Discipline in American Civil War Armies

[Malthus]

Valmy is not debating that some individuals were in favor of that.  He is not even debating that it was discussed in the government.  He is debating that it was a technical impossibility.  Legally impossible, by the constitution, so all States would need to approve it.  Technically impossible, because of all the conditions... They were slaves, fighting for their former masters?  That did not often happen.  You need to arm them, train them, feed them.  By 1864, realistically, how much training can you give them before sending them to the front?

Even if they freed and armed slaves in december 1864, even if a significant number agreed to fight for the South in exchange of their freedom, it wouldn't change much.

As was said in Gettysburg, they should have freed the slaves first, then declare independance.
That's about the only way I can think of why the South would receive significant foreign help from the United Kingdom.  And even there, it is a big stretch.  It's not like the UK could realistically field 500k-1M soldiers to send them to the US in support of the Confederacy.  There are all kinds of logistical and political constraints.

Now, however, once the issue of slavery is gone, even with the long list of grievances by the South, would there still be a popular will to secede from the North?  I doubt it, but I'm no expert.

Pretty well my take on it too. Slavery as an issue was a difficult stumbling block for gaining vital UK support. Though how much that support would have been worth is debatable - would the Royal Navy have been willing to break the US blockade? Commit UK troops?

[The Minsky Moment]

The whole point of secession was to preserve slavery, so the only way freeing slaves to fight could be seriously considered would be when matters were in extremis  By that date the logistical difficulties alone of mobilizing any significant numbers of freedmen would been insurmountable, for all the reasons Berkut mentioned. 

[Berkut]

Pretty well my take on it too. Slavery as an issue was a difficult stumbling block for gaining vital UK support. Though how much that support would have been worth is debatable - would the Royal Navy have been willing to break the US blockade? Commit UK troops?

That is one thing I never really understood about the "International recognition" thing. It is stated commonly that it was absolutely critical to the South. And I can see why they would think so, and why they would imagine this scenario where the UK is cominig to their rescue.

But I would say that a reasonable and objective analysis doesn't really lead to the conclusion that international recognition is the war winning event that is imagined.

I don't see it - lets say France AND the UK both recognize the legitimacy of the Confederacy. They send ambassadors, and offer to mediate a solution.

So what? Lincoln tells them "Thanks for the mediation offer, but we are not interested". Or sends some negotiating team to Paris to meet with some Confederate reps, with the instructions to not make any deal other than an immediate re-unification (ie just stall).

What is France and the UK going to do? Send an army over? Invade from Canada? Why? What would they stand to gain by doing anything so risky? The North is still the dominate power, and still the dominant trading partner for both of them.

And France was a mess at the time, and the UK while not a mess certainly didn't have any significant number of troops at the ACW scale to send. They sent what, 60 or 70 thousand troops to the Americas in the War of 1812? The Union was putting half a million to a million men in the field by any point that we could imagine intervention, and could have put more in if they had the threat of foreign invasion to work with - hell, Seward actually *tried* to start a war just to drum up more Northern support for the fight (Yes, that was really stupid, but still).

I think "foreign intervention" would never have mattered in the long run, and I don't think any European power had any illusions about their ability to intercede militarily.

[alfred russel]

Valmy is not debating that some individuals were in favor of that.  He is not even debating that it was discussed in the government.  He is debating that it was a technical impossibility.  Legally impossible, by the constitution, so all States would need to approve it.  Technically impossible, because of all the conditions... They were slaves, fighting for their former masters?  That did not often happen.  You need to arm them, train them, feed them.  By 1864, realistically, how much training can you give them before sending them to the front?

Even if they freed and armed slaves in december 1864, even if a significant number agreed to fight for the South in exchange of their freedom, it wouldn't change much.

As was said in Gettysburg, they should have freed the slaves first, then declare independance.
That's about the only way I can think of why the South would receive significant foreign help from the United Kingdom.  And even there, it is a big stretch.  It's not like the UK could realistically field 500k-1M soldiers to send them to the US in support of the Confederacy.  There are all kinds of logistical and political constraints.

They did have freed slaves in training as the war ended. I also think you may overestimate the amount of training received by soldiers in the civil war. It varied, but a lot didn't receive more than a week or so.

Also emergency wartime measures don't always follow the constitution. See several actions in the north for example.

Now, however, once the issue of slavery is gone, even with the long list of grievances by the South, would there still be a popular will to secede from the North?  I doubt it, but I'm no expert.

There is no chance the south would have seceded if included in secession was an abolition of slavery. Lincoln actually gave support to a pre war amendment to protect slavery if it would reverse the secession crisis. It is absurd: "So we can keep our slaves in the union, or we can form our own country without slavery..." Why would they do the latter?

In 1865 the calculus was fundamentally changed, however. At least I think the question is at what point did that calculus shift enough so that it could have actually changed government policy (if it ever did), and at the earliest point could it have been decisive?

I think UK involvement never was anticipated to go beyond naval and material support. I could be mistaken but I don't think anyone hoped for/feared british infantry units roaming the battlefield.

[Berkut]

Now, however, once the issue of slavery is gone, even with the long list of grievances by the South, would there still be a popular will to secede from the North?  I doubt it, but I'm no expert.

Yeah,agree with you there.

I posted this on facebook once arguing with the Lost Cause mythologists about "states rights" or tariffs or other such nonsense being the reason for the war.

If you list the top ten reasons the civil war happened, you would have a list like this:

1. Slavery
2-10. A bunch of other stuff.

If you could solve items 2-10 with a magic wand, while not touching item #1 at all, we still have a civil war.
If you could solve item #1 with a magic wand, while not touching items 2-10, we have no war.

There were not any other problems that could not be solved via the in place at the time political processes.

[The Brain]

I could be mistaken but I don't think anyone hoped for/feared british infantry units roaming the battlefield.

People were more concerned with them roaming the air, given the experience of an earlier conflict.

[alfred russel]

""Amateurs talk about tactics, but professionals study logistics."

Obviously incorrect, to such as an extent that I think it invalidates your other points. Everyone in this discussion is an amateur, and I don't think any of us have been discussing tactics. 

IT's a quote, I don't get to change it so it applies perfectly.

But I thought you were clever enough to understand the intent behind it anyway. I still think you are in fact.

I think we can agree there is an optimum balance between using the available men to work and to fight. I find it hard to believe that:

a) the optimum balance just happened to be all the military age white men fight, and all the military age black men work.
b) if we agree that the optimum balance was not a), the question is whether the south used too many men to fight or too many men to work. I've read a lot of stuff on the civil war, and I've yet to read any contemporary opinion that the south would be better off disarming a division or two so the soldiers could be farmers.

[Josquius]

Pretty well my take on it too. Slavery as an issue was a difficult stumbling block for gaining vital UK support. Though how much that support would have been worth is debatable - would the Royal Navy have been willing to break the US blockade? Commit UK troops?

That is one thing I never really understood about the "International recognition" thing. It is stated commonly that it was absolutely critical to the South. And I can see why they would think so, and why they would imagine this scenario where the UK is cominig to their rescue.

But I would say that a reasonable and objective analysis doesn't really lead to the conclusion that international recognition is the war winning event that is imagined.

I don't see it - lets say France AND the UK both recognize the legitimacy of the Confederacy. They send ambassadors, and offer to mediate a solution.

So what? Lincoln tells them "Thanks for the mediation offer, but we are not interested". Or sends some negotiating team to Paris to meet with some Confederate reps, with the instructions to not make any deal other than an immediate re-unification (ie just stall).

What is France and the UK going to do? Send an army over? Invade from Canada? Why? What would they stand to gain by doing anything so risky? The North is still the dominate power, and still the dominant trading partner for both of them.

And France was a mess at the time, and the UK while not a mess certainly didn't have any significant number of troops at the ACW scale to send. They sent what, 60 or 70 thousand troops to the Americas in the War of 1812? The Union was putting half a million to a million men in the field by any point that we could imagine intervention, and could have put more in if they had the threat of foreign invasion to work with - hell, Seward actually *tried* to start a war just to drum up more Northern support for the fight (Yes, that was really stupid, but still).

I think "foreign intervention" would never have mattered in the long run, and I don't think any European power had any illusions about their ability to intercede militarily.

Even if the US acts like an absolute cock and kicks off a full war with the UK its still unlikely they'd recognise the CSA. This would not be a popular political move: lest we forget the UK was far more anti slavery than the US.

This theoretical US-UK war would help the CSA for sure. The UK may well send money their way so they can die in British peoples place. But even the Soviet Union and the western allies in ww2 is a bit too tight an analogy.

[The Minsky Moment]

I'd amend Berkut's list to:

1. Slavery
2-10. Various laws or practices all directly relating to slavery

Take the South Carolina secession declaration, the reasons given for leaving are:
1) The northern states are frustrating enforcement of the fugitive slave act
2) The northern states are frustrating the ability to transit through their territory with slaves
3) The northern states "have denounced as sinful the institution of slavery"
4) The northern states permitted the establishment of anti-slavery societies
5) The northern states have encouraged slaves to escape or mount insurrection.
6) The northern states elected a President hostile to slavery as an institution.
7) The northern states have elevated free black men to citizenship

Literally every complaint in the secession declaration is directly related to slavery.

[Berkut]

""Amateurs talk about tactics, but professionals study logistics."

Obviously incorrect, to such as an extent that I think it invalidates your other points. Everyone in this discussion is an amateur, and I don't think any of us have been discussing tactics. 

IT's a quote, I don't get to change it so it applies perfectly.

But I thought you were clever enough to understand the intent behind it anyway. I still think you are in fact.

I think we can agree there is an optimum balance between using the available men to work and to fight. I find it hard to believe that:

a) the optimum balance just happened to be all the military age white men fight, and all the military age black men work.
b) if we agree that the optimum balance was not a), the question is whether the south used too many men to fight or too many men to work. I've read a lot of stuff on the civil war, and I've yet to read any contemporary opinion that the south would be better off disarming a division or two so the soldiers could be farmers.

I think that is nearly impossible to say, really.

But I take your point.

I would frame it however, that you are claiming that the optimum balance was that there should have been more men fighting, and less men working (or this does not make any sense at all).

Hence my quote - it seems a rather shallow analysis, even amateurish, to just assume that more men fighting is *necessarily* more optimal. My reading (and yes, it is amateur reading as well, of course) is that that is not clear at all, and there is ample evidence that in fact the number of men the South had in the field was practically constrained by their ability to support those men, and their ability to produce the needs of their society (both military and civilian) with the labor resources left behind. I don't think military historians look at it in the way you are asking though - should the south have sent some men home instead of having them fight, because that is a nearly impossible hypothetical to measure.

You are making the positive claim however that they should have in fact sent more men to fight, and left fewer at home, that the optimal balance was not reached, and in fact, was so far out of balance that the addition of tens of thousands of troops (and the reduction in available labor of tens of thousands of laborers) would have made a significant impact.

I think if that were true, the indirect evidence would show that the South, by and large, did not suffer from nearly fatal shortages of food, munitions, and supplies throughout the war because they had more than enough labor to produce those things, and in fact that labor was being wasted. That is clearly not the case.

[Malthus]

Pretty well my take on it too. Slavery as an issue was a difficult stumbling block for gaining vital UK support. Though how much that support would have been worth is debatable - would the Royal Navy have been willing to break the US blockade? Commit UK troops?

That is one thing I never really understood about the "International recognition" thing. It is stated commonly that it was absolutely critical to the South. And I can see why they would think so, and why they would imagine this scenario where the UK is cominig to their rescue.

But I would say that a reasonable and objective analysis doesn't really lead to the conclusion that international recognition is the war winning event that is imagined.

I don't see it - lets say France AND the UK both recognize the legitimacy of the Confederacy. They send ambassadors, and offer to mediate a solution.

So what? Lincoln tells them "Thanks for the mediation offer, but we are not interested". Or sends some negotiating team to Paris to meet with some Confederate reps, with the instructions to not make any deal other than an immediate re-unification (ie just stall).

What is France and the UK going to do? Send an army over? Invade from Canada? Why? What would they stand to gain by doing anything so risky? The North is still the dominate power, and still the dominant trading partner for both of them.

And France was a mess at the time, and the UK while not a mess certainly didn't have any significant number of troops at the ACW scale to send. They sent what, 60 or 70 thousand troops to the Americas in the War of 1812? The Union was putting half a million to a million men in the field by any point that we could imagine intervention, and could have put more in if they had the threat of foreign invasion to work with - hell, Seward actually *tried* to start a war just to drum up more Northern support for the fight (Yes, that was really stupid, but still).

I think "foreign intervention" would never have mattered in the long run, and I don't think any European power had any illusions about their ability to intercede militarily.

I suppose a plausible scenario would have been something like this:

- UK offers recognition to the South. 
- UK asserts the right to unrestricted trade with the South, now a recognized nation. Cotton for the UK, weapons for the South. 
- UK dares the US to interfere with that trade, or risk naval war with the UK - turnabout for the US' own grievances in 1812!

Why would the UK do this? Access to cotton is one big motivator, as is the profits to be made from  selling to a desperate South; plus, if all goes "well", a US stripped of the South is less of a potential future great-power rival.   

Would the North have still won? Certainly, if they fought it out to the end. The UK was never I think going to send an army to the South, which remained absolutely poorer in men and material.

However, the victory would have been a lot more costly if the Northern blockade was broken, making it more plausible that the North would decide the price was just not worth it.

[alfred russel]

I think that is nearly impossible to say, really.

But I take your point.

I would frame it however, that you are claiming that the optimum balance was that there should have been more men fighting, and less men working (or this does not make any sense at all).

Hence my quote - it seems a rather shallow analysis, even amateurish, to just assume that more men fighting is *necessarily* more optimal. My reading (and yes, it is amateur reading as well, of course) is that that is not clear at all, and there is ample evidence that in fact the number of men the South had in the field was practically constrained by their ability to support those men, and their ability to produce the needs of their society (both military and civilian) with the labor resources left behind. I don't think military historians look at it in the way you are asking though - should the south have sent some men home instead of having them fight, because that is a nearly impossible hypothetical to measure.

My point here is not that the south mobilized as many as 1 million men, and they could have tried to squeeze the black population to produce another 600k. For obvious reasons, much of the black population would probably be less than effective on a battlefield, and mass mobilization would present logistic problems (both of a production and consumption variety).

But there were 3.5m slaves. While some would be too old or too young to work, my understanding of slavery is that there weren't that many idle people. Removing 50k (hypothetically) of the black population into direct military service would not collapse production, but would dramatically increase the number of men under arms (the army apparently peaked in size at around 300k). 10s of thousands of laborers is not a big number compared to the number of people working.

I think if that were true, the indirect evidence would show that the South, by and large, did not suffer from nearly fatal shortages of food, munitions, and supplies throughout the war because they had more than enough labor to produce those things, and in fact that labor was being wasted. That is clearly not the case.

To be clear the south suffered from severe shortages of food, munitions, and supplies throughout the war. My point was that until 1864 they kept their army reasonably well fed.

I don't however think that labor was the primary cause of the shortages. A lack of salt, the effect of military campaigns, the blockade, and a deficient transportation network was probably the bigger contributor to the food problems than simply a lack of labor.

[Berkut]

Pretty well my take on it too. Slavery as an issue was a difficult stumbling block for gaining vital UK support. Though how much that support would have been worth is debatable - would the Royal Navy have been willing to break the US blockade? Commit UK troops?

That is one thing I never really understood about the "International recognition" thing. It is stated commonly that it was absolutely critical to the South. And I can see why they would think so, and why they would imagine this scenario where the UK is cominig to their rescue.

But I would say that a reasonable and objective analysis doesn't really lead to the conclusion that international recognition is the war winning event that is imagined.

I don't see it - lets say France AND the UK both recognize the legitimacy of the Confederacy. They send ambassadors, and offer to mediate a solution.

So what? Lincoln tells them "Thanks for the mediation offer, but we are not interested". Or sends some negotiating team to Paris to meet with some Confederate reps, with the instructions to not make any deal other than an immediate re-unification (ie just stall).

What is France and the UK going to do? Send an army over? Invade from Canada? Why? What would they stand to gain by doing anything so risky? The North is still the dominate power, and still the dominant trading partner for both of them.

And France was a mess at the time, and the UK while not a mess certainly didn't have any significant number of troops at the ACW scale to send. They sent what, 60 or 70 thousand troops to the Americas in the War of 1812? The Union was putting half a million to a million men in the field by any point that we could imagine intervention, and could have put more in if they had the threat of foreign invasion to work with - hell, Seward actually *tried* to start a war just to drum up more Northern support for the fight (Yes, that was really stupid, but still).

I think "foreign intervention" would never have mattered in the long run, and I don't think any European power had any illusions about their ability to intercede militarily.

I suppose a plausible scenario would have been something like this:

- UK offers recognition to the South. 
- UK asserts the right to unrestricted trade with the South, now a recognized nation. Cotton for the UK, weapons for the South. 
- UK dares the US to interfere with that trade, or risk naval war with the UK - turnabout for the US' own grievances in 1812!

BUt the UK would make no such claim, seeing as they just fought a long war and established themselves the right of blockade of belligerents, assuming you can effect it. This isn't something they can just "demand" that the US not enforce, there is international law here, and the US had a declared blockade. Indeed, the fact that the South was NOT officially recognized as a legal entity was somewhat problematic to the legal justification for a blockade.

Recognizing the Confederacy as a actual belligerent and sovereign nation radically *strenthens* the legal argument that the blockade was legitimate, not the other way around!

This is a legal precedent that existed prior to the ACW (Napoleonic Wars most recently), and well after it (WW1 and WW2).

Why would the UK do this? Access to cotton is one big motivator, as is the profits to be made from  selling to a desperate South; plus, if all goes "well", a US stripped of the South is less of a potential future great-power rival.   

Would the North have still won? Certainly, if they fought it out to the end. The UK was never I think going to send an army to the South, which remained absolutely poorer in men and material.

However, the victory would have been a lot more costly if the Northern blockade was broken, making it more plausible that the North would decide the price was just not worth it.

Yeah, if the blockage is your entire justification, that is a non-starter, especially as far as England is concerned. They were the singular global power MOST invested in maintaining the legal precedent that a power can in fact impose a blockade against belligerents.

The issue, btw, in the war of 1812 wasn't so much the blockade of France (which did piss the US off, but not really enough to consider war) but rather impressment of American sailors, and just the general feeling in the US that England did not take them seriously or treat them as a sovereign nation. Hell, I think the UK hadn't even, at the point, fulfilled all the terms of the Paris Peace treaty.

[Razgovory]

I think rebels are like pirates in that they are lawbreakers that are stopped by a military force.  I don't know when the ideas regarding who is and who is not a legal combatant were accepted by the people in the Western World.

The US has not declared war on anyone for 70 years.  The US has been at war a whole bunch of times since then.  I think a formal declaration of war would result in certain powers moving from the Executive to the Congress, and all the US presidents in that time have wanted to avoid that.

I wouldn't be surprised if there were some legal things in the 1860s that depended on whether or not the US was at war. For instance, was the crime of treason possible without a state of war? IIRC selling defense secrets to the Russians during the Cold War wasn't treason in the US (note: I don't know this but I seem to remember something along those lines). I don't know if treason was possible in a vernacular war.

Treason is only crime defined in the US Constitution.  I don't know exactly how it worked in the 19th century because there are occasions of people being convicted of treason against states.  John Brown was convicted of treason against the State of Virginia, a state he would have no loyalty to to begin with.  I know that people were convicted of treason for rebellions that did not include a declared war.

[ulmont]

I wouldn't be surprised if there were some legal things in the 1860s that depended on whether or not the US was at war. For instance, was the crime of treason possible without a state of war? IIRC selling defense secrets to the Russians during the Cold War wasn't treason in the US (note: I don't know this but I seem to remember something along those lines). I don't know if treason was possible in a vernacular war.

Treason is specifically defined in the US Constitution.  While it requires either confession or two witnesses to the same act, it does not require a war.

Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort. No person shall be convicted of treason unless on the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or on confession in open court.

The Congress shall have power to declare the punishment of treason, but no attainder of treason shall work corruption of blood, or forfeiture except during the life of the person attainted.

[Treason is only crime defined in the US Constitution.  I don't know exactly how it worked in the 19th century because there are occasions of people being convicted of treason against states.  John Brown was convicted of treason against the State of Virginia, a state he would have no loyalty to to begin with.  I know that people were convicted of treason for rebellions that did not include a declared war.

Virginia has a similar definition to the US at this point.

§ 18.2-481. Treason defined; how proved and punished.
Treason shall consist only in:

(1) Levying war against the Commonwealth;

(2) Adhering to its enemies, giving them aid and comfort;

(3) Establishing, without authority of the legislature, any government within its limits separate from the existing government;

(4) Holding or executing, in such usurped government, any office, or professing allegiance or fidelity to it; or

(5) Resisting the execution of the laws under color of its authority.

Such treason, if proved by the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or by confession in court, shall be punishable as a Class 2 felony.

Easy to prosecute John Brown under that standard.