Henry Warner Slocum

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Henry Warner Slocum bigraphy, stories - general, politician

Henry Warner Slocum : biography

September 24, 1827 – April 14, 1894

Henry Warner Slocum (September 24, 1827 – April 14, 1894), was a Union general during the American Civil War and later served in the United States House of Representatives from New York. During the war, he was one of the youngest major generals in the Army and fought numerous major battles in the Eastern Theater and in Georgia and the Carolinas. Controversy arose from his conduct at the Battle of Gettysburg, where he was accused of indecision and a dilatory advance to the battlefield, earning him the derogatory nickname "Slow Come".

Civil War

Early commands

At the outbreak of the Civil War, Slocum was appointed colonel of the 27th New York Infantry, which was a two-year regiment mustered in at Elmira, New York. He led the regiment in Maj. Gen. David Hunter’s division at the First Battle of Bull Run, where his regiment suffered 130 casualties and he was wounded in the thigh. In August 1861, he was appointed brigadier general of volunteers and commanded the 2nd Brigade, Maj. Gen. William B. Franklin’s 1st Division, I Corps during the Peninsula Campaign and the 1st Division, VI Corps at the Seven Days Battles, distinguishing himself at the Battle of Gaines’ Mill.Tagg, pp. 143-46.

On July 25, 1862, Slocum was appointed major general of volunteers to rank from July 4, the second youngest man in the Army to achieve that rank. Still in command of the 1st Division, he led it covering the retreat of Maj. Gen. John Pope after the Second Battle of Bull Run. At Crampton’s Gap during the Battle of South Mountain, he and his subordinate officers overrode their indecisive corps commander, Maj. Gen. William B. Franklin, assaulting the enemy line behind a stone wall and routing it. On October 20, 1862, he assumed command of the XII Corps after its commander, Maj. Gen. Joseph K. Mansfield, was killed at the Battle of Antietam, a battle where Slocum’s division was kept in reserve. He led the corps in the Battle of Fredericksburg (where he fortunately arrived too late on the scene to see any real action in that Union catastrophe) and the Battle of Chancellorsville, where he commanded the right wing, including his corps and those of Maj. Gens. George G. Meade and Oliver O. Howard, a force of 46,000 men. Slocum executed well and maneuvered his wing into the rear of Gen. Robert E. Lee’s army, only to be halted prematurely at Chancellorsville by Army of the Potomac commander Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker.Tagg, pp. 143-46. He publicly criticized Hooker after the battle and was one of the "cabal" of generals that attempted to have him removed from command.

Slocum was known as an unassertive, exceedingly careful, by-the-book officer.Sears, p. 191. By the summer of 1863, he was relatively young, at 36, to be a major general, but he possessed a manner that inspired confidence in his men. When Hooker was relieved of command of the Army of the Potomac, Slocum, being the most senior general in that army, was in line for command. However, he was not seriously considered, and agreed to serve under Meade.Tagg, p. 144.

Gettysburg

At the Battle of Gettysburg, Slocum received some criticism for his corps’ slow march to the battlefield, which led to his derisive nickname, "Slow Come". The XII Corps stopped at Two Taverns on the Baltimore Pike, about 5 miles southeast of the battlefield, by midmorning on July 1, 1863. Sometime between 1:30 and 2 p.m., he received an urgent message from Maj. Gen. Howard requesting immediate reinforcements at Gettysburg. Slocum later claimed that he had been unaware of the start of the battle, possibly because of an "acoustic shadow" caused by intervening hills. Officers on his staff, however, reported that by 1 p.m. they heard the sound of cannon, increasingly heavy musketry fire, and could see smoke rising high over the hills and the bursting of shells. In any event, the receipt of the message from Gen. Howard was clear evidence and unrelated to the acoustic situation.Sears, p. 191; Coddington, pp. 311-12.

Historian Larry Tagg claims that Slocum "spent the entire afternoon vacillating, neither bringing forward his corps nor going ahead himself to take command by virtue of his rank." Some historians have explained Slocum’s indecision by citing the "Pipe Creek Circular", Meade’s contingency plan for a defensive line in Maryland, saying that it directed Slocum to stop at Two TavernsPfanz, pp. 141-43. and into thinking that Meade wished to avoid a general engagement at Gettysburg. However, Meade’s supplementary order to Slocum, which placed the V Corps as well as the XII Corps under his direction, explicitly made any retrograde movement dependent on the decisions of Maj. Gen. John F. Reynolds in Gettysburg. (Reynolds had been killed earlier that day, but Slocum was unaware of that fact. The actions in Gettysburg made any immediate provisions of the circular irrelevant.)Coddington, p. 312.