| InMay 1863 death removed from the Confederate command system two of its highest ranking officers. Ironically, death intruded on two careers just as each had reached his pinnacle of success. In Virginia, tragedy overshadowed the Chancellorsville victory as General "Stonewall" Jackson succumbed to wounds accidentally inflicted by his own troops. At Spring Hill, Tennessee, General Earl Van Dorn met death more ignominiously at the hands of an irate physician who claimed that the diminutive Confederate officer had violated his home. Thus departed from the scenes of action two important Confederate commandersWest Pointers, Mexican War heroes, Civil War generalsone a quiet, taciturn, unyielding Virginian; the other a dashing, demonstrative, headstrong Mississippian. The South would honor the one and lament his passing. The other would be lost in the shadow and confusion that surrounded his hectic career and his tragic death. |
| The American Civil War period suggests many problems that we readily associate with modern war. As challenging as any of these problems in this complex struggle was that of leadership. Unlike twentieth-century wars, this was still a war of personalities, the last in which so many achieved individual distinction, and much of the search in both armies was for men to lead military units, large and small. Men cloaked in obscurity rose rapidly to positions of high command by displaying courage and leadership capabilities in the thick of battle or at the planning table. Others, offered these same opportunities, failed at crucial moments and were relegated to assignments of diminished responsibility. It was not a lack of courage, patriotism, or desire that kept this lesser breed of men from success. Instead, some leadership deficiency, usually too subtle to be distinguished until it was too late, prevented |
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