Booknotes: Managing the Union Army

New Arrival:

• Managing the Union Army: Scott, McClellan, Halleck, and Grant as General-in-Chief by Earl J. Hess (LSU Press, 2026).

Earl Hess strikes again! Only two weeks after I posted a review of his latest book, another one covering a very different, but equally compelling, subject is released. Managing the Union Army: Scott, McClellan, Halleck, and Grant as General-in-Chief is both an in-depth study of the position itself as well as a critical evaluation of the four men who occupied that seat during the Civil War.

Hess feels that the role and authority of the Union Army general-in-chief is frequently misunderstood in the literature. From the description: "The general-in-chief did not command the million-man Union army that fought in the Civil War, as most historians have assumed; rather, he was a member of a management team that included the president and the secretary of war. The president, as commander-in-chief, created the position by appointing an officer to it, and he could dismiss that officer at any time and choose not to appoint another."

In his introduction, the author outlines the four main tasks assigned to army general-in-chief. They were (1) to "serve as an advisor to the secretary of war and to the president" on a variety of matters including strategy, (2) "influence the daily administration of the army," (3) find "good high-ranking officers to fill important positions in the army, administratively and in the field," and (4), when and where desired or impelled, "to take command of important movements in the field" (pg. 3). In discussing how well or poorly each officer fulfilled these tasks, Hess "shows how the performance of the four men varied greatly ... He also details Grant’s unique achievement as a field commander―ending the war, which none of the other Union generals-in-chief were able to do." Among the flood of Grant books that have been published in recent years, one notable omission has been a standalone treatment of his role in the war as general-in-chief. With roughly half of this book's 400-plus pages of narrative devoted to that subject, we get close to that here.

More from the description: Hess's Managing the Union Army "upends our understanding of the general-in-chief, his role in the Union military system, and his influence on the conflict’s outcome. Hess reinterprets the accomplishments and failures of the four men who held the position, evaluating Winfield Scott, George B. McClellan, Henry W. Halleck, and Ulysses S. Grant in ways that might surprise many students of Civil War military history." For example, Hess "offers a much more positive evaluation of Halleck than is typical of the scholarly literature on Civil War commanders. Halleck was not only a successful general-in-chief but also fundamentally supported Grant during the last year of the conflict by serving as chief of staff of the U.S. Army, a fourth member of the management team."

Hess also examines the key part that personality played in carrying out the role of general-in-chief. His study "illuminates how personality traits helped or hindered the generals-in-chief during the war. McClellan’s deeply flawed personality contributed to his failure in fulfilling the duties of the position. Grant’s strongly positive personality and will-do attitude, by contrast, helped him to succeed more fully in the role than any of his predecessors."

This book, "through a close examination of administrative history, offers a dramatically new way of understanding how the Union army worked in the Civil War."