Quebec both gained and lost in this scenario. They've gained far more control over their senators than they ever exercised historically at the expense of the number of senators in the upper house. Macdonald has a very dangerous game moving forward.
Wrapped in Flames: The Great American War and Beyond
- Thread starter EnglishCanuck
- Start date
I do like that this one rather interesting change sparks so much potential in how Canadian policy is shaped going forward.
The effects of this are just staggering. The Maritimes can actually influence policy on a federal level and get things out of Confederation instead of just being a dumping ground for central Canadian goods, the west can better fight for its natural resource revenue. Ontario just lost big and (assuming Canada comes together) will probably be ganged up on in the senate over contentious issues as the other provinces try and curb its power.
It will be neat to see how the upper house develops. I could see the house having a variety of methods of being chosen in the future with a mix of Senate districts, rep by pop, and simple appointments from the legislature all being done by various provinces. It's going to be super tricky to navigate.
I think this (one would assume) self-evident issue that, with rep-by-pop in both houses of Parliament, which gave Ontario effectively the most voice at the table in any discussion post-Confederation, speaks to the influence of the Macdonald-Cartier alliance and their skill at playing off the fears of literally every other politician in Canada with the exception of Joseph Howe who lead the only real anti-Confederation political movement of note. Having George Brown onside also helped as he was probably the only existent Liberal counterweight to the Macdonald-Cartier alliance who might have monkeyed about with Confederation as I described here.
The power to address the (to this day) issue of regionalism in the Senate is huge, but it does come with its own probable drawbacks. However, it might also make the position of Senators more interesting. OTL it's been seen as a cushy 'plum' job with... not a lot of real responsibility. Here I have so many strange political ideas to play with I'm almost giddy to fast forward to the 1870s. But I do have some self-restraint.
Ah you've picked up on something Macdonald has noted TTL! The exact machinery of Senate composition is something he wants to address, and in drawing it up he may want to be firmly away from prying eyes and in London...
I admit I am not much familiar with canadian history which is why I didn't comment earlier but something that's interesting to me is the upper house having real power.I think IRL no westmister system does that .Could one day a a senator be appointed PM ?what if a party loses the house but somehow wins the senate?
could the idea of Canada be stronger even if the government is weaker?
lots of potential here
could the idea of Canada be stronger even if the government is weaker?
lots of potential here
Last edited:
The upper house in the Westminister system is, more often than not, an unelected body. The Canadian Senate was designed to be that way but to also be appointed on partisan lines with the sole purview of the Prime Minister. It was (and is) a terrible system that probably generates more waste than efficiency. This system however is potentially going to be subject to the whims of Parliamentary politics, so a PM will have a lot of incentive to play nice with Premiers (unlike OTL where by and large PM's have been able to ignore the provinces outside election years) or at the very least be very supportive of the local party apparatus.
You have succinctly noted a few of the problems this system presents, the distinct possibility that a party controls the House, but the Senate has been appointed by provincial governments hostile to Ottawa may be a big problem until it gets figured out. There won't be a possibility of a Senator appointed PM, but the odds of a Senator having a rich and fulfilling political career after a term in office are not remote.
That may depend on how the rest of the country shakes out.
Oh indeed!
Chapter 86: All Quiet on the Potomac Front
Chapter 86: All Quiet on the Potomac Front
“It is just as much a matter of chance that I am still alive as that I might have been hit. In a bomb-proof dugout I might have been smashed to atoms, and in the open survive ten hours' bombardment unscathed. No soldier survives a thousand chances. But every soldier believes in Chance and trusts his luck.” - Virginia private to his family, April 1864
“As the year 1864 dawned, it seemed that war was everywhere. While fighting raged across Virginia, Tennessee, Canada and the Pacific war was also raging in Mexico as that nation was invaded. Spain found itself pulled into another adventure in the Caribbean and South America would find itself pulled into the most calamitous war of the 1860s on that continent. It was enough to cause writer Anthony Trollope to morosely quip in a letter from Montreal “If there is peace in this hemisphere, I cannot find it.”
While Britain and the United States were seeking tentative peace talks in Rotterdam, the fighting in the South continued unabated, building towards a terrible crescendo…” – The World on Fire: The Third Anlgo-American War, Ashley Grimes, 2009, Random House Publishing
“The winter of 1863-64 had, by the standards of the great campaigns of 1863, been relatively quiet. While Lee’s army had been driven away from its siege of Washington, it remained strong along the southern banks of the river and outside the entrenchments south of the city. Rebel artillery fire still occasionally rained down on the capital, and the work of sharpshooters and mortars still killed men by pinpricks, but compared to the battles of August and September, the time from October of 1863 to March of 1864 had been positively sedate.
During that time, Rosecrans had been busy reshuffling his army. He had relieved or accepted the resignation of nearly a dozen commanders, and was busy reorganizing his forces from the past years heavy fighting. While many then and now have castigated his insistence on waiting and simply strengthening Washington’s defences, it is important to note that the Army of the Potomac was indeed exhausted and in desperate need of refit and reorganization. New draftees were coming in, and the new officers were taking control of their units.
It was not merely new officers, but new ways of organizing the army. Among his changes were fixes to the daily diet of the troops, camp sanitary changes, improvements and accountability of the quartermaster system, addition of and monitoring of company cooks, several hospital reforms, an improved furlough system, orders to stem rising desertion, improved drills, and stronger officer training. Though McClellan had adopted piecemeal changes along these lines across 1863, he had never simply sat down and coordinated army-wide changes, which Rosecrans used the months between October 1863 and March 1864 to do well.
These changes proved to be vital in 1864 as, even with the victories at Savage’s Factory and the lifting of the Siege of Washington, the morale in the Army of the Potomac had fallen sharply. Desertion had increased over the winter, in both armies, and as such the need to make examples of deserters (and replace them) became paramount. Though Rosecrans would order many executions for desertion, Lincoln would increasingly commute such sentences. On January 7, 1864, Lincoln spoke out against this treatment of deserters when he showed mercy toward a deserter named Henry Andrews. “I had ordered his punishment commuted to imprisonment during the war at hard labor, and had so telegraphed,” wrote Lincoln, ending the message stating, “I did this, not on any merit in the case, but because I am trying to evade the butchering business lately.”
Though desertion and bounty jumping were becoming a more common occurrence, many commanders and soldiers were not sad to see these men go. “Such another depraved, vice hardened, and desperate set of human beings has never before disgraced an army,” one disgusted New Hampshire soldier would write at seeing his new fellows in the regiment. Another officer would describe his new regiment as “bounty jumpers, thieves, cutthroats, and blackguards” who he must “nevertheless lead to war.” While many were less than impressed by the quality of the troops in 1864, the sad truth that commanders realized was that so long as the war continued both in Canada and the South, they would need these men.
The second problem was the expiry of enlistments. Many regiments had mustered in the spring 1861 with three year terms of enlistment, these would be expiring in early 1864 which placed the army in imminent threat of a manpower shortage. Thousands of men tired of war or simply unable to go on went home, and special incentives were needed to keep them on. One tired Massachusset’s veteran wrote “They use a man here just as they do for a turkey shooting match, fire at it all day and if they don’t kill it, raffle it off in the evening; so with us, if they can’t kill you in three years they want you for three more - but I will stay.” His own unit, the 19th Massachusetts, would be exemplary of such regiments that re-enlisted. With three quarters of its men remaining to the army, it was allowed to keep its unit identity, and the three year veterans received a special chevron on their sleeves…
Though he disliked Hooker on a personal level, he eagerly adopted the Corps badges and insignia which had, until that point, been raised at the initiative of individual commanders. It boosted morale and allowed men to retain a sense of identity. He gladly doled out the first such badge from on high to his beloved V Corps, and would soon follow with the rest.
Another idea he adopted was the establishment of the Bureau of Military Intelligence. Previously various army commanders, and even corps commanders, had simply relied on their own intelligence. McClellan had entrusted his entire intelligence apparatus to Allan Pinkerton and his agents, which by 1863 had led to a centralized system which answered only to McClellan and he trusted Pinkerton’s reports occasionally above those of his own scouts and cavalry. Rosecrans ended this, firing Pinkerton shortly after taking command and instead placing an officer in charge of all intelligence gathering. George H. Sharpe would, at the recommendation of numerous officers, be placed in command of the newly constituted Bureau of Military Information (BMI) on January 14th 1864. They would prove invaluable in the coming campaign, assessing and coordinating all intelligence information from special agents and scouts.
One final initiative, which he did owe to McClellan, was to fold the Union Army Balloon Corps into the BMI apparatus. Though Thaddeus Lowe had managed to keep his airships flying and spotting Confederate movements, the rapid campaigns of 1863 had not seen him utilized to his full potential. Rosecrans, who was now perpetually worried about being surrounded by the foe, wished to have a better view of the battlefield and for his army so put the aeronaut to good use.
Colonel Sharpe and Captain Lowe, the duo who would revolutionize Union intelligence gathering
Meanwhile, he was shaking up the corps command of the whole army.
The most well appointed forces were the III Corps and Rosecrans' old V Corps. The III Corps under Hooker was perhaps the most well organized and battle tested Corps in the entire Army of the Potomac. It had seen hard fighting since the Rappahannock Campaign in 1862 and in the Battles of Manassas Junction. At the Battle of Fredericksburg and then the Battle of Chantilly it had been Hooker’s men who had inflicted such punishing damage on Lee's army. “We were veterans to a man,” one soldier would recall fondly in a letter home prior to the 1864 campaigning season. The hard fighting corps numbered only 14,000 strong at the outset of the campaign.
The V Corps, now under John F. Reynolds, was just as well organized. Though it had gotten off to a rough start after Reynolds counter attack against the rebel forces had stalled in September of 1863, he had drilled and organized his forces as best he could. His division commanders, Meade, Whipple and Reno were all battle tested, and he had good rapport with each and the trust of the commander of the army. Reynolds commanded 16,000 men who would march south with Rosecrans at their head, proud of ‘Old Rosey’ as their leader.
IV Corps, now commanded by Ord, with the divisions of Slocum, King, and Gibbon had been retrained. It had however, suffered the most significant losses due to desertion. The sacking of both General McClellan, broadly popular in the corps, and Franklin had deflated their morale, their ranks collapsing to 13,000 men.
Daniel Sickle’s in command of the XIV Corps had earned his reputation on and off the battlefield. A ferocious man and a student of Hooker’s theory of war, he had taken to carousing amongst his officers and enforcing a stern discipline with the men. His divisions were those of Martindale, Pleasanton and the fresh division of Darius Couch replacing Sykes regulars. Couch’s men had spent much of 1862-63 in garrison with mostly skirmishing, and were mostly fresh compared to other units. It made XIV Corps one of the strongest in the army at 19,000 men.
XII Corps, still known derisively to some as the “Flying Dutchmen” but to many renamed the “Fighting Dutchmen” after their bravery at Savage’s Station, was much depleted. The draft of 1863 and their fame had reinforced their ranks with new recruits and regiments, but were sadly reduced to a strength of 14,000 men.
The newest addition was the II Corps under Hancock. These tough veterans had fought from Maine to New York, and had been the first major reassignment from fronts fighting the British. Hancock was perhaps one of the most veteran commanders in the field, and his presence, and reputation for saving Albany, boosted morale amongst the men who worked with him. Though they were small, a scant 12,000 men, it was a force that would take whatever the rebels threw at them and take it gladly, his two divisions under the leadership of Stoughton and Meagher.
In November of 1863 Rosecrans had begun organizing two new corps, one he hoped to strengthen his army, and another under duress.
The XVIII Corps was a primarily green unit, made up of troops and units drafted or recently formed, with only the veterans of Wadsworth’s defenders of Washington who were now commanded by Solomon Meredith. The two other divisions were under James Shields, who had been captured in the Valley in 1862 but parolled at the end of 1863 and returned to active duty, and finally Orlando B. Wilcox. While it was filled with fresh recruits and some veterans to stiffen the ranks, leaving it with 22,000 men, it was little trusted by the other commanders. Meredith had been given the division command purely by political connections, and Shield’s was still under the cloud of the Battle of Winchester. Only Wilcox seemed immune to the corps poor initial reputation. Its commander Oliver O. Howard, had been promoted thanks to his connections in II Corps, but was left with the thankless task of attempting to form the force into something resembling a coherent unit.
Finally, the XX Corps was the most distinct unit in the whole army. Composed of two divisions of two brigades each, the men were all colored troops. Initially conceived as a force which would only replace troops in defending Washington, Lincoln seized on it as a way to cement the loyalty of the Radicals. It would be composed of only black troops and white officers, it was a way to promote the ideas of what Lincoln now considered the Union to be fighting for, freedom for all men and an end to slavery. “If it does not drive the fear of God into the heart of the secesh, it will at least drive the bayonet home,” Lincoln quipped to Thadeus Stevens in a meeting regarding its creation.
Officering the corps proved to be something of a unique challenge. The regiments took men of varying quality, from ardent abolitionists and their competent officers like Robert Shaw, to scoundrels and rank chasers like Edward Ferrero. The First division was placed under the overall command of Rufus Saxton, who had so ably led his men in the defence of Washington. In it he had the only black regiment officers near exclusively by black officers under Colonel Martin Delany, who had been loath to miss the opportunity to fight alongside his brothers in arms. The Second was placed under Fererro, who had eagerly mouthed the platitudes of abolition, but would later be accused of seeking his own glory instead. Overall command had initially been meant to be granted to the Radical darling John C. Fremont, but he had refused such a ‘demotion’ and so was instead passed over for John Pope. Pope, previously in charge of Louisville, had been pining for assignment to a field command, and after his falling out with commanders in the West, had petitioned for action in the East. Lincoln, seeing Fremont refuse, had accepted his old friend’s enthusiasm for the command. Due to its small size, the corps only mustered some 11,000 men.
Rounding out the formation was the newly formed Cavalry Corps under Stonemen. His two divisions under Buford and Averell now commanded four brigades of calvary.
With the attached artillery and engineers, Rosecrans had increased the strength of the Army of the Potomac to the heady days of 1862, with over 135,000 men ready for duty come May of 1864.
By contrast, the Army of Northern Virginia had been much depleted. Lee had saved as many men as he could, but the fighting and the siege had taken its toll on his beloved soldiers just as much as the winter had. Between the Maryland Campaign, the Siege of Washington, and the battles of Savage’s Station and Dranesville, Lee had lost 40,000 men. From a strength of 123,000 the year prior the army had dwindled to a mere 85,000. “Far too many Southern boys lay in shallow graves between Fredericksburg and the Potomac,” one of Lee’s commanders would write, reflecting on the losses suffered over the past year. Though it had been a dispiriting winter, the newspapers would giddily write that this was, in fact, the 'Valley Forge' moment of the army, something it's commanders sincerely hoped.
To his dismay, Lee had only three proper corps available to him. Despite pleading with President Davis, to the point where he had almost offered his resignation, the Confederate President had refused to authorize the withdrawal of the two divisions which had withdrawn to Annapolis in the aftermath of the Battle of Savage’s Station. This meant that his Fourth Corps was now, effectively, only a single division strong, leaving the army’s true strength at a scant 72,000 men.
In the spring of 1864 much of it was dispersed along the southern banks of the Potomac with men scattered guarding his long and cumbersome lines of supply all the way back to Manassas Junction and Petersburg. Though he could still be supplied by boat to an extent, he was largely dependent on his overland supply which was minimal. Worse, since 1863 the men under his command had been engaged in hunting contrabands. The practice was highly lucrative, and many soldiers simply rounded up any African American they could find and shipped them south to the slave markets of Richmond. With pay sporadic in the chaotic events of 1863 and the winter months dull, it was an easy supplement for the soldiers to enrich themselves. Such activities interfered with guarding supply lines, discipline, and other such rudimentary tasks in the army.
Lee himself finally had to issue orders to the effect that such activities would not be tolerated while men were on duty, and to drive the point home had two men bullwhipped for abandoning their posts in order to partake in the practice, angrily writing "If white men wish to behave like lazy field hands, I will treat them as such." He did not however, ban the practice and merely ordered that captured “runaways” be brought to the Quartermasters Corps for proper reimbursement through military channels…
Breckinridge’s take over at the helm of the War Department did wonders for Lee’s army in the winter of 1863. Whereas the previous Commissary General, Lucius Northrop, had been placed in his position because of his friendship with Davis, Breckinridge was able to gently convince the President that his administration, and the war effort, would suffer. Reluctantly Davis acknowledged this, and allowed the talented Isaac St. John to be placed in charge which began to rationalize the supplies for each of the armies in the Confederacy.
The Army of Northern Virgnia had suffered heavily in the winter months, but using slave labor, British rail iron and imported machinery, Breckinridge managed to rebuild the rail system leading to Manassas and again organize a more competent overland supply route which delivered material to Lee’s army on the south bank of the Potomac. He also rationalized the intelligence gathering under Lee, controlling all scouts and spies through a semi-informal network of agents that reported to his men in the field and thence to Lee, who often coordinated these reports with Stuart’s scouting reports.
While these did help with the material and morale of the army, they did not address its dwindling numbers.
The passage of the Conscription Act in late 1863 meant that Breckinridge was responsible for rounding up tens of thousands of men to reinforce Lee’s battered army. Draft officers spread out across the South hauling men in and ‘draping them in gray and putting a rifle in their hands’ to shore up the lines. The threat of conscription did serve to keep many men whose enlistments were expiring in the ranks, but with the developing need for larger garrisons elsewhere and Breckinridge’s fear that Richmond would be a target in the upcoming campaign season, he could only bolster the ranks of the army with another 12,000 men.
Lee though, would make do with what he had. He put his recent promotion to Lt. General to good use, and wielded his authority like a club in order to get the army in line.
His first steps beginning in 1863 were to reorganize his commands. Jackson and Longstreet, his most trusted lieutenants, were of course remaining in command of First and Second Corps respectively. The Third Corps needed a new leader as Magruder’s wounds from the previous year were serious enough that he had to be relegated to command of the Chesapeake defences. In his place Richard S. Ewell was promoted to commanding the Third Corps.
The spare division from Whiting’s command, which though Whiting wanted returned, Lee was loathe to do. He realized he needed every man and musket south of the Potomac. Instead he would combine the orphaned division with Samuel G. French’s ‘sweepings’ who had played the role of distraction to the Union I Corps the previous year and been instrumental with their surrender. This newly created Fifth Corps was small, barely 13,000 men, but necessary to allow Lee to keep his options open. Placed under the command of Ambrose P. Hill, it would function as Lee’s reserve for the upcoming campaigns.
Richard Ewell, and Ambrose Hill, the new corps commanders in the Army of Northern Virginia
His army thus reconstituted, Lee had 84,000 men to face the newly reformed Army of the Potomac in the coming season…” - At the Sign of Triumph: The Rapidan Campaign, Dylan Gordon, Boston University Press, 1982
----
General Rosecrans Commanding
II Corps: Hancock
1st Division Stoughton 2nd Division Meagher
III Corps: Hooker
1st Division Grover 2nd Division Naglee 3rd Division Kearney
IV Corps Ord
1st Division Slocum 2nd Division King 3rd Division Gibbon
V Corps: Reynolds
1st Division Meade 2nd Division Whipple 3rd Division Reno
XII Corps: Sigel
1st Division Schenk 2nd Division Steinwehr 3rd Division Schimmelfennig
XIV Corps: Sickles
1st Division Martindale 2nd Division Pleasanton 3rd Division Couch
XVIII Corps: Howard
1st Division Meredith 2nd Division Shields 3rd Division Wilcox
XX Corps (Colored): Pope
1st Division Saxton 2nd Division Ferrero
Cavalry Corps: Stoneman
1st Division Buford 2nd Division Averell
II Corps: Hancock
1st Division Stoughton 2nd Division Meagher
III Corps: Hooker
1st Division Grover 2nd Division Naglee 3rd Division Kearney
IV Corps Ord
1st Division Slocum 2nd Division King 3rd Division Gibbon
V Corps: Reynolds
1st Division Meade 2nd Division Whipple 3rd Division Reno
XII Corps: Sigel
1st Division Schenk 2nd Division Steinwehr 3rd Division Schimmelfennig
XIV Corps: Sickles
1st Division Martindale 2nd Division Pleasanton 3rd Division Couch
XVIII Corps: Howard
1st Division Meredith 2nd Division Shields 3rd Division Wilcox
XX Corps (Colored): Pope
1st Division Saxton 2nd Division Ferrero
Cavalry Corps: Stoneman
1st Division Buford 2nd Division Averell
Lt. General Robert E. Lee commanding
First Corps: Jackson
Garnett, Trimble, D. H. Hill and Heth’s divisions
Second Corps: Longstreet
Anderson, Early, Pickett and
Third Corps: Ewell
McClaws, Jones and Griffith’s divisions
Fourth Corps: Whiting (detached at Annapolis)
Holmes and Ransom’s divisions
Fifth Corps: A. P. Hill
Hood and French’s divisions
Cavalry Corps: Stuart
First Corps: Jackson
Garnett, Trimble, D. H. Hill and Heth’s divisions
Second Corps: Longstreet
Anderson, Early, Pickett and
Third Corps: Ewell
McClaws, Jones and Griffith’s divisions
Fourth Corps: Whiting (detached at Annapolis)
Holmes and Ransom’s divisions
Fifth Corps: A. P. Hill
Hood and French’s divisions
Cavalry Corps: Stuart
And so the stage is set for the 1864 campaigns in the East. It's very little politics for a while now, so buckle up for the next few war chapters coming this July!
is it bad my first thought was "there gonna get war crimed "especially since there commander was oh dejvu [sorry just have to point it out whenever it happens.I remember typing this before. If I remember correctly someone's gonna argue with me with about this] anyways there led by John pope who managed to piss off Lee like no other union commander.
IRRC the union naming a LT general IOTL was a big deal because only washington and Scott held that rank and it was reversed for generals in chief but in the Confederate army LT generals were corp and small army commanders
Longstreet and jackson were granted this rank in 1862 for example so Lee would have probably very offended by Davis If he suggested such a demotion as he was a full general that outranked it already.
Got me a good chuckle with this one. Lincoln is always right on point isn't he?
I pity the poor souls who are going to end up on the wrong side of the border after all of this is over. Because, this is where we're heading. Slavery won't end in 1864 on the North American continent. Looking at the ATL situation, it's hard to see an outcome where the South doesn't actually gain independence... I think if it wasn't already obvious, this chapter made it clear.
No one seems to be in a position to deliver a decisive blow, although the campaigning season is yet to come and surprises may await us ahead, who knows?
Last edited:
Really good chapter. It'll be interesting to see a northern army that properly took its time to organize and use every tool at its disposal.
The George Sharpe gave me PTSD from that awful Tsouras book where the man is basically clairvoyant lol
Also interesting is how the Confederates are in such a bad shape. I thought they'd be well enough to stalemate the North into giving them independence thanks to the British joining the war.
Lastly a little nitpick: "smashed to atoms" sounds too modern for 1864 writing. I know the atom was discovered in the 1800s, but I don't know. I defer to you and your research
The George Sharpe gave me PTSD from that awful Tsouras book where the man is basically clairvoyant lol
Also interesting is how the Confederates are in such a bad shape. I thought they'd be well enough to stalemate the North into giving them independence thanks to the British joining the war.
Lastly a little nitpick: "smashed to atoms" sounds too modern for 1864 writing. I know the atom was discovered in the 1800s, but I don't know. I defer to you and your research
Tell me about it with the George Sharpe stuff. It got so incredibly annoying in that series how omniscient he was. It was the typical trope of making your enemies idiots and the guys you want to win amazingly intelligent in order to get the desired result.
I have some fears that this series might end up going in that direction because imo the Union is doing a little too well. My study of a possible Trent War sees it as virtually impossible for the Union to win this war. They simply cannot fight both the English (who are pretty much at the height of their historical power) and the Confederates.
If they're lucky they can escape the war without losing too much (basically just the 11 Confederate states) but the south's independence is all but assured imo.
It would take an immense amount of good fortune (on a Tsouras level) for the Union to definitively win this war.
Well, we had the Fort Sherman massacre already, and an entire corps of African Americans marching south to Richmond is not going to sit well with a lot of Southerners so let's just say that with a 'who's who' of that particular command it will have some very high, and very low, moments as it gets moving.
This is something I had actually forgotten. I had thought the CSA handed out those ranks later, but that's a good point. Might have to fix that!
The man's wit is legendary and I do appreciate him for it!
It's going to be an interesting one, especially since you can cram a lot of campaigns in between May and September. In OTL's 1864 Lee's army had shrunk considerably more than this, while the Union had a similar manpower problem and crisis with desertion and enlistments expiring, so Lee is by comparison actually in better position than he was OTL, with much of the same bloody ground behind him that was fought over so hard in our own Overland Campaign, and Virginia was spared almost a year of campaigning by the Siege of Washington so it's a much less burned over space with plenty of supplies waiting. Quite a few differences from OTL I can tell you...
Thank you! One thing about Rosecrans is that he always took his time to make sure his army was in a good position, and with the whole army nearly having been bagged in a nasty siege, it makes sense he'd focus for a while on rebuilding the battered army into something of a more cohesive fighting force.
Ha, he isn't all knowing (as you'll see) but he has done some wonderful work in 'filling in the blanks' for the Union Army whose intelligence gathering was... mediocre before hand. For a slight spoiler, Rosecrans is going to know exactly how desperate Lee's supply situation is for the upcoming campaign. Lee's position is better than it was OTL as I mentioned, but losing, effectively, 40,000 men while having almost another 20,000 sitting where they are just a force in being is a big blow when there's 100,000 vengeful Yankees coming south!
As for the atoms thing, the idea was speculated upon come 1808 and I've found enough people who shouldn't have known it (from a farmer's journal in Canada West to a Mississippi riverman's letter) that I felt comfortable enough letting this particular one through since this is a line from All Quiet on the Western Front that I felt I couldn't pass up to describe the stalemate around the Potomac. I nearly didn't use it, but when I discovered how old the word actually was, and that some people in the era were using it as a euphemism for tiny, I felt like it was a safe bet.
Oh we're not going the Tsouras route I can tell you that, though I am keeping the ultimate outcome close to the chest. That said, if the Union could turn around from a peace treaty with Britain and persuade the populace that it was worth it to keep fighting the South then an 1866 ending to the war would not be impossible. The Union manpower and industrial advantage would begin to tell, just at a far later date than OTL. However, the naval aspect, for the Union, is very different since, as I'll cover later, the Confederacy is no longer a small navy power, and two years of fighting Britain on the seas has taken its toll...
The Union can still dish out some damage, but it is an election year where the election will ultimately be a referendum on the war.
Or at least a sardonic one!
I am really looking forward to this timeline moving forward. It’s been a great read though hopefully it stays well well well away from the abomination that was Tsouras’s books
Oh rest assured, the... interesting events of Tsouras's books will not be taking place here. George Sharpe (more power to him) was a talented man OTL, but not the near demigod that Tsouras made him out to be. Not only will a sudden surge of Sharps Carbines also not be making the Union a force with automatic firepower, but the coffee mill gun was not a pre-modern machine gun and will not be making appearances in vast numbers.
That said, my taste for the guns means I do have one happy little moment for them in 1864 which I hope is appreciated...
With the coming battles in Virginia I think people will see that the outcome is, while not quite pre-ordained, enough to keep everyone in Richmond and Philadelphia biting their nails until November of 1864.
I gotta say you’ve done a phenomenal job with this timeline as I’m constantly on the edge of my seat reading trying to figure out how this is going to go. The Union has a massive task ahead of them to convince the Northern population that they are winning against the South. I’m also excited for the Western theater where there’s so many fascinating personalities running around.
Thank you! I'm hoping I can keep the Western theater well written too. It has a really big meeting of personalities coming up as soon as I finish the the first series of May-July battles in the East. There will be a lot of ground to cover, then some political bruhaha, and the campaigns of late 1864 before arguably the biggest political contest of that year, The election will be a three part post in and of itself.