THE USE OF PHYSICAL INTELLIGENCE IN GENERAL GEORGE B. MCCLEUAN ' S 186 2 PENINSULAR CAMPAIGN .

A Thesis Presented to The Faculty of Graduate Studies of The University of Guelph

by PATRICK JAMES HEINSEN

In partial fulfilment of requirements for the degree of Master of Arts April, 1997

(6 Patrick Heinsen, 1997 National Library Bibliothèque nationale I*m of Canada du Canada Acquisitions and Acquisitions et Bibliographie Services services bibliographiques 395 Wellington Street 395. rue Wellington Ottawa ON K1A ON4 Ottawa ON KIA ON4 Canada Canada rour rn votre refermctl

Our fiie Notre rdference

The author has granted a non- L'auteur a accordé une licence non exclusive Licence allowing the exclusive permettant à la National Library of Canada to Bibliothèque nationale du Canada de reproduce, loaq distribute or sell reproduire, prêter, distribuer ou copies of this thesis in rnicroform, vendre des copies de cette thèse sous paper or electronic formats. la forme de microfiche/film, de reproduction sur papier ou sur format électronique.

The author retains ownership of the L'auteur conserve la propriété du copyright in this thesis. Neither the droit d'auteur qui protège cette thèse. thesis nor substantial extracts fkom it Ni la thèse ni des extraits substantiels may be printed or otherwise de celle-ci ne doivent être imprimés reproduced without the author' s ou autrement reproduits sans son permission. autorisation. ABSTRACT

THE USE OF PHYSICAL INTELLIGENCE IN GENERAL GEORGE B. MCCLELLAN ' S 186 2 PENINSULAR CAMPAIGN .

Patrick James Heinsen Advisor: University of Guelph, 1997 Professor LR. Farrell

This thesis is an investigation of the use and misuse of physical intelligence by Union General George B. McClellan during his 1862 Virginia Peninsula Campaign. Civil War historians have yet to consider what role maps and their accompanying reports played in both the planning and execution of the Campaign. This neglect has led to incomplete conclusions regarding the important question of why the Peninsular Campaign failed. General McClellan would later explain that poor physical intelligence resulted in the failure of the Amy of the Potomac to take Richmond. From an examination of the original reports and maps of the region, it appears that McClellan was only partially justified in this conclusion. While McClellanrs maps were incomplete and in some cases possessed glaring errors, reports of the Peninsula's topography and environmental conditions were remarkably prophetic. That McClellan chose to ignore these reports raises questions concerning the quality of his generalship. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I wish to extend my thanks to the members of my comrnittee, Prof. David Farrell, Prof. Richard Reid, and Prof. Catharine Wilson for their unending support and encouragement. 1 would also like to thank Prof. Emeritus Mo McKenna of the University of Calgary for first sparking my interest in the American Civil War. Thanks to Barb and Barb in the office of the Department of History at the University of Guelph for al1 their help. Finally I wish to thank my family in Red Deer, the Glsand most of al1 my wife (and research assistant) Gina without whom al1 these efforts would have been for naught. ii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE: "Physical Intelligence and the American Civil War" 1. Military intelligence in the Civil War. 5 II. What is "physical intelligence"? 9

CHAPTER TWO: "Where were the maps of Virginia?" 1. Interna1 Improvements Program. II, Civilian maps.

CHAPTER THREE: 34 '"Physical Intelligence and the 'American Waterlooff' 1. Physical intelligence and Campaign planning. 46 II. Urbanna to Fort Monroe. 54

CHAPTER FOUR: "On to Richmond" 1. April 4. 11. April 5. III. Warwick River.

CHAPTER FIVE: "Williamsburg to Harrison's Landing" 1. Battle of Williamsburg- II. The Chickahominy. III. The Seven Days. IV. Battle of Glendale.

CONCLUSIONS 124

BIBLIOGRAPHY 131 PHYSICAL INTELLIGENCE AND THE AMERICAN CIVIL WAR

Spy & Topog duty has been more neglected by our folkç than any other and is the principal cause of surprises and defeats. A Wornall 1863

General George B. McClellan was receiving a substantial dose of partisan politics as he sat in the basement of the Capital building, late in February of 1863. Before him perched the members of Americars answer to the Star Chamber: the men of the Joint Congressional Cornmittee on the Conduct of the War under the reigns of all-out abolitionist Ben Wade of Ohio. On his last visit before this tribunal in January of 1862 (after the disaster of Ballrs Bluff) the impression he had made was singularly unimpressive - leading some of the Senators to cal1 for his withdrawal from command. This the they were out for his head. '' 'At what period, '" Senator Gooch asked of him, " 'had the works of the enemy at Yorktown [Virginia, on the York/James Peninsula] been constructed?"' McClellan explained that the Confederate works had most likely been on the Peninsula for some the. "'Did you know of those works before you landed on the peninsula?'" McClellan answered frankly: "'No, we did not know of the line of works along the Warwick. Gooch pressed his opening asking whether or not the topography of the Peninsula was well understood by anyone connected with his command when he began the Campaign. "'Our mapsff" McClellan explained, "'proved entirely inaccurate, and did us more harm than good, for we were constantly misled

by them. ' f' "'Rad there not, '" continued the Senator, "'been a great misapprehension as to the character of the roads and the nature of the soi1 on the peninsula?'" Little Mac's feeble response spoke volumes: "'1 was deceived.'"l

Politically and militarily, the laurels of 1861 belonged to the fledging Southern Confederacy. These States had produced a working goverment, and while it was not without substantial flaws, it was undeniably a functioning entity. They had also created amies that could and did successfully defend southern borders. They had created a country. General McClellan's modest successes in Western Virginia in June and July of that year at Philippi, Rich Mountain and Garrick's Ford and the Navy's many successful amphibious assaults did something to redress earlier defeats along Bull Run and Wilson's Creek. But when those disasters were emphasised, east and west, by Ball's Bluff in October and the bloody repulse of Grant at Belrnont, Missouri in November, there was a distinct public impression, both North and South, at home and abroad, that the North was failing in its quest to Save the Union. As President Lincoln would bemoan to Quartemaster General M.C. Meigs, "the bottom is out of the tub . ."2 This was the situation that found General McCZellan in

1U.S. Congress. Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War. Army of the Potomac, Vol. 1, (Millwood, NY.: Kraus, 1977). pp. 428-430. My italics.

ZShelby Foote, The Civil War, A Narrative: Fort Sumter to Perryville, Vol. 1 of 3 Vols, (New York: Vintage Books, a division of Random House, 1986), p. 156 (hereafter cited as: The Civil War, A Narrative). command of al1 Union Armies in November of that year. At the tender age of thirty-four, the "Young Napoleon of the west", as the journalists were calling him, promised Lincoln that he "could do it all." McClelian set about planning a massive strike (linking his name even closer to that of the Corsican's) at the Rebel capital in order to crush the rebellion in a single, glorious blow - an "American Waterloow. The 1862 Peninsular Campaign that followed was one of the largest of the war, pitting the premier Federal army of over 100 000 men against its Confederate counterpart within sight of Richmond's church spires. McCleilan took his

Grande Armée closer than any other Save General US. Grant to

ending the Confederacy. His campaign was intended to erase the memory of the unorganised 'fist-fightr that was Bull Run and the inept management that produced Ballrs Bluff. Every detail would be taken into consideration in order to orchestrate the perfect campaign. That there were flaws came as no surprise, but that the planned instrument of the destruction of the Confederacy - McClellants Army of the Potomac - came itself within a hair's breadth of annihilation filled onlookers on both sides with amazement. What went wrong? Historians of Civil War are al1 confronted by this question, and have al1 focused on McClellan himself in attempting to explain the Anny of the Potomac's failure. In doing so, they have tended to centre their discussion on the divide between General McClellan and the Lincoln Administration. The failure of the Army of the Potomac was therefore explained either by a lack of ~dministration support or lack of forethought on McClellanrs behalf. McClellan apologists point to the withholding of General McDarell as the primary reason behind McCleilants failure. H.J. Eckenrode and Bryan Conrad suggest that the withholding of McDowell, while giving McClellan greater determination in having to overcome this "adverse stroke of fortune", was the result of Secretary of War Edwin Stantonrs secret desire to destroy McClellan. Stanton, it is argued, "worked on Lincoln's fears" concerning Washington's defences, thereby inducing the President to fatally denude McClellan's army of this important body of troops.3 Similar is the work of William Swinton who claimed that the withholding of McDowell brought on the siege of Yorktown which in turn destroyed McClellanfs campaign. Swinton hauever, wisely noted that "grave faults were committed both by the Administration and by General McClellan."4 Focusing strictly on high-level decision making, however, does not adequately answer the question. Certainly, the interaction between McClellan and his Commander-in-Chief is very important in understanding why Richmond did not fa11 in the summer of 1862. But this interaction is only one

~H.J. Eckenrode and Bryan Conrad, George B. McClellan, The Man Who Saved the Union, (Chape1 Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1941), p. 47.

4 William Swinton, Campaigns of the -y of the Potomac, (New York: Charles Richardson, 1866), pp. 94-106. Swinton's opinion is shared by the majority of authors on the subject. These include: Warren W. Hassler, Jr., General George B. McClellan, Shield of the union, (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1957) ; Foote, The Civil War, A Narrative; and Allan Nevins, The Improvised War, 18614862. Vol. I of The War for the Union. 3 Vols. (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1960 ) . (hereafter cited as : The Improvised War). layer in a much more complex mesh of issues surrounding the Peninsula Campaign. More recent scholarship in military intelligence has begun to open a field of Civil War study which promises to help historians understand McClellanrs f ailure.

Thanks in large part to the work of Edwin C. Fishel, Bruce W. Bidwell and William B. Feis the study of Civil War intelligence is slowly finding a wider audience.5 Peninsular historians, however, have long been aware of the important role intelligence played in the campaign. McClellants chief of intelligence Allan Pinkerton, for example, has until recently been credited with convincing General McClellan that he was facing an army which outnumbered his own. Although past writers often noted this intelligence failure, none deemed it necessary to examine its validity.6 Military intelligence took many foms during the Civil War. Its importance to effective army operations should not be underestimated. The Civil War moved at a Pace that few of

SEdwin C. Fishel, "The Mythology of Civil War Intelligence," Civil War History 10 (December, 1964), pp. 344-367; Fishel, "Pinkerton and McClellan: Who Deceived Whom?," Civil War fistory 2 (June, l988), pp. 114-141; Lt. Col. C.T. Schmidt, "G-2, Anny of the Potomac," Military Review 28 (July, 1948), pp. 45-56; Bruce W. Biàuell, History of the Military Intelligence Division, Department of the General Staff: 1775-1941 (Frederick, MD. : University Publications of America, 1986); William B. Feis, "A Union Military Intelligence Failure: Jubal Early's Raid, June 12- July 14, 1864," Civil War History 3 (1990), pp. 212-226; Feis, "Neutralizing the Valley: The Role of Military Intelligence in the Defeat of Jubal Early's Army of the Valley, 1864-1865," Civil War History 3 (19931, pp. 201-213.

mevins, The ~mprovised War, p. 300; Hassler, Jr., General George B. McClellan, Shield of the Union, p. 171 ; Bruce Catton, Mt. Lincoln's Amy, (New York: Doubleday, 1951) , pp. 122-123. its participants realised or could foresee. Military railroads and the telegraph saw their first extensive use during the Civil War. By the end of the War an amy could be moved in hours over distances that at the start of the conflict were thought of in terms of days. Commanders found they could have orders transmitted over great distances quickly and accurately. These changing circumstances placed a premium on the collection and dissemination of accurate military intelligence. As G.A.J. OrToole points out, "our real knowledge of Civil War intelligence and espionage remains sketchy."7 What can be said for certain is that "military intelligencefp,in the modern sense, was not called such during the 1860s. In the Civil War the term used to designate the activities now called intelligence was "secret service." While both the Confederate and Federal governments had secret service organizations, neither referred to them as the secret service (which would imply a nation wide organization). Instead, as Edwin Fishel explains, "Generals at any and al1 echelons engaged in intelligence and counterintelligence operations ad libitum."8 Secondly, the War saw the first use of systematic military intelligence methods in America, of aerial reconnaissance, electronic signal intercepts, and the establishment of intelligence as a distinct organizational and functional element within an army (this would not occur

7G.J.A. OfToole (ed.), The Encyclopaedia of American Intel 1 igence and Espionage From the Revoîutionary War to the Present, (New York: Facts on File, 19881, p. 123. BFishel, 14The Mythology of Civil War Intelligence", p. 345. until 1863). Forms of intelligence gathering were quite varied: spies played a role, but their importance has corne under some suspicion. The American theatre of war was in some important respects ideal for spy operations. Both sides shared the same language and culture (although dialects did prove to be a problem) and an extensive border region where loyalties were never certain. These factors allowed an unlimited number of operatives. Yet with these circurnstances working in their favour, the Union or Confederate spy did not collect a great deal of important intelligence. While spies were often accurate in their reporting on amy positions, these forces were most likely to be city garrisons, as amies in the field were much more difficult to penetrate.9 While the exploits of Elizabeth Van Lew, Rose Greenhow and Timothy Webster made good reading, the true value of their spying remains suspect.

Much more cormnon and useful methods of intelligence collection and dissemination during the Civil War took the form of signal intercepts, cavalry reconnaissances, interrogations and newspapers. Although the Federals used wire communications frequently, the recorded instances of enemy wire tapping are rare. Signal interception therefore mainly took the form of observing enemy flag and torch communication - a very comon practice. Since both sides used the same visual signalling system developed prior to the war, the interception of enemy communication by this medium must have been relatively simple. Both sides knew this, however, making the real job that of discovering what information was true and what had been deliberately planted. Effective cavalry was to prove important to field commanders when other methods of intelligence were difficult to corne by. While cavalry reconnaissance parties could not see as far as signalmen or balloonists, they could, rain or shine, locate positions that woods or hills concealed. Interrogation of deserters or local inhabitants was another major source of intelligence and played a decisive role in Hooker's Chancellorsville plan as well for Meade at Gettysburg.10 On the Peninsula, Allan Pinkerton utilised interrogation extensively and was able to identify every one of General Lee's regiments, although he unfortunately overestimated their size and mistakenly believed that he must have underestimated their numbers-11 Newspapers were full of military information during the war and were relied on by the troops, but were also full of errors. As with signal intercepts, both sides realised this fact and acted accordingly . The most overworked and under appreciated fonn of military intelligence, however, is the map. Obviously, the information derived from the map is essential to both

10 Ibid., pp. 360-365.

11 Allan Pinkerton, The Spy of the Rebellion, (Hartford, Conn.: M.A. Winter and Hatch, 1885), pp. 587-608. For cornparison, the listings for the Army of Northern Virginia for the same period are in The War of the ~ebellion:A Compilation of the Official Record of the Union and Confederate mies, 128 Vols, (Washington, D.C. : G.P.O., 1880-1901), Ser. 1, Vol. 11, pt. 2, pp. 483-489 (hereafter cited as: O.R., with al1 references to Series 1 unless otherwise noted). offensive and defensive operation, on both a strategic and tactical level. In territory that a commander does not have an intimate acquaintance, the map becomes the eyes of the army . It should be kept in rnind that the "good" military map contains both topographical and environmental intelligence - what 1 will term "physical intelligence." It should transmit information to its reader concerning the course of the rivers and streams, the direction and number of the roads, the names of the roads (however many there may be), and the positions of enemy fortifications. It should also attempt to represent the forests and fields, the soi1 conditions, the hills and valleys, the swamps and marches either in the map itself, or at least in accompanying reports. The importance of physical intelligence to McClellanfs Peninsular Campaign has been surprisingly unappreciated. While historians of the Campaign denote the unexpected environmental conditions, inaccurate maps and poor roads encountered on the Peninsula, they have made little attempt to analyse how the Army of the Potomac found itself without adequate physical intelligence in the first place and how this deficit affected its operations. While historians have been aware of the possible study of map use in the civil War, it was not until Stephen Sears, in his excellent To the Gates of Richmond, that an attempt was made to incorporate physical intelligence in any rneaningful way.12 As with previous historians, Sears discusses inaccurate maps, muddy roads and swollen rivers, but unlike others, he attempts to analyse how these effected army operations. Not limiting hirnself to maps, Sears also makes mention of physical intelligence reports reaching McCïeïian during his planning of the Campaign.13 In doing so, To the Gates of Richmond cornes closer than any other work to understanding the quality of generalship exhibited by the Young Napoleon. Unfortunately, while providing more information than previous historians, even Sears does not expand his discussion much beyond noting where problems existed. Furthermore, Sears inaccurately gives the impression that al1 of General McClellanrs physical intelligence was poor. The Peninsular Campaign tested the physical intelligence collection abilities of both the Confederate and Union amies to the greatest extent. Lieutenant-General Richard Taylor (the Army of Northern Virginia) would later cornplain that

12 Stephen W. Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, The Peninsula Campaign, (New York: Ticknor and Fields, 1992). (hereafter cited as: To the Gates of Richmond) . Ari Hoogenboom first raised the issue of map inaccuracies and their effects on army operations by asking whether or not "the neglect of 'spy and topog [Topographical Engineer] dutyt led to 'defeats. ' f' Ari Hoogenboom, " 'Spy and Topog Duty has been... Neglectedtr"Civil War History, 10 (December, 1964), pp. 368-370.

13Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, pp. 10-11. Other attempts to study map use in the Civil War have failed to bring much depth to the subject. For examples see: Major Daniel D. Nettesheim, "Topographical Intelligence and the American Civil Warrw Masters Thesis, U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 1978. (hereafter cited as "Topog Intelligence"); and Christopher Nelson, Mapping the Civil War; Featuring Rare Maps from the Library of Congress, (Washington D.C.: Starwood Publishing, Inc., 1992). Confederate commanders "knew no more about the topography of the country than they did about Central Africa."14 McClellan would argue before the Joint Congressional Cornmittee and in both his Report on the Organization and Campaigns of the Anny

of the Potomac, and McClellan 's Own Story, that poor physical

intelligence had crippled his otherwise brilliant plans.15 In reality, General McClelian had a mix of accurate and inaccurate physical intelligence concerning the Peninsula at his command. The mannes in which he used this physical intelligence speaks volumes concerning the quality of his generalship. In order to convince the Lincoln Administration that his plan of attack on Richmond was superior to theirs, he pointed to physical intelligence which supported his proposal. In the process, he elected to ignore a great deal of intelligence which should have given him pause. While this strategy helped get his army to Fort Monroe (at the tip of the Peninsula), once there, it had disastrous sesults. McClellanfs insistence on a seaborne route of attack gave his physical intelligence collection agencies little the to adequately fulfil their functions. This resulted in the Army of the Potomac operating in the dark while on the Peninsula.

14Richasd Taylor, ~estructionand Reconstruction, Persona1 Experiences of the Late War, Charles P. Roland editor, (Waltham, MA.: Blaisdel Publishing Company, 19681, p. 80.

~SU.S.Congress. Joint Cornmittee on the Conduct of the War. Anny of the Potomac, pp. 428-430; George B. McClellan, Report on the Organization and Campaigns of the Army of the Potomac: To Which is Added an Account of the Campaign in Western Virginia, with plans of Battle-Fields, (New York: Sheldon, 1864), pp. 65, 157 (hereafter cited as: Report); George B. McClellan, McCleilan0s Own Story, (New York: Charles L. Webster and Company, 1887), pp. 125, 264, 289. Not only did this cripple the movements of the army, it caused McClellan to lose his nerve. Instead of accepting responsibility for failure, however, McCiellan then argued that he had not been responsible - he had ken "deceivedm by his physical intelligence. WHERE WERE THE MAPS OF VIRGINIA?

The ignorance of the topography of the country here complained of exists with regard to other important regions of our country, which will, probably, sooner or later, become the theatres of war. .. Secretary of War, Joel ~oinsett 1836

For one to understand the collection and use of physical intelligence during the Civil War, one must begin with the long and laborious process that was the development of the Corps of Topographical Engineers. It was to be under their auspices that the vast majority of physical intelligence concerning Virginia was to come into McClellanfs hands. That they were unable to provide a great deal of physical intelligence lay in their prewar focus. This focus included work on coastal fortifications, interna1 improvement projects, and western exploration. While these provided a lot of work for the topographers, it did not allow them the opportunity to produce detailed military surveys of the eastern United States. Civilian maps of Virginia were equally difficult to come by. By the mid-nineteenth century, Tidewater Virginia was something of an economic back-water and as such, detailed maps were not readily available. This lack of knowledge concerning Virginiars geography was a brittle foundation upon which McClellan8s Peninsular Campaign plans were based. On July 25, 1777, Generai George Washington appointed Robert Erskine, Simon DeWitt and Thomas Hutchins the first geographers and surveyors in the Continental Amy. Despite this early beginning, regular topographie service did not begin until the War of 1812 when a full-fledged Topographical Engineer unit, consisting of sixteen officers, was created.1 The operational guidelines for this new branch were spelled out in the 1813 Anny Regulations and as such are of sorne importance to our discussion. The Topographical Ençineers were : To make such surveys and exhibit such delineations of these as the commanding general shall direct; to make plans of al1 military positions (which the Army shall occupy) and of their respective vicinities, indicating the various roads, rivers, creeks, ravines, hills, woods and villages to be found therein; to accompany al1 reconnoitring parties sent out to obtain intelligence of the movements of the enemy or of his position, etc,; to make sketches of their route, accompanied by written notes of everything worthy of observation thereon; to keep a journal of every day's movements when the army is on the march, noticing the varieties of ground, of buildings, of culture, and the distances and the state of the road between given points. ..2 Not simply confined to the tracing of roads and rivers, the regulations clearly placed the topographers at the forefront of physical intelligence collection. These guidelines make it obvious that in al1 future operations much detailed

- 1 Henry P. Beers , History of the U. S. Topographical Engineers, 1813-1863," The Military Engineer, 200 (June 1942), p. 287; William W. Goetzmann, Amy Exploration in the American West, 1803-1 863, (New Haven, Conn: Yale University Press, 1965), pp. 6-7. The Act authorised the appointment, as part of the general staff, of eight topographical engineers with the brevet rank, pay and emoluments of majors of cavalry, and eight assistants with brevet rank, pay and emoluments of captains of infantry.

21813 Am~yRegulations, American State Papers, Military Affairs, Vol. 1, Walter Lowrie editor, (Washington, LC: G.P.O., 1832-1861), p. 431 (hereafter to be cited as ASP, MA*). information was expected from the militaq map and accompanying report. The cessation of hostilities saw the end of the Topographical Engineers by act of Congress - al1 being honourably discharged on June 15, 1815, Majors John Anderson and Isaac Roberdeau, however, both of whom had served in the war, were kept in service under the authority of the President and given direct orders by the War Department to complete surveys on the northern frontier and Lake Champlain.3 In an 1816 memoir to the Chief Engineer during the survey of Lake Champlain, they went out of their way to argue that much of the utility of the topographers would be thrown away if their functions "commenced and ceased with immediate military action." A great deal of the went into the production of military surveys; the that would have to be renewed on the same subjects should future wars arise. Anderson and Roberdeau recommended the completion of a military survey of the entire United States: This work, together with the duties necessarily arising out of the survey of the sea-coast, and the establishment of the boundary-line between the United States and the British Provinces in Canada, can be executed with the best effect by a Corps of Topographical Engineers, under the immediate direction of the Chief of the Engineer Corps.*

Only for a short the after the conflict was it possible to justify the Corps' peacetime existence through highlighting its wartime utility. Major Daniel Nettesheim adds that, "political realities of the peacetime environment precluded a

J~eers,''A History of the U.S. ~opographicalEngineers, 1813-1863,'' p. 287. 4Nettesheim, 'Topog Intelligence,'' pp. 8-9. 16 sustained justification of the corps on this basis ....II Nevertheless in 1816, thanks in part to the demands of Anderson and Roberdeau, while organizing the general staff of the Army, Congress authorised the employment of ten topographers - five for each division.5 The ten Topographical Engineers remaining in service were anything but idle. The torching of the "Federal City" in 1814 painfully highlighted the vulnerability of the East Coast to seaborne attack. A preoccupation with coastal defence was to mark Amty planning for the next decade - and strangely enough, served as an excuse to neglect cornprehensive military surveys of the eastern interior in years to corne. As a result, the Topographical Engineers found themselves constantly occupied with construction surveys and plans for coastal fortifications. Removed from the Anny divisions in 1818, the ten topographers were placed under the direction of the Engineering Department, under a special branch dedicated to these construction projects. In 1822, for example, twelve of the fourteen active topographical projects dealt directly with coastal surveys and surveys of navigation channels to supplement fortification works.6

It would not be until the General Survey Act of 1824 that this coastal orientation would be changed as interna1 improvement programs cornpletely shifted topographical focus.

5 Ibid. , p. 9. The five topographers for each division were divided as follows : three topographes engineers , and two assistants. This number included Roberdeau and Anderson, both of whom were assigned to the Northern Division.

6 Annual Report of the Secretary of War for 1822, ASP, m, Vol. II, p. 184. This is not to Say that al1 coaçtal work for the topographers ended. A law of April 14, 1818 had charged the Army and Navy with the Survey of the Coast, which had originally been instituted in 1816 under Treasury Department appointee Ferdinand R. Hassler. Because of pressure from other tasks, the Army was unable to undertake a systematic survey, and this responsibility then fell to Topographical Engineers like John J. Abert.7 In 1819, Secretary of War John C. Calhoun was one of the leading voices behind the Interna1 Irnprovements Program. He argued that: A judicious system of roads and canals, constructed for the convenience of commerce, and the transportation of the mail only, without any reference to military operations is itself the most efficient means for 'the most complete defence of the United Statesr.... The propriety of employing the Army on works of public utility cannot be doubted .8 In a nation opposed to standing amies, Calhoun argued that national safety required such a program. Only through an effective road and canal system (not yet in existence), could large bodies of troops be quickly mobilised. Any potential program that promised to expand army operations (especially in peacetime) was a welcome boon to American military circles. Quickly, military men added their voices to support Calhoun. Brigadier General Simon Bernard, head of the Board of Engineers for Fortifications, in 1821 pointed out that coastal forts were merely one "base" in what

7Beers, "A History of the U.S. Topographical Engineers, 1813-1863,'' p. 288.

BNettesheim, "Topog Intelligence," p. 10. should be a highly integrated defence system. Of equal importance, argued Bernard, were the other three "basesrf:a navy, the amy, and a developed transportation and communications system.9 In addition to adding their voices in support of the possible expansion of the Annyfs role, the American military provided its men. ~hiswas done through Sylvanus Thayerrs West Point Academy. First among Thayerrs students were the engineers, reflecting both Jefferson's ideas concerning the role of the Academy, and a curriculum that had french and mathematics as its two pillars. A first year class included courses in algebra, geometry, trigonometry and mensuration; a second would add "drawing" and analytical geometry. As a third year student, topographical drawing and physics were stressed and finally; in one's final year, engineering.10 Only the elite of each year's class would be able to join the Armyfs Topographical Enqineers. "By virtue of his West Point training and status," explains William Goetzmann, the graduate, "was an engineer, something above the ordinary field officer, whose duties were confined usually to strictly military tasks." As a Topographical Engineer though, "he on occasion might address the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He probably subscribed to Stillmanrs American Journal of Science and he was a pillar of the

g~bid.,pp. 10-11.

10 Stephen E. Ambrose, Duty, Honor, Country: A History of West Point, (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1966), pp. 66-99. French was necessary in order to read the textbooks in use at the time by the Academy. Thayer, in fact, travelled to France himself in 1816 to purchase textbooks. He was eventually forced to purchase them from parisian bookstores as the École Polytechnique had not yet reopened. Smithsonian Institution."ll West Point, though, was not the end of training for the topographers. In many instances they were able to supplement their learning in Europe. From 1851 to 1854, for example, Andrew A. Humphreys, the future head of the Anny of the Potomac's Topographical Department while on the Peninsula, toured extensively in Europe to study the latest methods of flood control.12

The General Survey ~ctof April 30, 1824 marked the success of interna1 improvement advocates and their amy supporters in expanding the topographer's workload. The shift of priorities meant that Secretary Calhoun could place al1 topographical officers that could be spared £rom existing coastal surveys under the newly created Board for Internal Improvements - supplementing their numbers with non-engineer officers temporarily detailed to assist them.13 This new workload, while allowing the topographers to focus on the country's interior, was not helpful in tems of

11 Goetzmann, Amy Exploration in the American West, 1803-1863, p. 5. 121n 1856, George McClellan himself was among the rnembers of the "Crimean Commission", who journeyed to the Crimean front in order to observe "the latest ordinance and fortifications under fire." Ibid., p. 16; Somewhat ironically, the Commission was to return home with a map of Sevastopol that far exceeded any maps then available of American cities. Major Richard Delafield, Report on the Art of War in Europe in 1854, 1855, and 1856, (Washington: George W. Bowman, 1860), 36th Congress, Executive. Doc. no. 59, plate 8. 13~nnualReport of the Secretary of War for 1824, ASP, MA, Vol. II, p. 700. The Board of Engineers for Internal Improvernents included Gen. Simon Bernard, Col. Joseph G. Totten, Chief Engineer of the -y, and John L. Sullivan, an experienced Civil Engineer. Authorisation was included in the act for the employment of two or more Civil Engineers and officers of the Corps of Engineers. producing military surveys of the country. The topographers now worked at civil surveys specifically designed for construction purposes. Military surveying, so desperately needed, took a back seat to an immense civil workload. Major General Alexander Macomb, the Chief Engineer in 1825, estimated that the surveys underway for the internal improvernents program "would afford constant ernployment, for many yearstr even if steps were taken "to treble the number of topographical engineers now in service."14 An example of one of the earliest projects developed by these officers was a survey of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal aqueduct over the Potomac River at Georgetown. As well, in 1828 reports were submitted for a proposed trans-Florida canal. During the 1830s the Topographical Engineers were extensively engaged upon both govermental and private internal improvement projects including numerous surveys of rivers, roads, canals, railways, and harbours throughout the country-1s With the vast majority of army topographers working on civil surveys, could these not simply be supplemented for military surveys in times of need? Such was the reassurance that Secretary of War John Eaton gave to Congress in 1831. "Recently, [the Topographical Bureau's] operations have been confined to what may be considered civil purposes - to the surveying of practicable routes for roads and canals, and to

i4Annual Report of the Secretary of War for 1825, ASP, MA, Vol. III, p. 140.

15~eers,"A History of the U.S. Topographical Engineers, 1813-1863," pp. 288-289. Beers explains that since civil engineers were scarce in those days the government was called upon to provi.de Anny officers to work on private undertakings. the opening and improving of the navigation of our [waterways]." Their activities, he noted, were not entirely of a civilian nature, however, for "the information thus obtained may be serviceably used hereafter in military

operations ."16

The validity of this argument must be questioned. Civ. surveys would contain information useful to the military, but only in the broadest sense for there are important differences between the two. Nettesheim provides an excellent exarnple of the inherent differences between the two survey types through an examination of a 1828 civil survey for a road from Washington, D.C. to upstate New York. This survey produced a general map covering an area fifty miles wide between the two points and only depicted major town sites, turnpikes and rivers. The scale of one inch to five miles (1:317 000) was "too small to represent much of the valuable information from a military point of view."l7 Grade studies were included along critical stretches of the route, rock sources were analysed as were the types of local timber. Most importantly, no local roads, small towns, streams or general hi11 patterns were depicted. Understandably, the survey was designed specifically for one purpose - that of building a road. However, "using the same resources, but changing the objective to a military reccnnaissance of the area, would have resulted in a significantly different map

16Annual Report of the Secretary of War for 1831, ASP, MA, Vol. IV, p. 641. and report.Rl* The scale would have been adjusted to at least one inch to one mile (1:53 000) as anything smaller would be practically useless on a tactical level. Elevations woiild be included and notes would be made concerning the relative height of local features in cornparison to one another. A~SO,local road nets, streams, swamps and vegetation patterns would need to be included - in short, the definition of physical intelligence as outlined by the 1813

Army Regulations. This definition retained its validity into the Civil War. In 1862, H.L. Whiting commented on the qualities of a "good" milita- map. Al1 the topographical features of the country which it embraced should be represented, including, "the main roads, by-roads, and bridle-paths; the woods, open grounds, and streams; houses, out-buildings, and fences; with as close a sketch of the contour as the hidden character of the country would allow." Only through a map of this quality, claimed Whiting, could any military movement "be studied and planned with perfect reliability."lg Furthemore, during the Peninsular Campaign, Humphreys reported that "notes" were collected by himself and staff in order to compile a complete map of the campaign. This map was to "clearly exhibit the chatacteristic topographical and hydrographical features; the nature of the soil; [and] ...the degree and kind of cultivation...."20

19 Richard W. Stephenson, The Cartography of Northern Virginia, Facsimile Reproductions of Maps Dating From 1608 to 1915, (Fairfax County, Virginia: History and Archaeology Section, Office of Comprehensive Planning, 1981), p. 7. Obviously, the civil survey could not realistically be "serviceably used" by the military - they were not one in the same, Even if the Topographical Bureau had the freedom to conduct military surveys, the small number of topographers precluded such projects - the ten officers had to be spread quite thinly. While there were also thirteen civil engineers who assistéd th-, the working relationship between the officers and their civilian counterparts was strained. This further reduced what military information could be gained as neither side felt compelled to follm the directives of the other. Additionally, while there were thirty non-engineer off icers assigned as assistants to the topographers , they were on a rotational basis. Often after becomlng familiar with topographical basics, these assistants found themselves transferred.21 As a result, the pleas of men like Secretary of War Lewis Cass in 1831 went unheeded: A minute knmledge of the features of a country is essential to any plan of military operations, and this knowledge should be gathered in a season of leisure and deposited in Our archives. In Europe it is considered one of the most important elements of military science, and upon its contributions have often depended the efforts of a whole campaign -22

Lieutenant Colonel John Abert in his 1836 report summed up the frustration felt by those within the Topographical Bureau. The report, he claimed, said nothing that had not been said before, and the details enclosed proved "the utter

ZlNettesheim, "Topog Intelligence," pp. 17-18.

=Annual Report of the Secretary of War for 1831, ASP, MA, Vol. IV, pp. 710-711. inability of the Bureau to execute the duties assigned to it under the various laws of Congress without further aid."z3 The reestablishment of Coastal Survey in 1836 saw the continued employment of at least two topographical officers until the abolishment of the Corps of Topographical Engineers in 1863. Furthemore, in 1834 topographers were ernployed in connection with the construction of lighthouses - at first under the auspices of the Treasury Department but later (1847) under the superintendence of the Corps itself.24 Seminole hostilities in 1836 saw the withdrawal of several topographers from interna1 improvement projects. The lack of military surveys of Florida seriously impeded operations against the Seminoles who fought running battles with the amy throughout the region's back country. Secretary of War Joel Poinsett expressed the many difficulties incurred by U.S. forces, notably listing those of physical intelligence first: . . . it may be important to state the causes which have enabled an enemy, so inferior in number and resources, to baffle the efforts of the goverment to subdue them, and which have rendered the contest not only so disastrously protracted, but so very expensive. The theatre of war, remarkable for its natural difficulties, was entirely unknown to the cornmanding off icers of our army -25 This statement could have easily been taken from the Virginia Peninsula Campaign some thirty years later. ~oinsett

23 Annual Report of the Topographical Bureau for 1836, ASP, MA, Vol. Vff, p. 912.

24Beers, "A History of the US. Topographical Engineers, 1813-1863," pp. 289-290.

2s Annual Report of the Secretary of War for 1837, ASP, MA, Vol. VII, p. 571. recornmended "an immediate increase in the Corps of Topographical Engineers" as the civil workload it laboured under made it "physically impracticableffto fulfil what should have been its mandate. As a result, "important surveys are neglected; works of improvement are slowly and imperfectly carried on, and the expectations of the country disappointed."26 Poinsett also, importantly, made note of the difficulties endured by other branches due to poor maps - especially in regards to quartermaster operations. "A simple enmeration of the functions of the quartermaster general," Poinsett noted, "[showed] that the duties of his office cannot be perfomed without the assistance of the officers of the topographical corps.'f As the qüartemaster was to "give faculty and effect" to the movements and operations of the army, knowledge of local road networks was paramount.27 Poinsett concluded by arguing for the termination of a civil workload being forced upon the Corps of Topographical Engineers. While Poinsett agreed that the topographers had earlier been needed to help in the interna1 improvements programs, he proclaimed that, "a different state of things now exists." Not only was it not necessary to aid the States and companies involved in the improvements by lending Topographical Engineers, this process was an "injustice towards. .. the countryM as the "efficiency of the corps" was impaired. "The commander of the Army of the South," continued Poinsett: ...says, emphatically, in a late communication to the adjutant general: 'Had the topographical engineers been employed in their appropriate duties in Florida only one year of the sixteen since we obtained possession of the country, from two to three millions of dollars might have been saved in the expenditures of the war.' The ignorance of the topography of the country here complained of exists with regard to other important regions of the country, which will, probably, sooner or later, become the theatres of war; and 1 earnestly hope the department will have in its power to remedy this defect by confining the members of the corps to their appropriate duties, of examining and surveying the country, for the purposes of national improvements and national defence, and superintendhg the erection of national works.2a Comrnanders in Florida knew exactly what the "appropriate duties" of the topographers were - and it is clear that the Secretary did as well. Poinsettfs concluding plea, however, by including the ideas of dual missions and of the interchangeability of the two types of surveys unfortunately clouded what otherwise seemed to have been a clear message. The cal1 to increase the number of Topographical Engineers was heard, for in 1838 their number expanded to thirty-eight and the Bureau's status was raised to that of an independent Corps. As well, their focus began to include more military surveys, but, unfortunately for future Civil War generals this work was mainly west of the Mississippi. As an example, Nettesheim points to the 1860 employment of the topographical engineers as "typical of the decade preceding the Civil War." Of the thirty-eight topographical officers, eleven served with the Western milita- departments; eight on lighthouse duties; six on Western exploration duties (an activity that McClellan himself was

28 ~bid.,pp. 573-574. involved in) specifically for the railways; four on river improvements; four on coastal surveys; three instructed at West Point; and two served in the Bureau in Washington.29 In

1852, Secretary of War Charles M. Conrad divided interna1 improvement programs between the Corps of Engineers and the Corps of Topographical Engineers. While the Engineers were charged with improvements on the Atlantic and Gulf coasts, the Topographical Engineers retained charge of projects on the Great Lakes and 'western rivers."30 After the War with

Mexico, and the settlement of the Oregon controversy with Great Britain, the Corps saw a great deal of activity surveying newly acquired territory. Examples included Captain John Pope's reconnaissance of the Santa Fe trail in 1850; the preparation of a map of New Mexico in 1851; military road surveys of Texas under Col. Joseph E. Johnston; and the 1859 exploration of the San Juan and the head tributaries of the Colorado River by Captain John N. Macomb. Topographers were also engaged for many years after 1853 on Pacific Railroad surveys. Of the four proposed routes, al1 but the northernmost were under the direction of the Topographical Engineers. From 1854, this aspect of the topographical workload was under the direction of Captain Andrew A. Humphreys in the War Department of the Office of Pacific Railroad Explorations and Surveys. This office

Zg~ettesheim, "Topog Intelligence," pp. 20-21, 24.

30~enryP. Beers, "A History of the U.S. Topographical Engineers, 1813-1863, Part II," The Military Engineer 201 (July, 1942), p. 348. remained in operation into the Civil War.31 Indeed, such was the western focus of the vast majority of civil and military surveys during this period that Goetzmann proclaimed the Corps of Topographical Engineers to be "... a central institution of Manifest Destiny ...."32 Finally, the creation of States and territories provided further work for the Corps. 1840-41 saw the Sabine River survey in Texas which included work by then civil assistant George G. Meade. The western boundary of Missouri was surveyed in 1838; from 1843 to 1846 the Michigan and Wisconsin Territory line; and in 1857 the southern boundary of Kansas Territory. Added to this were boundary surveys of various Indian reservations west of the Mississippi after the establishment of a permanent "Indian frontier" in 1834.33 By 1843 the only valid argument that the topographers had in regards to increasing the number of military surveys in the east stemmed directly from the War of 1812. This eastern focus, however, would be restricted to major cities. The only situation calling for detailed militaq surveys in the east was if a seaborne invading force were to attack that Coast. In this eventuality, so the argument held, the landing force would head straight for the major centres -

31 Ibid., pp. 350-351. Although these explorations demonstrated the practicability of transcontinental railroads, no projects were completed until after the War. They did however consume a great deal of the Corps of Topographical Engineers' limited manpower resources: ten officers in total.

32Goetzmann, Army Exploration in the American West, 1803-1863, p. 4.

33~eers,'*A History of the U. S. Topographical Engineers, 181301863, Part II," p. 351. only travelling a few miles inland. While military surveys of the cities and their immediate surroundings were recommended, the fact that the ground between them was terra incoqnita was excusable3 The end product of this recommendation was a total of five military surveys east of the Mississippi between 1843 and 1860 including the Maryland peninsula; New York City; New Bedford; Torugas (Florida); and 658 miles of the Northeastern border.3s For the east then, the lack of military maps was understandable. Even if military surveys had been made a priority though, it is difficult to see how, with the limited number of topographers in the Corps, an adequate job could have been done in compiling existing and yet to be obtained information into quality maps. Taking as an example the Northeast bordes survey, Nettesheim points to the impossibility of the task. He explains that the project took eight years to complete with an average annual employment of five topographical officers, the topographers managing to produce forty-one maps of the region being studied (the length of the boundary surveyed was 658 miles at an average width of four miles). This number included a general map of the entire border at a scale of one inch to ten miles or 1:634 000, and numerous other maps of increasing detail as required dom to a scale of twelve inches to one mile or 1:5 000. The entire area mapped was approximately 2 650 square miles which worked out to approximately 330 square miles surveyed each year. In 1850, the entire land area of

34Nettesheim, "Topog Intelligence," p. 22.

351bid., p. 23. the United States was well over a million and a half square miles- "Terrain affected the speed of a survey," concedes Nettesheim, "but even disregarding this factor... [ulsing five officers each year, [a survey of the entire United

States] would have taken 4 500 years." If the entire Corps had been employed on this project, the survey would still take about 650 years!36 Granting that the civil and military survey were not interchangeable, surely civilian made maps could have proved of some use to Union topographers compiling maps of Virginia. There were map publishers in major Eastern cities like New York and Philadelphia, but the number of Virginia State maps at their disposa1 was slight. Prior to the conflict, many of those who did not see the need for detailed military surveys of the country pointed to the existence of maps compiled under the order of State Legislatures as alternative sources of intelligence. This assumption was faulty in two respects: Firstly, only a small number of States were in possession of these maps. Before 1840, the only systematic surveys conducted were in Pennsylvania (1822) and Virginia (1826).

The scale of both maps was far too small for the inclusion of much detail as both maps were one inch to £ive miles or 1:314 000. Furthemore, most county surveys remained uncompiled in manuscript form in State archives and were therefore unavailable. Mapping had always been important in Virginia, as a knowledge of surveying gave Virginian gentry inside information on choice new lands. However, it had been a long tinte since Virginia had any new lands to offer. The Virginia Peninsula especially, by the Nd-nineteenth century, had fallen into obscurity. During the Peninsular Campaign, Union Reverend J.J. Marks described a land that had long ago been heavily used. "The general aspect of the country was that of a land which, by poor cultivation, had ken worn 0ut."37 Charles Wainwright noted that not more than a quarter of the land that the Army of the Potomac passed through was cleared, but "it has al1 evidently been under the plough at one the or another; as the corn rows and dead furrows can be seen plainly in the woods, even where the trees have the largest growth. "38 Marks considered a landscape in which the local inhabitants lived in isolation from the rest of the State, as "much as out of the world as the inhabitants of small sea islands."39 Although demand increased during the 1840s and 1850s for more county maps, these were limited to the rapidly expanding and relatively affluent areas in the Northeast and Ohio.40 Secondly, the quality of those existing maps needed to be questioned. Surveyors were paid according to the amount of territory surveyed, and short-cutting was the obvious

37 ~everendJ .J . Marks, D .D ., The ~eninsularCampaign in Virginia, (Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott and Company, 1864), p. 178.

38Charles S. Wainwright, A Diary of Battle, The Personal Journals of Colonel Charles S. Wainwright, 1861 -1 865, Allan Nevins editor, (New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc., 1962), p. 61 (hereafter cited as: A Diary of Battle).

39~arks,The Peninsular Campaign in Virginia, p. 118.

40 Richard Stephenson, Land ûwnership Maps, A Checklist of Nineteenth Century United States County Maps in the Library of Congress, (Washington, D.C.: G.P.O., 1967), pp. 7-15. result. Unscrupulous surveyors completed maps of entire townships within three days, dispensing with compasses and odorneters, which were only approximate instruments in themselves. Surveyors would do entire surveys without even leaving their buggies - guessing at general direction and estimating distances by buggy speed.41 Substantial public interest in the geography of Virginia was only generated by the War itself.42 Within the first year of the conflict, a number of civilian maps were produced of the State but these were usually based on much older surveys or, when available, Newspaper reports £rom battles.

Examples of these included: Duncan's 1862 "Map of the Seat of War in Virginia" (fig.1) and Johnson's 1862 "Map of the Vicinity of Richmond" (fig.2). Within the Army of the Potomac, the most popular civilian map was that produced by the J.T. Lloyd Company of New York. Based on the original state survey (and sold in a linen-backed pocket edition for anny officers at a dollar and a half), it was one inch to eight miles and as such, was of limited usefulness. Lloyd's

41 Ibid., pp. 16,17.

42~ineteenthcentury maps of Virginia prior to the Civil War are very few in Number. Most civilian surveys of the State date from the eighteenth century for use in Court ordered land title surveys or State ordered surveys. The National Archives and Records ~dministrationpossess only four nineteenth century, pre-1860 maps of the entire State. These varied widely in function; from examinations of coal deposits to surveys of the distribution of slave populations. Civil War Maps in the National Archives, forward by Bernard L. Boutin, preface by Wayne C. Grover, (Washington, D.C.: G.P.O., 1964), p. 39. Persona1 correspondence with manuscript facilities at The Virginia Military Academy, Virginia Technical University, George Mason University, Old Dominion University, The University of Virginia and Christopher Newport University revealed no civilian maps of the State prior to the Civil War. ='ap depicted no vegetation, and al1 population centres, with the exception of cities and county seats, were represented by the same symbol. Furthermore, it included only a general outline of the staters mountains and fw major bridges or

fords 33 The duties of the Topographical Engineers had been clearly enunciated by the 1813 llnny Regulations. The collection and dissemination of physical intelligence was to be the primary goal of this entity. The history of the Corps of Topographical Engineerst development holds the key to understanding its failure in 1861 to produce many detailed military surveys of what was to become the prima- theatre of the Civil War. While coastal fortification work and the interna1 improvements program "savedw the topographical bureau from extinction after the War of 1812, when one considers the needs that arose in 1861, they would, in important ways, prove to be hollow victories. The sheer size of the new workload, and its western focus guaranteed that few military surveys would be conducted in the east. Moreover, the hope that civil surveys could replace military surveys proved false. None at the the could predict that Poinsett's cornplaints regarding the lack of physical intelligence during the seminole War were to be repeated - this the with a much higher price attached.

43~ettesheim,"Topog ~ntelligence,"pp. 53-54. PHPSICAL INTELLIGENCE AND THE 'AMERICAN WATERLOO'

The trim, precise, and clean-eut appearance that a well-drawn map presen ts lends it an air of scientific authenticity that may or may not be desenred. John Kirtland Wright1

The guarded optimism that had accompanied the rise of General George B. McClellan to Commander-in-Chief of Union Armies November 1861 had al1 but vanished by March of 1862 (he had been at the head of al1 Union amies for four months and in direct cornmand of the Army of the Potomac for over seven months). What had happened to the quick, decisive victory he had promised seven months before? While he

drilled his Airmy, the Confederates were still in encampments overlooking the Federal capital. While McClellan was still very popular with his men - who cheered him at every opportunity - critics in higher circles were dernanding action. As a direct result of these demands, McClellan was forced to cal1 a Council of War on March 7 in which twelve brigadier generals under his command were questioned on where best to strike at the Rebels. Only three or four had any vague ideas of where McClellan was planing on using "his" Anny of the Potomac and most supposed they had been summoned to Washington in order to be given instructions to dislodge Confederate artillery blocking the Potomac below the capital. It came as something of a shock to discover that they were to

1John Kirtland Wright, Human Nature in Geography, Fourteen Papers, 1925-1965, (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1966), p. 33. settle a major difference of opinion between the President and his Commander-in-Cbief.2 At ten ofclock that morning, Chief-of-Staff General Randolph B. Marcy announced to the generals that they would be deciding a matter of grand strategy. There were three proposed lines of attack: the Administration proposed either an overland route via Manassas junction to the Confederate capital - thus lifting the partial Rebel blockade of Washington and delivering the city from the threat of attack by the enemy forces which at that moment were a mere twenty- £ive miles from the capital. Alternatively, the Administration suggested a shorter turning movement by land to the Occoquan River, hardly a two day march south of the present Washington lines, to threaten the vital Confederate rail link between Richmond and Manassas. General McClellan's plan, on the other hand, called for a much bolder movement from Annapolis - thus avoiding the C.S.A. batteries on the Potomac - via Chesapeake Bay to a small Virginia tobacco port fifteen miles up the Rappahannock River called Urbanna. The use of the navy would bring the army to within fifty miles of the Confederate capital. From Urbanna, McClellan claimed that the Amy of the Potomac could march on Richmond "by the shortest possible land route" while forcing the Rebels back from Manassas without a fight. One "long marchW £rom Urbanna to the York River would cut off enemy forces holding the lower York/James Peninsula and then only two more days would be necessary to bring the Amiy of the Potomac face-to-face

2Sears, To the Gates of ~ichmond,p. 3. with Richmond.3 The Council of War was divided in its decision: the three senior generals, Edwin Sumner, Irvin McDowell, and

Samuel Heintzelman (who had been informed by Marcy that the real issue was McClellanfs future in command as there was a "strong effort to have him supersededw) opposed the change of

base, and they were joined by John G. Barnard, the Army's Chief Engineer. In support of McClellan, not surprisingiy, were many generals who owed their present positions to

"Little Mac". These included Andrew Porter, Fitz John Porter, Louis Blenker, William B. Franklin, William F. Smith, Erasmus Keyes, George McCall, and Henry Naglee.4 Their views were subsequently presented to Lincoln who officially approved the Chesapeake rnovement the next day with two important qualifications. McClellan was instructed that the capital must be left '&entirely secure," its defenders to be detemined jointly by McClellan and the new corps cornrnanders. Also, there was to be no more delay: operations would begin

3Ibid., pp. 5-7, 10; George B. McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860- 1865, Stephen W. Sears editor, (New York: Ticknor and Fields, 1989), p. 167.

4 Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, pp. 6-7; Samuel P. Heintzelman diary, March 8, 1862, Heintzeiman Papers and diary, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. (hereafter given designation LC); Hassler Jr., General George B. McClellan, Shield of the Union, pp. 61-70. The extent to which the vote on the competing plans was politically motivated is not entirely clear. Hassler clahs that Sumner, McDowell, Heintzelman and Barnard were al1 "Radical generalsfland that their placement as Corps commanders was "forcedffupon McClellan by the Lincoln administration as a means of controlling the Young Napoleon. Sears on the other hand points out that only Erasmus Keyes was not duplicated on a proposed corps listing of his own, drawn up several months earlier. in ten days, March 18.5 March 8, 1862 could be called the official beginning of the Peninsular campaign; but in reality, McClellan had begun his planning for this operation in November of the previous year - and in one sense, from the beginning of his rnilitary career. For McClellan, the idea of a single, brilliant seaborne strike at Richmond was central to his thinking concerning the future prosecution of the war. He concluded that there should be an 'American Waterloot in which the Young Napoleon would now hold the field. There were four factors that lead McClellan to this conclusion: first was his militaq training and experience; secondly, the availability of a powerful navy; thirdly, the fact that Lincoln (the "original gorilla") favoured an alternative route; and finally, military

intelligence. 6 As Stephen Sears explains, "[he] modelled [the strike] on that of the masters of the art of war he admired and had carefully studied, for no one in the army was so well read in military history as General McClellan."7 There were two

5 Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, p. 8.

GMcClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1865, p. 135. McClellan first refers to Lincoln in this way, perhaps in mimic of Stanton, in a letter to his wife, Mary Ellen McClellan on November 17, 1961. "I went to the White House shortly after tea where 1 found the 'original gorilla, ' about as intelligent as ever. What a specimen to be at the head of our affairs now!"

7 Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, p. 10; Bruce Catton, "The Generalship of Ulysses S. Grant," Grant, Lee, Lincoln and the Radicals: Essays on Civil War Leadership, Grady McWhiney editor, (Chicago: Northwestern University Press, 1964), p. 10, Catton claims that McClellan was "one of the men who most faithfully tried to make war by the old tradition.. . .Ir roots to his military training: the first was his the spent under the tutelage of Denise Hart Mahan at the West Point Academy. The second was the opportunity to serve under General Winfield Scott during the Mexican war of 1846-48. While George McClellan was a student at West Point, and for many years after, Professor D.H. Mahan guided the Acadernyrs military doctrine. While Mahan devoted the greater part of his the to the instruction of civil engineering, "his contributions as a tactician and strategist were to be much more imp0rtant.~'8 Through his course in the 'Art of War', taught £rom 1843, and its text, An Elementary Treatise on Advanced-Guard, Out-Pos t, and Detachment Service of Troops, and the Manner of Posting and Handling Them in the Presence of an Enemy. With a Historical Sketch of the Rise and Progress of Tactics, etc., etc., Mahan made a fundamental impact on the manner in which the Civil War would be fought. Out-Post as it was called, gave a brief account of military experiences £rom the Greeks to Napoleon - who Mahan saw as the "perfect soldier." Emblazoned on the walls of the 'Napoleon Clubr, the "crowning jewel of intellectual life at West Point" (of which Mahan was president and of which could count as members George McClellan and Robert E. Lee} were painted maps of Napoleon's movements to be endlessly discussed by the club's members. And importantly, as Stephen Ambrose notes, "Mahan's interpretation of Napoleon was based on the theories of Baron Henri Jomini."g Briefly stated,

*Ambrose, Duty, Honor, Country: A History of West Point, p. 100.

gIbid., pp. 101, 138. unlike his contemporary, Karl von Clausewitz, Jomini taught that Napoleon's success stemmed from the use of principles established by Frederick the Great rather than from the innovations which von Clausewitz championed. Jomini wanted to introduce a rationality and system to the study of war in order to make war less costly; therefore he created rules that emphasised speed of movement rather than the destruction of the enemy's will to fight. Notable among the points he stressed were the ideas that "rivers are excellent lines of supply, and powerful auxiliaries in the establishment of a good line of operations..." and that "[i]n strategy, the object of the campaign determines the objective point. If this ahbe offensive, the point will be the possession of

the hostile capital. .. "10 An example of this philosophy, in which McClellan took part, was the 1847 Mexico City campaign under General Winfield Scott (fig.3). The campaign was the highlight of the war as it involved an amphibious assault and siege of the port city of Vera Cruz and then a "rapid crushing movement" from there on the Mexican capital.11 McClellan, fresh out of

10 car1 von Clausewitz, "On War, " The Art of War in World History, From Antiquity to the Nuclear Age, Gérard Chaliand editor, (Berkeley, Los Angeles: University of California Press, lW4), pp. 711-721; Henri de Jomini, The Art of War, translated by G.H. Mendell and W.P. Craighill (1862; reprint, Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1971), pp. 69-80. It should be noted that Mendell and Craighill were instructors at West Point. Interestingly, Jomini was quick to note the importance of physical intelligence and warned of the difficulties to be encountered when an opposing commander "knows the country" better than oneself.

11 John Edward Weems, To Conquer a Peace, The War Between the United States and Mexico, (College Station: Texas ALM University Press, 1974), p. 248. West Point, had his first taste of battle during this campaign. The experience was vesy important to the young officer who would later write to Scott on 1861: Vven if 1 did not agree with you 1 have that implicit confidence in the General under whom 1 iirst learned the art of warlMl2 McClellanrs experiences in the Mexican War are interesting in another respect, for it was during this the that he first discovered some of the problems inherent in nonexistent or faulty physical intelligence. As McClellan's friend George G. Meade, then with the Topographical Engineers, wrote to him: "Well may we be grateful that we are at war with Mexico! Were it any other powex, our gross

follies would have been punished severely before naumWl3 McClellan experienced some of these follies first hand. On a march £rom Victoria to Tampico in 1847, he recorded in his diary that, "[we] started before daylight and before going 200 yards [on the road they had been assigned to follau] we landed in a lake - the road, or path, passed directly through it ...." Also, while fighting through the streets of Vera Cruz, McClellan was given the precarious task of climbing the dome of cityfs tallest chape1 in order to "ascertain from that place the direction of the streetsmM14 Naval power was another important factor in choosing the

Chesapeake route of attack. Up to March 8, 1862, the Union

12 McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1865, p. 16.

13 George B. McClellan, The Mexican War Diary of General George B. McClellan, William Starr Myers editor, (New York: Da Capo Press, 1972), p. 22.

l*Ibid., pp. 46,60. nay was proving itself to be a very effective weapon, in the process opening the Confederate coasts to invasion. As much as it ran against the grain of his "bold strike at the heart of the Confederacyw idea, McClellan was more than willing to use the modus operandi of Scott's blockade when it suited his own purposes. Federal naval blows at Cape Hatteras and Ship Island were soon joined by the capture of Port Royal, South Carolina, in November 1861. As McCiellan wrote his wife on November 14: "...our Navy has covered itself with glory and cannot receive too much credit."ls What made these victories seem al1 the more impressive was the fact that the locations had been hand picked by a three-man joint strategy board whose "paper targets" were soon translated into Union possessions. To this point navhere had the fleet failed to seize any objective assigned to it. "From now on," Foote noted, "apparently, the board had only to select its targets .... Naval power was going to be a dominant factor in this war."16 Just as naval power had been used at Vera Cruz, now McClellan planned to use in Chesapeake Bay. McClellan wanted his Waterloo to be flawless - or as near to that impossibility as preparation would allm. Yet he felt he was not being given the thne he needed to cornplete the training of the Army of the Potomac. Despite the glaring example of Bull Run, to his dismay he was being prodded by "rash counsellorsM to commit what he believed was the same error that had lead to the "great skeddadle." As he wrote to

15 McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1 865, p. 132.

16~oote,The Civil Var, A ~arrative,pp. 115-120. his good friend Samuel Barlow: I feel.. . that the issue of this struggle is to be decided by the next great battle, and that 1 owe it to my country and myself not to advance until 1 have reasonable chances in my favour. The strength of the Army of the Potomac has been vastly overrated in the public opinion ... When 1 am ready 1 will move without regard to season or weather - 1 can overcome these difficulties. 1 think the interests of the country demand the 'festina lente' policy. But of one thing you can rest assured - when the blow is struck it will be heavy, rapid, and decisive.17 While "eventual rapidity" (festina lente) may have ken his intention, to political observers in the capital speed was the last thing on his mind. Their constant prodding soon drove the general to distraction. "1 canft tell you," he wrote his wife, "how disgusted 1 am becorning with these wretched politicians."l8 Then he began lashing out at the

Administration itself: "When 1 returned yesterday after a long ride I was obliged to attend a meeting of the Cabinet at 8 pm. and was bored and annoyed. There are some of the greatest geese in the Cabinet 1 have ever seen - enough to tax the patience of Job.. .."19 Soon his anger and resentment were directed at the President. The ''Gorillaffwas something of an amateur strategist, and while McClellan at first found his discussions of things military amusing, they became

17~c~lella11,The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 18604865, pp. 127-128. It is interesting to note, in retrospect, the confidence McClellan had in overcoming natural barriers ("season or weather"). For him, the real struggle seemed to be against the very Administration that employed him. 18~oote.The Civil War, A Narrative, p. 141.

19 McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClel lm, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1 865, p 106. tiresome. The idea of the armchair strategist counselling the Young Napoleon was too much for the general to take. When Lincoln then proposed to "borrow" McClellan's amy to execute the Occoquan River turning movement (President's

Special War Order No. 1 of January 30, 1861), the last straw had been broken. Rising from his sickbed on February 3, (McClellan had fallen il1 with typhoid fever) he composed a lengthy paper defending his strategy. Arguing that the Occoquan route was "anticipatedf' by the enemy , McClellan discussed some of the positive aspects of his own Urbanna route. In the process he placed great emphasis on the physical constitution of Tidewater Virginia: The second base of operations available for the Amy of the Potomac is that of the lower Chesapeake Bay, which affords the shortest possible land routes to Richmond, and strikes directly at the heart of the enemy's power in the East. The roads in that region are passable at al1 seasons of the year. The country now alluded to is much more favourable for offensive operations than that in front of Washington (which is very unfavourable) - much more level - more cleared land - the woods less dense - the soi1 more sandy - the spring some two or three weeks earlier. This movement if successful gives us the Capital, the communications, the supplies of the rebels; Norfolk would fall; al1 the waters of the Chesapeake would be ours; al1 Virginia would be in our power; and the enemy forced to abandon Tennessee and North Carolina. 20

m~bid.,pp. 162-171. In part, the paper was also meant to answer five questions put to McClellan by Lincoln: "1st. Does not your plan involve a greatly larges expenditure of time, and money than mine? 2nd. Wherein is a victory more certain by your plan than mine? 3rd. Wherein is a victory more valuable by your plan than mine? 4th. In fact, would it not be less valuable, in this, that it would break no great line of the enemy's communications, while mine would? 5th. In case of disaster, would not a safe retreat be more difficult by your plan than be mine?" One can imagine Young Napoleon's reaction to this kind of questioning by a military amateur! 44

As far as McClellan was concerned, "hisffarmy would go where he wanted. That destination was also influenced by the military intelligence in McClellanrs possession. We can divide this information into two spheres: estimates of Confederate troop numbers and physical intelligence concerning the state of Virginia. Both of these elements were of crucial importance in the planning of McClellanfs strike via Urbanna. McClellan was called to Washington five days after the

Bull Run fiasco, and took command of the Army of the Potomac on August 20, 1861. Within two weeks of arriving, he wrote

General-in-Chief Winfield Scott that he was "induced to believe that the enemy has at least 100 000 men in front of us," this information being received through "spies. letters, and telegrams." Such a claim would have corne as quite a shock to the Confederacy who could at that the muster barely 30 000 troops on the Manassas battlefield!zl The estimate was given by McClellan while his private detective Allan Pinkerton was busy setting up shop in Washington and as such was done independently. Therefore, while McClellan claimed "spies, letters, and telegramsffas his sources, Edwin Fishel argues that "the ultimate sources were guesswork and TLIIILOU~... . "22 His estirnates soon increased. On August 16 he wrote his wife that "the enemy have from 3 to 4 times my force," and on the 19th: "Beauregard probably has 150 000 men

21 Ibid. , pp. 79-80; Fishel, "Pinkerton and McClellan: Who Deceived Wh~rn?~*,p. 116. Scott, Cameron and Lincoln found this number ridiculously high.

22Fishe1, "Pinkerton and McClellan: Who Deceived Whom?", p. 117. - I cannot count more than 55 OOO!" To Caneron in early September he listed his own forces at 80 749 and noted that

"the enemy probably have 170 000! ''23 Where McClellan was getting these figures is even less clear than his original estimate of 100 000. By giving such a high estimate in the first place, he was comitted to giving six-figure estimates of enemy strength or face ridicule. If Pinkerton had begun giving him troop estimates, these have yet to come to light. Whatever the case, Fishel argues that d4McCleïianprobably had already established the practice ... of reporting intelligence independently of what he received from Pinkerton." On October 4, Pinkerton issued the first of his estimates. He listed Johnston's amy at only 98 400 - a figure 42 percent less than McClellan had given, but still almost 70 percent larger than its true strength.24 Pinkerton's estimates were to get less accurate, not better. This was presumably in order not to contradict his client's estimates. To understand McClellanrs planning, this overestimation of Confederate numbers is crucial: at all times during the Peninsula campaign, General McCiellan believed he was outnumbered, The fact that he was himself the author of this falsehood is fascinating. Rather than lessen or even question his own estimates in light of those provided by Pinkerton on October 4, McClellan preferred to keep estimates as high as possible. Why this was done is unclear, but it

23 McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 18604865. pp. 85, 87, 100.

24Fishe1, "Pinkerton and McClellan: Who Deceived Whom?", p. 118. could be suggested that once his reputation was on the line (by having given the original six-figure estimate) he was not willing to back dom or admit error. As a result, using the

Chesapeake was a logical course of action for it would allow him to by-pass an army he believed to be twice the size of his own, It is much more difficult to assess the role that physical intelligence played in McClellan's planning. Clearly, McClellan based his decision to take the Chesapeake route, in part, on information derived from sources such as the Coast Survey. On the other hand, a great deal of physical intelligence was ignored - specifically intelligence that would cast doubt of the feasibility of "quick marchesrr. This became especially apparent after the weekend of March 8- 9 when plans suddenly changed and a base at Urbanna was replaced by one at Fort Monroe (Old Point Comfort). It would again appear that once McCïellan staked his reputation on the seaborne route, any seaborne route would be preferable to giving in to Administration plans. Matters of pride seemed to outweigh matters of judgment. Two main sources of physical intelligence were available to McClellan when he came to Washington: The Corps of Topographical Engineers, and Allan Pinkerton's detective agency Union Armies began the Civil War with important advantages over their Confederate counterparts and equally important disadvantages in the realm of physical intelligence collection and dissemination- The most important Union disadvantage lay in the fact that in order to win the ensuing conflict, Federal Amies would have to invade the South. This was certainly not the situation for the Confederacy which could clah victory simple by maintaining the integrity of its borders. The offensive focus necessarily placed the collection of physical intelligence by Union forces at a premium. Intimately connected to this fact was a lack of reliable and willing guides. Few guides would handicap the North in two important ways: firstly and most obviously, reliable guides were essential to army operations in enemy territory; and secondly, individuals with an intimate connection to the regions in question were the perfect source with which to verify maps. Because guides were lacking for Virginia, Union commanders actually were forced to place a higher value upon their maps.25 Offsetting these Union disadvantages was the retention of the Corps of Topographical Engineers and their map collections. At the beginning of 1861, the Corps boasted forty-five officers.26 With the topographers came their ability to provide maps - including surveys of some Eastern cities. They also had the facilities to reproduce existing

25~distinction is being made here between virginia and the area that would soon become West Virginia. Obviously the affiliations of the locals dictated to a great extent their willingness to cooperate as guides. While few white guides were available to McClellan's forces during the Peninsula Campaign, there are occurrences of blacks offering their services to the Union. It would seem however that their ability to provide accurate guidance for Union columns was quite limited. O.R. XI: 3, pp. 22, 69-70.

26~eers,"A History of the U.S. Topographical Engineers, 1813-1863, Part IIw, p. 351; Nettesheim, "Topog Intelligencew, p. 34. Only seven left to join the C.S.A. Nettesheim argues that this was mainly due to the presence of a superior secondary education system in the North. maps, both military surveys and private maps as well as the Coastal Surveys (although these were also connected to other branches of goverment). In the east, one of the most important examples of this latter survey was the 1858 compilation (fig.4). Section "Cm of this survey focused on the Chesapeake Bay region and was pieced together £rom a series of surveys beginning in 1843 and was received by the

Bureau in June of 186127 This work is most interesting due to its very accurate representation of the James and York rivers from surveys in 1852, 1853, 1854 and 1857. Understandably, these surveys failed to note any features on land and only marked lesser rivers (such as the Chickahominy and Warwick) at their entrance to major waterways. On the other hand, those areas that the surveys were designed to cover were represented in unsurpassed accuracy and its value to McClellan remains unquestioned - as he wrote to Professor A.D. Bache in January 1862: With the exception of the results of the Govt Expeditions on the Plains etc the only reliable topographical information we have of our country is derived from the Coast Survey. Without the Coast Survey maps it would certainly have been vesy difficult, if not impossible, to have arranged and carried out most of our military operations. The only maps of any value that we possess of the country on the other side of the Potomac is the result of the labours of the Coast Survey.28

Unfortunately for the North, many of their initial

27 Registers of Let ters Received by the ~opographical Bureau of the War Department, 1824-65, Record Group 77: Records of the Office of the Chief of Engineers, National Archives, Washington, D.C., M505, reel 4, Vol. 7, p. 34 (hereafter cited as: Letters Received).

28McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1865, p. 151. advantages were negated due to a variety of circumstances including a lack of long-range planning, and interna1

inefficiencies. Most noticeable amongst negated advantages was the departure of seventeen topographical officers within a year of 1861. Seven of these, including Joseph E. Johnston, went with their States. Added to these were extended sick leaves and the forced retirements of four officers including the Chief of Topographical Bureau Colonel Abert and the very experienced Lieutenant Colonel Kearney.29 Into their places stepped, respectively, Major Hartman Bache and Major Thomas Jefferson Cram.30 State commission in the volunteer service was an attractive alternative to those remaining officers. Eleven accepted these State commissions, hediately gaining the rank of lieutenant colonel or colonel and a much bettes chance at promotion. At a the when advancement within the Topographical Corps was slow, some officers took topographer postings as "intem" positions while waiting for field opportunities to becorne available. Major A.A. Humphreys was one of the few to receive an immediate brevet colonelcy as a topographical officer when assigned to the Anny of the Potomac and even then he still pressed for a volunteer commission in the hopes of a combat command. Nettesheim explains that only by shelving his request and "holding out the carrot" of going directly to division-level comrnand after some topographical duty could

29Abert had been in the process of compiling a map of Northern Virginia after writing the Bureau that "[it] was deficient in maps of Virginia." Letters Received, p. 7. 30Beers, "A History of the U.S. Topographical Engineers, 1813-1863, Part IIw, p. 352. the War Department keep Humphreys "in the topographical

Part of this urgency for field command came £rom the idea that the war would not last the year. Officers arriving in Washington were met with no clear directives on where their postings might be as routine administration and daily bureaucratie matters drove the system.32 However, when the short-war mentality was destroyed by the Bull Run defeat, the realities of war crashed down around the Topographical Bureau in Washington. Faced with unending demands for physical intelligence, transitional leadership, and seemingly absent long-term planning, topographical officers found themselves without clear direction. As Lieutenant James Wilson discovered on his arriva1 in the nation's capital, al1 was not well: The chief of my corps, a patriotic, loyal gentleman, was superannuated, and instead of having any definite idea of how and where 1 should be used, he seemed to be half dazed and told me to look about for a few days and make up my mind as to where 1 should like to serve. It was both disappointing and discouraging.33 Hartman Bachefs Bureau was flooded with requests for maps of

31 Nettesheim, "Topog Intelligencen, pp. 35-36.

32At a time when the Bureau had few maps of Virginia, Topographical Engineers were still being assigned to projects on the Great Lakes (Buffalo, New York) and the Pacific Railroad surveys. Letters Sent by the Topographical Bureau of the War Department and by Successor Divisions in the Office of the Chief of ~ngineers,1829-1870, Record Group 77: Records of the Office of the Chief of Engineers, National Archives, Washington, D.C., M66, reel 23, pp. 1-420 (hereafter cited as: Letters Sent); Letters Received, pp. 6- 344.

33~ettesheim,"Topog Intelligence", p. 37. the Southern States. Bache, however, was having enough difficult even coming up with maps for the Corps. On August 13, 1861, for example, he wrote the Barnes map publishers of Philadelphia asking them to "furnish this Bureau, if you have th-, [sic] county maps of Jefferson, Clark, Frederick, London, Fairfax, Prince William Counties, Virginia", adding the post script: "Send by Express."34 Bache was writing to anyone he could think of that could provi.de maps of the

Conf ederacy : newspapers such as the National Intelligencer, the General Land Office, General Wool at Fort Monroe, C.G. Kennedy (Superintendent of the Census for the Department of the Interior), and Professor A.D. Bache (Superintendent of the Coast Survey), among others. For al1 his efforts, Hartman Bache was only modestly successful in filling orders for maps or topographers. A typical letter of the period was that sent to General Keyes: "1 am entirely unable to comply with your wishes to furnish a Topographical Engineer for duty with your corps, as every available officer has been assigned to duty in the various Military Departments ."35 As the Bureau lurched into the Civil War, the desperation for adequate maps of the Confederacy - Virginia in particular - resulted in the Bureau resorting to methods of map acquisition that in the long nin hurt its cause. One example of this was the "Boschke" map of Washington, D.C. Prior to the war, one Albert Boschke, who had been employed

34 ~ettersSent, p. 19. Barnes replied that the "County Maps ordered are not to be had...", but that he did possess a four page copy of a rnap encornpassing both Virginia and Maryland which he would sel1 to the Bureau for three dollars. Letters Received, p. 35.

SLetters Sent, pp. 7, 19, 38, 41, 65, 187, 320. for a time with the Coast Survey, had spent considerable personal time and rnoney in the production of a rnap covering the city and District of Washington. Boschke sold his interest in the project at the beginning of the war to copper engraver David McClelland who in turn made an offer to sel1 the plates to the Goverment for $20,000. Thinking the price extravagant however, Secretasy of War Stanton ordered the plates seized - leaving McClelland no compensation.36 Needless to Say, this action did little to further the voluntary production of private maps. Nevertheless, the Topographical Engineers worked tirelessly at their duties, pouring over al1 information that Bache could find in order to produce rnaps of the Confederacy. Northern Virginia, because of its proximity to the capital of the Union, received a great deal of attention from federal map makers. General McClellan, for his part, was keenly interested in some of their findings. For him, physical intelligence seems to have taken two forms: information which supported his plan, and that which did not. The Coast Survey of 1858 was one of those pieces of intelligence that he believed "proved" the feasibility of his seaborne route, but it was not alone. It will be recalled that in his strategy paper of February 3, 1862, defending his Chesapeake route to the Administration, McClellan placed an emphasis on physical intelligence. Not only was his proposed route a shorter distance overland, the roads were "passable at al1 seasons" and the country (this being from Urbanna) was better suited to offensive operations as it was "much more level," had

36 James Rhoads , "Civil War Maps and Mappingfr, Mili tary Engineer 327 (January-February, 19571, pp. 39-40. "more cleared land," and "less dense" wooded areas. Much of this information came to him through a January 3, 1862 terrain-study of Virginia. While the authorship of this study is unclear, that it was made specifically for General McClellan is certain.37 The report divided the State into two sections and concentrated (county by county) on that section referred to as the "Tertiary Formation of Virginia" (fig.5). Two sections of the report supported McClellanrs Chesapeake plan. The study claimed that winter was the rainy season of the year in this section of Virginia, and that "...good natural roads, having a good proportion of sand. .." travelled across land that was described as "...fertile and open.. ..",a The notion of "openM country was supported by a map produced in early January by Colonel Thomas J. Cram of the Topographical Engineers who at the tirne was stationed at Fort

Monroe (fig.6). Much in the same vein as the Coast Survey on which it was based, the map showed a cleared landscape highlighting the rivers of the region and was used by McClellan to plan his movements.39 That McClellan would use this map to defend a proposed movement via Urbanna is

37 ~irginiatopographical study, Jan. 3, 1862, McClellan Papers (A-34:14), Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., pp. 7412-7455. Sears claims the study was made by Stewart Van Vliet, but this does not make a great deal of sense for not only was Van Vliet a quartemaster with the Army of the Potomac, but a large portion is attributed to one "W. Worrall (Wornall?), Civil Engineers" thus leading one to believe that it most likely came to McClellan through the Topographical Bureau. (hereafter cited as: virginia topographical study with al1 references to A-34:14).

Wbid., pp. 7444, 7455.

39 Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, p. vi. interesting for Cramrs map represented the rivers between that point and Richmond as formidable obstacles.

Furthemore, this map indicated that there were very few roads in the region. These factors lead one to question the accuracy of McClellanrs February third clah that only three days would be required to move an army of over 100 000 £rom Urbanna to Richmond, On the weekend of March 8-9, 1862, two events occurred which put McClellanrs Chesapeake plan in danger. The first was the arriva1 of the Confederate Ironclad MerrUnack and the second - quite coincidental - was Joseph E. Johnston's decision to pull his forces back from their exposed position at Centreville to Culpeper Court House on the south side of the Rappahannock River (fig.7). These moves seemed to destroy McClellanYs plans prior to their implernentation. As he wrote to General John E. Wool, the commander at Fort Monroe: "The performances of the Merrimack places a new aspect upon everything, and may very probably change my whole plan of campaign, just on the eve of execution."4o The clash between this vesse1 and the Monitor during the same day gave him heart. By March 14, he wrote Gustavus V. Fox that: "From al1 accounts received 1 have such a lively faith in the gallant little Monitor that I feel that we can trust her...."41 That trust would prove to be essential for now McClellan had decided on taking his third choice - Fort Monroe - as his base of operations against Richmond. Now

40 McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1 865, p. 199. that General Johnston had retired behind the Rappahannoc k , McClellan concluded that Urbanna and Mob Jack Bay (his second choice further dmChesapeake Bay) were no longer options as they could be quickly reached by Johnston. According to his February 3 paper, "worst [had] corne to worst" and while while a base at Fort Monroe would allm "complete security" of operations, the modified campaign would nevertheless suffer from ''less celerity and brilliancy of results. "42 "Complete securityffmeant that McClellan considered the Pamunkey and Mattaponi Rivers to be sufficient obstacles to bar Johnstonfs path to the Peninsula £rom his encampment on the Rappahannock River. One is left to wonder why he did not consider the Pamunkey and Mattaponi obstacles that could have retarded his proposed strike from Urbanna. This change came as a bombshell to the Topographical Bureau which had up until this point been working feverishly on maps and information concerning Northern Virginia. The change sent them scrambling: thankfully, the Coast Survey, Tertiary Formation study and Crarn map were still valid, but other sources needed to be found - and quickly. McClellan, of course, had for some the had Port Monroe in his rnind as a back-up base. As early as November 6, 1861, he had written General Wool for information as to the possibility of offensive operations £rom that Union outpost. Wool replied that Fort Monroe was certainly "the most important position on the Atlantic coastfffrom which expeditions could be launched "at al1 seasons of the year."43 And in February 1862, Wool wired Stantor. arguing that "there has been no the in the last three months... that Richmond could not have been taken [from Fort Monroe] with 50 000 men, and even with a

less force. "44 The brunt of the topographical workload fell upon Andrew A. Humphreys, the Army of the Potomac's Chief of Topographical Engineers, who in his final report noted that while "every available source was exhausted that promised to furnish information," the amount of physical intelligence uncovered was Wery meagre."45 Humphreys consulted every available authority on the region and turned up maps such as a 1770 County rnap (fig-8), British plans of the siege of YOS~~OWTI,in 1781 (fig.9), and the original survey of the Peninsula from Fort Monroe to Williamsburg, made in 1818 by Major James Kearney, al1 of which satisfactorily established certain points. Various outlines were compiled; but the most elaborate and recent, and the one followed by General

McCleilan, was a map again furnished by Colonel T.J. Cram which embraced Newport News, Hog Island, Gloucester and

43 o.R., IV, pp. 627-630. Bruce Catton argues that McClellan first got the idea of using Fort Monroe as a base of operations against Richmond by interviewing Captain Rush Hawkins after a meeting in which Hawkins was to give a report on Hatteras Inlet. "Hawkins was al1 primed; he had been telling old General Wool... that what the goverment ought to do was land an amy at the tip of the Virginia Peninsula and move on Richmond from the east, and he quickly sketched out a rough map of the terrain where the roads led.... McCleilan pumped him dry and pocketed his sketch map." Catton, Mr. Lincoln's Anny, p. 87. 44O.R., IX, p. 17,

450.R., XI, part 1, p. 152. Williamsburg (figs.10-A, 104, 10-C), and existing maps of Henrico County which included the future approaches to

Richmond (figs.11-A, 11-B).46 In some respects, these maps met the criteria set out by McCiellan on February 3. None showed any major impediments to quick travel between Fort Monroe and Richmond and al1 but one represented the region as cleared famland. McClellan saw this as evidence for the ~dministrationdemonstrating that his newly proposed route up the Peninsula was better than following Johnstonrs army now entrenched on the other side of the Rappahannock. If these maps were not proof enough, McClellan could point to the problems encounters in efforts to reconnoitre Johnstonrs retreating columns. As his friend, the Prince De Joinville recorded, following the Rebels to the Rappahannock was a ''material irnpossibilityrrat this time of the year: An incident had just proven this to be so. General Stoneman, with a flying column, had just been sent in pursuit of the enemy. This column came up with the enemy on the Rappahannock, along the railway to Gordonsville, and had two engagements of no great importance. Then came the rain. The fords were swollen, the bridges carried away, the water- courses could no longer be passed by swimming; they

46~llanPinkerton in hiç memoirs claims that his operatives provided the bulk of information available to McClellan on the topography of the Peninsula. #'The commanding general was engaged in perfecting his plans for a campaign against Richmond, and in order to do this intelligently, much information was required of the condition of the country through which the amy must pass.... [This task was] mainly left to be discovered by the men in the secret service department. " While Pinkerton did have operatives working in Virginia, the accuracy of this clah is suspect. 1 believe it can safely be assumed that ~inkerton was taking some artistic licence in the compilation of his memoirs. Allan Pinkerton, The Spy of the Rebellion (Hartford, Conn.: M.A. Winter and Hatch, 1885), p. 482. were torrents. Stoneman8s column began to suffer for want of provisions, and its situation was perilous. Such was the country before the amy. The land march was therefore abandoned.--47 Whether the Administration was privy to the same information McClellan had is unknown; This however seems unlikely, for contained in the maps and report were some very interesting contradictions to his daims. Firstly, while the Tertiary formation study does speak of "good natural roadsN in this region of Virginia, a closer reading makes it clear that the report's "good roadsw only existed "when [the roads] cross the ridges from river to river." In the low, open famland which accounted for the vast majority of the region on Mcclellan's maps (and which he had argued would be an advantage), the roads were much "heavier." In these areas, so the report contended, a great deal of "swampy landw, and few slopes, meant that rainwater would rarely be drained. While the roads were poor in the "fertile and open" country that bordered the rivers "to the depth of one, two or three miles", once they passed into the more wooded country it could be expected that, "wagons [would bel less likely to ~tall.,..~'4a This did not leave much mileage on the few ~eninsularroads on which wagons could travel easily in wet weather. Taking Cram's updated April 2, 1862 map (fig.10-B) as an example (the last map produced of the lower Peninsula prior to McClellants advance on Yorktown two days later) and

47Francois Ferdinand Phillippe, Prince de Joinville, The Anny of the Potomac: Its Organization, Its Commander, and Its Campaign. translated by William Henry Hurlbert (New York: Anson D.F. Randolph, 1862), pp. 28-29,

48Virginia topographical study, pp. 7443, 7450, 7455. taking the most conservative estimate of the amount of area in which poor roads could be expected - one mile on either side of rivers - we find that on the main road between Fort Monroe and Yorktown (a distance of approximately twenty miles), ten miles of road could be predicted to be unusable in rainy conditions . Secondly, the Tertiary report's daim that winter was Virginia's "rainy season" deserves questioning. Statistics compiled during the first half of the twentieth century state that while December received an average rainfall of 2-97 inches, May received 3.72, June 3.75, July 5.61 and August 5.54. Also, the heaviest rainfalls in the state were always recorded in the Tertiary formation. Within this formation were Henrico, New Kent, Charles City, York, James and King William Counties. Heavy rainfalls were not recorded, however, in those counties between King William and Fairfax on the line of the Richmond, Fredericksburg and Potomac R.R., nor on the line of Johnston's retreat to Centreville.49 Therefore, McClellanrs planned advance would take his amy through the wettest region of the State, at the wettest period of the year over roads that would become "heavym under these conditions. Finally, the idea that the landscape encountered would be cleared farmland with "less dense" wooded areas was not supported by the changes made in the two Cram Peninsula maps (figs.10-A, 10-B). As Cram continued his work up to April 3,

- - 49Steven K. Pontius, Bernd Knennecke and Susan L. Woodward, An Atlas of Virginia, the 17ti2, lSth, and Early 19th Centuries (Dubuque, Iowa: Kendall/Hunt Publishing Company, l989), pp. 13, 16. more and more wooded areas began to appear on his once "open" famland. What this says about McClellanrs generalship is not clear cut, Certainly he believed he was outnumbered, yet he himself was the author of this misconception. While aspects of his physical intelligence supported his proposed plan, others refuted it. He had a clear outline of the Peninsula, and frorn this correctly gathered that he might supply his anny by sea. McClellan could see on his maps that it might prove difficult to move an army of over 100 000 in a region with so few roads - regardless of their condition. Again though, the York and James Rivers offered a way around this problem (that is until the James was closed by the Merrimack). Furthemore, the lack of roads might be overcome by using local railway lines. As a result, the York River Railroad became fundamentally important in his planning as it was the only rail link in the vicinity (even though it only reached as far as West Point). But what if his ability to use the York River became limited? Or what if he needed to move his army where the York River ~ailroaddid not run? Could he then turn to roads that were few in number and whose utility to the Anny of the Potomac's artillery, ambulances and supply trains was suspect at best? In the end it did not matter. After arguing against the Administration for such a long time and staking his reptation on the "brilliancy of resultsv sure to be realised through his genius - after the March 8-9 weekend, any seaborne route would be made to suite his purposes. McClellan was willing to gamble that his well laid out plan would not suffer as a result of a last minute change of base. Therefore, on March 17 the lead contingent of the Anny of the Potomac took to the Chesapeake for Fort Monroe. Within the next three weeks, 389 vessels delivered to this Union stronghold 121 500 men, 14 592 animals, 1 224 wagons and ambulances, 44 artillery batteries and the

"enomous quantity" of goods necessary to supply it.50

50 Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, p. 24. If you take a flat map and move wooden blocks upon it strategically, the thing looks well, the blocks behave as they should. The science of war is moving live men like blocks and gctting the blocks into place at a fixed moment . But it takes time to mould your men into blocks and flat maps turn into country where creeks and gullies hamper your wooden squares. They stick in the brush, they are tired and rest, they struggle after ripe blackberries, and you cannot lift them up in your hand and move them. Stephen Vincent Benét John Brown 's Body1

The sain was falling at Fort Monroe the afternoon of

April 2, 1862 as General George McClellan arrived on the Peninsula to assume personal command of advance elements of the Axmy of the Potomac. Spirits were high amongst the Federals. This was especially true of General McClellan who the day before he had written his wife that he "did not feel safe until 1 could fairly see Alexandria behind us.... Officially speaking," he told her, "1 feel very glad to get away £rom that sink of iniquity [Washington]...."z Now that he was at last separated from the Lincoln Administration, the Young Napoleon could at last turn his full attention to campaigning. McClellanrs struggles up to this point had been for the sole purpose of delivering his army from the designs of "meddling" politicians. By arguing against an overland route to Richmond, he had assured that the Virginia Peninsula

1 Hassler, Jr., General George B. McClellan, Shield of the Union, p. 2 - 2~c~lellan,The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1865, p. 223. would be the stage upon which his Jominian strike would be played out. One of the key factors in enabling him to proceed to the eni insu la was the physical intelligence which he possessed. The Peninsula, thanks to the Coast Survey, appeared to be the "soft underbellyw of the Confederacy with well defined seaborne supply routes. Its roads, he explained to the Lincoln Administration, were well drained and sandy, making them practicable avenues of approach al1 year. Not al1 the intelligence in his possession, however, had been presented to the Administration. Not only did the Tertiary

Formation study note that there was a great deal of "swampy land", it made explicit reference to fact that in open country around the many small streams and rivers on the Peninsula the roads could be expected to be "heavy." In order to convince Lincoln that his was the superior plan these discrepancies within his own intelligence reports were suppressed. General McClellan pointed to the physical intelligence that supported his position and ignored that which did not match his preconceived plans. This process was to repeated once he was on the Peninsula as well; at Yorktown, for example, McCiellan decided on a siege prior to an examination of the Confederate works he faced. As more detailed intelligence later arrived at his headquarters, he again highlighted that which served his purposes and ignored the rest. McClellan did not enjoy perfect physical intelligence of the Peninsula. As his army advanced from Fort Monroe, the landscape as represented by his maps did not match the environment that actually surrounded his columns. While the first day of operations towards Yorktown was generally successful, day two (Aprii 5) saw the collapse of his finely tuned plan. First came sains that caused the roads to disintegrate, which in turn caused his transportation network to collapse. The final blow came when his columns ran into Confederate entrenchments where he did not expect them- The perception that his physical intelligence was inaccurate seemed to sap McCiellan of his nerve. Instead of a quick blow toward the Rebel capital, the Amy of the Potomac began a lengthy siege. As he sat in the mud before the Warwick River, Jominian "brilliance" no longer seemed to apply. According to Sears, the "stride of a giant" became that of a

McClellanrs first units to arrive at Fort Monroe were those of General Heintzelman's Third Corps. Heintzelman was instructed to "push strong reconnaissances well to the front" and "engage guides in sufficient numbers at once" in order to ascertain both the advanced positions of the enemy and the "lay of the land."4 The ground which Heintzelman now traversed was certainly not unknown to Union forces. Not only was the area from Fort Monroe to Big Bethe1 (a prominent feature on the west bank of the North West Branch of the Back River) well represented on the Cram map, it had been a battlefield the previous summer. On June 10, 1861, General Ben Butler had been ordered to move on two Confederate

3 Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, p. 39.

4 George B. McClellan, Report on the Organization and Campaigns of the Army of the Potomac: To Which is Added an Account of the Campaign in Western Virginia, with plans of Battle-Fields (New York: Sheldon, 18641, p. 153 (hereafter cited as: Report). positions at Big and Little Bethel. Both assaults were, however, in Butler's own words, "mismanaged." Butler had only faulty, out of date maps at his disposa1 and as a result the two columns he sent out to flank the Rebels at Little Bethel instead met in front of that position and ended up firing into one another.5 Heintzelman, on the other hand,

ran into practically no interference in his examinations and made enough forward progress to elicit a warning to halt from McClellan.6 As a result, the Third Corps limited al1 further manoeuvres to the east bank of the South West Branch of the Back River. This restriction would prove to be unfortunate as Heintzelman wished to 'Jexplorewsome of the roads lying just beyond Big Bethe12 Instead, these important roads would be left to 4Jdiscoverwon the first day of operations toward Yorktown, The fact that Heintzelman met little opposition helped convince McClellan that the Confederate forces were as yet unaware of his intentions. Supporting this contention was a troop estimate provided to him by General Wool in early March. On March 12, Wool wired headquarters that he believed the Confederates under General John Magruder had "from 15 000 to 18 000 men, extending from the James River to Yorktown."

5 Nevins, The War for the Union: The Improvised War 1861- 1862, pp. 211-212.

6 McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1865, pp. 218-219. McClellan specifically instructed Heintzelman not to push his reconnaissance too far or to show too much force as McClellan wanted to be careful not "to prernaturely develop our plans to the enemy."

70.R. XI: 3, p. 47. This figure was soon verified by General Fitz John Porter when he arrived on the Peninsula at the end of the month. "From al1 1 learn.. .," Porter wired McCiellan, "no greater force this side than 15 000 men."s This news must have buoyed McClellanrs spirits further for it meant that his army would enjoy a considerable numeric advantage over any Confederate forces between Fort Monroe and Richmond (an advantage which was one of the tenants of his plan in the first place). If he could now just beat the rest of Johnstonfsamy to the Rebel capital, his campaign might retain much of its "brilliancy". On March 19, McClellan received a detailed report from D.P. Woodbury of the Topographical Bureau accornpanying the

T.J. Cram map of the Peninsula (fig.10-A). The substance of Woodbury's report was not based on first hand observation but was instead obtained from Cram himself. Because of this, Woodbury explained that he was "indebted to [Cram]... for almost al1 the information 1 obtained" and, "some intelligent negroes, who corroborated [that] information."g Woodbury discussed the possible Rebel defensive works facing Fort Monroe, the various landings and their utility on the York.

8 Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, pp. 29-30. Wool had obtained this information by sending out one of his men as a deserter to the Confederates. The man enlisted in a Confederate regiment and then returned "with precise information of the Rebel works between York and James Rivers. "

9O.R. XI: 3., p. 22. As in Heintzelmanrs case, Woodbury was warned against letting the enemy know of his presence on the Peninsula. "1 received," he wrote in the report to McClellan, "at your headquarters ... verbal instructions ... that 1 should make no reconnaissances in person of the landings on York River, lest the enemy thereby might receive intimations of intended movements." Back River, Ship Point, Cheeseman's Creek and the area between Womley's Creek and the western entrance to Back Bay were recomended as possible landing sites with the latter (knam as the Sand-Box) being considered the best because it had "no natural obstacles". Woodbury was careful to point out natural formations that could serve to slow Union forces advancing from Hampton to Yorktavn - specifically the North West Branch of the Back River at Big Bethe1 and Howard's Bridge on the Poquosin River. The Report offered two solutions to this dilemma: a further amphibious landing higher on the York to turn any Rebel defences below, or a turning movement up the Peninsula on the road from Newport News to Warwick Court House- Woodbury did note that as far as the latter was concerned, "more information is desirable."lo Using the Cram map as reference, Woodbury first saw no reason why a force on Newport News-Warwick Court House road could not strike to the head of the Warwick River at Halfway House, thereby outflanking Yorktown by land. The only obstacle as represented by the map was an insignificant branch of the Warwick River which crossed the road from Newport News at Old Ship Yard. Contradicting himself though, Woodbury then proceeded to give some credit to this line: The last natural line of the enemy - a branch of the Warwick river, a branch of Wormley's Creek, and the divide between the two... - unfortunately is not turned by the landing below Wormley's Creek, and this fact suggests the want of other means of turning the works of the enemy entirely above Yorktown, and if possible above Williamsburg.~l

Why Woodbury reversed hdself is not entirely clear. As Woodbury made his investigations at Fort Monroe more intelligence on the Peninsula was only beginning to corne to light. For example, Woodbury reported that "[a]t Warwick there is a battery of guns. ... This battery is not represented on [Cramfs]map, and 1 cannot make out its exact location."l2 This battery would prove to be Magruder's entrenchments at Lee's Mill. McClellan adopted both of Woodburyfs proposed plans of attack. "1 had hoped," he was later to write, %y rapid movements, to drive before me or capture the enemy on the

Peninsula...."l3 As such, Generals Porter, Hamilton and

Sedwick of Heintzelmanfs Third Corps were to move their divisions to the point where Ship Point road intersected the main road £rom Hampton to Yorktown. McClellan expected this Corps to meet with some resistance and therefore instructed General Keyesf Fourth Corps, which included the divisions of Generals Smith and Couch, to take the James River road £rom Newport News to Young's Mill. On the second day of

operations, Keyes was to move his Corps "via Warwick Court House, and the road leading near the Old Ship Yard, to Half Way House on the Yorktown and Williamsburg Road."14 Thus, while Heintzelman tied down the Yorktown garrison, Keyes would flank it leaving Magruder in the same position as Cornwallis had been in 1781. McClellan came prepared to reduce a cut off Yorktown by siege if necessary, on March 22 sending a request to Chief of Staff Randolph Marcy for over

13~c~lellan,Report, p. 156.

14 Ibid. , pp. 157-158. 120 siege guns.15 To "turn the works of the enemy" below Yorktown, if severe resistance was encountered overland, McClellan turned to the Navy. He decided to use his First Corps under General Irvin McDoweïl as a smaller amphibious force with which he could turn any Confederate works encountered by Heintzelman. McDowellrs Corps could "effect a landing [at] the Sand-Box... in order to turn al1 the enernyfs defences..., or else, should existing circumstances render it preferable, land on the Gloucester side of the York River, and move on West Point,"l6 In this way McClellan believed he rnight be able to capture, or a least force the withdrawal, of Confederate forces on the

Peninsula. Exactly how McDowell was expected to hold in Magruderls forces should they retreat while at the same time holding off Johnston's army arriving from Centreville is unknown, Fuxthermore, McDoweiirs Corps would only be able to operate on the York River as the James was effectively closed to Union traffic. Assurning that Magruder chose to wall himself up in Yorktown, McClellan wanted the assistance of the Navy in reducing both that position and Gloucester Point. After the campaign, McClellan was very critical of the quantity and quality of Naval assistance he received during the siege of Yorktown. "Upon my arriva1 at Fort Monroe," he reported, "[Flag Officer ~ouisM. Goldsborough] did not feel able to detach. .. a suitable force to attack... Yorktown and

15 McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1 865, pp. 216-2 17. i6~cClellan,Report, p. 152. Gloucester. Al1 this was contrary to what had been previously stated to me, and materially affected my plans."l7 Woodburyfs report had rnentioned that Goldsborough "expressed his desire to cooperate in every way", and even went so far as to suggest that the Navy might run some gunboats past the Yorktown batteries.18 Sears points out that at the time, McClellan knew that he could not expect much help from Goldsborough, whose primary concern was the containment of the Merrimack. This commitment would leave the Navy only seven wooden gunboats to support any army operations. Not only was this force too small to be effective against the cannon of Yorktown and Gloucester Point, but their guns could not even elevate sufficiently to reach the bluffs comprising the Confederate defences. As early as Maxch 28, McClellan again wrote Marcy explaining that he must go prepared for a siege "in case the Navy is not able to afford the means of destroying the rebel batteries at these points. "19 This seems to suggest that McCleilan believed his outflanking operation with Keyes would be sufficient to cut off Yorktown and open the York River. If this were the case, how did he expect to get past the "last natural line" that Woodbury spoke of? A possible explanation is that he did not believe such a line existed. As noted above, the suddenness of the shift from Urbanna to Fort Monroe had set off a scrarnble amongst the intelligence collection agencies of the

ITIbid., p. 156. Flag Officer Louis M. Goldsborough was commander of the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron.

180.~. XI: 3., p. 23.

19 Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, p. 32. Anny of the Potomac. Until March 9, the lower Peninsula had not had a high priority, and in searching through his files, Allan Pinkerton found only three reports on the area.20 One of these was a late 1861 report made by Timothy Webster, the most successful of his operatives. Webster's journey to the Confederate capital in October had taken him to both Gloucester Point and Yorktown where he compiled detailed lists of the nature of the works and number of cannon. He then travelled from Yorktown, in the disguise of a smuggler, directly across the Peninsula to "Grove Wharf" - listed as "Grove ' s Landingrron the Cram map ( f ig -10-B ) . According to the Cram map, this route fell directly on Woodbury's "last natural linew, yet Webster failed to note the presence of any defensive works. Pinkerton claimed that Webster's "notes of the topography of the country were of the greatest value and he received the warmest thanks of the commanding generaLm21 Indeed, it certainly seems that Webster's information was taken at face value and there appeared to be no reason why it should not have been. Travelling across the Peninsula on the route Webster followed would not have led him to believe the Confederates had constructed any other works. Unfortunately, Pinkerton and McClellan did not realise that Webster had not crossed the Peninsula where they thought. The Cram map lists Grove's Landing on Mulberry Island at the terminus of a road running just to the east of the small north branch of the Warwick River. This was the same branch that Woodbury made special reference to in his report. In reality, Grove's

20 Ibid., p. 29.

21 Pinkerton, The Spy of the Rebellion, pp. 313-325. Wharf was not on Mulberry Island at all, but up the James river directly across from Hog Island (fig.12). While it was true that Webster had travelled to Grove's Wharf and had not seen anything of value to report, Cramfs positioning of that landing was incorrect, and may have led McClellan to doubt the accuracy of Woodbury s last natural line. " True to his word that "the grass will not grow under my feetw, McClellan set his amy on the rnarch early on the morning of April 4.22 While forward progress was heartening, inadequacies in Federal intelligence gave some pause. The Prince De Joinville, for example, noted that the few locals encountered were "hostile and dumb" and slaves and deserters generally provided too much information to be considered reliable in order to "secure a welcome." "We were here twenty-four miles from Yorktown," the Prince noted, "and we could not learn what works the enemy had thrown up, nor what was his force within them. "23

Perhaps most unnerving were the appearance of many discrepancies between Cramfs map and the landscape through which the anny was moving. As Joinville explained, "another not less curious trait of war, which appeared in the outset of the campaign and was constantly reproduced, was the complete absence of al1 information in regard to the country.... '~4 While the day was beautifully clear, and the marching easy, the roads proved narrow, and the wide open

22 McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 18604865, p. 225.

23 Joinville, The Amzy of the Potomac: Its ~rganization, Its Commander, and Its ~ampaign,p. 38. spaces of Cramrsmap quickly disappeared into heavily wooded second gravth forest. Furthemore, the country was quite flat, and therefore somewhat swampy, as Keyesf Corps discovered at Watt's creek (an obstruction not listed by Cram). James Graham, a Colonel in the 62nd Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry commented in a letter to his Grandfather that "the country here is very flat, so much so that it is with a great deal of difficulty that it is drained." Recalling an earlier rain shower at Fort Monroe, Graham explained that the only mannes in which troops could drain the two to four inches of water in their camps was to "dig holes."25 Progress on this first day had gone according to plan however; the Army of the Potomac was halfway to Yorktown and the few Rebels sighted during the day faded back without offering resistance. This was particularly satisfying to McClellan who saw positions such as Big Bethe1 and Howard's Bridge fa11 without requiring amphibious landings. He wrote home that afternoon that "everything has worked well today - 1 have gained some strong positions without fighting and shall try some more manoeuvring tomorrow." The next day, he told his wife, would see the army "invest Yorktown" where he "may have a fight."26 Joinville saw the progress in another light: "So the Army of the Potomac moved on in the dark

25 James L. Graham to Grandfather, April 2, Civil War Miscellaneous Collection, U.S. Army Milita- History Institute (hereafter cited as: USAMHI).

26 McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1865, p. 228. toward Yorktown. #'27 If April 4 had been a satisfactory day for George

McClellan, the April 5 was anything but. As Steven Sears so aptly expressed it: "day two of the operation ... proved to be a day of great disill~sioment....~2~ The first of the day's discoveries came £rom the heavens in the form of a rnorning downpour lasting several hours, an occurrence believed by McClellan to be "unusual at this season of the year."29 At this point, the entire Union amy sank into the "good natural roads ." When McClellan began his advance frorn Fort Monroe the responsibility of cwrdinating, moving, and supplying the 68 700 men then on the Peninsula had been monumental in itself. When the roads dissolved on April 5, al1 semblance of organization and efficiency in Union columns melted away as well. "The rain", wrote Joinville, "falling in torrents... had made these roads. .. completely impracticable." While the infantry could manage to move by skirting the dense forests, the Prince noted that, "as soon as two or three wagons had made ruts in the ground, no wheeled vehicle could move an inch."30 Thomas Langstroth, a civilian wagonmaster attached to Company 1 of the 52nd Pennsylvania Militia in Keyesf Fourth Corps would write of

27~oinville,The Army of the Potomac: Its Organization, Its Commander, and Its Campaign, p. 39.

28 Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, p. 36.

29 ~oinville,The Army of the Potomac: Its Organization, Its Commander, and Its Campaign, p. 39. the "whole Country [as] one swap and the roads impassible. It is nothing to see a dozen or more mules dom in the mud at one time." While in front of Yorktown he tried to paint a picture of what he had seen for those at home: 1 tell you it was a sight to see nearly one hundred thousand men on the road at one time mired up with hundreds of wagons and cannons without number. 1 think the road was full for the distance of ten miles; and the trouble 1 had with the teams; talk about swearing but that was enough to make any man swear [even] if he was a preacher. 31 Gouverneur Kemble Warren recorded that the very rain which "poured live blood into the green landscape", destroyed the roads, turning them into "one infernal stream of mud, into which wagons sink to their bodies, [and] mules flounder about like wretches from a sinking ship." "Horrid ixrtprecations and oathsw, lamented Warren, "corne up from the drivers. .. so that in the midst of a landscape where the pure heart could find a heaven, the horrors of war have added a scene which might clah a place in pandemonium...."32 Private William Fairbanks from Massachusetts wrote home complaining about the "Virginia briars, swamps, and mud to our knees." He noted that : The whole country around here, is hardly anything but dense woods and swampy; day before yesterday we had what you might cal1 a Virginia thunder shower, and it was a shower to, nomistakenly. 1 never seen it rain, or thunder so hard in my life as it did

- 3IThomas Langstroth, April 30, 12, Civil War Miscellaneous Collection, USAMHI.

32 Gouverneur Kemble Warren, Gouverneur Kemble Warren, The Life and Letters of An American Soldier, 1830-1882. Emerson Gifford Taylor editor, (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1932), pp. 65, 67. that day.33 One Union artillerist, Charles ~ainwright,took it upon himself to examine the roads in which the army found itself mired. He discovered that they consisted of three layers; the topsoil tending to be about foot of light sandy loam that rested upon the second, a bed of shell marl, which in turn lay upon heavy clay. As the roads were not crowned and the land was quite flat, rainwater drained into the shell marl, converting it "into the consistency of soft rnortar." Anything breaking through the surface, he found, would not stop sinking until it hit the heavy clay.34 McCieilan had been worxied about the few wagons which he had been able to bring to the Peninsula in the first place and the rains which now fell further crippled his ability to move. "We have no baggage tonightf', he wrote his wife early on the morning of the 6th, and later that same day he pleaded with Lincoln to send as many wagons as possible as "1 have by no means the transportation 1 must have to move rny army even a few miles. "3s The reasoning behind McClellan 's lack of wheeled transport is difficult to fathom. Most likely, it was a combination of wanting to get his army moving before his presence on the Peninsula was fully realised by the Confederates, and an unfounded belief that the roads would not prove troublesome. Whatever the reasoning, The Army of the Potomac was to suffer from poor transportation throughout

-- 33~illiamFairbanks to Father, April, Wear Yorktown", Civil War Miscellaneous Collection, USAMHI.

34Wainwright, A Diary of Battle, p. 58.

35 McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1865, pp. 230-231. the Campaign as supplies were often unavailable to the men in the field. The second great surprise of the day occurred when McCleiian's flanking operation on the Newport News-Halfway House road ran into opposition. As Heintzelman's Third Corps approached Yorktown, reports came back to headquarters of sharp skirmishing. This was expected - Crarn's map represented Yorktown as surrounded by well laid out defensive works and Webster had discussed the details of these works at length. What was unexpected was a report from Keyes. Keyes had an early start the morning of April 5, partly because he was concerned about the inadequacy of his maps, as well as the difficulties he was having moving up his wagon trains. Soon afterward, Keyes notified headquarters that his advance had been halted by enemy works "which offer a severe resistancee1'36 AS that day's advance began, Union comrnanders were discovering more and more differences between their maps and the landscape. When one compares Cramrs map (fig.10-B) to the final campaign map compiled in September 1862 from surveys executed while in the field (fig.l2), the differences are striking. Heintzelman's Corps, for example, discovered that the distance between Hampton and Howard's Bridge was actually two miles further in reality than as represented by Cram. The most important discrepancies were encountered by General Keyes. As rnentioned above, his columns had already passed through a swamp (Sawyers) which did not exist on their maps. Early on April 5, Keyes found that the three Young's

36 Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, p. 37. Mills on Deep Creek listed by Cram did not exist, and the road failed to veer towards the James at Danbeigh Church (in addition to other roads appearing which were not on his map - compare fig.10-B with fig.13). Soon afterward, Keyes discovered that Warwick Courthouse was not actually on the

Warwick River and most importantly, that Mulberry Island was not an island! As he reported to General Marcy at eleven ofclock that morning, he had "little information regarding the roads," and he had been forced to dispatch "mulatto guidesw and "engineers out on reconnaissan~eç.'~37 T.J. Cram had indicated that the main body of the

Warwick River passed next to Warwick Court House when in fact only a minor stream reached that point via Taylor's Landing. The true course of the Warwick River was included on the Cram map, but was represented as only an insignificant stream running directly into the middle of Mulberry Island. Cram had, however, begun to incorporate some of the information that Woodbury spoke of into the final edition of the map. The same reports from blacks and deserters that convinced Woodbury that there was a ''last natural lineV also induced Cram to add the "Pondn and wooded area at Young's Mill. The problem was that Cram confused Young's Mill (a figment of his imagination) with Lee's Mill - where the Rebels indeed were engaged in constructing a defensive line behind a series of

370.R. XI: 3, pp. 69-70; At one o'clock in the afternoon, Wool reported to Stanton that: "We have heard some firing in the direction of Yorktown... [but] al1 goes smoothly. 1 do not believe the Army of the Potomac will find many troops to contend with." p. 68; Early on the morning of the 6th, Keyes wrote Marcy complaining that he was unable to find out where the roads ran between his location and his supply depot at Ship Point. pp. 74-75. dams . The Warwick River provided an hpressive but not invulnerable position for Magruder's srnall amy. One of the best descriptions of the Rebel defences is that of Lieutenant C.B. Comstock, Topographical Engineers, in a report of April 12. The Warwick in fact had two names for above Lee's Mill it was know locally as Beaver Trenches. While the Warwick proper (below Lee's Mill) was at ieast five feet deep, Beaver Trenches was "a small Stream, not more than ten or fifteen feet wide and a foot or two deep." However, Magruder had seen fit to add dams to both the Warwick and Beaver Trenches inundating the wide marches on either side well into the heavy forest which ran entirely across the Peninsula (fig.13). These dams, two in total between Lee's Mill and Wynn's Mill, provided a shallav but continuous water obstacle in front of the Rebel lines.38 Behind this line, Magruder's men performed their well known "playw. Keenly aware of the vast size of the Union

Anny, "Prince Johnw did his best to make his 15 000 seem like 100 000. Everywhere along the line Confederate regiments marched and countermarched with the sole objective of showing themselves to the enemy at as many places as possible. One ouis si ana regiment made the trip from Yorktown to the James and back six times that day.39 Having dismissed Woodbury's warning of a possible line

38 John G. Barnard and W. P. Barry, Report of the Engineer and Artillery Operations of the Amy of the Potomac From Its Organization to the Close of the Peninsular Campaign, (New York: VanNostrand, 1863), pp. 194-199.

39 Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, p. 37. of Confederate defence, McClellan was understandably shocked to discover the Warwick defences lying across his path. In his official report, for example, he wrote that "unexpectedlyw Keyes was brought to a halt before the enemyfs works.40 Obviously Cram's map gave an inaccurate representation of that river and, as a result, McClelian would later have a ready scapegoat for failure. Alexander Webb, one of the first historians of the Peninsular Campaign, questioned the logic behind McClellanrs decision to ignore Woodbury. "To the uneducated eye", Webb argued, "it seems to be a most 'feasible' manoeuvre to march to [Yorktown's] rear, surround it, and invest it, and thus repeat what Washington effected upon the same spot in 1781 ...."41 Webb went on to argue that McClellanfs assumption that this course would be successful was amateurish. While it was correctly presumed that Magruder's sole purpose on the Peninsula was to slow McClellan down, why was it not also assurned that this would require him to present a front across the entire Peninsula? The effect of finding Magruder stretched across his path behind a river which did not exist on his maps cornpletely unnerved the Young Napoleon. Not only had his maps been incorrect, but so had the weather reports. Furthemore, his gamble on road conditions had certainly not paid off. And from reports coming back from the front, the estimates of 15 000 for Magruderfs strength seemed to be just as inaccurate. McClellan quickly persuaded himself that

NMcClellan, Report, p. 160.

41 Alexander S. Webb, The Peninsul a, McClell an 's Campaign of 1862, (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1881), p. 53. Magruder would never try to hold a line across the Peninsula with that small a force. "General McClellan had a highly systematic cast of mind," explains Sears, "he liked events to proceed according to careful plan, and suddenly his best-laid plans for taking Yorktown were falling to pieces. Everything he had counted on in his planning was going wrong."Q The result was a retreat - more psychological than in the physical sense, but a retreat nonetheless - to a military arena in which McClellan felt secure. "Our neighbours are in a very strong position," he declared to Louis Goldsborough that evening, "1 cannot turn Yorktown withoüt a battle, in which 1 must use heavy artillery and go through the preliminary operations of a siegeow43 The siege operation was the "security blanket" McClellan resorted to when he believed his physical intelligence had failed him. "That Stream is an obstacle of great magnitude," he wrote to Brigadier General L. Thomas on the 5th, "[tlhe information obtained at Fort Monroe in regard to the topography of the country and the position and strength of the enemy has been unreliable...."44 McClellan had been involved in two previous siege operations, the first in Mexico at Vera Cruz under Scott and the second as an observer of the siege of Sevastopol in 1855. Sears concluded that "no officer in either army knew more about conducting a siege

42 Sears, Tu the Gates of Richmond, p. 38.

43 McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McCïellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1865, p. 229. 44McClelian, Report, p. 263. than George M~Clellan.~'45 With seeming catastrophe surrounding his movements, McClellan felt infinitely more cornfortable slowing things down. McClellan desired a siege so badly in fact that he ordered these operations to commence prior to full reconnaissances of the Confederate positions! In his letter to Goldsborough of the Sth, after mentioning the necessity of a siege, McClellan went on to note that, "the reconnaissances of tomorrow will enable me to form a pretty correct judgment of what 1 have to meet.. .."46 To Lincoln that evening, McClellan further demonstrated his ignorance concerning the

Warwick line. "A reconnaissance just made by General Barnard," he wrote, "shows that their line extends... from Yorktown to the Warwick River."47 McClellan's choice of words suggests that he did not realise that the Warwick River was the Confederate line. By his own admission, it was not until April 9 that he "had acquired a pretty good knowledge of the position and strength of the enemyrs works and the obstacles to overccme."48 The final shock of this day arrived on McClellanfs desk that evening in the form of a telegram frorn Lincoln. It announced that General McDowellfs First Corps had been detached from his command to remain in Washington. One of the conditions on which the President approved the Peninsula

45 Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, p. 39.

46McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1865, p. 229.

470.~. XI: 3, p. 71. My italics.

a ~c~lellan,Report, p. 170. plan was that Washington should be left completely secure against attack. The Council of War of March 13, had decided that a force of about 55 000 men would be more than sufficient to fulfil this obligation. With McClellanrs departure, however, it was discovered that the General had taken great liberties - or lied, depending on one's affiliations - in arriving at his troop counts. The rasult was that no more than 26 761 raw, poorly equipped troops had been left to secure the capital. It was reported that when

Lincoln was told of these facts, "he was justly indignant."49 McClellan would later claim that the withholding of McDowell dislocated his plans for advancing up the Peninsula quickly. This claim was pure fantasy for McClellan had managed to bring the Campaign to a full stop prior to receiving word of McDowell's retention by deciding to lay siege to Magruder's def ences. The next morning found Federal pickets cautiously examining the works that barred their path. There was a great divergence of opinion on the nature of the Confederate defences. Keyes' first impression was much like McClellan's: "The approaches on Our side are generally through low, swampy or thickly wooded grounds; over roads which we are obligated to repais or make before we can get forward our carriages... we cannot advance."50 Joinville agreed, arguing that the depth of the water and marshy borders made the obstacle

49 Webb, The Peninsula, p. 57; Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, pp. 33-34.

50 Hiram Ketchum, General McClellan 's Peninsula Campaign t Review of the Report of the Committee on the Conduct of the War Relative to the Peninsula Campaign, (New York: n.p., 1864), p. 15. "impassable by infantry."sl William Thomas Harbaugh Brooks

seemed to sum up the situation and the frustrations felt by many : Our knowledge of the country was zero our maps worse than none for they were entirely wrong and served only to mislead us. The Country is naturally marshy, is one grand sink mine for continuous rains. The roads are without bottoms and we are not in an enviable position by any manner of rneans. We have got ourselves in a sort of hornets nest that will take al1 of our strength and energy to work this.52

On the other hand, there were many voices that called for dediate and concerted action. Both Generals Hooker and Heintzelman wanted to push Magruder's forces as soon as possible. Hooker argued that from his examination of the Yorktown workç, "1 felt that their lines could be pierced without any considerable los^....'^ Heintzelman would later testify that he "was always of the opinion that we could have

forced their lines ...."53 General William 'Baldy* Smith went so £as as to send out a reconnaissance in force undex Brigadier General Winfield Scott Hancock. Hancock proceeded through the brush and across the stream to probe the Rebel lines. Once there, he quickly discovered a "weak pointw which he believed could easily be taken. He was not reinforced howevex, as General McClellan had meanwhile instructed Smith that no action was to be initiated until the

51 Joinville, The Ariny of the Potomac: Its Organization, Its Commander, and Its Campaign, p. 40.

52 w.T.H. Brooks to Father, ~pril9, Civil War Miscellaneous Collection, USAMHI.

53Ketchum, General McClellan 's Peninsula Campaign : Review of the Report of the Cornittee on the Conduct of the War Relative to the Peninsula Campaign, p. 15. Topographical Engineers had thoroughly studied the line.54 Hancock was thereby ordered to end his reconnaissance and al1 thoughts of forcing the Warwick line dissolved. George McClellan would have his siege.55 As McClellan set to the work of planning the siege, the Union army went to work repairing the roads and digging the trenches. The sheer volume of work required of the Union troops was staggering. The thick forests provided ready-made corduroy, but cutting paths through them was time consuming and disorienting. LSometimes," wrote Solemon Beals, "1 have had to find my way to the engineers [for whom he was bringing tools on the backs of mules] who are themselves trying to

54Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, p. 42. This was a dangerous enough task in itself, Gouverneur Kemble Warren for example recalled assisting A.A. Humphreys for a week in front of Yorktown. On the 18th, he wrote his brother: "Yesterday 1 finished up a portion of the map of the enemy line where Lieutenant Wagner was wounded and two of his men killed. The shell struck the plane-table and burst, knocking it to pieces, but, strange enough, Mr. Dorr, who was drawing at it, was unhurtfr; Warren, Gouverneur Kemble Warren, The Life and Letters of An American Soldier, 1830-1882, p. 65; Humphreys had a very difficult the finding topographers to help the Army of the Potomac. Files of letters sent by the Topographical Bureau in Washington contain numerous requests for more topographers during early April from both Humphreys and McClellan. Unfortunately, Colonel S.H. Long (then Chief of the Bureau) had no more Topographers to spare. Letters Sent, pp. 367, 488.

55It should be noted that an assault on the Confederate lines was attempted on April 16 by four companies of the 3rd Vermont. One adventurous Vermont Lieutenant had waded across the waist-deep ~arwickand reported that he thought the enemy's works could be taken. General Smith launched an attack with the Vermont regiment which succeeded in taking the enemy works. Again though, the assault was not supported by order of General McClellan and the regiment had to fa11 back. Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, pp. 55-56. find their way in the woods ."S6 With the roads in the state they were in, corduroying was essential (and upwards of 12 000 Union troops found themselves involved in this activity), not only to bring up food for man and beast, but also to support the nearly one hundred heavy siege pieces that McClellan had brought with him. And while the work on the Confederate side was less laborious, both "Yankee" and "Rebw sat in the same unending swaps and both suffered frorn an acute want of supplies. "We have had great difficulties to encounter," wrote General M.C. Meigs, Quartemaster-General of the Army of the Potomac, in his report of April 28, "but they have been overcome, and the wants of the arrny have been, and are, supplied promptly. The best evidence of this is that there have been no complaints."57 The Quartemaster-ûeneral and

Commissary of Subsistence departments of the Anny of the Potomac were not prepared for the environment into which McClellan had thrust thern. While there may not have been official complaints, Meigs was quite incorrect in his assertion that "difficulties were overcome." Rain or shine, the amy required over 500 tons of forage and subsistence daily - an amount they rarely received. As General Van Vliet explained: Vach man consumes three pounds of provisions each day, and every horse 26 pounds of forage. One hundred thousand men would therefore eat up 150 wagon loads of subsistence daily. The difficulties of supplying an amy of

56 Solemon F. Beals to Brother-in-Law, May 5, civil War Miscellaneous Collection, USAMHI.

570.R. XI: 3., p. 127. 100 000 men are not generally comprehended."5* These difficulties were certainly comprehended by the troops. The poor roads meant no food or water - forcing them to forage. General Keyes stated that as a result of the incessant rains, for "ten days, after reaching Warwick Court House, the ground was so soft and miry in places that the rations for the men at many points of the line had to be carried on the backs of men."59 James Graham wrote home complaining that, "to get our water we dig a hole wherever we want our water and put in a barre1 and then we get our well complete. 1 think just where our brigade is situated is the worst place about here."60 Luther Furst in the 39th Pe~sylvaniaInfantry Regiment wrote hm, "nearly everybody has left, leaving house and home with niggers, horses and furniture, granaries filled with corn... We now gather al1 our forage [green corn, cattle, tobacco and honey] as we advance."61 W.T.H. Brooks protested to his father that due to "impracticable" roads, there was

I4no getting up supplies. Under these circumstances there is but one way for people of determination - and that 1 think we are - we are building roads - corduroying back to our supplies."62 Charles Wainwright interestingly enough noted

~o.R.XI: S., p. 159.

59 ~asslerJr ., General George B. McCl el lan, Shield of the Union, p. 89.

aJames L. Graham to Grandfather, April 22, Civil War Miscellaneous ~ollection,USAMHI.

61 Luther C. Furst , May 5, Civil War Miscellaneous Collection, USAMHI-

62 W. T. H. Brooks to Father, April 9, Civil War Miscellaneous Collection, USAMHI. that the roads in this part of Virginia were "much like those we had on the Potomac," and that their corduroying gave the country "the appearance of one vast bee hive."63

Sitting in the swamps around Yorktown did little for the health of McClellanrs army. "The long delay here," wrote the Reverend J.J. Marks, "the exposure, fatigue, hunger, the fevers in the swamps, did more to dispirit the army and waste its strength than five battles."64 As the Army failed to move, the hospitals filled with Union soldiers. George McClellan had manipulated the physical intelligence available to him in order to get the Army of the Potomac to the Virginia Peninsula. Now he had brought it to a halt because he believed this same intelligence had failed him. In reality, General McClellan had 'called-the-tune', and naw the Army of the Potomac was forced to 'pay-the- piperf.

Bwainwright, A Diaq of Battle, p. 36.

64 Marks, The Peninsular Campaign in Virginia, p. 137. WILLIAMSBURG TO HARRISON' S LAND1 NG

Why had not al1 this country been fully explored? Why not al1 these roads long since felt by our cavalry? Surely somebody has been asleep! Rev. J.J. Marks

The Anny of the Potomac sat before Yorktownfs defences for the better part of a month before it was to resume its advance. This was not a period of inactivity, however, as the back-breaking labour of road building and the poor sanitary conditions of the Warwick River bottomlands sapped the army of much of its strength. Coupled with the corduroying of water-logged roads was the construction of new trails through the seemingly impenetrable forests of the Warwick's bottomlands. The Peninsular Campaign, though, was only beginning. McCieilan had covered barely one-fifth of the ground between Fort Monroe and Richmond from the commencement of the advance on April 4. It was now early May, and if the Amy of the Potomac thought it had faced the worst that the Virginia Peninsula had to offer, it was sadly mistaken. What faith McCleilan had had in his physical intelligence dissolved along with the roads beneath his army (that he was himself partly to blame for the position his army was in did not occur to McCleilan). He no longer "trustedm his maps of the Peninsula and would now proceed from Yorktown to Richmond much as would a blind-man in an unfamiliar room. As the Army of the Potomac cautiously felt its way to the Confederate capital, the neglect of physical intelligence collection bore a bitter fruit. Inadequate physical intelligence and irresponsible use of that which was available had played a crucial role in convincing McClellan that the siege of Yorktown was a necessity (thereby grinding the Peninsula Campaign to a halt). While operating in Henrico County, poor physical intelligence would very nearly result in the destruction of the Army of the Potomac. This destruction was nearly achieved due to a lack of understanding on McClellanfs part of both the nature of the Chickahominy River bottomlands (which included the formidable White Oak Swamp), and the road networks between that river and the James. McClellanfs grand assault on the Warwick line was to have begun at first light on May 5. It was the Confederates, however, that opened their artillery first - just after nightfall on May 3. By daylight the next morning al1 was silent across the Warwick inducing General Beintzeirnan to ascend in Professor Thaddeus Lowe's balloon Intrepid to see what the Rebels were up to.1 Heintzelman found to his surprise that Confederate army had departed. And so, General McClellan took Yorktown and opened the York River. The Confederate retreat took McClellan completely by surprise and he had to quickly improvise a response. He thus sent al1 his available cavalry out past Yorktown under George Stoneman in order to find the Rebels. Stonemanfscavalry encountered Johnston's rear-guard at Williamsburg, Virginia's old

1 Sears , To the Gates of Richmond, pp. 61-62. colonial capital.2 The battle that ensued at Williamsburg serves as an example of the extent to which the Army of the Potomac was legitimately hampered (or "deceived" as McClellan would argue) by poor physical intelligence. On Cramrs map (fig.10- C), Williamsburg presented a formidable obstacle as two creeks (Achershape and Queenrs) closed on the main Williamsburg to Yorktown road. Manoeuvrability would be further hampered by the fact that this was the narravest portion of the Peninsula - there were barely seven miles between the York and James Rivers here. As early as March 19, Woodbury had observed that Williamsburg was the second "natural linen behind which the Confederates rnight stand.3

Cram's map, however, did not give the position the credit it deserved. In reality, Cramrs positioning of the water obstacles was poor. Achershape Creek was in fact College

Creek and Queen's Creek (as positioned by Cram) was actually Cub Creek. Furthemore, College Creek and Cub Creek overlapped one another in front of a formidable Confederate earthwork called Fort Magruder (fig.14). Fort Magruder was positioned sorne three hundred yards north of the intersection

2~eenlyaware of the dangers of a Union flanking movement up the York River, Johnston wanted to get as far up the Peninsula as was possible. His retreat soon bogged down in the soft roads and Stoneman was able to make contact quickly the next morning, forcing the Confederates to rnake a stand.

~O.R., XI: 3, p. 23. of the Yorktown road and the Newport News road.4 Not only did Cram not account for the Fort (or any of the many other Confederate emplacements on this line), he marked the junction of the Yorktown and Newport News roads as one and three quarter miles below the junction of the "Country road" (this name is used in M.D. McAlesterrs May 6 Reconnaissance, but is not given a name on Cramfs map) and main Williamsburg road. This gave the impression that two separate columns moving up the Yorktown and Newport News roads respectively, would have the opportunity to join on the main Williamsburg road well before Fort Magruder. In fact, the intersection was directly under the guns of the Fort. Cram also represented the area around Willimsburg as open farmland when in fact it was a marshy bottomland, thickly wooded and impenetrable for al1 but light infantry. The heavy undergrowth, combined with the al1 important Yorktown road and Newport News road intersecting within range of Fort Magruderfs cannon, made cooperation on the battlefield nearly impossible for Union cornmanders. Now that the York River was open to McClellan, he was keen on making use of this unobstructed artery. As the battle of Williamsburg raged to the west, McClellan passed his the organizing an amphibious landing at West Point, the terminus of the Richmond and York River Railroad. The assault would be under General William Franklin, one of the

4 Strangely enough , Fort Magruder was mentioned in Woodburyfs March 19 Report to McClellan. "On the right side of the road, 1 mile below Williamsburg, there is Fort Magruder, a square redoubt...." Ibid., p. 23. most competent officers in the Union Army.5 Why McCleiian decided Franklin could not organize the West Point landing on his own is unknown. Whatever the case, the decision resulted in McClellan not being on the field during the Williamsburg action - instead the battle was directed by the very incapable General Edwin Sumner.6 Sumner's mismanagement of the battle was exacerbated by a lack of Union physical intelligence. Thanks to a road which did not appear on the Crarn map, the Federals did not realise that the Confederate position could have easily been flanked on the right. Instead of moving around Fort Magruder's works, General Hooker (the first Union General on the scene) pushed his infant- straight into the heavy woods before the Confederate defences. Order amongst the tangled undergrowth soon dissolved, and Hookerfs command was quickly outnumbered and in a desperate situation. Hooker called on Sumner for reinforcements, but none were to be had. Although Sumner and Keyes were less than a mile from Hooker, the nature of the ground did not permit them to send troops. As the Reverend J.J. Marks explained, "If one endeavoured to escape £rom these roads and turned into the woods, the undergrowth was so thick that it was impossible to proceed

5 Sears, T& the Gates of Richmond, p. 84.

GIbid., p. 71. Sears points to the words of Francis W. Palfrey, one of the earliest campaign historians, to support his own view that McClellanfs belated appearance on the Williamsburg battlefield exemplified a character flaw in the Young Napoleon. 4JCuriouslyenough," Palfrey wrote, "there was almost always something for McCleilan to do more important tha.n to fight his own battles." p. 81. more than a few Eeet."7 Hooker was told that he would have to wait for reserves then advancing £rom Yorktown. This news provided him little cornfort, hauever, as the roads between Williamsburg and Yorktown were in very poor condition even though it had been dry for days. One of those reserves was Jonathan P. Stowe, who noted in his diary that his regiment took nine hours to rnove three quarters of a mile through the mud that day!8 The lai country of the Peninsula simply did not dry up. After the battle, Charles Wainwright again wrote of the condition of the ground upon which the Army of the Potomac had to fight. "Here 1 saw the most wonderful exemplification of the nature of the ground," explained Wainwright as he came across a disabled artillery cassion

(stuck in the mud) with both horses still attached, only one of which was alive. "The weight [of the dead horse] bearing on the pole had caused the live horse to sink in the ground feet-first until it reached halfway up his chest, and suf f ocated him. "9

Eookerrs command was rescued thanks to the efforts of General Phi1 Kearny who hurried regiments coming up the

TMarks, The Peninsular Campaign in Virginia, p. 152.

B~onathanP. Stowe Diary, May 5, 1862, Civil War Times Illustrated Collection, USAMHI; The Prince De Joinville remarked that "The roads... were narrow and full of frightful morasses from which it was difficult to extricate the cannon, although the weather had been fine and dry for several days. At any other the we should have paused to admire the scenery." Joinville, The -y of the Potomac: Its Organization, Its Commander, and 1ts Campaign, p. 49.

9 ~ainwright,A Diary of Battle, p, 58. Newport News road to Hookerfs support.lo Hooker and Kearny fought in the woods into the evening of May 5. W.T.H. Brooks recalled that thoughts of a night assault were quickly forgotten: [I]t took very few moments to show how utterly ridiculous was the idea - the troops could not march a hundred yards in such woods without getting in great confusion in daytime to march at night was simply impossible. 11 Confusion reigned at Sumner's headquarters as well; while Hooker's division lost over 1 500 men (70 percent of the Union casualties) during the dayrs action against some 13 750 Confederate defenders, 25 000 Union troops stood idle under Sumner.12 While Sumner was blind to the battle on his left, he was distracted by information on the nature of the ground to his right. Local slaves informed Union officers that the Rebels had not occupied certain works on Cub Creek (an obstacle Sumner was not aware of). In order to find out for certain, Captain Stewart of the Topographical Engineers, was sent to reconnoitre the position. He found that indeed, the Confederate works on the right of the Union lines were not occupied, and that there was a road which could be followed

1O~cClellangave no credit to Kearny in a letter to General Burnside on May 21. Instead, he inflated his own role in the battle: "In five minutes after 1 reached the ground [~illiamsburg]a possible defeat was changed into certain victoq." McClellm, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1865, p. 269.

11 W .T. H. Brooks to Father, May 7 Civil War Miscellaneous Collection, USAMHI .

12 Sears To the Gates of Richmond, p. 83 . that would flank Fort Magruder.13 The same lack of knowledge concerning road networks retarded Federal efforts on the left flank as well. While the Allen's Wharf road was listed on the Cram map, it was incorrectly represented as meeting the ''Country road". In fact, the Allen's Wharf road joined the main Williamsburg road halfway between Williamsburg and Fort Magruder - leaving the left flank comparatively open. As McClellan explained in his report, General Emory (who had been assigned to guard the road to Allen's fann) only discovered the true position of the road too late in the day to exploit this weakness.

Although a flanking manoeuvre was attempted by Emory, "want of knowledge of the ground, and the lateness of the hour" forced a cancellation of the attack.14 The lack of accurate physical intelligence had denied the Union a chance to outflank Johnstonrs stand at Williamsburg, but McClellan still held out hopes that he could trap the Confederates with the West Point landing. Again, McClellanrs columns (in this case Franklin) would be operating in the dark. The Richmond and York River Railroad at West Point had always been an important element in McClellanfs Campaign planning. Now that the roads had proven

13Ibid., p. 73; Webb, The Peninsula, McClellan's Campaign of 1862, p. 77; O.R. XI: 1, p. 124. This route was soon followed by a brigade under Winfield Scott Hancock. Hancock took Confederate redoubts by crossing Cub Creek and moved on Fort Magruder £rom the rear. Unfortunately, he was not supported by Sumner who, not understanding Aancock's position, recalled him. Thus Sumner threw away the best opportunity of the day to deliver a significant blow to the Rebels . 14~cClellan,Report, p. 182. to be as poor as the Tertiary Formation study predicted, the railroad became even more essential. In order to secure the rail-link and to attempt to cut off Johnstonfs retreating army, Franklin embarked £rom Yorktown on May 6. Although Franklin's amphibious assault was originally intended for West Point specifically, landing facilities there were found to be wanting upon arrival. General Franklin was then forced to make his landing across from West Point on the south bank of the York River at Eltham's Landing on May 7-15 Unfortunately, Union maps of the area did not denote al1 the roads, and many of those that were listed were based on guesswork. "The road £rom Brick House Point to the main road," reported Franklin, "is not laid down on the photographic or C.S. maps." Furthermore, unlike Cram's map (fig.6), the country was heavily wooded and Union scouts and topographers quickly became lost as they searched the undergrowth for roads leading south.16 As a result, Franklin's expediticn remained at Eltham's Landing, and instead of pushing across Johnston's path, patiently waited for the rest of the Army of the Potomac to arrive. One of the factors that hindered Franklin's exploration of the country around Eltham was a lack of cavalry. Franklin reported on May 7 that he had "ordered an examination to determine more accurately [the nature of the ground], but it

150.R. XI: 1, p. 139.

16 McClellan, McClellan's Own Story, p. 303. It should be noted that the only sections of Cram's map of southeast Virginia in which woods are present are in the region surrounding Fort Monroe, and on the James River south of Richmond. This naturally gave the impression that those areas not represented as wooded were this way on purpose. is a slow business on account of want of cavalry."l-i As Union confidence in their physical intelligence faded, other methods of intelligence gathering gained increasing importance. Among these were the cavalry and aeronautic contingents of the Anny of the Potomac. "It was intended," wrote General McClellan in his Report on the Organization and Campaigns of the Army of the Potomac, "to assign at best one regiment of cavalry to each division of the active army on the Peninsula." This was not achieved, claimed McClellan, due to "circumstances beyond my control." As a result, "the cavalry force, serving in the field, was never as large as it should have been. "18 This want of cavalry was especially felt as the army proceeded west from the Williamsburg battlefield. Stephen Z. Starr questioned McClellants claim of "circumstances beyond [his] control" as the reason behind the poor use of cavalry on the Peninsula. Starr argues that when McClellan created the Army of the Potomac, he "showed evidence of a blind spot that was to prove costly." This blind spot was cavalry. By attempting to place a regiment of cavalry with each division of infantry, McClellan scattered his available cavalry throughout the army under a variety of different commanders. Had the cavalry been formed under a single command, Starr believes the Union ability to find its way through the terra incognita of the Peninsula would have improved dramatically.

18~c~lellan,Report, p. 54. McClellan does not explain what these "circumstances" were. Seeing that it was his plan from its inception, this claim would appear to have only been made in hindsight, and motivated by McClellanfs bitterness toward the Lincoln Administration, Even in the absence of other military uses for it, a strong, well organized and well led cavalry would have been of great benefit to McClellan, merely to explore and rnap the twisted, meandering country roads and obscure plantation paths over which he had to move his troops, and to locate the many natural obstacles - dense woods, streams, and swamps - that made movement on the Peninsula a military nightmare.19

It would seem that while McClellan indeed had enough cavalry,

its poor organization made it practically useless to hirn. Aeronautics also became more important to the Army of the Potomac as maps proved more and more unreliable. With the beginning of military operations in 1861, several leading balloonists had approached Washington with the intention of offering their services to the amy. Off icials in the capital were interested enough to provide Thaddeus S.C. Lowe

with a contract for his services. Lowe accompanied the Army of the Potomac to the Peninsula but achieved little success

there. The Peninsula was simply far too heavily wooded for Lowe to see much of anything. Moreover, the rains which so often dissolved the roads, grounded his balloons. The only important information derived from this source of intelligence would appear to have been Heintzelrnan's ascent

19 Stephen 2. Starr, The Union Cavalry in the Civil War, From Fort Sumter to Gettysburg, 1861-1863 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1979), pp. 234, 262. over Yorktown on May 4.20 Other times, Lowe's observations simply served to dishearten the troops. W.T.R. Brooks, for example, wrote to his father while stationed on the Chickahominy that, "[olur balloon men see carriages and people in Richmond - so that in a straight line, we are but a short distance off. 1% may be like the Jordan tho, a 'hard road to hauL'"21 "Our progress has been slow," McClellan cornplained on May 21, "but that is due to ignorance of the country (we have to feel our way everywhere; the maps are worthless), [and] the narrowness, small number, and condition of the roads. "22 Using TI% Cram's maps of the Peninsula to move from Williamsburg to New Kent Court House proved adequate where the main roads were concerned. But as should have been obvious from the start, these were very few in number, and with poor use of Union cavalry, the many other smaller roads were not explored. As a result, almost 100 000 men and their impedimenta travelled over a single road. General Johnston,

20 Sears argues that Lowe in fact falsified reports in order to make his exploits seem more important. For example, Lowe claimed that his observations "shaped the battle" of Seven Pines when in fact high winds had grounded his balloons during the action. Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, p. 412; The Army of the Potomac's Topographical Engineers had experimented with balloons in 1861 by hiring aeronaut John Wise. An accident that resulted in the balloon having to be shot down before it fell into Confederate hands soured the Topographical view of ballooning. OfToole, The Encyclopaedia of American Intelligence and Espionage From the Revolutionary War to the Present, pp. 385-386.

21 W .T .H . Brooks to Father , May 24, Civil War Miscellaneous Collection, USAMHI.

22 McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1865, p. 269. on the other hand, was able to retreat with relative ease by dividing his army at Barhamsville (fig.2).23 McClellanfs immediate target was White House, where the Richmond and York River Railroad crossed the Pamunkey River. The process of moving his army over a single road to New Kent Court House proved torturous. William H. Walling of the 16th New York wrote home of the "inward satisfaction" he felt now that the army was getting closer to the Rebel capital24 Vnfortunately, inward satisfaction was the only satisfaction the Army of the Potomac would enjoy. "We have had long and weary marches over roads made almost impassable by previous rains," recorded Frederick Fauler during the rnarch.25 mile passing through Barhamsville on May 13, Charles Wainwright noted that this part of the Peninsula had the same soi1 consistency as the area around Yorktown. He also estimated that "not more than a quarter of the land is cleared."26 Cram's map representing cleared farmland little resembled the

- - 23 Sears , To the Gates of Richmond, p. 89. Whether McClellan would have been able to divide his army any earlier than New Kent Court House even if he had known about the other roads of the area is questionable. The condition of the roads should have made contact with the York River a primary concern for the supply of the columns. Surprisingly though, Franklin's amphibious force was the only Union Corps to by supplied via the York River during this time. Why McClellan did not make use of the various local tobacco landings on the York River along the course of the army's march is unknown for some were represented on his map (fig.6).

24 William Henry Walling to Sister, May 12, Civil War Miscellaneous Collection, USAMHI*

25Frederick K. Fauler to Friend, May 12, Civil War Miscellaneous Collection, USAMHI

26 Charles S. Wainwright, A Diary of Battle, p. 61 . dense forests that surrounded McClellanfs army. When he finally reached White House on May 17, Wainwright stated that : 1 was rather surprised to find the roads generally very bad; that from Cumberland Landing to the White House along which Porter's command were trying to march, was almost impassable, quite so for artillery..,- The country does not seem to dry up at all, owning 1 suppose to the subsoil of marl being full of water, and the immense amount of wood. 1 said that not over a quarter of the land is cleared. I doubt now if there is much more than one acre in ten. 27 Gradually the army crawled from point to point along the Pamunkey River. Gunboats took the lead exploring the south bank, and these were followed by Topographical Engineers with cavalry escorts. The topographers reconnoitred the country, sketching by the eye and cornpass provisional maps, which were then photographed at headquarters for the use of the generals. The following day, with the help of these maps, the army would set out. As the Prince De Joinville explained, the "fighting force" marched by brigades with their baggage in tow. Long lines of wagons, each drawn by four horses or six mules, "made the army stretch upon the narrow forest path over an immense space of country." And hence followed formidable delays as longer marches were impossible without leaving the columns scattered and lost in the woods by night. "Six miles," lamented Joinville, "was the extreme limit of our dayfs march."28 "It is truly said that large bodies move slowly," wrote James Graham of the

28 Joinville, The Azmy of the Potomac: Its Organization, Its Commander, and Its Campaign, pp. 60-61. 62nd Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry on May 20 at Tunstill's Station. "Sorte people think we might be able to march 20 or 25 miles a day instead of what we do," Graham complained to his Aunt. JJIfthe whole country was one grave1 road, it might be accomplished but without something of this kind it is impossible. "29 By May 18, McClellanrs Headquarters were at White House Landing on the Pamunkey. White House was where McCleilan had originally planned to be on the second day of operations from Urbana. Conditions were somewhat different now. It had taken a month and a half of campaigning to reach this point £rom Fort Monroe. Moreover, instead of beating Johnston's amy to Richmond, the Anny of Northern Virginia now stood squarely in his path. On the other hand, McClellan was now campaigning in the season he had originally intended. Even though it was now summer, his environmental tribulations continued. Hanover and Henrico counties did not dry up, suggesting that even if he had been able to use Urbanna as a base, his notion of a three day march (as outlined in his February 3 paper), was ill-conceived. In addition, General McClellanfs knowledge of the road networks of the area before

29 James L. Graham to Aunt, May 20, Civil War Miscellaneous Collection, USAMHI. Richmond was as poor as that at Williamsburg. 30 Again, his maps (figs.11-A, ll-B) only represented the major thoroughiares giving no hint of the multitude of other trails, paths and smaller roads that crisscrossed Hanover and Henrico counties. Perhaps the best indication of the extent of xoads that were available to McCïellan (had he known about them) can be gathered by comparing his own Henrico county maps to the post-campaign report map cornpiled by Confederate topographer A.H. Campbell (fig.15). At New Kent Court House, the Federal army divided with the right wing (Porter and Franklin) going north to Cumberland and then White House and finally reaching Cold Harbour on May 22. The left wing (Heintzelman and Keyes) kept to the Richmond road (also know as the Williamsburg or Seven-mile road) and reached Bottom's Bridge on the Chickahominy on May 20.31

George McClellan had written on February 3 that it would take his anny a mere two days to rnove frorn White House to Richmond. In this prediction McClellan proved that he had little idea what the landscape before Richmond would be like.

m1t has been argued that McCieilan in fact possessed a very good map of Henrico county, so the closer he got to the Confederate capital £rom Fort Monroe, the bettes his physical intelligence became. Christopher Nelson, Mapping the Civil War Featuring Rare Maps from the Library of Congress , p. 7 2. A quick cornparison between his Henrico county maps and Campbell's 1863 map raises serious questions concerning how Nelson can make this claim. Granted, the rivers of Henrico county are accurately depicted, as are vast wooded stretches, but McClellan's maps only listed Henrico's major roads. Furthemore, the Union commander did not have access to maps of either Hanover or Charles City counties. As a result, McClellan's movements through these counties were very time consuming . 310.R. XI: 1, p. 110. Joseph E. Johnston made no such error. Johnston had withdrawn the Airmy of Northern Virginia to within three miles of the Confederate capital. While this did not allow him much freedom of action (he would no longer be able to retreat without giving up Richmond), he felt very secure knowing that the Chickahominy River was in his front and no longer in his rear. As Stephen Sears explains, "the Chickahominy was not the sort of river that any general would relish having anywhere near hia .If 32 "The Chickahominy at the season we struck it," reported General Barnard, "was one of the most formidable obstacles that could be opposed to the advance of the amy ....'r33 The Chickahominy travelled in a east-by-southeast direction beginning north of Richmond and travelling in front of the city and out to the James. In the process, its borders provided definition for Hanover, Henrico and Charles City counties. It was less a river than a collection of slow winding streams which traversed a mile wide marshy bottom land. "Through this belt of swamp," explained Barnard, "the Stream flows, sometimes in as single channel, more frequently divided into se~eral....~~34McClellanfs Henrico county map used refreshing candour in referring to the Chickahominy as a "Swampw rather than as a "RiverM. If this feature did not provide enough of a barrier, when it rained, the various streams of the Chickahominy would quickly overflow their

32 Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, p. 95.

34 Ibid., p. 111. banks and the entire mile wide bottomland would fil1 with water turning the swap into a lake - destroying al1 but the largest bridges. It was this particular characteristic that made Johnston so keen to position his forces behind the Chickahominy. Strangely enough, General McClellan did not expect the Chickahominy to be the obstacle it proved to be. This may have been due in part to his Tertiary Formation study which unfortunately listed the Chickahominy River itself as an insignificant obstacle that was at most fifty feet wide. However, the same study reported that the soi1 and roads bordering both the Chickahominy and James Rivers could be expected to be "heavy". Furthemore, while the width of the Chickahominy River was slight, the generally hilly surface of Henrico and Hanover counties "teminated in [an] abrupt precipice" into the wide, "heavily wooded" bottomlands of the river.35 In addition, McClellanrs Henrico county map clearly represented a wide (generally three quarters of a mile), marshy bottomland along the length of the Chickahominy. It seems clear that McClellanrs original estimate of two days to cross the swamp relied on hio amy finding al1 of the

Chickahominy bridges standing. As it was, General Johnston had seen to it that al1 the bridges - with the important exception of the Richmond and York River Railroad bridge - were destroyed by his retreating columns. Also, for the Urbanna movement to have been successful, Confederate opposition could not have been encountered on the Chickahominy. The bottomlands were found to be intersected

35 Virginia topographical study, pp. 7453, 7450. by deep ditches, which even when not overflowed were spongy, and impractical for cavalry or artillery. General Barnard would later explain that these "boggy bottomlands" for a half-mile on either side of the Stream, "could only be made passable to cavalry or artillery by corduroying - work which could not be done... in one [or] two days, nor done at al1 on the enemyrs side under his unsubdued fire ...."36 Even Barnard's estimate of two days time to corduroy the approaches to the swamp did not take into account the time needed to survey the positions. A typical reconnaissance and survey of the Chickahominy was that undertaken by Topographical Engineer Lieutenant M.D. McAlester on May 21 at Bottomfs Bridge (fig.16). At a scale of 400 yards to one inch (and with north at the bottom) the map provided a detailed representation of the area. It should be noted, however, that due to a lack of available cavalry, McAlester was forced to guess at the approximate position of a number of local roads (indicated by dotted lines on the rnap). To get some idea of the road network in the area, the Lieutenant had interviewed one of Mr Bradley's slaves.37 When one compares the number of roads (or their likely position) in the irnmediate area surrounding Bottomfs Bridge on McAlester's map to those on McClellanrs Henrico

360.R. XI: 1, p. 113.

37 Barnard and Barry, Report of the Engineer and Artillery Operations of the Army of the Potomac From Its Organization to the Close of the Peninsular Campaign, p. 211. One of the drawbacks encountered by Union topographers when interviewing Peninsular locals was that few had ever been more than a few miles from home. This limited the amount of information they could obtain even from willing informers. county map, one gets a better idea of how few roads the Army of the Potomac was aware of. Personal bravado appears to have been another reason McClellan did not give the Chickahominy line much acknowledgment. While publicly he gave much credit to environment as a determining factor in the campaign to come (it will be remembered that McClellan took great pains to point out that his proposed plan of attack was better than the Administration's due to better roads and a "country.-. much more favourable for offensive operations"), privately he did not consider it to be important. He had assured his friend Samuel Barlow that when he was ready to move he would do so "without regard to season or weather" for after all, to the Young Napoleon these were trifling matters.38 Johnston did not contest the line of the Chickahominy in its entirety. Instead, the Army of Northern Virginia, now formed around Richmond, only fronted the swamp from New Bridge to the Richmond, Fredericksburg and Potomac Railroad. This allowed McClellan's forces at Bottom's Bridge to eventually cross the swamp and begin moving West through Henrico county. "1 find him [the Army of Northern Virginia] everywhere in force," McClellan wrote Lincoln, "and every reconnaissance costs many valuable lives. Yet 1 am obliged to feel my way foot by foot at whatever cost, so great are the difficulties of the country."39 By feeling its way through the countryside, the Army of the Potomac reached

38 McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1 865, p. 12 8. 39McClellan, Report, p. 233. Mechanicsville on the right, and Seven Pines on the left on May 24 (the advance to Seven Pines, which was seven miles from Bottomrs Bridge, took four days). "Al1 the information obtained from deserters, negroes and spies indicated that the enerny occupied in force al1 the approacheç to Richmond from the east," wrote McClellan, "That their army was superior to ours in numbers did not admit of a doubt .r'40 McC1ellanrs caution was not only due to his belief that he was operating before a superior host. As the army advanced, new roads appeared where there were none on his maps, and those roads were as "heavy" as ever. One Union soldier complained that the road to Ranover Court House "was eighteen miles in length, and about one foot in depth."41 "The ground was so soft," recorded Quartemaster William LeDuc, "that loaded wagons would cut through the top soil, and have to be unloaded and dug or pried 0ut.~~42 Supplying the army was becoming increasingly difficult, as the single railroad to White House could not meet the needs of an army of over 100 000. Furthemore, that army was now spread from

White Oak Swamp (Hooker) to Mechanicsville (Porter). As such, wagon trains wound their way throughout the countryside behind Union lines both day and night. "Late in the afternoon I started [May 221, with al1 available teams, to bring up supplies £rom White House depot," wrote LeDuc. ''The

41 Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, p. 114,

42William G. LeDuc, Recollections of a Civil Var Quartemaster (St. Paul: The North Central Publishing Company, 1963), p. 71. night was dark, the road unknown to me, and so muddy that, on level ground, the horses were splashing through a bed of thin mortar, and the wagons would sometimes drop to the axle in mud holes." LeDuc summed up Union frustrations: Our march of seven miles occupied al1 day, and into the night - leaving some wagons fast in the mud within half a mile of camp. The newspaper generals in the great cities, with their granite pavements, are shouting themselves hoarse with the cry: 'On to Richmond! ' 43

Another Union soldier simply noted that the mud washed into his regimentrs watering hole by the sains produced some interesting results. "Our coffee looks very good - the clay giving it colour like cream - but it tastes rather rough.''44 Engineer officers were responsible for guiding these supply colurnns but they were in very short supply. Not only were engineers needed in the construction of corduroy roads, McCiellan had begun rebuilding the bridges over the Chickahominy in order to connect his army. For these projects, al1 engineer officers including topographers, were required. This left Humphreys without enough men to survey either Hanover or Henrico counties. Telegrams soon reached the Topographical Bureau in Washington from both McClellan and Humphreys pleading for more topographers but none were to

43 ~bid.,pp. 69, 76.

44 Solemon F. Beals to Brother, June 19, Civil War Miscellaneous Collection, USAMHI. be had.45 And as such, the Army of the Potomac now sat in front of Richmond. Not only did its commanders not know the bottornless road networks over which they were expected to operate, the army was divided by a swarnp which during wet weather flooded.

On May 31, the Army of the Potomac got a taste of the Chickahominy at its worst. "Bridges over the Chickahominy river were washed away other evening," Joseph Elliott recorded in his diary, "cutting off communication with our troops except by the rail-roadOM46 With amazing rapidity, Virginia rains had turned the Chickahominy into a lake and disabled the bridges Union engineers had just finished working on. As ~lliotnoted, the only tie remaining between Porter's Corps and the armyrs supplies at White House, and the rest of the army was the Richmond and York River Railroad. This was the opportunity Johnston had been waiting for and he was elated as the skies opened up on May 30- He had expected the Chickahominy to rise in flood, now he could at last fa11 on a section of the Union amy.47 And as the

Chickahorniny had effectively split the Army of the Potomac, it just as effectively demoralised its commander. "It is

45Letters Sent, pp. 380, 367. The Topographical Engineers it was explained to both McClellan and Humphreys were al1 employed with the various Union amies in the field. A detailed description of their respective postings was sent to the Peninsula with the attachent: "This exhibit shows that not an available officer remains to meet your requisition."

46Joseph P. Elliott, Diary, June 2, Civil War Miscellaneous Collection, USAMHI-

47Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, p. 120. again raining hard and for several hours!" McClellan wrote his wife, "1 feel almost discouraged ... it is certain that there has not been for years and years such a season - it does not corne by chance. 1 am quite checked by it...."48 Johnston's army attacked the Federals at Fair Oaks Station on the Richmond and York River Railroad. They fell first on Silas Caseyrs Division and quickly pushed the confused Ünion troops back. The fighting was disorganised on both sides, however, due mainly to the dense forests in which the amies fought (fig.17). Although the battle was inconclusive, it had dramatically illustrated the precarious position in which the Army of the Potomac found itself.49 McCiellanrs fears did not subsided quickly either as ties between the two halves of his army remained tenuous. The Chickahominy continued to flood well into June. As W.T.H. Brooks explained to his father on June 22: "We are about to

48 McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1 865, p. 294.

490n May 17, Washington finally dispatched McDowellrs First Corps to the Peninsula. They ordered McDowell to proceed overland however, and not dom the Chesapeake )as McClellan wanted). In the months and years to corne, McClellan would argue that McDowellrs dispatch overland force hirn to straddle the Chickahominy. George McClellan, McClellan's ûwn Story (New York: Charles L. Webster and Company, 1887), p. 343; Because he had to be far enough north to extend "a welcoming hand to McDowellM, it was necessary to remain tied to the York and Pamunkey Rivers and therefore he had no choice but to position his army across the Chickahominy. Sears argues that McClellanrs interpretation was "entirely an afterthought." In fact, claims Sears, his decision to base his campaign at White House Landing and to march on Richmond following the railroad "was entirely his own doing." "It was only hindsight that furnished him with second thoughts and a scapegoat on which to lay the blarne." Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, pp. 104- 105. have another similar 'rise [in the Chickahominy] - although the water has not yet subsided to within its original boundary. [Only] South America can produce as much rain!rr50 While waiting for the roads to harden and the Chickahominy to subside, McClellan spent his the readying his army for a siege of Richmond. Instead of exploring the countryside, his topographers were busy sighting artillery emplacements and assisting other engineers in the rebuilding of bridges and corduroying of roads.51 Engaged in these activities, the Army of the Potomac passed the greater part of June. McClellan was finally ready to strike on June 25. The battle begun on June 25 became a series of battles known as the 'Seven Daysr beginning in the woods of Fair Oaks and ending on the slopes of Malvern Hill on July 1. The Seven Days has deservedly received a great deal of attention by Civil War historians. Not only was it the first time

Robert E. Lee led the Army of Northern Virginia, but it also saw the near destruction of McClellanrs army. Poor physical intelligence was an omnipresent force during the Seven Days on both sides. 52 Day one (June 25) began with McClellanrs planned attack toward Richmond. McClellan massed four Anny Corps (76 000 men) on the south side of the Chickahominy and began to advance into the woods near the ~ineMile Road. This attack,

50 W.T.H. Brooks to Father, June 22, Civil War Miscellaneous Collection, USAMHI.

51 0.R. XI: 1, pp. 114-116.

s2See Sears, To the Gates of ~ichmond,pp. 199, 227-228, 234-235, 314-315 for examples of inaccurate maps leading Confederate generals astray. due to the heavily wooded country, soon broke down as units in Hookerfs command became disoriented. The result was reminiscent of Johnstonfs attack on Fair Oaks a month before as little was decided. McClellan was becoming increasingly nemous, however, as rumours of Confederate reinforcements arriving in Richmond were reaching his ears. He quickly convinced himself that every available soldier in the Confederacy must have arrived in Richmond. "1 shall have to contend against vastly superior odds," he announced to Washington. The Rebels, he believed, would attack with 200 000 men including the comands of Jackson and

Beauregard. 53 On June 26, General Lee (he had replaced a wounded Johnston) took the initiative and attacked Porter's Corps north of the Chickahorniny. His plan involved a great deal of risk for not only did it cal1 for precise timing and coordination of wide-ranging columns, but Lee had also denuded the Richmond lines in order to launch his assault. While 76 000 Federals faced a mere 29 000 Rebels south of the Chickahominy, to the north Lee brought 56 000 troops against Porter's 28 000. While Confederate numbers were indeed greater at the point of attack that those of the defenders,

Lee's force was a far cry from the 200 000 McClellan believed he had. Lee's columns clashed with Porter on Beaver Dam Creek but the al1 important flanking movement Lee planned for Jackson failed. This battle completely unnerved McClellan.

53 McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1865, p. 308, 309. McClellan wired Stanton on June 24 to report that he had learned from a deserter that Jackson's command was on route and "was intended to attack my rear on the 28th." His knowledge of the Mechanicsville area was limited at best, and reports of a large force operating just to the northeast of Porter alanned him. "1 incline to think that Jackson will attack my right and rear," he wrote Stanton.54 Porter had not lost any ground during the battle, but McClellan was convinced that the game was up. Early the next morning he wired Heintzelman despairing that, "On the other side of the Chickahorniny the day is lost."ss

At sorne point on June 27, General McClellan decided that in order to Save his amy from what he thought was certain defeat in front of Richmond, he would have to retreat. During that day, while the majority of his army sat idle before 29 000 Rebel troops in the Richmond defences, McClellan had watched events unfold north of the Chickahominy. He had ordered Porter to fa11 back to cover the Chickahominy bridges and there, with his Sack to the swamp, Porter held Leers attackers at bay. Union casualties were almost half those of the Confederates, but again McClellan was convinced that he had suffered a defeat and that his forces south of the Chickahominy were in peril. That evening, McClellan decided on what line he would conduct his retreat (McClellan would cal1 it a "change of basew). "We have met a severe repulse today having been attacked by vastly superior numbers," he wrote to Louis Goldsborough that night, "and 1 am obliged to fa11 back between the

54Ibid., p. 309.

55 Ibid., p. 322. Chickahominy and the James River."56 "That night [June 271 it was understood," Barnard later reported, "that the army was to march to the James River." McClellan instructed General Woodbury to proceed to White Oak Swamp and construct bridges, and Barnard was ordered to send out engineers to "aid in the same and to explore the roads."s7 McClellan ordered his quartermasters to bring al1 the supplies they could south of the Chickahominy to start crossing White Oak Swamp. Those supplies which could not be saved were to be burned. Charles Perkins recorded in his diary that day that there were "al1 sorts of rumours in camp about burning stores at White House."s8 This news did little to improve morale. "In reference to White Oak Swamp it may be observed that the stream itself is quite insignificant," reported Barnard, "but that, like the Chickahominy, it is bounded by swamp on each side. ..."59 As represented on the Henrico County map,

White Oak Swamp was a formidable obstacle. Not only was it heavily wooded (especially to the north), there was only one road - the Charles City Road - which traversed it. How McClellan expected to shuttle his wagon trains through this bottleneck while holding off an amy believed to be larger then his own is unknown. The results were predictable: "The 28th and 29th of June were passed in sending forward the

570.R. XI: 1, p. 118,

58 Charles C. ~erkins,Diary, June 28, Civil War Times Illustrated Collection, USAMHI.

590.~. XI: 1, p. 119, train of 5000 wagons, the siege train, a herd of 2500 oxen, and other impedimenta," wrote Joinville, "[tlhe reader may judge what a piece of work this was, when he reflects that it was al1 to be done upon a single narrow road."Go While

McClellan took pride in this feat, in reality he had subjected the amy to undue risk through poor planning. "The halting of a single wagon for any purpose checked the entire movement," noted LeDuc, "[tlhere was no such thing as passing unless a new road was cut around the obstructionJ"'l It was soon discovered that not al1 Federal units were aware of how to reach the Charles City Road in the first place. While Woodbury was labouring on constructing bridges over the swamp, Barnard found "that there was as yet no established connection or fixed route by which the troops and trains near Savage Station were to reach [the White Oak crossings]." Barnard took it upon hirnself to reconnoitre the various roads running between Savage Station and White Oak Swamp, but in the meantime, Federal columns were left to their own devices -62 AS a result, progress was painfully slow. J.J. Marks noted that "there was entire uncertainty in regard to everything before us." Because the roads were generally unknown, they had to be "carefully felt" before the columns could advance. Scouts were sent in advance, and when these returned the order was given for the advance of a mile

Joinville, The Army of the Potomac: Its Organization, Its Commander, and Its Campaign, p. 92.

61 LeDuc, Recollections of a Civil War Quartemaster, p. 83.

62O.R. XI: 1, p. 119. or so. Then the process was repeated and, "in this way the army slowly moved on, until it disappeared ... [into] the wilderness."63 William LeDuc discovered to his dismay that this lack of road awareness reached the highest levels. Having been put in charge of Second Corps transportation by Sumner, LeDuc was ordered to McClellanfs Headquarters to get details of what roads to follow, The Adjutant General (Seth

Williams) explained that, "'Our destination is the James River - by what roads 1 know not...'" and sent LeDuc to see Chief Quartermaster (General Van Vliet). "To him 1 went," wrote LeDuc, "and he knew nothing of the roads, and directed me to see [Barnard], and he told me that he had no map of the country, and knew nothing of the roads." LeDuc reported back to Sumner and concluded that he wouid have to find a road on

As the Amy of the Potomac started crossing White Oak Swamp, Barnard's engineers began to realise that two bridges would not suffice. Unfortunately, construction of other crossings was out of the question. On account of the thick forest surrounding the swamp, a new bridge would require a new road to be cut. But the engineers needed to carry out this work were not available because they were either out scouting roads south of White Oak Swap or serving as guides for Union columns attempting to make their escape.65 Perhaps the most amazing feature of this disorganised

- - 63Marks, ~hëPeninsular Campaign in Virginia, p. 271.

64 LeDuc, Recollections of a Civil War Quartemaster, p. 82.

650.~. XI: 1, p. 119. retreat was that the locality had already been subject to Union reconnaissance! On May 20, General Naglee had made a reconnaissance from Bottornfs Bridge "to within two miles of the James River on the Quaker Road,"66 Furthemore, on June 15, McClellan had ordered a limited reconnaissance by General

Casey to New Market near the James River-67 Hm was it that the Army of the Potomac operated with such ignorance of the southeast corner of Henrico County? Joinville believed that poor organization did nothing to remedy poor physical intelligence. "The want of a General Staff was not less severely felt in obtaining and transmitting the information necessary at the moment of an impending action," explained Joinville. No one knew the country; the maps were so defective that they were useless.... [Yet] everyone kept his observations to himself, not from illwill, but because it was nobodyfs special duty to do this general work, It was a defect in the organization. 66 Confusion continued to reign within Union lines as Lee resumed his attack on June 29. During the battle at Savagers Station that day, poor maps led General Heintzelrnan astray, Sumner later expressed his amazement that when the enemy presented himself on the Williamsburg road, Heintzelmanfs

66 Henry M. Naglee, Report of Brigadier General Henry M. Naglee, Commanding First Brigade, Casey's Division, Army of the Potomac, of the Part Taken by his Brigade in The Battle of Seven Pines. May 31, 1862 (Philadelphia: Collins, Printer, 1862), p. 3,

67 Hassler, Jr., General George B. McClellan, Shield of the Union, p. 135.

68 Joinville, The Anny of the Potomac: Its Organization, Its Commander, and Its Campaign, p. 53 Corps did not attack it. Sumner afterwards discovered that Heintzelman had in fact retired £rom the field prior to the battle. "This defection," reported Sumner, "might have been

attended with the most disastrous consequences.... "69 The reasoning behind Heintzelman's actions was discovered to be a faulty map. Heintzelman had been ordered in the evening of June 28 to withdraw his Corps from the advanced position taken on June 25. Heintzelman's withdrawal was intended to coincide with the withdrawals of both Franklin and Sumner. The three Corps were expected to retreat in line and cover the White Oak Swap crossing. As it turned out, the map furnished to Heintzelman incorrectly showed Sumner's position. Heintzelman explained: "From some misapprehension General Sumner held a more advanced position than was indicated on the map.. . thus leaving a space of about three fourths of a mile between [Sumner] and [Franklin]."70 Lee's army was able to split Sumner and Franklin at Savage's Station, forcing their Corps to quickly fa11 back on the already crowded crossings of White Oak Swamp. In the panicked crossing that evening, J.J. Marks noted that, "in a region of almost impervious swarnps and forests it was easy to entrap an army ...." "We had not the slightest knowledge, from previous reconnaissances, of this forbidding region,"

Marks complained. ''[Tlhe question was often asked: 'Why had not al1 this country been fully explored? Why not al1 these roads long since felt by Our cavalry? Surely somebody has

69McClellan, Report, p. 260. been asleep! '"71 While Savage's Station forced the Union rear-guard into the uncornfortcible position of having to cross the swamp at night, the next dayrs battle at Glendale (Day 6 of the Seven Days) almost resulted in Union disaster. Glendale was a srna11 community that sat at the crossroads of the Long Bridge, Charles City and Quaker roads. It was so small in fact that it was not even marked on McClellanrs Henrico County map (fig.11-A). Despite its size, McClellan considered Glendale vitally important. According to his rnap, the only way that the Anny of the Potomac could reach safe haven on the James River was to proceed south on the Quaker road to Turkey Bridge (just south of Malvern Hill and within range of Union gunboats). As such, the intersection of the Long Bridge, Charles City and Quaker roads at Glendale had to be defended at al1 costs for over it would pass McClel1anfs supply trains. Little did the Union commander realise that another road had been found, Late the previous day (June 29), General Keyes, while interrogating a local farmer "under fine of death," had learned of an old grass-covered wood road east of, and running parallel to, the Quaker road. Once his scouts located its exact position, he promptly sent the trains of his Fourth Corps via this route to the James. The rest of the army, unaware of this road, went through Glendale (although later some of General Smith's men discovered the road for themselves). Glendale was a very poor position to have to defend - so poor in fact that during the subsequent

71 Marks, The Peninsular Campaign in virginia, p. 271. battle, Lee outnumbered McClellan on the field 71 000 to 61 500.72 Because McClelian was not aware of other roads running parallel to the Quaker Road, he felt compelled to move al1 his forces through Glendale.73 Poor Union physical

intelligence helped give the Amy of Northern Virginia an excellent chance to destroy McClellan. Confederate General Porter Alexander would observe years later that of the few chances during the Civil War that the Confederacy had to end the war through military victory, "(t1hi.s chance of June 30, 1862 impresses me as the best of all."74 McClellan and his amy ended the Peninsular Campaign much as they had begun it: stuck in the mud. This the, Warwick bottomlands had given way to the fields of Harrison's Landing, but the result was the same. Jonathan Stowe recorded on July 3, that "the whole army [is] camped on the plain which was a wheat-field but was now a complete mud hole."75 Sitting in the mud of Harrison's Landing was

preferable, however, to blindly feeling the roads over which the Army of the Potomac had retreated £rom Richmond. General McClellan had brought his army from Yorktown to Harrison's Landing in almost exactly two months, a far cry from the three days originally predicted. McClellan, when operating before Richmond, had the season he had wanted in the first

72 Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, pp. 275-279.

nI8We then knew of but one road for the movement of troops and Our immense trains." McClellan, Report, p. 263.

74 Sears, To the Gates of Richmond, p 280.

75 Jonathan P. Stowe, ~iary, July 3, Civil War Miscellaneous Collection, USAMHI* place, but again his understanding of the environment to which he had entrusted his anny proved lacking. Just as with the road conditions lower on the Peninsula, his Tertiary Formation study did in fact predict that "heavy" roads could be expected along the Chickahominy and James Rivers. Bowever, just as in April, he chose to ignore this warning. His maps showed very few roads between Williamsburg and the Chickahominy; nevertheless he decided he could move an army of 100 000 over this route. His Henrico County rnap represented wide wetlands on both sides of the Chickahominy, yet he chose to straddle this obstacle. When the rains fell, and his amy was divided, Humphreysf Topographical Engineers were hard pressed to construct bridges instead of having opportunities to survey local roads. When the retreat was sounded, Union colurnns were often left to fend for themselves as the Army of the Potomac stumbled blindly toward the James and safety. McClellan often referred to his 'change of baser as being masterfully executed.76 Certainly, he had to overcome incornplete maps while operating before Richmond (especially at Glendale), but he never seems to have questioned his decision to put the Army of the Potomac in this awkward position in the first place. That he was able to 'escape' was due more to inaccurate Confederate maps than brilliant management on his behalf.

76The movement, claimed McClellan, was "handsomely effected." McClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1865, p. 330. CONCLUSIONS

I me no thanks to you or any other persons in Washington - you have done your best to sacrifice this Amy. George B. McClellan

General George McClellan did not have access to a great array of physical intelligence while planning and executing his 1862 Peninsular Campaign, The Corps of Topographical Engineers, to whom the responsibility of collection and dissemination of physical intelligence fell, found little information available on Virginia as the Civil War began. This was due in great part to their prewar mandate. The interna1 improvement projects of the first half of the nineteenth century, while providing work for the Corps, did not allow them the opportunity to undertake many military surveys of the eastern United States. While topographers were engaged in scientific expeditions in the West, vast tracks of the East languished in relative obscurity. This was especially true of Tidewater Virginia. Once an expanding United States passed this region by, detailed surveys were no longer required. While surveys of prosperous Ohio and influential New England were plentiful, surveys of Virginia were few in number and of questionable quality. The lack of physical intelligence provided to McClellan regarding the lower Peninsula was not entirely the fault of the Topographical Bureau. When McClellanrs proposed landing at Urbanna was replaced by Fort Monroe in March, the Bureau was caught off-guard. Despite the efforts of Hartman Bache and Andrew Humphreys, the topographers were able to provide McClellan with a mere four maps and two reports on the Peninsula. That these maps were based on the Coast Survey did much to increase McClellanrs confidence in their accuracy. And while few in number, they presented McClellan with clear avenues of approach to the Confederate capital - a £as cry £rom the Appalachian wilderness he had fought through in 1861.1 A straightfomard assessrnent of McClellan's use of the physical intelligence provided to him is not easy. It allowed him to counter Administration claims that an overland route to the Confederate capital was superior to his own seaborne route. In doing so, the Young Napoleon pointed to intelligence that supported his own opinions and ignored that which did not. When the campaign ground to a halt, McClellan did anything but ignore physical intelligence, for it provided him with a ready scapegoat for failure. It was not, however, alone amongst excuses. "If I Save this Arrny now 1 tell you plainly," McClellan wrote to Stanton after the battle of Glendale, "that I owe no thanks to you or any other persons in ~ashington- you have

'The roads of Western Virginia were described by McClellan as "few, narrow and difficult." As cultivation was confined mainly to the valleys, and the mountainsides were 'obstructed by rock and a dense growth of timber and underbrush", it was difficult "even for skirmishers to move across the country .... There are few regions more difficult for the operations of large bodies of troops." This experience may in part explain McClellan's aversion to flanking Johnston's army from the West. McClellan, Report, pp. 24-25. done your best to sacrifice this Army."z Not only, claimed McClellan, had the governrnent rushed his amyfsmovement, it had denuded him of vital troops at a critical point in the campaign. Furthemore, when Washington finally allowed those troops to rejoin the Army of the Potomac, the goverment ordered them overland instead of via the Chesapeake, forcing McClellan to position his army astride the Chickahominy River. And when the army was forced to find alternative means of physical intelligence collection, this task was made more difficult as "circumstances beyond [hisj control" had resulted in an insufficient cavalry force on the Peninsula. It would seem that McClellan conveniently forgot that by the time he marched the Army of the Potomac from Fort Monroe to White House Landing, the season in which he had originally wanted to operate had arrived. It would also seem he forgot that it had been decided prior to the campaign that he should leave a specified number of troops "in and around" Washington in order to leave it, "entirely secure." This he did not do. Moreover, when he received word of the withholding of McDowellfs Corps in order to meet this previous cornitment, a perceived lack of physical intelligence had already convinced him of the necessity of siege operations. The withholding of McDowell did not damage his campaign plans or result in the siege of Yorktown. McClellan also apparently forgot that his placement of the army astride the Chickahominy was based more on his ignorance of the river's capabilities rather than a need to "hold out a welcoming hand" to McDowellfs Corps. Finally, insufficient cavalry to scout road networks during

PMcClellan, The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1865, p. 323. the Campaign was the result of poor organization on McClellanfs part (ironically, McClellan's ability to organize has long been considered one of his best qualities). The Navy had also let the Young Napoleon dom McCîeiïan would later argue that prornised Naval support never materialised and thus a planned York River turning movement of Yorktown could not be attempted. In reality, McClellan was well aware that Goldsborough would be unable to lend much assistance to an attack on the Confederate positions at Yorktown and Gloucester.

In addition to these excuses was McClellanfs claim that he suffered from a lack of accurate physical intelligence. This claim was an important aspect of his attempt to convince both himself and others that failure before Richmond was not his fault. He had been "deceived", McClellan would explain to the Joint Congressional Cornmittee. Was this true? Could it explain failure? Some of McClellanfs physical intelligence was quite accurate. Woodburyfs report accompanying T.J. Cramfs Peninsula maps contained important information concerning both the Warwick line and the Confederate position at ~illiamsburg. The Topographical Bureau's Tertiary Formation study warned of the "heavyN sections of road that could be expected on the Peninsula which were "almost impassable in the spring ...." It warned that, "a good deal of this portion of Virginia ... is swampy." The study described the countryside as too level to carry off rainwater and noted that, '#the Topographical Engineer may look for a difficult crossing [of the region's many rivers] .... 3 Unfortunately, much of McClellanrs physical intelligence was erroneous. This was especially true of his maps. While depicting the direction of the regionfs larger roads, they did little to help the Amy of the Potomac negotiate the myriad of smaller roads, trails and paths that crisscrossed the Peninsula. Furthemore, al1 but one of McClellanls maps mistakenly represented the Peninsula as cleared farmland, when at least three-quarters of it were heavily wooded. T.J. Cram's depiction of the Warwick River running parallel to the James River stands out as the most obvious map error McClellan had to overcome. It was equalled in importance, however, by numerous smaller map errors which plagued his campaign. It would seem McClellan had a ready scapegoat for failure. This would have been the case except that Confederate commanders laboured under the same handicap. Neither side had accurate maps of the Peninsula. While General Lee proved that he could still operate under these conditions, McClellan demonstrated that he clearly could not. Bruce Catton has argued that the Civil War required its generals to possess not only general military cornpetence and indefinable qualities of leadership, "but it also called for a great adaptabilitymW4 When confronted by the lunexpected' Warwick line, McClellan turned to a siege and ended al1 hopes of "brilliancyv. While straddling the Chickahominy bottomlands, and facing an opponent who was closing over unknown road

svirginia topographical study. p. 7451, 7443, 7450.

rCatton, "The Generalship of Ulysses S. Grantw, pp. 3-4. networks, McClellan abandoned his campaign altogether. Every time McClellan was faced with adversity, whether it came in the form of government "interference" or poor physical intelligence, his confidence eroded, his campaign collapsed. McClellan may also have had a valid excuse for failure if successful Union generals had benefited £rom more accurate physical intelligence. This was not the case. In his report on the preparations made by the Topographical Engineers for Grant's 1864 Wilderness Campaign, Major Nathaniel Michler argued that even though the topographers provided the anny with twenty-nine maps of Virginia (at a scale of one inch to one mile), their utility was slight. The experiences of the Campaign demonstrated that: however well the only accessible maps might have served the purposes of general knowledge, still they furnish but little of that detailed information so necessary in selecting and ordering the different routes of marching colms, and were too decidedly deficient in accuracy and detail to enable a general to maneuver with certainty his troops in the face of a brave and ever-watchful enemy .s

Much as McClellan had been forced to do, Grant had to feel his way through Virginia. Humphreys woula later write that the intelligence collected by his Corps, @or to the Peninsular Campaign, "was quite as full as anything we had in the pursuit of Lee in April, 1865, after we got ten milés from Petersburg - indeed, more full, more complete."6 Why did General McClellan proceed wkh the Campaign when he was well aware of how difficult travel on the Peninsula

50.~.XXXVI: 1, p. 293.

GWebb, The Peninsula, McClellan's Ca~paigxzof 1862, p. 52, might be? He knew the roads might be "heavy" and his maps told him that they were few in number. Yet these same roads were chosen to bring forth an army of over 100 000 and al1 its supplies. Personal bravado seems to have won out over sound judgment. Having argued against the Lincoln Administration for so long, McClellan decided to go ahead with a Chesapeake borne attack route after the March 8-9 weekend even though intelligence regarding the lower Peninsula was slight at best. To the Young Napoleon this did not matter. The "brilliance" of his Jominian plans would surely overcome any obstacles which might await his columns - be they natural or man-made. George McClellan chose not to heed the warnings in the little physical intelligence he had available. In doing so, he placed the ILirmy of the Potomac and himself in a position in which effective operation was difficult at best. When forced to command under these circumstances, McClellan proved he was no match for what the Virginia Peninsula had to of fer. 131

BIBLIOGRAPHY

MANUSCRIPTS:

Earl Gregg Swem Library, College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, Va. Manuscripts and Rare Books Department: "Copy of a Map of a portion of S.E. Virginia, Cornpiled under the direction of Colonel T.J. Cram." (Cram, 1862) Hargrett Library, University of Georgia, Athens, Ga. Rare Map Collection: "Map of the Seat of War in Virginia. Dec. 1862." (Duncan, 1862) "Plan of the Investment and Attack of York in Virginia." (Hill, 1781) "Johnson's Map of the Vicinity of Richmond, and Peninsular Campaign." (Johnson and Ward, 1862) Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia Andrew A. Humphreys Collection: "Henrico County Maps" (1862) Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. George B. McClellan Papers: Virginia topographical study (A-34:14). Samuel P. Heintzelman Papers and diary National Archives, Washington, D.C. Record Group 77: Records of the Office of the Chief of Engineers : "Extract from 'Fort Monroe, Norfolk, Suffolk, and Yorktown with their connections and surroundings for Military pur pose^'.^ (Cram, February, 1862), G77-1. "Extract from 'Fort Monroe, Norfolk, Suffolk, and Yorktown with their connections and surroundings for Military Purposesr,with additions." (Cram, April 2, l862), G77-2. Registers of Letters Received by the Topographical Bureau of the War Department, 1824-1865. MSO5, reel 4.

Letters Sent by the Topographical Bureau of the War Department and by Successor Divisions in the Office of the Chief of Engineers, 1829-1870. M66, reel 23. U.S. Rrmy Military History Institute, Carlisle Barracks, Pa. Civil War Miscellaneous Collection: Solemon F. Beals Papers W. T. H . Brooks letters Joseph P. Elliott diary William Fairbanks letters Frederick K. Fauler Papers Luther C. Furst diary James L. Graham Papers Thomas Langstroth letters William Henry Walling Papers

Civil War Times Illustrated Collection: Charles C, Perkins diary Jonathan P. Stowe diary

PRINTED WORKS (PRIMARY SOURCES):

American State Papers, Military Affairs. Vol. I-VIL Walter Lowrie editor. Washington, D.C.: G.P.O., 1813-1861. Vol. 1. 1813 Army Regulations. Vol. II. Annual Report of the Secretary of War, 1822, 1824- Vol, III . Annual Report of the Secretary of War, 1825. Vol- IV. Annual Report of the Secretary of War, 1831. Vol. VIL Annual Report of the Secretary of War, 1837. Vol. VII. Annual Report of the Topographical Bureau for 1836.

Atlas to Accompany the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies 1861-1 865, Introduced by Henxy Steele Commager. New York: Thomas Yoseloff, 1958. CLXXV Plates.

Barnard, John G., and Barry, W.F. Report of the Engi~eerand Artillery Operations of the Amy of the Potomac From Its Organization to the Close of the Peninsular Campaign. New York: VanNostrand, 1863.

Bosse, David. A Historical Atlas, Civil War Newspaper Maps. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993.

Clausewitz, Car1 von. "On Warw, The Art of War in World History, From Antiquity to the Nuclear Age. Gérard Chaliand editor. Berkeley, Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1994.

Delafield, Richard. Report on the Art of War in Europe in 1854, 1855, and 1856. Washington, D.C.: George W. Bowman, 1860. Henry, John. The John Henry County Map of Virginia, 1770. With an introduction by Louis B. Wright. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1977.

Joinville, Francois Ferdinand Phillippe, Prince de. The Anny of the Potomac: Its Organization, Its Commander, and Its Campaign. Translated by William Henry Hurlbert. New York: Anson D.F. Randolph, 1862.

Jomini, Henri de. The Art of War. Translated by G.H. Mendel1 and W.P. Craighill. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1862; reprint, 1971. Ketchum, Hiram. General McClellan's Peninsula Campaign: Review of the Report of the Committee on the Conduct of the War Relative to the Pei~insulaCampaign. New York: nop., 1864,

LeDuc, William G. Recollections of a Civil War Quartemaster. St. Paul: The North Central Publishing Company, 1963,

Marks. Reverend JoJ., D.D. The Peninsular Campaign in Virginia. Philadelphia: JOB- Lippincott and Company, 1864.

McClellan, George B. McClellan's Own Story. New York: Charles L, Webster & Company, 1887.

McClellan, George B. Report on the Organization and Campaigns of the Anny of the Potomac: To Which is Added an Account of the Campaign in Western Virginia, with Plans of Battle-fields. New York: Sheldon, 1864.

McClellan, George B. The Civil War Papers of George B. McClell an, Selected Correspondence, 1860-1 865. Stephen W. Sears editor. New York: Ticknor and Fields, 1989.

McClellan, George B. The Mexican War Diary of General George B. McClellan. William Starr Myers editor. New York: Da Capo Press, 1972-

Naglee, Henry M. Report of Brigadier General Henry M. Naglee, Commanding First Brigade, Casey 's Division, Amy of the Potomac, of the Part Taken by his Brigade in the Seven Days, From June 26 to July 2, 1862 Anny of the Potomac. Philadelphia: Collins, Printer, 1862.

Pinkerton, Allan. The Spy of the Rebellion. Hartford, Conn.: M.A. Winter and Hatch, 1885.

Report of the Superintendent of the Coastal Survey, showing the Progress of the Survey during the year 1858. Washington, D.C.: William A. Harris, Printer, 1859. Taylor, Richard. Destruction and Reconstruction, Persona1 Experiences of the Late War. Charles P. Roland editor. Waltham, Mass.: Blaisdell Publishing Company, 1968.

The War of Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Amies, 128 Vols. Washington, D.C.: G.P.O., 1880-1901.

United States Congress. Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War. Anny of the Potomac. 2 Vols. Millwood, New York: Kraus, 1977.

Wainwright, Charles S. A Diary of Battle, The Persona1 Journals of Col one1 Charles S. Wainwright , 1861-1 865. Allan Nevins editor. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc., 1962. Warren, Gouverneur Kemble . Gouverneur Kembl e Warren, The Life and Letters of An American Soldier, 1830-1882. Emerson Gifford Taylor editor. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1932.

PRINTED WORKS (SECONDARY SOURCES):

Ambrose, Stephen E. Duty, Honor, Country: A Histozy of West Point. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1966.

Beers, Henry P. "A History of the Topographical Engineers, 1813-1863", The Military ~ngineer200 (June, 1942).

Beers, Henry P. "A History of the Topographical Engineers, 1813-1863, Part II", The Military Engineer 201 (July, 1942).

Bidwell, Bruce W. History of the Military Intelligence Division, Department of the General Staff: 1775-1 941. Frederick, Maryland: University Publications of America, 1986.

Catton, Bruce. ML Lincoln's Amy. New York: Doubleday, 1962.

Catton, Bruce. "The Generalship of Ulysses S. Grant", Grant, Lee, Lincoln and the Radicals: Essays on civil War Leadership. Grady McWhiney editor. Chicago: Northwestern University Press, 1964.

Civil War Maps in the National Archives. Forward by Bernard L. Bontin, preface by Wayne C. Grover. Washington, D.C.: G.P.O., 1964. Eckenrode, H.J. and Conrad, Bryan. George B. McClellan, The Man Who Saved the Union. Chape1 Hill: The ~niversityof North Carolina Press, 1941. Feis, William B. "A Union Military Intelligence Failure: Jubal Early's Raid, June 12-July 14, 1864", Civil War History 3 (1990). Feis, William B. "Neutralizing the Valley: The Role of Military Intelligence in the Defeat of Jubal Early's Army of the Valley, 1864-1865", Civil War History 3 (1993). Fishel, Edwin C. "The Mythology of Civil War Intelligence", Civil War History 10 (Decernber, 1964).

Fishel, Edwin C. "Pinkerton and McClellan: Who Deceived Whom?", Civil War History 2 (June, 1988).

Foote, Shelby. The Civil War, A Narrative: Fort Sumter to Perqwille. Vol. 1 of 3 Vols. New York: Vintage Books, a division of Random House, 1986.

Goetzmann, William H. Anny Exploration in the American West, 1803-1863. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1965.

Hassler, Warren W., Jr. General George B. McCïellan: Shield of the Union. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1957.

Hoogenboom, Ari. "'Spy & Topog Duty has Been... Neglected'." Civil War History, Vol. 10, No. 4, 1964.

Nelson, Christopher . Mapping the Civil War; Featuring Rare Maps from the Library of Congress . Washington, D .C .: Starwood Publishing, Inc., 1992. Nettesheim, Daniel D. "Topographical Intelligence and the American Civil War." Masters Thesis, U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 1978- Nevins, Allan. The Improvised War, 1861-1862. Vol. I of The War for the Union. 3 Vols. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1959. OrReilly,Noel S., David C. Bosse, and Robert W. Karrow, Jr. Civil War Maps; A Graphic Index to the Atlas to Accompany the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Annies. Chicago: The New Library, 1987. OrToole, G. J.A. editor. The American Encyclopedia of American Intelligence and Espionage. New York: Facts on File, 1988. Pontius, Steven K., Bernd Knennecke and Susan LI Woodward. An Atlas of Virginia, the 17th, 18th, and Early 19th Centuries. Dubuque, Iowa: Kendali/Hunt ~ublishingCompany, 1989.

Rhoads, James Berton. ''Civil War Maps and Mapping", The Military Engineer 327 (January-February, 1957).

Schmidt, Colonel C.T., "G-2, Army of the Potomac." Military Review, Vol. 28, No. 4, July 1948.

Sears, Stephen W. To the Gates of Richmond, The Peninsula Campaign. New York: Ticknor and Fields, 1992.

Starr, Stephen Z. The Union Cavalry in the Civil War, From Fort Sumter to Gettysburg, 1861-1863. Vol. 1 of 3 Vols. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1979.

Stephenson, Richard W. Land Ownership Maps, A Checklist of Nineteenth Century United States County Maps in the Library of Congress. Washington, D.C.: G.P.O., 1967.

Stephenson, Richard W. The Cartography of Northern Vîrginia, Facsimile Reproductions of Maps Dating From 1608 to 1915. Fairfax County, Virginia: History and Archaeology Section, Office of Comprehensive Planning, 1981.

Swinton, William. Campaiqns of the Anny of the Potomac. New York: Charles Richardson, 1866.

The Department of Military Art and Engineering, The United States Military Academy. The West Point Atlas of American Wars, Vol. 1, 1689-1900. Vincent J Esposito editor. New York: Praeger Publishers, 1978.

Webb, Alexander S. The Peninsul a, McClellan 's Campaign of 1862. New York: Charles Scribnerfs Sons, 1881.

Weerns, John EàYard. To Conquer a Peace, The War Between the United States and Mexico. College Station, Texas: Texas A&M University Press, 1974. Wright, John Kirtland. Human Nature in Geography, Fourteen Papers, 1925-1965. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1966. PIG.1. "Map of the Seat of War in Virginia. Dec. 186ZM, (Duncan, 1862 ) , Rare Map Collection, Hargrett Libra-ry, University of Georgia. FIG.2. %Johnson's Map of the Vicinity of Richmond, and Peninsular Campaign in Virginia", (Johnson, 1862), Rare Map Collection, Hargrett Library, University of Georgia. FIG.3. "The Mexican War: Scott's CampaignM, from: The Department of Military Art and Engineering, The United States Military Academy. The West Point Atlas of American Wars, Vol. 1, 1689-1900. Vincent J. Esposito editor (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1978), Map 15-A. FIG.4. "U.S. Coast Survey, Sketch C Showing the Progress of the Survey in Section No. III, From 1843 to 18581t, from: Report of the Superintendent of the Coastal Survey, showing the Progress of the Survey during the year 1858, (Washington, D.C.: William A. Harris, Printer, 18591, Plate 8. FIG.5. "Detail of the Tertiary Formation of the State of Virginiarr, produced by author. FIG.6. "Copy of a Map of a portion of S.E. Virginia, Compiled under the direction of Colonel T.J. Crarnffr (Cram, 1862), Manuscripts and Rare Books Department, Earl Gregg Swem Library, College of William and Mary. FIG.7. "Peninsular Campaign", from: The Department of Military Art and Engineering, The United States Military Academy . The West Point Atlas of American Wars, Vol. 1, 1689-1900. Vincent J. Esposito editor (New York: Praeger Publishers, l978), Map 39. FIG. 8. John Henry, The John Henry County Map of Virginia, 1770. With an introduction by Louis B. Wright, (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1977). FIG.9. "Plan of the Investment and Attack of York in Virginia", (Hills, 1781), Rare Map Collection, Hargrett Library, ~niversityof Georgia. FIG. 10-A. "Extract from 'Fort Monroe, Norfolk, Suffolk, and Yorktown with their connections and surroundings for Military Purposesr", (Cram, February, 1862), Record Group 77, G77-1, National Archives, Washington, D.C. FIG.10-B. "Extract £rom 'Fort Monroe, Norfolk, Suffolk, and Yorktown with their connections and surroundings for Military Purposesf, with additionsw, (Cram, April 2, 1862), Record Group 77, G77-2, National Archives, Washington, D.C. FIG.lO-C. "Extract from 'Fort Monroe, Norfolk, Suffolk, and Yorktown with their connections and surroundings for Military Purposesg, with additionsw, (Cram, April 2, 1862), Record Group 77, G77-2, National Archives, Washington, D.C. FIG.11-A. "Henrico County Maprf (n.a., 1862), Andrew A. Humphreys Collection, Historical Society of Pennsylvania. FIG.11-B. "Henrico County Mapu (n-a., 1862), Andrew A. Humphreys Collection, Historicai Society of Pennsylvania. FIG. 12. "Yorktown to William~burg~~,f rom: Atlas to Accompany the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Annies 1861 -1 865, Introduced by Henry Steele Comrnanger, (New York: Thomas Yoseloff, 1958), Plate XVIII, No.2. FIG.13. "The Position of Yorktown with the Approachesw, from: Atlas to Accompany the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Annies 1861 -1865, Introduced by Henry Steele Commanger, (New York : Thomas Yoselof f , 1958 ) , Plate XV, No. 4. FIG.14. *'Reconnaissance of Part of the Rebel Works in Front of Williamsburg", frorn: Atlas to Accompany the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Anzties 1861 -1 865, Introduced by Henry Steele Commanger, (New York: Thomas Yoseloff, 1958), Plate XX, No.2. FIG.15. "Map of the Battle-Ground in the Vicinity of Richmond, Va.", from: Atlas to Accompany the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Anrties 1861-1865, Introduced by Henry Steele Cornmanger, (New York: Thomas Yoselof f , 1958), Plate XX, No.1. r;r Bu Lxeuts. Cornstock riid Il' .\lr.ilcr -.-.ï Xay 2l't LU61 . - - - $Ca& icX> riCp #fulnrA - a - ., -. . 1 XI& at-m-.:*wq

FIG.16. d'Reconnaissance beyond the Chickahominy at Bottom and Rail Road Bridges", (Cornstock and McAlester, May 21, 1862), from: John G. Barnard and W.F. Barry, Report of the Engineer and Artillery Operations of the ILrmy of the Potomac From Its Organization to the Close of the Peninsular Campaign, (New York: VanNostrand, 1863), Plate 13. FIG. 17. "Plan of the Battle of Fair Oakst", (New York Times, June 13, 1862), from: David Bosse, A Historieal Atlas, Civil War Newspaper Maps , (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993), p. 96. IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (QA-3)

L K L; - ~~~~~g 11111" LLL IIIII"

APPLlED IWGE . lnc E 1653 East Main Street ,, ,, -.- Rochester. NY 146û9 USA .=-= .=-= Phone: 716/482-ONû --=-- Fax: 716/288-5989