i would like to thank our panelists this evening -- dr. faulkner, dr. bailey, and director mark adams. please join me in an applause. [applause] >> this weekend on c-span3 american history tv -- thursday 8:00, comparing the 1950's beats and beatniks to the hippies of the 1960's. >> the beats were despairing veterans of the great depression . the hippies were the optimistic children of the baby boom generation and the rising affluence of the postwar consumer boom. >> at 10:00 eastern on "reel

north appearedr before senate subcommittees on the iran contra affair. shows what the american people should not think by the way you ask that question we intended to deceive the american people. the effort for these covert operations was made in such a way our adversaries would not or thereledge of it would be no association of this government with those activities in that is not wrong. >> and sunday at noon, theorians, authors, explore consequences of what they call -- pursed world war ii post-world war ii authority state. >> they know it is illegal for an individual to go into your house and take what they want. fortunately, that moral standards still exists.

people andake from her people. but it's not illegal for the government to do it. >> for a complete schedule, go to c-span.org. >> up next, a panel of historians they've the leadership of george horton meade during the civil war. they talk about general mea de, including during the battle of gettysburg. they look at his reputation during and after the war and talk about why he is not as celebrated as union counterpart and williamgrant tecumseh sherman. >> good morning, everyone. -- peted carmichael carmichael. i am the director of the civil war institute. i welcome all of you to our

panel. i will quickly go through this lineup. on my far right, you're left, we have john hennessy, a historian at fredericksburg national state park. he is also the author of an acclaimed book on bull run. to his left, scott hartwig. -- a longtime supporter of cwi and retired historian from gettysburg national park. written a book on and see them. it is a two-volume study. the second volume will hopefully be out in a few years. good? [laughter] to the left of scott is jennifer murray. also a historian right here at the gettysburg national park. .he is a professor of history

know,ny of you know him -- kim no. no lastly, you need introduction. our c-span audiences know you as works. his specialty, as you all know, u.s.esidency specifically grant. let's turn to george gordon behind one of the most important victories in american military history, barely recognized for his role in defeating wii's army at gettysburg. meade saw this coming.

suppose it will be discovered that i was not at gettysburg at all." [laughter] a colonel of that same regiment was the true savior of gettysburg. that leads us to this. why doesn't george gordon meade have a bobble head doll like joshua chamberlain? -- andsuggested that

brooks is, among many things, our marketing genius. brooks suggested we should have bobblehead dolls of all of the cwi historians, and i said, i don't think we would be able to keep brooks in stock. what do you think? >> brooks' bobblehead would be the biggest. [applause] >> that was not scripted. i swear. we did not plan that. >> my bobblehead would have socks on. [applause] carmichael: i am not do not knowat you the fashion statement. >> no scarf, peter? why? mr. carmichael: 90 degrees outside. that's why. let's go to the question -- why -- george gordon meade -- his

reputation, he does not have a reputation, right question mark why is he forgotten? really here at gettysburg and his entire military career question >> one reason is the lack of capable biographers up to this point in time that we only have a handful of rather dry eye a graphical studies. we have heard from studies in the works of the time that i think will get him a lot of attention. of a of biographies of the last couple of decades. eade is a fascinating biographical topic, but people have not found him attractive until recently. >> i would add i think there are two things related to gettysburg, and one thing

related to the overland campaign reputationd meade's greatly and carries to this way. one is sick of's testimony about his generalship at gettysburg, both the pseudonym articles he wrote in new york newspapers that were really condemning meade's generalship. perpetratedimony that. but also the committee on the conduct of the war, the hearings they held in the spring of 1864 were for meade tremendously damage to his reputation because all they called for for the meetings were enemies of meade. how, i huge hero at gettysburg. remember him? why did they call him?

he hated meade. they tried to stack the deck against meade, and they he was inmeade when washington and had him testified. to testify.repared then in the overland campaign, he -- there was a correspondent who wrote for a philadelphia newspaper, i think the philadelphia inquirer, and in a story he wrote about the early part of the campaign, he wrote -- a lot of his article was apparently pretty accurate, but one of the things he mentioned was meade wanted to rich after the battle of the wilderness. meade was somewhat of a prickly, sensitive guy. he really took offense and was getting tired of the lies being correspondence. he had him humiliated. he had him drummed out of the army.

they put a placard on him, mounted him backwards on a horse and the packard said "libeler of the press," jumped him out of the army. the result was the correspondence got together and out of anything positive. anything disastrous connected to namermy, they put meade's on it. that helped damage his reputation for the rest of time, up to today. be a biggerrgue may lens of this question. almost every book that spans the civil war, as you note, will have, say, 500 pages on the war in gettysburg and 150 on everything else. we have, as a society, and historians had a tremendous opportunity over the years to remedy the bad reps that meade received during the war, the unjust press he received, but we have such a fixation as a

public, as historians, too, on the possibility of existential -- when we read about to read aboutke those moments. we believe the war could turn on an instant. they believed the next big battle they were going to participate in would be that moment. after gettysburg, it became clear to most people, even, most importantly, to abraham lincoln, the war would not hinge on a single existential moment. instead, it would be a war of accumulation. as consumers of drama, historians and the public alike, we have discounted -- we don't like that as much. it's not as interesting.

a grinding war of accumulation. when he wrote about military campaigns, he often referred to them as operations. not battles, but operations. and much like grant -- one of the reasons they worked together as well as they did, they began to see the war as an operation. i think it is simply the warped perception of history in these the union army, if

defeated at gettysburg is going to collapse. we have that believe that if the confederates had one at gettysburg, the war would have been different. there is nothing in the war that tells us that was, i infect, the case. a man who waged war of accumulation over time and we just don't find it very interesting. >> i will add to that. of hiss very much aware declining reputation. if you read through his letters, he is constantly talking to his -- i am very intimate very intimate correspondence about his decline, grant and sherman are eclipsing them. it was not always that way. prominence, when he gets to frederick july 8 on the pursuit, the people of frederick come out and greet him. they bring flowers and reads. he is treated as a rock star.

then he gets to falling water and you see his levitation precipitously declining because he does not push lee. thingsleslie, one of the -- i think what john is talking about, if you go to the town, to the shops, a they're all these paintings. you have to look very hard to painting.de there are a couple. they are not terribly exciting. statue out on cemetery ridge is just standing there looking, trying to see if we can see the virginia monument across the way. lee is on a higher pedestal than he is. to what meadek complained about, after while we will see a was not at gettysburg at all. but those three days, you do not ,ee meade and those heroic

dramatic moments. he is an army manager. it is hancock who comes to the field to rally the troops. it is other people who dramatic things, even if they are wrong added -- wrongheaded like dancer goal. if i ask you, give me an image of meade at gettysburg, you are hard-pressed, outside the army of war, to do that. even meade himself this is the climax of battle and he comes up, my god, has the enemy already been repulsed? i have not even seen them. he does go to little round top where the 146 new york monument is. there is a sign that he was here right after the battle, contemplating what to do next. and of course, it if he chose to

do nothing, we might find that to be a wise decision. there is nothing looking for that decisive turning point. he is a war manager. at gettysburg, he proved he was -- afterward he showed he was not the man who is going to win the war. that man was still elsewhere at this time. >> also, i would add, and i think john fell point and what brooks is adding on -- john fell point what brooks is adding on is very good. meade developed into a modern soldier. what got him into trouble in gettysburg, he constantly developed alternate plans. in case this happened or that

happened, he wanted to have plans in place. that was actually relatively rare among civil war commanders. they had a plan. had alternative plans and they use that against him, but i think he was a businesslike warrior. so, when you think about some of the great leaders that emerge from the civil war -- sheridan, grant, sherman -- but sherman never cultivated the press. the press loved him. meade never cultivated the press at all. the press did not love him. his men did not necessarily love him. they respected him, but they did not love him. he was not the kind of personality that i think elicited enthusiasm, whether it was with politicians, people, the army. he elicited respects, but not -- and he also did not do anything to build his reputation.

you look at meade before the battle of gettysburg and your hard-pressed to find an officer with a battle record as good as he is. they say he is a cautious fighter. really? antietam? he was a hard fighter, but people in the army knew it. people outside the army did not know that very well. he did not cultivate the press in any way. >> when he tried to cultivate the interest of anyone, he was over the potomac and lincoln visited the army of the potomac and he writes to his wife. and one said those who write home to their wives have the reputation changed forever by the letters that they write or are ordered to have written.

writes backs, meade to his wife, saying that he spent brunch flirting with mary todd lincoln. usually this would merit a combat service badge -- [laughter] professor simpson: this was the only time that mary saw someone flirting with her rather than her husband. theseade did understand things. he was clumsy trying to advance himself. he did not like it. it was not who he was. he was very conscious of his reputation. also that he was not very skilled at self-promotion. he would have been awful on twitter. his facebook page would be bland. kind of like tennessee. [laughter] : you got it.pson

in any case, and he does not have those things. he has a staff that is actually loyal to him and has filled the -- aboutmany archival how meade is unjustly overshadowed by others. has skills. >> i think he sees himself as a quintessential 19th-century philadelphian gentleman. he writes over and over in his order and order underscore sherman for life. for meade, that his duty, which is not parallel to being like brooks in shameless self-promotion. [laughter]

if meade had been more like brooks simpson -- professor simpson: you would have a much more interesting biography people would buy. >> with a big bobblehead. as the: you will not be part of theat preparation for this panel was making sure none of us had to sit in a loveseat with rooks. and we succeeded. something we tend to overlook -- dickens -- a consistent 10 to overlook -- tend to overlook, when you're commenting on your superiors, it is very easy to be aggressive, assertive or imagine that you would have been.

you see these leaders, especially of the army of the potomac, most notably hooker, but also meade, revert to a much more cautious approach to things , to first responders -- responsibilities to avoid disaster. as a subordinate, meade was very vocal in his letters home about the need to be more aggressive. but when he assumes command, of course, he found it was not always as symbol as that -- he found it was not always as si mple as that. , you have tode understand army command. his reception is very much a function of their relationship and their prior commanders

their rearrangement of how they perceive the army of the potomac . by the time he took command of course, for some of them there had been john pope, burnside. in one way did what love and did love a couple of them -- at least mcclellan, but by the time gettysburg came along -- but unlike the army of northern virginia, which is in a fight almost solely with lee into a lesser degree with jackson, the army of the potomac came to identify with itself. the army that march 2 gettysburg had a very powerful sense of identity. the reason in my view gettysburg is so important to the nation is because it was so important to the army of the potomac area it .as that justification

see they areou memorialized. they memorialized their service at gettysburg. other discussions about the monuments at gettysburg. the creation of the national cemetery here. all of these are a reflection of how important it is burke was and reflection of the fact that the army identified so strongly with itself. as itsr saw grants identity, although they admired grant and came to admire general meade as well. tellingly, it was the decision not to do something. the army saw that decision as careful solidification of their well-being without risking the

cause for which they fought. and they appreciated that a great deal. so, you find the low, simmering placement in american heritage is a function of all these things. this is probably the largest group of people who have gotten up early for george gordon meade since the great review in 1865. [laughter] >> i think the mine run thing is very interesting. own correspondent is upset that that did not take place. called up that assault when he is in charge of the second core, and meade's own correspondence, i was ready to go. gets credited with mine run, but oddly enough, this was a battle in which he wanted to be aggressive. meade did not have a good pr

sense in other ways. it's a very interesting letter ,e writes his wife on june 4 1864, in which he claims credit for being in command on the field the entire day. cold harbor. generally speaking, you would not want to take credit for what happened at cold harbor as the commander of the attacking forces, but meade was so much being in charge, it tells his wife, i was on the field the whole day. he was so proud of that ecology, he did not realize that he that was not much -- that that was not that much of an a compass minerals it was part of that grinding war that john was talking about. a vast, vast majority of meade's service as commander of the army 3,the potomac is after june

1863 and he plays an essential role in the campaigns of late 1863 which was people forget altogether and the campaigns of 1864 and 1865. and yet, given meade unerring ability to avoid a spotlight that sometimes i think he craved privately, but could never bring himself to talk about publicly, guess who does not show up at mclean's parlor in 1865? george gordon meade is not present when robert e. lee surrenders. grant is not feeling well that day. they do not wait. the only comment, lee looks at meade and says, you have gotten replies,yer, and meade

you have to account for most of that. was notpomattox, meade close to simpson: that is the point. they did not wait. we are still concerned about image, and it seems to me, so concerned about how meade tried to commit himself, especially in his private letters -- which we should emphasize, private letters to his wife -- i think we have forgotten something more fundamental. that is about philosophy. i think scott was pointing to it. you see meade as a more modern general. had contingencies in terms of his planning. what we are forgetting is that meade came to an understanding that civil war armies were indestructible. he came to that conclusion -- one that lee never, ever reached -- sherman certainly did. i don't know about grant.

but for us to really understand decision-making in the field, there was the recognition that you could, in fact -- it is what happened on july 1, rectitude of cores and what could be rest of the army do? they would recover pretty quickly, couldn't they? he had seen that time and time again. he understood the limitations of what an army could achieve tactically on the battlefield. that, to me, explains the conservatism that you mentioned. there is a maturation in thought. you can speak to grant. you cannot take the overland campaign and extract it from all union military operations. if you look at that, you would say, grant obviously believed he he couldood -- that win a victory of annihilation

overly. i'm not sure he did. but when you look at that campaign with the rest of the union military operations, i possibly see consistency with what meade did on the ground for the army of the potomac, because he knew you had to get a hold of the army of northern virginia and not let go so sherman and the maneuvering. and remember what sherman said after atlanta. let's not play their game, right? i don't want to chase down hood's army. we will have another pitch battle. they will fight. they will retreat. they will fight again. i think what we're missing in meade is, again, he stands out in terms of his philosophy, i think. -- part ofsay meade thing a good general is knowing when to fight and when not to fight. meade was pretty good at that in determining when there was some potential gain to be made, as john mentioned about my and run.

you could also include his former controversial decision not to attack lee at hagerstown and williamsport at the end of the gettysburg campaign. and hedid want to attack did have some of his corps commanders who wanted to attack -- wadsworth and howard wanted to attack, and then the once he trusted more recommended against the attack. i think that is a good example what are theyzing potential gains here and what are the potential risks that we have? fighting a battle is a tremendous risk because battle is so uncertain. you can have a brilliant battlefield plan and then things go awry. i think with meade there is a couple of things. one, he sees when you fight and when you don't fight, but i think the other thing that meade

sees and grant and sherman definitely see is you can't win the war without feeding. -- without fighting. so you'll see people say he was criticized during the campaign and he did not lose all his casualties. if you followed mcclellan's strategy, you just transferred to where the fighting was going to be. you have to beat lee and his army. it is not like being in northern georgia or you can outmaneuver them. you're going to have to fight them. i think meade understands that. him and said, he chooses not to fight. this is a general who fights hard when he needs to. sometimes clumsily and sometimes not well, but he knows you have to fight to break down the confederates and he also

realizes armies are very resilient. you're not going to fight a battle and destroy the enemy army. it is going to be a grinding process. >> that leads to my next question. how is it possible to describe partnership as anything other than dysfunctional when you consider that from may 4 until june 24, 55,000 casualties. to me, that is a dysfunctional partnership. >> personal, it is the grant-meade relationship, not meade-grant. had -- they fought pitched battle after pitched battle. that was why they were summit casualties.

as opposed to waiting a few months, then we go at it again. much more is achieved between the wilderness and the crossing of the james than the army of the potomac had ever achieved. you look at the war as if wording of it, as some do, kevin levine chats about this every once in a while. just like the stanley cup so far, you win on the home ice so to speak. yankees when north of the intomac and confederates w south. it is only in 1864 that the yankees gain and retain the again.ive time and time and it really doesn't matter that they don't win a decisive battle. they keep moving on. they keep persisting and there's something to be said not only about the officers and men, but

the generals who are undeterred. they're going to keep on plugging at it until this is done, as opposed to pull back afterwards, rest and reconsider what they're going to do. there's things grant and meade understood, which was the clock was ticking. 1864 is an election year. you have all heard the comment that robert e. lee makes that across the chain, there will be a siege and it is just a matter of time. time was the one thing that grant in meade did not have. they had to produce the results and at least nullify lee's ability to turn the table while other subordinates of grant like sherman could take care of business. when you focus tightly on the

grant-meade relationship, you don't share grant's appreciation whoeade, in terms of a man could manage the army of the potomac and knew it generals well. while grant at the same time is keeping an eye on benjamin butler, keeping an eye on sherman, the authorities at washington. that was something grant could do that meade was not good at doing. meade freed grant to exercise beingsponsibilities of the general in chief, and grant himself pointed out to staff members who complained about meade's performance that grant could not manage the entire war effort at the same time. for your focus on casualties, they also can -- also inflicted

33,000 casualties. george meade is a union general most responsible for the disruption of the army of northern virginia. never forget that. >> if it were true we would not forget that. [laughter] you talk about 55,000 casualties. how many casualties suffered at gettysburg? 28,000. how many casualties does he suffered during the overland campaign? 33,000? whoou want to look at a man lost a lot of men, you want to look at robert lee. >> no matter what you say, i'm

going to respond the same way. [laughter] one here. a live over aink it papers number of things. a number of casualties there were a number that were lost because meade and grant for whatever reason did not indicate -- did not communicate well. we could go down the list. thereuld be in agreement was some miscommunication that were failed opportunities. that 55,000 casualties nearly lost lincoln the election. those casualties created an army of the potomac. the very best soldiers and officers are dead, wounded, maimed all the way down to richmond. took aasualties, it chunk out of the army of northern virginia, but let's be clear that there were a lot of

missteps along the way, and it were lost opportunities because grant and meade did not get their act together. >> the reason they were missed opportunities is because a lot of officers and men in the army of the potomac are now suffering what we call short timers disease. we talk about a number of people who reenlisted. it is under 50%. one of those people who is to disillusioned- is is oliver wendell holmes. in his correspondence in 1864, basically the message is, i can't wait to get out of here. i've had enough. reasons the army does not have the opportunity it has is his people say i'm about to go home. i'm not going to get killed at this point in time.

i think that is a understandable calculus. both armies, i would argue, have wrecked themselves by mid-june. neither army can perform as well. from a larger perspective, that achieves a great deal for the union because what had robert e. lee been able to do in past years? a daringhe flow to counterattack. lee has no cards to play. he has a feeble reprise of 1862. grant has nullified lee. he could not have done that without meade. and the relentless war waged. lee took the confederacy's greatest asset out of the war and now you're left to rely on joe johnson, who does

not like to fight, or food -- or hood, who is great at eliminating an army, it just happens to be his own. [laughter] >> therefore, from a larger point of view that takes us away just from the battlefield and looks strategically, this partnership achieves a major objective. it takes the army of northern virginia out of the war. >> i often think of 1864 as a doctor would think of a case of cancer. and the campaign itself is chemotherapy. there are all different types of cancer. there are some where chemotherapy is mild and fixes the problem. and there are some types where the chemotherapy comes as close to killing the patient as it possibly can in order to make

them well. the 1864 campaign was that. it, lincoln knew it, meade knew it. the northern populace was prepared that this campaign would be different. these were not existential moments, but in existential epic. when they came to write the reports in the official records, that is what they called different parts of the campaign. not battles, but epics. , the partnership, getting very specific about it, if you look at it from the perspective of grant and meade, both of them were in a difficult situation. as mentor and subordinate. -- as manager and subordinate.

put yourself in the situation of , whose boss is going to take his chair and sit next to you at your desk all day everyday. that is a hard situation. his boss is going to spend a lot of energy communicating to you that the culture of the organization you have managed for nine months is not quite what he wants it to be and wanted to change, and he will make a change if he has to. and he does. the story of the battle of the wilderness, yes, it is the story of the battle, but there is also a story of grant interjecting himself into the culture of the army. trying to overcome a reflexively conservative approach to war. , to my mind in an almost astoundingly, manages his way through that. he is offended at times, angry

at times, sometimes never confronts, that he never succumbs or indulges to the point where he loses focus on what he is trying to accomplish. it really is a remarkable thing. i would count the partnership as one of the four or five most military partnerships in u.s. military history. and i would count, and i think the 1864ould agree, campaign as a necessary, though harsh, course of therapy on a patient with only one path of survival, and that was the path they ultimately took. your use to comment on of the word dysfunction in the relationship. first, i would say i don't think their management of the army was

any more dysfunctional than sherman's management of the atlantic campaign. if you are using the number of casualties as a number of dysfunction, then they are both dysfunctional. but both campaigns achieved their objectives. sherman took atlanta and ultimately, lee's army surrendered. i would say that the thing that is remarkable to me about meade , let's talk about meade, i think meade and grant relationship was a very functional relationship even though it was fraught with problems. they made a lot of mistakes in the overland campaign. one of the things that was the themesaid emerged -- that emerged was meade and grant expected human beings to do things they were not capable of doing. the other point was that everyone in the campaign after a certain point was utterly exhausted. their nerves were on edge.

you can imagine, every, single day, you're not getting regular sleep or meals for weeks on end. what's remarkable to me is that meade and grant emotionally and psychologically held up to the very end. if you look at the second world war as an example. the number of army commanders, division commanders who were relieved of command, not because they were incompetent but because of psychologically they could not stand the strain of it, you begin to understand. they were under the same strain in the overland campaign. war and had his problems, hancock ultimately has to take his leave of the army. a lot of them did not hold up. and the fact that that relationship held up under all that strain and performed like a did is pretty remarkable. even though, i am a granting

you, they made a lot of mistakes. lives,rificed a lot of in some cases probably needlessly. >> that is certainly gordon's point. especially his book on spotsylvania. he is very critical of the communication between them. he notes time and time again that there were opportunities, and they were not lost from exhaustion or fatigue, although you are certainly right. carol reardon will be with us tonight and she has written fantastic -- written a fantastic piece about this. but again, my point, as the moderator bringing up another angle, is taken from gordon ray. how do you explain the maneuver

that grant embarked upon after cold harbor? it is an incredible moment. it is an opportunity to steal petersburg and he did not do it. they did not do it. again, i don't know how one explains that. i am sure brooks and others have ideas about it. i truly don't. it is a mystery to me. there is combination of factors there. >> but meade cannot be held accountable for the fact that the crossing of the james does not result in the fall of petersburg. i want to point out something, he comes worth really stick in these words really stick in my mouth, but john hennessy is exactly right. [laughter] >> one of the comments we will go back to and we will cross to james later on. we want to go back to may after the movement starts from the wilderness and there's a traffic jam along the way and there is

this famous encounter where meade meets grant and complains about sheridan's actions, and sheridan is complaining. sheridan says, just give me the calvary and i will whip jeff stewart. says, just let him do it. hip just you what is interesting about the exchange is it is usually from grants perspective. i want you to flip that around. this punk upstart is going to be given free reign for what he wants. are oil and meade water, a bad combination.

you have just been snubbed by your new boss. and meade takes it. all right? compare this to another commander, george gordon needs to do very well a couple of months later, for the second time during the war throws up his command in the face of the enemy. i did not get the job i want, i quit. again, meade is not a quitter. he absorbs as many punches in this relationship with grant than he does fighting the confederates. the crossing of the james, ironically you're going to talk about that, we're focusing on whoseand not on a man -- this isashington a statue, jim has done a lot of research on this.

it is kind of neglected, like his education. >> do you want to talk about the monument? this monument goes up in 1927. if any of you have seen this monument in washington, d.c., it but to sit closer to grant, now it sits further away from the capital. it goes up in 1927. in 1911, the pennsylvania legislature passed a meade memorial. in 1927.up is consistently in grant's shadow and remains there in memory. there is a discussion about how the meade memorial cannot memorial.ant's

if you've have seen that memorial at the capital, it has liens. has lions. you cannot eclipse lions. jin is in the midst of completing a biography on george meade. reflecting on what brooks just , his ability to subordinate ego. he endured a tremendous amount from the press and within the army so he could make this partnership work. could you talk about his personality?

you spoke about his sense of duty, but there is certainly something admirable about this man. ego was put aside for the cause. >> we focus on the relationship with grant, but it might be worth comments on the relationship with lincoln, as well. some of our panelists talked about the decisive title -- decisive battle. civil war historians are not always good military historians. i think it is important when we evaluate meade or any others that we talk about what decisive battles mean. what expectations lincoln or the northern public or the press might have had for meade. decisive battles are incredibly rare in world history. you can think of napoleon executing decisive battles. beyond that, it is unlikely to happen in the civil war for a variety of reasons. that leads to a lot of his

tarnished reputation because he does not bag lee at williamsport. he offers his resignation. of militaryreakdown relations during the gettysburg campaign, and some of that has to go to lincoln's elementary understanding of what it takes to be an army and cripple the army of virginia. >> that is a observation because i think lincoln is often complemented for his restraint and how he handled meade. he wrote a letter expressing his disappointment that meade did not pursue and deliver that final blow. he took the letter, put it in his desk and did not send it. he expressed all of his frustrations and criticisms. the idea that lincoln showed restraint is just nonsense.

that did not happen. i think you are exactly right. i don't know how much lincoln's thinking matured over time. brooks suggested that maybe it did. but your point again about this relationship with meade and lincoln, has your research revealed anything about post gettysburg or is it just about lincoln and grant and meade on the sideline? >> lincoln says your golden opportunity is gone. he thinks it meade defensively at gettysburg, it ends the war. that is a tremendous pressure on any commander. it toess compared waterloo. it is just not going to happen. >> there are people that like to talk about the civil war as the

modern war, hard work, whatever. the fact of the matter is that those historical comparisons look backward. ofy look back to a myth napoleonic conflict as opposed to actual conflict under napoleon. what is equally important is the letter that is sent. the same day that lincoln composes this letter of disappointment in meade he also writes grant and says, during the pittsburgh campaign, you were right and i was wrong. i made some bad calls here. he's willing to give grant the kind of slack in a campaign ddled.he actively me in a way he was not willing to give to meade. important that lincoln

always has an open door for any commander to come and complained to him. it was really important that if you were a general in the army of the potomac, to get wounded in a battle, and then get access to the present. antietam, joe hooker gives his version to lincoln and lincoln never shakes it. when he visits in october 1862, he insists on seeing where hooker's men fought. sickleshappens is dan loses his way, but that gives him first access to lincoln. actually writes, in lincoln's mind, the first draft of what happened at gettysburg. bosses like this, the

first story they get is the story that sticks in her mind. lincoln had that weakness. you report to me, i get this understanding, especially a simple notion that i could have gone down there and what the win in thate cannot situation. sickles is already recuperating in washington. that is when the campaign against meade began. >> one of the myths that has about meade at the potomac that he just had to reach out and take it. that is how all these people testified at the end of the war, they all make this statement of

easily they could destroyed the army cued in the case of two of them, they're not in the battle of antietam. they should've known better. the battle of antietam, lee's army was in worse condition and they did not destroy it. knew those things. but that story has resonated. it's another thing that has damaged his reputation. that he could've just reached out. if you just been aggressive, he would have ended the war. >> the episode at williams court and perhaps vicksburg exchange that lincoln had with grant, remember the administration have been forging a war effort intended to diminish by increments the cell's ability to wage war. i'm often struck by the commitment to this kind of grinding war with respect to

slavery and civilians and those sorts of things, new policy that emerges, and disconnect between that and lincoln's impatience as a related to military events. i think what we see after gettysburg, and i'm not sure what the mainspring was in bringing them into alignment, but lincoln is thinking on military matters, it ultimately came into alignment the grinding policies the government had put in place at a prior time. and so you see after the gettysburg campaign, you see in meade with an aborted advance in central virginia that does not work. back inlee force meade the bristow campaign. you see meade launch an assault that succeeds in a limited level but does not taste the course of the war. campaigneade launch a

that into nothing. suddenly, all of these things are somewhat acceptable to meade . admittedly, i think he is also deeply affected by the fact there are not under -- are not a lot of other choices to make about the army of the potomac. of the most important parts of john pope's presence in virginia in 1862 was that it was discouraged, if not eliminated, any possibility that lincoln would bring in a westerner to command the army of the potomac itself. that had not gone well. potomac to ahe remarkable degree is a closed shop. there are only two or three commanders the entire war. it is a closed shop.

in any event, i think the expectations of military campaigns is an important thing that we see happen after gettysburg. notingo, it is worth that lincoln did not have a lot of options when it came to getting a new guy. >> brooks wrote a fantastic piece. it is about the press on the cusp of the overland campaign, published in gary gallagher's collection of essays on the wilderness. great expectations. listening to john's point about things coming into alignment, on greatment expectations, how does that

reflect upon the world in which inhabited, how does the press figuring? -- figure in? the expectations fall short during the overland campaign. campaignens during the is meade starts a war with the press. you think of scott hancock as this great guy because of what he did at gettysburg, but he starts becoming ready childish in the press. warren will never have such a nice monument as what he did in little round top. if he had gunshot, we would member him as the man who saved

little round top but not some college professor. [laughter] college professor and obscure, that is redundant anyway. [laughter] >> meade cannot win on this. meade understands this. if the army wins, the credit will go to grant. he tells his wife. if the army loses, then they will blame me. meade is not good at structuring that politics of image, which i would argue is essential. for all the talk about actual performance, this is a people's war in which people's perception of leadership is crucial to what is going on. lincoln himself has a rather naive unformed notion of military leadership. he buys into this from the beginning of the war to the end of the war.

there is a comment he makes about sheridan. general, i thought you would be 6'4", but 5'4" will do in a pinch. that betrays what lincoln thanks -- lincoln thinks a general should look like and a popular image of what the general should look like. that is negated by this rather businesslike war management style that grant and meade engage in. we don't see that partnership as we do the lee-jackson partnership. the fact of the matter is that partnership wins the war in the east. we tend to focus on the grant-sherman partnership. meade caused by the wayside once again. even this panel, which at times

has been the brooks roast, shows the ability of four scholars committed to meade, and peter, to go in a different direction and concentrate on different things other than meade's role in the war and his contributions eventually to victory. >> i want to open it up to the audience. you all know the routine by now. come to one of the mics. , san jose, sharks fan. before coming here, i did some reading. i read some professor gelzo. i want to address the height -- pike creek circular. these three guys treated as a foregone conclusion. i look at the pike creek circular and the remarks such as

the time for falling back can only be developed by circumstances. or, whether circumstances arise as would seem to indicate necessity for falling back. pike creekn is, circular, the plan or contingency plan? >> it is a plan. i'm not going to say it is a contingency plan. it is a plan that meade would have liked to implement. it was an exceptionally strong position. and he wanted to do, said this when he testified about the war, he wanted to fight a defensive battle. that would have been the battle he wanted. the only way to get that battle is to draw lee out of pennsylvania and down into maryland to attack him in that position. meade clearly understood that might not happen. if you look at his actions on

june 30, what he does is very important. he empowers john reynolds to command the left-wing of the army. he makes in a wing commander. he also empowers reynolds with committee should 40. -- with tremendous authority. reynolds is essentially given the authority to fight a battle in pennsylvania, to precipitate a battle if he feels it is to the advantage of the army. it is a smart move by meade because he delegates his authority to someone he has trust in. he knows he cannot be everywhere at the same time. once reynolds does precipitate the battle at gettysburg, what does meade do? pike not wedded to the circular, he scraps it. he does not tell everybody that we need to fall back to pike creek. it is not a contingency plan. he wants to do pike creek.

to his credit, when the circumstances change, he scraps the plan, orders the concentration at gettysburg, and fights the battle that was picked by his subordinates commander. i think what reflects on him is flexibility. >> we have been talking about the committee on conduct of war. it is an outstanding book edited by william hyde. "the unioneed -- general speaks." it has all the transcripts of the court. fantastic stuff. it is very well edited with great analysis. william hyde, it is a fantastic book. >> al from mechanicsburg, pennsylvania. i would like to understand the effect of meade's personal politics on how he is perceived

and evaluated and also the army politics. he was a mcclellan man. how does that combine as to how he was viewed? >> i will go ahead with that. meade was a democrat. he seems to have been sympathetic to the more cautious limited war policies of 1862. but he also shows signs that he knows that ultimately the determination of policy as it relates to confederate civilians and the abolition of slavery is not really his business in that he is not part of a process of making that policy. mcclellan saw himself as part of the process of making that policy. pope saw himself as part of

making that policy. meade did not. by the time he assumes command, he has managed to dodge the political pitfalls of engaging in that debate, which sunk men like mcclellan and franklin and many others. by the time he assumes command, the union debate over the nature of war, over the aims of the war is largely resolved. the emancipation proclamation is very controversial. it stimulates months of acrimony and debate within the army and beyond. by the time meade takes command, debates,t see public certainly not within the army about emancipation.

they accepted that it was in their interests. they all thought for the abolition of slavery as a matter of policy. meade understood that. he exercised the policies in regards to civilians in the same way his predecessors had. , morelly over time severely, but really the army of the potomac never wavered from the approach towards civilians that it assumed in late 1862. even under mcclellan, when he resumed command of the army into the back to virginia, the army related itself with civilians in the same way that pope's army had. pope had a period of three weeks where he lost control of his army. the objection of the high command to war policies as it related to civilians was almost

always rooted, not so much in an objection to suffering civilians, especially secessionist civilians, but the impact of that policy on the discipline of the army itself. by 1863, that was pretty well set. meade had the good fortune or wisdom to avoid the debate early on. once he assumed command, the debate as it related to the army was largely resolved. >> thank you. >> mike, pennsylvania. it is kind of well understood , or a truism that the civil war was a transformative process. in listening to today's debate , it seems to me that the civil war is kind of like a portal for these different 19th-century personalities to transform themselves into some aspect of modernity. some of them do it well in

certain aspects such as technology or deployment of warfare, and others might do it better in terms of managing the press and public image. the kind of things we accept routinely as part of modernity. overall, most of these characters seem to be conflicted because they don't completely step into this modern world we can see. many of them are locked and where they would be in the 19th century. i would like the panel to comment on that. do you agree? >> aren't we all? aren't we all stuck between what we have known and what we are to learn? look at the internet. how many of you have flip phones? probably a lot of you. some of you may not have phones at all. we are all stuck in that. it happens to apply to the military world as well. excellent. >> after gettysburg, there was a significant reorganization of the army.

a bunch of conservative officers were removed. what role or input did meade get into that reorganization of the army? what input did meade get into the reorganization of the army? >> he had a huge role in the reorganization of the army. he was the primary proponent of the reorganization of the army. it was not grant. grant just approved the reorganization when he arrived. he thought the first and third corps who had suffered at the battle of gettysburg had never really recovered. recruiting and not been able to recover them. they did not have enough new units coming in. meade also did not have enough corps commanders that were competent to command army corps.

he felt reducing the number of army corps. he also, i think, looked at lee's army and how maneuverable it was with a larger corps and thought it was a better model. he is never going to admit that. that the confederate organization was better than what they had. even those that -- even though later on, andrew humphries, who would become chief of staff of the army, he felt that having more army corps in certain circumstances worked better because it gave you more maneuver elements. the other argument is that when you reduce the number, you have less people to give orders to. he was a big part of that reorganization. >> dennis, hagerstown, maryland. during the retreat from gettysburg, the claim was that all meade had to do was reach out and the confederates were his. the confederates had an

south of set up gettysburg. it says it -- it is said it makes fredericksburg look like a speed bump. how much did this line of earthworks affect meade's pursuit? that area.cons at first the weather is foggy and he does not get a good view of what the area is like. then he holds a council of war and his commanders decide not to push. when they go out the following day, he does like a reconnaissance in force. there are plenty of respected commanders in the army of the potomac that said meade made the right decision not to attack, including two of the most senior commanders. charles wainwright, the first

corps artillery guy offers a similar sentiment that if he had attacked at falling waters, his forces would have been crushed. >> lewis, pennsylvania. he stole part of my question. there are several things that most people, i have heard or not heard, about that meade was bogged down with. the first one was that one of the first things he had to do was protect baltimore and washington, d.c. consequently, he always had to worry about being defeated and those two cities would be attacked. he waited a day after the battle was over to find out what was going on because lee's army was still there and were digging in, hoping for an assault. the williamsport defenses were

built by engineers. if you have ever seen pictures of them, you would never want to attack them as a frontal assault. the confederates are hoping for a frontal assault. >> that is an excellent summary. we want to get to the question. your question is? >> one more thing is, and also meade when he did decide to move, part of his army moved 32 miles in one day. i don't have a question. i just want to bring this up. [laughter] >> thank you very much. >> you have done a very nice job of summarizing what has been said here. we appreciate your listening and summarizing. fantastic. >> we should have had you up here. [laughter] >> go to the back mic. >> i am brian from howard

county, maryland. something was mentioned on the panel about civil war armies being indestructible, that meade realized the army of northern virginia, if i heard correctly, was indestructible. i have heard that the typical civil war battle is when both armies come together, bang the heck out of each other, don't actually destroy each other, and live to fight another day. my question is, if civil war armies could not destroy each other, why is that? or what did it mean to destroy the enemy in the civil war context? >> i heard the same thing you heard. as soon as i heard civil war armies were indestructible, i started thinking of vicksburg, fort donaldson, locations where armies were destroyed. they surrendered. civil war armies could be

defeated and captured. lee's army in northern virginia was defeated. johnson's army of tennessee was defeated and surrendered. they could. i think really what we meant up here was that because of the abilities -- what is the difference between waterloo and gettysburg? the difference is there is no railroads and no supply system like you had during the 19th century in america to sustain an army in the field. after the vital -- the battle of waterloo, you think is a different kind of battle, i think it is a silly comparison. it is much more difficult for the french to reconstitute their army after that defeat. the panic spreads. civil war armies were better supplied and in some respects

, were more resilient because of the sort of weaponry they had, the logistical system they had to support them, it enabled them to recover from damaging battles. you think about the battle of gettysburg where lee's army loses so many men. or the battle of the wilderness, and the armies continue to function. how do they continue to function? they continue to function because the system that sustains them is well-developed. >> real quick. battles of annihilation are hard to achieve because the soldiers come from the same citizen soldier tradition. they have the same type of training that makes it harder to achieve an edge on one another. yhey work with charity -- parit a lot. >> i would turn towards what i think is the single best military history of the war, how the north won.

herman hattaway and archer jones. the argument is that it is a policy of exhaustion and rating strategy that ultimately brings the confederacy to its knees. a brilliant book. we have time for two quick questions. very quick. we need efficient answers, as well. >> this is just a quick comment. >> we need a question. >> i am john from washington, d.c. thented to point out where statue is, it is across from the national gallery of art, but the building you see in the background is the main federal courthouse in washington. if you are accused of any major governmental malfeasance, that is where you are going to be. my feeling is you may see that statute in the future on national tv. [laughter] >> alright. our final question. kristen, landsberg, virginia.

uva. i wonder if you could talk about meade's postwar career and if he had any role in reconstruction or the army after the war? >> he does. he is sent down in 1867 and 1868 to handle georgia and several other states. he is actually, for all of his early results about issues of race, he is much more aggressive in protecting african-american citizens, especially in georgia. when grant becomes president and they engage in promotions, meade finds that he is not going to get a long coveted third star. it goes to his longtime rival philip sheridan. he spends those last several years unhappy, feeling unappreciated.

just after election day in 1872 , with grant winning reelection, meade dies. >> on that note we will end. [laughter] >> let me thank the panelists for our lively conversation. thank you all. [applause] >> this weekend on american history tv on the span three. tonight at 8:00 eastern on lectures in history, university of washington professor william were compares the 1950's the to the the -- beatniks hippies of the 1960's. >> the hippies were the optimistic children of the baby boom generation and the rising affluence of the postwar consumer boom. >> at 10:00 eastern on rell

america -- reel america. >> american people ought not to be led to believe by the way you are asking a question that we intentionally deceived american people or had that intent to begin with. the efforts to conduct these covert operations was made in such a way that our adversaries would not have knowledge of them, or we could deny american association or the association of this government to those activities. that is not wrong. >> sunday at noon, historians, authors and former congressman exploded consequences of what they call america's post-world war ii security state. people that liked authoritarianism, to tell people what to do, they know it is illegal for an individual to go into your house and take what they want. fortunately, that moral standard still exist good you cannot take

from people and hurt people. it happens, but most people recognize you cannot do it. it is not your legal for the government to do it. >> for our fleet schedule, or to c-span.org. baseball hall of famer jim bunning who went on to the house and senate passed away in may. up next, mitch mcconnell talks about the life and career of his fellow republican. in 2013.recorded it is about 30 minutes. >> thank you very much. good afternoon, everyone. as jeff mentioned, this is the fourth in a series of speeches i have been giving on college campuses highlighting some of the more accomplished members of the united states