Civil War & Civil Rights

1862

General George McClellan (Photo courtesy Library of Congress)

One of the Civil War’s most pivotal months began as unpromisingly as ever for the Union in the East.

President Lincoln continued trying to push his obstinate general-in-chief, George McClellan, into actually fighting. McClellan disagreed with Lincoln in public over the President’s wish for a straightforward lunge at Richmond. McClellan favored a more roundabout, and thus conveniently less immediate, strike by water down the Chesapeake Bay to come at the Confederate capital from the  coast. Continue reading →