Halleck

Lincoln's Chief of Staff

Stephen E. Ambrose

• Publisher: LSU Press
• Year: 1996
• Topic: History
• eBook ISBN:
  9780807155400
• Subtopic: American Civil War History
• Index: History

"Halleck originates nothing, anticipates nothing, to assist others; takes no responsibility, plans nothing, suggests nothing, is good for nothing." Lincoln's secretary of the navy Gideon Welles's harsh words embody the stereotype into which Union General-in-Chief Henry Wager Halleck has been cast by most historians since Appomattox. In Halleck: Lincoln's Chief of Staff, originally published in 1962, Stephen Ambrose challenges the standard interpretation of this controversial figure. Ambrose argues persuasively that Halleck has been greatly underrated as a war theorist because of past writers' failure to do justice to his close involvement with movements basic to the development of the American military establishment. He concedes that "by all the touchstones used to judge great captains of the past, Halleck was a failure, " but maintains he was nonetheless "the 'Old Brains' of the Union Army in the time of the testing of the nation."

INDEX

Alabama River, 181, 185

Alexander the Great, 132, 211

Alexandria, Louisiana, 121

Alexandria, Virginia, 72–74

Allegheny Mountains, 39

Alton, Illinois, 191

Andrew, John, 146

Antietam, Battle of, 84, 85

Antietam Creek, 84

Antietam, Maryland, 86, 88, 92, 160

Appomattox Court House, 198

Aquia Creek, 69, 94

Arkansas Post, 116

Army of the James, 187

Army and Navy Journal, 211

Army of Northern Virginia, 83, 132, 142, 165

Army of the Potomac, 39, 59, 60, 69, 72, 79, 84, 94, 101, 104, 131, 133, 136, 137, 145, 149, 153, 155, 161, 164, 177, 187, 197

Army of Virginia, 64, 71, 80

Arnold, Isaac, 117

Atlanta, Georgia, 46, 58, 145, 156, 159, 165, 179, 183, 186

Augusta, Georgia, 183

Baldwin, Mississippi, 55

Baltimore, Maryland, 138, 174, 177

Banks, Nathaniel P., 112, 117, 122, 124, 127, 131, 145–48, 156, 168, 169, 207, 209

Beauregard, P. G. T., 8, 25, 26, 41, 45, 46, 55, 63; at Corinth, 47–54

Belle Plain, Virginia, 165–66

Belmont, Battle of, 21

Ben Hur, 175

Berlin, Maryland, 95

Bermuda Hundred, Virginia, 170

Big Black River, 119, 121, 128

Blaine, James G., 60

Blue Ridge Mountains, 94

Bonaparte, Napoleon, 5, 91, 148, 164, 172, 211

Bonaparte, Napoleon III, 146

Bowling Green, Kentucky, 18, 20, 23, 26, 27, 29, 35, 39, 41

Bragg, Braxton, 59, 88, 89, 91, 92, 107, 123, 125, 126, 148, 150, 151, 155

British Columbia, 211

British Parliament, 107

Browning, Orville H., 113

Buell, Don Carlos, 18, 20, 23, 26–36, 39, 43, 49, 52, 93, 106, 150, 168, 207

takes Nashville, 35

at Shiloh, 45

Chattanooga expedition of, 56–59

and Kentucky campaign of, 88–92

Bull Run, second Battle of, 74–76, 79, 88, 105

Burnside, Ambrose, 68, 71, 72, 92, 99, 101, 102, 106, 127, 152, 154, 159, 164

and Fredericksburg campaign, 94–99

at Knoxville, 155–56

Butler, Benjamin, 14, 60, 117, 168, 170–73, 197, 207, 209

Cairo, Illinois, 15, 18, 19, 36, 110, 191

California Constitutional Convention, 8

Canby, Edward, 170, 174, 183–84, 194

Cedar Mountain, Battle of, 71, 72

Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, 177

Champion Hill, Battle of, 121

Chancellorsville, Battle of, 132

Chancellorsville, Virginia, 137, 167

Charleston and Savannah Railroad, 186

Charleston, South Carolina, 9, 46, 182, 187

Chase, Salmon P., 68, 153

criticizes Halleck, 76, 103

Chattahoochee River, 178

Chattanooga, Tennessee, 46, 57, 59, 60, 88, 90, 153–57, 159, 160, 165

Battle of, 155–56

Chicago, Illinois, 192

Chicago Tribune, 53

Chickamauga, Battle of, 152, 189

Cincinnati Commercial, 53

Cincinnati, Ohio, 91, 102, 117

City Point, Virginia, 172, 176, 178, 183, 185, 196, 197

Clarksville, Tennessee, 29, 35

Clausewitz, Karl von, 5, 107, 211

Columbus, Kentucky, 18, 19, 21, 23, 25, 27, 28, 39, 41

evacuated, 36

Corinth, Mississippi, 41, 43, 46–59, 61, 63, 145

Cullum, George W., 19, 30, 36, 212

Culpepper, Virginia, 94

Cumberland, Maryland, 141

Cumberland River, 18–20, 23, 25

Curtis, Samuel, 17, 22–25, 32, 41–43, 56, 63, 125

Davis, David, 93

Davis, Jefferson, 14, 54, 179, 199–20...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Dedication
• CONTENTS
• MAPS AND ILLUSTRATIONS
• Preface
• I. The Formative Years
• II. From Chaos to Order
• III. “Give Me Command in the West”
• IV. The Siege of Corinth
• V. Consolidating Recent Gains
• VI. McClellan, Pope, and Second Bull Run
• VII. The Guillotine for Unsuccessful Generals
• VIII. Burnside and Rosecrans
• IX. Intrigue Along the Mississippi
• X. Concentrate on Important Points
• XI. Gettysburg and Vicksburg
• XII. Responsibility and Odium
• XIII. Chief of Staff
• XIV. Total War
• XV. Victory
• Bibliography
• Index