As he walked down a White House corridor en route to a meeting with President Abraham Lincoln and his Cabinet on June 29, 1861, Brig. Gen. Irvin McDowell had no way of knowing how dramatically the next 23 days would change his life and the lives of thousands of others, transforming the course of the young Civil War. Well regarded by his peers — including the venerable Winfield Scott, general-in-chief of the Federal armies, on whose staff he had once served — the 42-year-old McDowell was a career Army officer. But, despite his decades of military service, the newly minted commander of the Department of Northeastern Virginia, like so many officers of 1861, had never led a large body of men in combat.
HALLOWED GROUND
SPRING 2011
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While Lincoln and his Cabinet members listened, McDowell laid out a plan to attack the 24,000-man Confederate Army under Gen. Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard, deployed near the winding Bull Run creek about 25 miles southwest of Washington. The general intended to use about 30,000 troops in the effort, marching in three columns, while another 10,000 men were held in reserve. With such numerical superiority, it appeared McDowell would overwhelm his Southern counterpart. Meanwhile, the 15,000 Federal troops under aging veteran Maj. Gen. Robert Patterson stationed in the lower Shenandoah Valley were tasked with preventing a Confederate force of about 11,000 men under Gen. Joseph Johnston from slipping out of the Valley and reinforcing Beauregard near the vital rail link of Manassas Junction. It was a complex plan, especially for an inexperienced army, and even McDowell had reservations about taking the offensive. Although some of Lincoln's advisors questioned Patterson's ability to hold Johnston in the Valley, the plan was ultimately approved.
On paper, it was a solid, if ambitious plan; but, in practice, a number of factors were working against
McDowell. Available maps were woefully inadequate, leading to mistakes in march routes and distances. The troops were green and undisciplined, and the complex plan required a level of precision marching and coordination challenging to a veteran army. Pressed by political rather than military considerations, McDowell's army started west on July 16, making slow but steady progress toward its rendezvous with Beauregard.
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