"The Western Theatre" Topic

I'm a bit of an ACW tyro so don't get upset if this is overly ignorant, but is it fair to say the Western Theatre in the ACW had little strategic significance to the war as a whole?

This is not to say it wasn't as bloody as the east, nor as tenaciously fought. It just seems that post-Hood, when the Union had won, nothing much seemed to happen there & elements from both sides (some of Hood's men joining the AoNV & Sherman's March) turning east.

Closing the Mississippi River to the South was pretty significant. Vicksburg was a big deal.

Umm… I would say the opposite, actually. The war was really won in the Western theater.

The Union won the war in the west. The Eastern theater was basically stalemated until the very end of the war.

I would agree with the above. It is underrated. The East winning the war is a myth. Just as the AWI being won in the Northeast is a myth--it was won in the South. And for the sake of completeness, the US saving the Brits during WWI and thereby winning the war is also a myth. :-)

Agree with all of the above.

The War in the West was the decisive theater.

mjc

"The War in the West was the decisive theater."

Because? Details, please (or at least recommend a good book).

I thought this book was pretty good:

amazon.com/gp/product/019516895X?ie=UTF8&tag=advent01-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=019516895X

I think the main reasons the West is underrated is that it doesn't have the charisma or mythology that's built up around R.E.Lee and the ANV over the decades, nor does it have the national symbolism of Gettysburg.

There is no 'Vicksburg Address'.

Vicksburg was just as important – some would argue more so – but the nature of events there don't have that 'one battle to decide all' feel that belongs to Gettysburg, because the siege element has never captured the imagination in the manner of Pickett's Charge or Little Round Top.

Not saying any of this is justified,rather that's the way its panned out.

The Eastern Theater was essentially the series of campaigns and battles between the Army of the Potomac and the Army of Northern Virginia and was largely limited to battles fought in northern Virginia. It also was the area closest to both capitals and the major newspaper of both sides. As a result most of the news stories involved that area and the "political focus" for both sides was in that area. The typical definition is anything fought east of the Appalachian Mountains (which technically would make Atlanta and the March to the Sea part of the Eastern Theater), but in actuality just about everything that occurred outside of this limited area can be thought of as being within the Western Theater (typically defined as being fought west of the Appalachian Mountains).

In reality the Union had to win in both theaters in order to win the war. The Union did not consider the war over until all southern forces had capitulated, but the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia was considered the most significant.

Still and all a lot of critical stuff occurred in the Western Theater.

A counterpart to the "the war was won in the West" theme can be found in the recent book "The Grand Design – Strategy and the U. S. Civil War" by Donald Stoker.

Just to name a few reasons:

1. New Orleans was by far the largest city in the South.

2. The Mississippi / Ohio / Missouri were the major commercial 'highway' for 2/3 of the entire nation (north and south combined). All of this commerce passed through New Orleans.

3. The majority of the South's food crops, draft animals, and horses came from the border states and west.

4. The Battles fought in the west produced 'results'. As mentioned above the war in the East produced many battles but failed to produce any thing that significantly changed the status quo until the west had collapsed.

Always good to get informed opinion.
Many thanks.

What they all said.

I totally agree – the Western Theatre was the theatre of decision – when you look at the East, the battle lines moved comparably very little, while in the West the Union gobbled up Confederate territory like the Russians gobbled up Central Asia; as noted, New Orleans was the largest city in the South and Vicksburg and the Mississippi were key to moving men and material across the South

The Confederates had some good troops and excellent divisional generals in the West, but the army commanders had by and large not the same reputation as Confederate corp and army commanders in the East – Joe Johnson is under-rated, but Bragg was a disaster and Hood was even worse

The Mississippi basin drains the arable heart of North America, from the Rockies to the Appalachians, from Canada south to the Gulf of Mexico. Whoever controls New Orleans controls that vast drainage. The Mississippi basin is the central geographic fact of the United States, and it was the backbone and ribs of the Civil War.

The reason that most of the forces moved out of the west was that the U.S. had largely won the war in that area. After Nashville the remaining Confederate forces in the area were not strong enough to pose a serious threat to the U.S. forces in the area. Those same Confederate troops were desperately needed in the Carolinas in order to try to stop or at least slow Sherman's advance, which at that point was being opposed by local forces most of which were previously posted along the Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina coasts. In addition, much of the infrastructure that the Confederacy had previously relied on for its war effort in the west was either captured, destroyed or had been isolated. It wasn't so much a case of the west not being important, but rather that the remaining important Confederate forces and resources towards the end of the war were mostly in the east that caused both sides to move there.

However things were not completely quiet. In early 1865 Wilson advanced from Tennessee against Forest in central Alabama while Stoneman operated out of Tennessee against Confederate infrastructure in Virginia and North Carolina, and another U.S. column moved against Confederate forces holding Mobile Alabama.

"I think the main reasons the West is underrated…"

I don't agree with the premise. No student of the ACW underrates the west, so who exactly is it that underrates the west?

"I don't agree with the premise. No student of the ACW underrates the west, so who exactly is it that underrates the west?"

Well, ochoin deach for one…

Past tense please.

Underate the west, probably not. But if you belong to a few yahoogroups with a base of history not gaming, you will find several who perhaps overrate the east.

I agree the west was very significant to the winning of the war, not the east Shermans march to the sea.

The largest single blow to the Confederacy was the loss of New Orleans. With the only shipyards in the South and its position near the Gulf it was the Confederacy's only hope of holding the Mississippi River, supplying the Western states and breaking the blockade. They were casting 10" guns there by 1862! Give the win to David Glasgow Farragut and 22 wooden warships of the U.S.N. The Confederates didn't realize the importance then, and many people don't get it now.
Also, on land, Grant's Henry and Donelson Campaign and Vicksburg Campaign were skillfully executed. In the West the Union Generals and troops were often very tough.

General Halleck said "Vicksburg is worth 40 Richmonds."

The heart of the South was Georgia and South Carolinia, remember these were the only two states to vote to leave the union at the 1850 Nashville Convention. When Sherman took the western armies through these two states, he drove the final stake into the South. We many not remember how anti Union these two states were, but the boys from the Midwest sure did and were intent on making them never forget what happens to traitors.

The American Civil War is like a stage magician's trick. In the East, you have a "plausible diversion," and everybody looks closely, and doesn't realize that the real action is in the West.
Grelber

Great comments on the importance of the War in the West. It is also a great source for wargame scenarios. There was a huge variation in troop quality, which always makes for fun (for example at Perryville the Union had both experienced units and units that had never drilled together as a regiment. Talk about a challenge to any commander!) Not to mention quality of commanders on both sides. I could go on…and on.

My apologies for jumping in a month late, but I must have missed this post, and the topic and the resulting discussion has is very interesting.

One counter thought on the subject. Was the war won in the west because the South put it's limited resources into producing the stalemate in the east? I think a good arguement could be made for this. What would have happened if Richmond had fallen in July of 1863 instead of Vicksburg? What percentage of essential war goods were produced in and around Richmond?

I would argue that the west fell because the southern leaders, at the time, placed a higher priority on Richmond than the west. How much of this was politics and courting public opinion is hard to say, but the south could not be strong in all theaters. They placed a higher priority on the defense of Richmond than the west, leading to the eastern stalemate.

Another interesting question to mull over. Would we have the same opionions of Sherman and Grant as we do now if they had commanded armies in the east in 1861-63?

Was the Grant of 1862 a good enough general to have had success were he to have commanded the Army of the Potomac in that year, or did he need some time to gain experience and develop the generalship needed to fight Lee and the ANV on equal terms?

What if Grant had been commanding in the east in 1862 and had a Shiloh experience against the ANV? One could argue that a general of Lee's quality would have finished off Grant at the second day of Shiloh. Would that have finished Grant's career or would he have gritted his teeth, dug in and perserved after such a loss (in the same manner as he did in the 1864 Overland Campaign)

Certainly after the Vicksburg campaign, Grant's star was on the rise and he had learned his craft in the western theatre.

I don't have an answer for these questions, but they are fun to speculate on.

Hard to argue that the ACW was not won by the USA in the West!
The East has lots of serious business going on and a whole passle of charismatic "stars" getting a whole lot of press then and now! And the East was very very important to the war effort, but the North won the war eventully by nearly totally dominating the CSA west of the mountains. It took a while, but with Davis', Braggs' and Hoods help the USA prevailed!

No Confederate general could have beaten Grant on the second day of Shiloh with the fresh Army of the Ohio on the field.

I'm not saying that the war was not won in the west. But I believe that it was because the South allocated their resources to defending the eastern theater, thus producing the stalemate, at the expense of the western theater. The North won the war in the theater where they had the advantage.

Was the Grant of 1862 a good enough general to have had success were he to have commanded the Army of the Potomac in that year, or did he need some time to gain experience and develop the generalship needed to fight Lee and the ANV on equal terms?

Conversely, was Lee and the ANV of '62 good enough to beat someone of Grant's quality, as opposed to bumblers like McClellan and Pope?

I have often wondered what would have happened had Grant been brought east to command the Army of Virginia instead of Pope. Certainly the 2d Bull Run campaign would have gone a lot differently.

Interesting discussion. One could argue either way with success, but it might be that the war would have dragged on indefinitely had Grant not developed the strategy that put extreme and equal pressure on the enemy both in the East and in the West simultaneously. By September 1864, the Confederates in either theater were in their death throes; but the Army of Tennessee remained mobile and battle worthy, and soldiered on until crushed at Nashville in late December. By this time, the ANV was dying less dramtically, but done for none the less.

Happy New Year