Grant and the Siddermark campaigns

I've just been reading General Grant's [US Civil War] autobiography and its fascinating to see how much is reflected in the campaigns in Siddermark and Dohler.

From things like discussion of using trees for abatti's to trench fighting to worry's about logitistics. His learning about cutting loose from a supply base in his campaigns around Vicksburg - a small link to BGV going to Five Forks etc.

One thing that I dont think we've seen much of in Safehold, that was a recurrent theme for Grant was problems with his subordinate generals. Some of them were good, intelligent & reliable, but some were real disasters - slow or negligent or downright disobedient, and often not just once but repeatedly.

I had always thought that in the army it was 'I say to one go, and he goes', but apparently that was not so in real life - maybe those were more political appointees whome he could not get rid of.

One other interesting snippet is that initially the Southerners had better rifles than the North, at least out west and at least once they [Union] do a swap on capturing a sufficient quantity.

isaac_newton wrote:I've just been reading General Grant's [US Civil War] autobiography and its fascinating to see how much is reflected in the campaigns in Siddermark and Dohler.

From things like discussion of using trees for abatti's to trench fighting to worry's about logitistics. His learning about cutting loose from a supply base in his campaigns around Vicksburg - a small link to BGV going to Five Forks etc.

One thing that I dont think we've seen much of in Safehold, that was a recurrent theme for Grant was problems with his subordinate generals. Some of them were good, intelligent & reliable, but some were real disasters - slow or negligent or downright disobedient, and often not just once but repeatedly.

I had always thought that in the army it was 'I say to one go, and he goes', but apparently that was not so in real life - maybe those were more political appointees whome he could not get rid of.

One other interesting snippet is that initially the Southerners had better rifles than the North, at least out west and at least once they [Union] do a swap on capturing a sufficient quantity.

One thing to keep in mind is that in the Civil War officers were not always graduates of the military academies nor did the universities have anything such as ROTC. Most of the units that fought in the Civil War would be the equivalent of todays National Guard and is why the units had names such as the 54th Mass or the 20th Maine. Also the commanding officers of those units were selected by the Governor of each state and the underofficers were a selection of political appointees and ones voted on by the men of the units. As such these officers couldn't be dismissed that easily by regular army officers such as Grant (He applied and was granted reactivation of his commission). That doesn't even get into the internal politics of the US Army that developed after the Mexican-American war.

Now compare this to the Imperial Charisian Army which its officer corps was comprised solely at its founding by officers from the Royal Army of Chisholm or the Royal Marines of Charis and those officers only got their ICA positions by appointment of the Emperor and Empress.

Thus in the Civil War you had officers who owed their positions to multiple different political entities and thus why CO's could do what they wanted with out to much trouble. In the ICA all officers owed their positions directly to the throne and if they don't listen they get the chop.

isaac_newton wrote:One thing that I dont think we've seen much of in Safehold, that was a recurrent theme for Grant was problems with his subordinate generals. Some of them were good, intelligent & reliable, but some were real disasters - slow or negligent or downright disobedient, and often not just once but repeatedly.

There is at least one example I can think of, one of the generals in defense of Corisande was a prime example. During the Battle of Haryl's Crossing he did not advance when he was ordered to, which actually turned out to be the correct thing to do. Again at Talbor Pass he did not advance when ordered to, and this time caused the whole army to be trapped and in the end defeated.

I suspect on the Charis and Sidemore side, the higher officers where very heavily checked out by the inner circle at avoid these sort of problems.

On the Church side you have the Inquisitors which would put a stop on that sort of thing in most cases, unless the officer in question wanted his family to face the question.

KBaggy wrote:

isaac_newton wrote:One thing that I dont think we've seen much of in Safehold, that was a recurrent theme for Grant was problems with his subordinate generals. Some of them were good, intelligent & reliable, but some were real disasters - slow or negligent or downright disobedient, and often not just once but repeatedly.

There is at least one example I can think of, one of the generals in defense of Corisande was a prime example. During the Battle of Haryl's Crossing he did not advance when he was ordered to, which actually turned out to be the correct thing to do. Again at Talbor Pass he did not advance when ordered to, and this time caused the whole army to be trapped and in the end defeated.

I suspect on the Charis and Sidemore side, the higher officers where very heavily checked out by the inner circle at avoid these sort of problems.

On the Church side you have the Inquisitors which would put a stop on that sort of thing in most cases, unless the officer in question wanted his family to face the question.

On the church side there have been some real duds. Think Harless and his associates. Think about that guy (whose name I don't remember) who tried to bulldoze his way through Eastshare's blocking position on the Daivyn and then was routed nearly 100 miles back up the river by an army only a fraction of his size.

As for the inquisition and its involvement, church armies have been handicapped by that more than they've been helped...

Don

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n7axw wrote:On the church side there have been some real duds. Think Harless and his associates. Think about that guy (whose name I don't remember) who tried to bulldoze his way through Eastshare's blocking position on the Daivyn and then was routed nearly 100 miles back up the river by an army only a fraction of his size.

Bishop Militant Canhyr Kaitswyrth.
Tried to unsucessfully scout Eastshare's position, knew his opponent was weaker in numbers but didn't properly account for the advantage of better weapons, better tactics and unfavorable terrain.

JBNL1972 wrote:

n7axw wrote:On the church side there have been some real duds. Think Harless and his associates. Think about that guy (whose name I don't remember) who tried to bulldoze his way through Eastshare's blocking position on the Daivyn and then was routed nearly 100 miles back up the river by an army only a fraction of his size.

Bishop Militant Canhyr Kaitswyrth.
Tried to unsucessfully scout Eastshare's position, knew his opponent was weaker in numbers but didn't properly account for the advantage of better weapons, better tactics and unfavorable terrain.

Yep. I did think of the name later. But you've properly identified the name and the incident.

Don

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