How did George B. McClellan enter military service at age 15?

George B. McClellan entered federal service as a cadet at the United States Military Academy in 1842 after his father secured a letter from President John Tyler that waived the usual minimum age requirement of 16.

What role did George B. McClellan play during the Mexican War?

George B. McClellan served as an engineering officer during the war and received brevet promotions to first lieutenant for services at Contreras and Churubusco and to captain for his service at Chapultepec.

Why was George B. McClellan removed from command of the Army of the Potomac?

Lincoln ordered that he be removed from command on the 5th of November 1862 because he failed to pursue Lee aggressively after the Battle of Antietam.

When did George B. McClellan win the election for governor of New Jersey?

George B. McClellan won the general election for governor of New Jersey in 1877 after being nominated by acclamation by the state convention.

George B. McClellan

George Brinton McClellan was born in Philadelphia on the 3rd of December 1826. His father George was a surgeon who founded Jefferson Medical College. His mother Elizabeth Sophia Steinmetz Brinton McClellan came from a leading Pennsylvania family noted for her grace and refinement. The couple had five children including Frederica John George Arthur and Mary. One of his great-grandfathers Samuel McClellan served as a brigadier general during the Revolutionary War. McClellan initially intended to follow his father into medicine but attended a private academy followed by enrollment in a private preparatory school for the University of Pennsylvania. He began attending the university in 1840 at age 14. After two years he changed his goal to military service. With assistance from his father's letter to President John Tyler he was accepted at the United States Military Academy in 1842 at age 15. The academy waived its usual minimum age of 16. At West Point he was an energetic and ambitious cadet deeply interested in the teachings of Dennis Hart Mahan and the theoretical strategic principles of Antoine-Henri Jomini. His closest friends were aristocratic southerners including George Pickett Dabney Maury Cadmus Wilcox and A. P. Hill. These associations gave him what he considered to be an appreciation of the southern mind and an understanding of the political and military implications of sectional differences that led to the Civil War. He graduated at age 19 in 1846 second in his class of 59 cadets losing the top position to Charles Seaforth Stewart only because of inferior drawing skills.

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McClellan arrived near the mouth of the Rio Grande in October 1846 well prepared for action with a double-barreled shotgun two pistols a saber a dress sword and a Bowie knife. He complained that he had arrived too late to take any part in the American victory at Monterrey in September. During a temporary armistice McClellan was stricken with dysentery and malaria which kept him in the hospital for nearly a month. Malaria would recur in later years; he called it his Mexican disease. He served as an engineering officer during the war frequently subject to enemy fire. He was appointed a brevet first lieutenant for his services at Contreras and Churubusco and to captain for his service at Chapultepec. He performed reconnaissance missions for Maj. Gen. Winfield Scott a close friend of McClellan's father. As a lieutenant he also served under Captain Robert E. Lee who he would later face at the Battle of Antietam during the Civil War. His experiences in the war shaped his military and political life. He learned that flanking movements used by Scott at Cerro Gordo were often better than frontal assaults and the value of siege operations like Veracruz. He witnessed Scott's success in balancing political with military affairs and his good relations with the civil population. McClellan also developed a disdain for volunteer soldiers and officers particularly politicians who cared nothing for discipline and training. In March 1852 he was ordered to report to Capt. Randolph B. Marcy at Fort Smith Arkansas to serve as second-in-command on an expedition to discover the sources of the Red River. By June the expedition reached the source of the north fork of the river and Marcy named a small tributary McClellan's Creek. Upon their return on July 28 they were astonished to find that they had been given up for dead.

McClellan resigned his commission the 16th of January 1857 and became chief engineer and vice president of the Illinois Central Railroad. He then became president of the Ohio and Mississippi Railroad in 1860. He performed well in both jobs expanding the Illinois Central toward New Orleans and helping the Ohio and Mississippi recover from the Panic of 1857. Despite his successes and lucrative salary of $10,000 per year he was frustrated with civilian employment and continued to study classical military strategy assiduously. In March 1855 McClellan was promoted to captain and assigned to the 1st U.S. Cavalry regiment. Due to his political connections and mastery of French he received the assignment to be an official observer of the European armies in the Crimean War in 1855 as part of the Delafield Commission led by Richard Delafield. Traveling widely and interacting with the highest military commands and royal families he observed the siege of Sevastopol. Upon his return to the United States in 1856 he requested an assignment in Philadelphia to prepare his report which contained a critical analysis of the siege and a lengthy description of the organization of the European armies. He also wrote a manual on cavalry tactics that was based on Russian cavalry regulations. Like other observers though McClellan did not appreciate the importance of the emergence of rifled muskets in the Crimean War and the fundamental changes in warfare tactics it would require. The Army adopted McClellan's cavalry manual and also his design for a saddle dubbed the McClellan Saddle which he claimed to have seen used by Hussars in Prussia and Hungary. It became standard issue for as long as the U.S. horse cavalry existed and is still used for ceremonies.

At the start of the Civil War in 1861 McClellan's knowledge of what was called big war science and his railroad experience suggested he might excel at military logistics. His old report from his tour in the Crimean war was quickly rushed for publication. This placed him in great demand as the Union mobilized its militia and its armies. The governors of Ohio Pennsylvania and New York actively pursued him to command their states' militia. On May 3 McClellan re-entered federal service as commander of the Department of the Ohio responsible for the defense of the states of Ohio Indiana Illinois and later western Pennsylvania western Virginia and Missouri. On May 14 he was commissioned a major general in the regular army. At age 34 he outranked everyone in the Army except Lt. Gen. Winfield Scott the general-in-chief. McClellan's rapid promotion was partly due to his acquaintance with Salmon P. Chase Treasury Secretary and former Ohio governor and senator. After the defeat of the Union forces at Bull Run on the 21st of July 1861 Lincoln summoned McClellan from western Virginia where McClellan had given the North the only engagements bearing a semblance of victory. He traveled by special train on the main Pennsylvania line from Wheeling through Pittsburgh Philadelphia and Baltimore and on to Washington City and was greeted by enthusiastic crowds that met his train along the way. Carl Sandburg wrote McClellan was the man of the hour pointed to by events and chosen by an overwhelming weight of public and private opinion. On July 26 the day he reached the capital McClellan was appointed commander of the Military Division of the Potomac the main Union force responsible for the defense of Washington. On August 20 several military units in Virginia were consolidated into his department and he immediately formed the Army of the Potomac with himself as its first commander.

McClellan's army began to sail from Alexandria on March 17. It was an armada that dwarfed all previous American expeditions transporting 121,500 men 44 artillery batteries 1,150 wagons over 15,000 horses and tons of equipment and supplies. An English observer remarked that it was the stride of a giant. The army's advance from Fort Monroe up the Virginia Peninsula proved to be slow. Early in the campaign Confederate General John B. Prince John Magruder defended the Peninsula against McClellan's advance with a vastly smaller force. He created a false impression of many troops behind the lines and of even more troops arriving. He accomplished this by marching small groups of men repeatedly past places where they could be observed at a distance or were just out of sight accompanied by great noise and fanfare. During this time General Johnston was able to provide Magruder with reinforcements but even then there were far fewer troops than McClellan believed were opposite him. On May 31 as McClellan planned an assault his army was surprised by a Confederate attack. Johnston saw that the Union army was split in half by the rain-swollen Chickahominy River and hoped to defeat it in detail at Seven Pines and Fair Oaks. McClellan was unable to command the army personally because of a recurrence of malarial fever but his subordinates were able to repel the attacks. At the end of June Lee began a series of attacks that became known as the Seven Days Battles. The first major battle at Mechanicsville was poorly coordinated by Lee and his subordinates and resulted in heavy casualties for little tactical gain. However the battle had a significant impact on McClellan's nerve. The surprise appearance of Maj. Gen. Stonewall Jackson's troops in the battle convinced McClellan that he was even more outnumbered than he had thought.

The Battle of Antietam on the 17th of September 1862 was the single bloodiest day in American military history. The outnumbered Confederate forces fought desperately and well. Despite significant advantages in manpower McClellan was unable to concentrate his forces effectively which meant that Lee was able to shift his defenders to parry each of three Union thrusts launched separately and sequentially against the Confederate left center and finally the right. McClellan was also unwilling due to Porter's opinion to employ his ample reserve forces to capitalize on localized successes. Historian James M. McPherson has pointed out that the two corps McClellan kept in reserve were in fact larger than Lee's entire force. The reason for McClellan's reluctance was that as in previous battles he was convinced he was outnumbered. Although McClellan's subordinates can claim their share of responsibility for delays such as Ambrose Burnside's misadventures at Burnside Bridge and blunders like Edwin V. Sumner's attack without reconnaissance these were localized problems from which the full army could have recovered. As with the decisive battles in the Seven Days McClellan's headquarters were too far to the rear to allow his personal control over the battle. Because McClellan failed to pursue Lee aggressively after Antietam Lincoln ordered that he be removed from command on the 5th of November 1862. Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside assumed command of the Army of the Potomac on the 9th of November 1862. McClellan wrote to his wife Those in whose judgment I rely tell me that I fought the battle splendidly and that it was a masterpiece of art.... I feel I have done all that can be asked in twice saving the country.

The platform called for an immediate cessation of hostilities and a negotiated settlement with the Confederacy. McClellan was forced to repudiate the platform which made his campaign inconsistent and difficult. He also was not helped by the party's choice for vice president George H. Pendleton a peace candidate from Ohio. Lincoln won the election handily with 212 Electoral College votes to 21 and a popular vote of 2,218,388 to 1,812,807 or 55% to 45%. For all his popularity with the troops McClellan failed to secure their support and the military vote went to Lincoln nearly 3, 1. Lincoln's share of the vote in the Army of the Potomac was 70%. At the conclusion of the war in 1865 McClellan and his family went to Europe not returning until 1868; in this period he did not participate in politics. Prior to his return in September 1868 the Democratic Party had expressed some interest in nominating him for president again but Ulysses S. Grant became the Republican candidate in May 1868 and this interest died.

McClellan worked on engineering projects in New York City and was offered the position of president of the newly formed University of California which he declined. He was appointed chief engineer of the New York City Department of Docks in 1870. Beginning in 1872 he also served as the president of the Atlantic and Great Western Railroad. He and his family then embarked on another three-year stay in Europe from 1873 to 1875. In March 1877 the Governor of New York Lucius Robinson nominated McClellan to serve as the first state Superintendent of Public Works but the New York State Senate rejected him as incompetent to fill the position for which he was named. In 1877 the New Jersey Democratic Party nominated him for governor an action that took him by surprise because he had not expressed an interest in the position. His nomination was largely an effort by key party members to prevent the leading candidate Leon Abbett from gaining the nomination. After his name was unexpectedly placed into nomination at the state convention there was a stampede and he was nominated by acclamation. In the general election he faced William A. Newell a Republican former governor who accused McClellan of living in New York which he easily refuted. McClellan won the election as Democrats gained a majority in both houses of the New Jersey legislature for the first time since 1870.

George B. McClellan.

Mexican Disease And European Lessons

Mexican Disease And European Lessons

Railroads And The Crimean Watch

The Napoleon Of The Present War

The Peninsula And The Seven Days

The Bloodiest Day And The Removal

The General Who Ran For President

Governor And The Last Years

Railroads And The Crimean Watch

The Napoleon Of The Present War

The Peninsula And The Seven Days

The Bloodiest Day And The Removal

The General Who Ran For President

Governor And The Last Years

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George B. McClellan.

1. Mexican Disease And European Lessons

1. Mexican Disease And European Lessons

2. Railroads And The Crimean Watch

3. The Napoleon Of The Present War

4. The Peninsula And The Seven Days

5. The Bloodiest Day And The Removal

6. The General Who Ran For President

7. Governor And The Last Years

2. Railroads And The Crimean Watch

3. The Napoleon Of The Present War

4. The Peninsula And The Seven Days

5. The Bloodiest Day And The Removal

6. The General Who Ran For President

7. Governor And The Last Years

Up Next

Continue Browsing

Common questions

Mexican Disease And European Lessons

Mexican Disease And European Lessons

Railroads And The Crimean Watch

The Napoleon Of The Present War

The Peninsula And The Seven Days

The Bloodiest Day And The Removal

The General Who Ran For President

Governor And The Last Years

Railroads And The Crimean Watch

The Napoleon Of The Present War

The Peninsula And The Seven Days

The Bloodiest Day And The Removal

The General Who Ran For President

Governor And The Last Years