an appointment to the United States Military Academy
at West Point, New York. In 1846, he graduated sec-
ond in his class and was assigned to an engineering unit
that saw some action during the Mexican-American war
(1846–48). Awarded three commendations for distin-
guished service, McClellan was promoted to the rank of
captain after the war and returned to West Point, where
he served as a professor of military engineering. Before
leaving that post in 1851, he wrote a manual on French
methods of bayonet training, which the Army adopted
in 1852.
McClellan was posted to a various stations around
the United States, but in 1855 he was sent to Europe
to study military organization and equipment. He wit-
nessed the siege of Sebastopol (the Crimean War), and
on his return to the United States he wrote The Armies
of Europe. He also designed a new saddle, known as “the
McClellan,” which was used for more than 50 years. In
1857, he retired from the military as a captain and be-
came the chief engineer, and later vice president, of the
Illinois Central Railroad before becoming president of
the Ohio and Mississippi Railroad in 1860.
With the outbreak of the American Civil War in
early 1861, McClellan was recalled to service in the U.S.
Army and made major general of the Ohio state volun-
teers. Just one month later, he was given command of
the Department of Ohio, which embraced the states of
Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, later expanded to Virginia
and parts of Pennsylvania. Moving his troops east, Mc-
Clellan secured what is now the state of West Virginia
for the Union through a victory against Confederate
forces at Rich Mountain, West Virginia (11 July 1861).
This major battle came 10 days before the Union defeat
at First Bull Run, which many historians consider the
first major battle of the war. Because of his quick victory
at Rich Mountain, McClellan was summoned to Wash-
ington, D.C., and replaced Irvin McDowell as com-
mander of the Union’s Army of the Potomac, which was
confused from the defeat at First Bull Run. He quickly
reorganized the units in his command and restored their
morale through training and good administration. Al-
though his men came to think of McClellan as a father
figure—he was known to his troops as “The Young Na-
poleon”—in reality he was a poor general, hesitant of
committing his troops and constantly failing to follow
up successes on the battlefield.
Nonetheless, when General Winfield scott, an
old officer who had fought in the War of 1812, retired
on 1 November 1861 following the Union defeat at
Ball’s Bluff, McClellan was named as his replacement
as commander in chief. McClellan, age 34, immedi-
ately decided to change the way Scott had fought the
war and shift to a different strategy, a move at odds with
the wishes of President Abraham Lincoln, who wanted
decisive major engagements against the Confederates
to quickly defeat them and end the war. Lincoln was
continually frustrated with his general’s cautious ap-
proach to fighting. Although McClellan won victories
against the Confederates at Williamsburg (5 May 1862)
and Hanover Court House (27 May 1862), he did not
follow these up with offensives. Historian Richard Hol-
mes explains: “His amphibious Jamestown peninsular
campaign (March–September 1862), brilliant in con-
ception and potentially war-ending both in terms of
the numbers under his command and their location so
close to the Confederate capital, was undone by a cau-
tion bordering on paralysis. Extending a flank to reach
out to a secondary Union advance from the north under
McDowell, he was checked at Seven Pines [31 May–1
June 1862], sat still for three weeks, and was then driven
back to the water’s edge by Lee during the Seven Days’
Battles [25 June–1 July 1862], showing a skill in re-
treat conspicuously absent from his hesitant advance
to contact.” When General John Pope moved south to
preserve the small Union gains, he was easily defeated
at Second Bull Run (29–30 August 1862)—all because
of McClellan’s refusal to advance his troops properly.
With Robert E. lee’s invasion of Maryland, McClellan
moved from Washington, D.C., to attack the Southern-
ers, meeting at Antietam (17 September 1862), another
Union victory. However, when Lee’s force retreated over
the Potomac, instead of following them and delivering
a staggering blow against a fleeing army, McClellan let
them slip away, unmolested, as he waited for additional
supplies from his rear. Finally, seeing that McClellan
would never defeat Lee’s army, Lincoln replaced him as
general in chief with General Ambrose Burnside and or-
dered him to Trenton, New Jersey. McClellan’s military
career was over.
In 1864, the Democrats, realizing that the war’s
growing number of casualties had made Lincoln un-
popular, approached McClellan to be their candidate for
president. Although until that time he had been apo-
litical, he accepted their nomination, with Representa-
tive George H. Pendleton (later author of the Pendleton
Civil Service Act) as his running mate. For a time, it
appeared that McClellan would be victorious, as North-
ern voters, the only ones allowed to participate in the mcclellAn, geoRge bRinton