Question 1
Evaluate the interpretations in both of the two passages.
Explain which you think is more convincing as an explanation of Confederate generalship during
the American Civil War.
Passage A
Many charges have been brought against Confederate military leadership. It is often claimed that while the South had brilliant tactical leaders, it produced no generals who rose to the level of strategic vision demonstrated by Grant and Sherman. Robert E. Lee has particularly come in for criticism. His strategic vision, it has been claimed, was limited to the Virginia theatre, where his influence concentrated Confederate resources at the expense of the Western theatres. The result was that the Confederacy lost the West – and thus lost the war. The Western Confederate armies also suffered from inept generalship.
The Confederacy’s command structure in the West was also a problem. There was an impossible tangle of authority and direction, so much so that it was not always clear who was in command. Internal feuds among the Western generals did not help matters. The result was that Confederate armies failed to develop a co-ordinated defence. President Davis ultimately bears responsibility for the overlapping command structure. He has also been blamed for interfering too much in military matters and for being responsible for feuds that built up between himself and commanders.
Confederate commanders are also charged with being too offensive-minded. It can be argued that the Confederacy literally bled itself to death in the first three years of the war by making costly attacks and losing their bravest men. It can be claimed that the Confederacy should not have tried to fight a conventional war at all. Perhaps if it had relied more on guerrilla warfare, it might have eroded the Northern will to fight.
A. Farmer, The American Civil War 1861–1865, published in 1996.
Passage B
The American Civil War saw elements of Napoleonic leadership. This was more apparent in terms of high command, in the generalship of Robert E. Lee, the most important commander of the Confederate forces. Like Napoleon, Lee found himself with smaller forces. He too forged a strong personal bond with his men, who saw him in the early years of the war as invincible. His defence of the South from the invasions launched by the North showed a mastery of the battlefield. Lee’s strategy of defending Richmond while sending fast-moving forces into the Shenandoah Valley was effective in preventing the North from using superior numbers to take Richmond.
A daring attack into Northern territory in 1863 distracted the North from its attacks and Lee was able to withdraw in good order and escape Union attempts to cut his forces off from the South. It showed that the South was capable of attack and able to withstand a heavy Union attack and still outmanoeuvre the North. Lee’s defensive action in 1863 to prevent a heavy Union invasion was also brilliantly conducted.
Lee, like Napoleon, had an eye for the battlefield; he divided his forces effectively and inspired confidence by some bold strategic and tactical decisions. He also displayed effective defensive leadership. However, he found that frontal assaults on well-established positions and the continuing loss of manpower against enemies with greater human resources eroded his reputation.
The battle of Gettysburg was his greatest failure. However, his image as a military gentleman was impressive.
M. Wells and N. Fellows, The Changing Nature of Warfare 1792-1945, published in 2016.
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