Use and Disuse of Personal Staffs in the American Civil War

THE RIGHT HAND OF COMMAND: USE AND DISUSE OF PERSONAL STAFFS IN THE AMERICAN CIVIL WAR By ROBERT STEVEN JONES Bachelor of Arts Northwestern Oklahoma State University Alva, Oklahoma 1988 Master of Arts Oklahoma State University Stillwater, Oklahoma 1990 Submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate College of the Oklahoma State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY May, 1997 -r~e':Ji~ )99 -, f) J1~Y THE RIGHT HAND OF COMMAND: USE AND DISUSE OF PERSONAL STAFFS IN THE AMERICAN CIVIL WAR Thesis Approved: Dean of the Graduate College ii PREFACE On July 20, 1861, Union Major General Irvin McDowell needed help. Under pressure from President Abraham Lincoln to attack Confederate troops near Washington D. C. and fight the one big battle that most Northerners thought would end the Southern rebellion, McDowell had 34,000 troops, most of them poorly trained ninety-day volunteers, struggling through the muggy Virginia heat toward a creek known as Bull Run. McDowell's plan to attack General l?.G.T. Beauregard's 25,000 rebels was a sound one, he thought, but it involved feints and flank attacks, and he wondered if his green troops and commanders were up to it. They had already taken four days to march little more than twenty miles, supplies stretched along the line of march, and the unseasoned soldiers were exhausted before they had even fired a shot. Worse yet, with the enemy now nearby, two artillery batteries were lost. With no aide-de-camp at hand to find them, the beleaguered McDowell rode off to do it himself. English newspaper journalist William Howard Russell, in America to cover the civil conflict, spotted McDowell and commented on the general's menial task. McDowell replied that his staff was so small that he had to do the work himself. Russell reported, ''The worst served iii English general has always a young fellow or two about him who can fly across the country, draw a rough sketch map, ride like a foxhunter, and find something out about the enemy and their position, understand and convey orders, and obey them. I look about for these types in vain.'' 1 McDowell's predicament mirrored one that field commanders shared throughout the Civil War--they needed competent assistants to help them with not only the particulars of campaigning but also the day-to-day routines of running large armies. Military historian John M. Vermillion says army commanders have so many responsibilities, from handling paperwork at headquarters to fighting, that they cannot be successful without ''a close circle of functional assistants.'' He calls that need for help the ''corporate nature of leadership. 112 On paper, Civil War commanders had the organization at hand to give them the help they sorely needed~-the military staff. Civil War historians Herman Hattaway and Archer Jones call the military staff a commander's ''management team,'' assigned to make the general's job easier. 3 Staff systems in both North and South were alike, for the Confederate Army copied the United States Army's staff organization. Every general with a field command had a staff, sometimes called a ''general staff,'' sometimes a ''field staff.'' That staff was divided in two. One half was the special staff, which handled the problems of supply and transportation for the command, be it division, corps, iv or army. The other half was the ''personal staff,'' which kept the records of the army and sent orders to combat units. A brief note about terminology. While staffs in the field were sometimes known as general staffs, European armies often called special staffs ''general staffs.'' Consequently, that usage spilled into American army vernacular. To make matters more confusing, by the time of the American Civil War, European armies had developed national ''general staffs'' to make operational plans and train staff officers for field duty. Also, during the course of the Civil War, the United States set up what was known as a ''general staff'' in Washington, but as it coordinated transportation and supply, albeit for all armies in the field, it was in reality a special staff. To avoid unnecessary confusion, this study will avoid the use of the term ''general staff'' as much as possible, reverting to it only to explain staff developments in Europe which provide context for American staff work. In all other instances, the umbrella term for both staff units operating in the field will be ''headquarters staff.'' Individually, the two halves will be called ''personal'' and ''special'' staffs. The United States Army had used special staffs since the days of the Revolution, and by the start of the Civil War their duties were clear. Special staffs included a chief of engineers, chief of ordnance, quartermaster V general and assistant quartermaster general, chief and assistant chief of commissaries, provost marshal and assistant provost marshal, chief surgeon, and chaplain. Answerable to the commander, these men did not exercise line authority but did control men in their own department. For example, the chief engineer directed all the engineers attached to the particular army. Likewise the chief of ordnance oversaw soldiers handling artillery pieces and their ammunition, the quartermaster and commissary generals directed soldiers who tended to supplies and their transportation. At higher level headquarters the chief surgeon and any medical officers under him established field hospitals and evacuated sick and wounded soldiers. The duties of staff chaplain are equally obvious. As the jobs of special staff officers are self-explanatory, and because officers well understood their usage by 1861, this study will not deal with special staff usage. Some special staff officers, however, are sources for other information.• Of interest to this study is the second subunit of the headquarters staff--the personal staff. An act which the United states Congress passed on June 22, 1861, allowed each brigade commander one assistant adjutant general and two aides-de-camp on his personal staff. The number of staff officers increased at higher command levels. Generals often took as many staffers as the War Department would approve, with the assistant adjutant general acting vi as the commander's main assistant. As the war progressed, generals commanding independent armies usually had one chief of staff (acting as the main assistant instead of the assistant adjutant general), two military secretaries, up to seven aides-de-camp, two assistant adjutants general, and one inspector general.& A personal staff could be of great help to a commander. in carrying out a campaign. A·Jl..- .. efficient personal staff could collect information, prepare plans, translate decisions and plans into orders, send those orders to lower echelons, see that orders were properly executed, and give opinions to commanders.• Yet traditional usage in the United States army, and perhaps a commander's uncertainty about what to do with his personal staff, often relegated staffers to roles of office clerks or couriers. Guidelines for personal staff usage did exist in 1861, and they came _J_~om Europe, largely France and Prussia, where the Napoleonic Wars had swelled the size of armies and, necessarily, advanced the duties and the functions of the staff. The French Revolution, which began in 1789, swept away that country's old hereditary monarchy and bestowed upon all French people the egalitarian title of ''citizen.'' The term carried certain responsibilities, however. Revolutionary leaders expected all French men to support and protect the gains of the Revolution with military service, and they made it mandatory in 1793 with the levee en masse, a national conscription law. 7 Such vii nationalistic impulses ballooned revolutionary and Napoleonic armies. Other European armies consequently expanded to counter French armies trying to spread the revolution across Europe. When French and Prussians fought the battles of Jena and Auerstadt, October 14, 1806, Napoleon had 180,000 troops at his command; Prussian commanders could field 171,000. When the same armies met at Ligny, June 16, 1815, French troops numbered 123,000, while Prussians totaled 115,000. Napoleon fought Waterloo two days later with 105,000 men, while allies fielded 157,000 troops against him. 8 Such massive armies required improvements in special and personal staff work to insure smooth operations. Military theorists in France and Prussia wrote about staff duties and organization, and some translations of their work were in the United states and available for Civil War generals to use. Their writings revealed that modern headquarters staffs had three elements: clearly defined organization and duties; well-educated staff officers; and chiefs of staff who played key roles in the function of the staff. France and Prussia also developed national entities--the Staff Corps in the former, the Great General Staff in the latter--that trained staff officers then assigned them to field commanders. Those national staffs also developed wartime strategies and policies which staff officers used as guidelines when assisting army commanders. viii With no national general staff to help them, and with few War Department guidelines for staff work beyond the proper form for filling out reports, Civil War personal staff officers were adrift. Instead of reflecting a national standard, staffs usually reflected the character of their commanding general and did as much--or as little- as he expected of them. They were often curious mixtures of West Point-trained soldiers and inexperienced civilians. They might be composed of neighbors from the general's hometown, members of his family, or friends of a political sponsor. The staff officer learned his duties on the job. Some men became excellent staff officers, others never rose above inefficiency.· Because every army, corps, division, brigade, and regimental commander had a staff, no study of limited scope can explore the workings of each headquarters.

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