee took command of the southren forces. John Pope, another union general, moved west to Charlottesville to draw off Lee's forces from Richmond. But with Confederate troops constanly attacking McClellan's forces, he was forced to withdraw. Pope was then asked to attack but was easily driven back and McClellan withdrew along with Pope. Sept. 17th, 1862 McClellan and General Ambrose Burnside attacked Lee at Antietam with 75,300 to 37,330. Lee held out until reinforcements arrived and was beaten back. Lee was able to move back into the south completely unhindered. Both sides had about 15,000 Causilties. It was the most costly day in U.S. history Lincoln was furious with McClellan because he did not take a golden oppurtuity at defeating Lee once and for all, but instead letting him go back and regroup. Lincoln then asked McClellan to go on an offensive, but McClellan agian complained about not haveing enough horses to do it. About this time Lincoln was fed up and ordered McClellan back to Washington and was relieved of all command as of Nov. 7th 1862, and was replaced by General Burnside. McClellan tried to run for presidency in 1864 and called for peace and a ceaseing of hotilities. He was beaten in a landslide, only gaining Delaware, Kentucky, and New Jersey. Terrible General
 * Background**
 * Beginning of Civil War Career**
 * McClellan's Campaign**
 * Peninsular Campaign**
 * Antietam**
 * Lincoln's Pissed[[image:http://t1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:3QxZsXAg6cUcWM%3Ahttp://kylewade.com/images/Angry_Lincoln.jpg width="128" height="130" align="right" link="imgres?imgurl=http://kylewade.com/images/Angry_Lincoln.jpg&imgrefurl=http://kylewade.com/blog.html&usg=___9igFxSpUAZXjATtwfWrGvVzrFE=&h=501&w=495&sz=210&hl=en&start=1&um=1&tbnid=3QxZsXAg6cUcWM:&tbnh=130&tbnw=128&prev=/images?q=angry lincoln&hl=en&rls=com.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox&rlz=1I7TSNA_enUS353US353&sa=N&um=1"]]**
 * Presidency**
 * Summary**

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 * Info**