Seeing that President Lincoln was kind and unassuming
in discussing military questions, McClellan quickly contracted the habit
of expressing contempt for him in his confidential letters; and the
feeling rapidly grew until it reached a mark of open disrespect. The
same trait manifested itself in his making exclusive confidants of only
two or three of his subordinate generals, and ignoring the counsel of
all the others; and when, later on, Congress appointed a standing
committee of leading senators and representatives to examine into the
conduct of the war, he placed himself in a similar attitude respecting
their inquiry and advice.
McClellan's activity and judgment as an army organizer naturally created
great hopes that he would be equally efficient as a commander in the
field. But these hopes were grievously disappointed. To his first great
defect of estimating himself as the sole savior of the country, must at
once be added the second, of his utter inability to form any reasonable
judgment of the strength of the enemy in his front. On September 8, when
the Confederate army at Manassas numbered forty-one thousand, he rated
it at one hundred and thirty thousand. By the end of October that
estimate had risen to one hundred and fifty thousand, to meet which he
asked that his own force should be raised to an aggregate of two hundred
and forty thousand, with a total of effectives of two hundred and eight
thousand, and four hundred and eighty-eight guns.
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