Ambrose Burnside

Ambrose E. Burnside

Ambrose Everett Burnside (born May 23, 1824 in Liberty , Union County , Indiana , †  September 13, 1881 in Bristol , Rhode Island ) was a General in the US Army during the Civil War and Governor of Rhode Island. He also represented this state in the US Senate .

Soldier and entrepreneur in the prewar period

Burnside first attended the local Liberty Seminary, which he left after the death of his mother in 1841 to complete an apprenticeship as a tailor. With the support of his father, he succeeded in 1843 to be admitted to study at the US Military Academy at West Point , New York , which he left in 1847 with an average degree. He was assigned as a lieutenant in the artillery and was to be used with his unit in the Mexican-American War , but only arrived in the theater of war in Mexico after the fighting was over . Burnside was then transferred to New Mexico , where he was wounded by an arrow in a skirmish with rebellious Apaches in 1849 . In 1852 he became the commandant of Fort Adams in Newport , Rhode Island, where he met his future wife, Mary. But just a year later he submitted his departure to devote himself to the manufacture of a breech- loading carbine he had developed himself. Known as the Burnside carbine, the weapon won a comparative battle against 17 competing models in a test at West Point, but was not introduced into the Army despite an initial commitment from Secretary of War John Buchanan Floyd . Burnside, who had already invested large sums in building a factory and had also waged a costly and unsuccessful election campaign for a seat in the United States' Congress , had to sell his patent and withdraw from his own company. Ironically, the carbine was bought in large numbers by the US Army after the outbreak of the Civil War. Burnside, meanwhile, found a new job as CFO of the Illinois Central Railroad , where he met his future predecessor as Commander in Chief of the Potomac Army , McClellan .

Civil war

Burnside has served as a brigadier general in the state's militia since serving in Rhode Island . When at the beginning of the Civil War in 1861 in the individual states volunteers were recruited for the crackdown on secession of the Confederation , Burnside set up a regiment (the 1st Rhode Island Infantry Regiment ) and was appointed its commander with the rank of colonel . During the First Battle of Bull Run , he commanded a brigade that was used in a prominent position. Although the battle ended in the crushing defeat of the Army of Northeastern Virginia , Burnside had recommended himself for higher assignments and was promoted to Brigadier General of Volunteers effective August 6th.

In the fall of 1861 Burnside was given command of an amphibious expedition to the North Carolina coast , where he was able to achieve some military successes against weak resistance. In gratitude, Burnside was promoted to major general on March 18, 1862. After the failure of McClellan's peninsula campaign against the Confederate capital Richmond , Virginia , Burnside's troops were withdrawn from North Carolina, relocated to Virginia and as IX. Corps incorporated into the Potomac Army. Allegedly in the summer of 1862 he was offered the supreme command of this army several times, which he is said to have refused due to a lack of confidence in his own military capabilities. In the Battle of Antietam on September 17, 1862, Burnside gambled away a great chance for a decisive victory over the opposing Northern Virginia Army under the command of Robert E. Lee , as he let himself be delayed too long by a bottleneck at a small bridge instead of crossing the stream with the help of a nearby ford (the bridge has since been called the Burnside Bridge ).

In early November 1862, McClellan was finally replaced as Commander-in-Chief of the Potomac Army and Burnside automatically fell to command due to his seniority. Although he still believed he was not up to such a responsibility , this time out of a sense of duty to President Lincoln he accepted the task. Burnside made a promising plan to surprise his army across the Rappahannock and capture Richmond before Lee could react. Since the passage over the river was delayed by several days due to the lack of pontoon bridges , the Confederates were able to take a position on the opposite bank. Burnside insisted on the attack he had planned, which led to a bloody fiasco at the Battle of Fredericksburg . At the end of January 1863 he was replaced by Joseph Hooker and transferred with his corps to Ohio .

At the end of 1863 Burnside succeeded in advancing into the union-friendly east Tennessee and occupying its most important city, Knoxville . A subsequent counter-offensive and siege by Confederate troops under James Longstreet , he was able to withstand until relief, which he was able to restore his damaged reputation for the time being.

Burnside between 1865 and 1880

The new Commander in Chief Ulysses S. Grant ordered Burnside and his corps back to Virginia to take part in the planned spring offensive of 1864. In the battles in the Wilderness , Spotsylvania and Cold Harbor , however, his troops were only moderately successful, and the so-called crater battle near Petersburg on July 30, 1864, which was planned by Burnside personally but carried out in a highly amateurish manner by his subordinates, meant that End of his military career. He received no further command and resigned immediately after the end of the fighting in April 1865.

post war period

After the end of the Civil War, Burnside went back into the railroad business. From 1866 to 1869 he was governor of Rhode Island. During a trip to Europe in 1870 he tried unsuccessfully to mediate in the Franco-Prussian War , and on his return to the United States in 1871 was elected both President of the Veterans' Association ( Grand Army of the Republic ) and the newly founded National Rifle Association . From 1874 until his death he was a Republican Senator in Congress and in 1881 was brief chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee .

Burnside's most prominent external feature was his unusual beard, which combined a mustache and mighty sideburns with a clean-shaven chin. In allusion to its name, sideburns are still referred to as sideburns in the USA today .

literature

• William Marvel: Burnside. Chapel Hill, University of North Carolina Press 1991, ISBN 0807819832 .

Web links

Commons : Ambrose Burnside  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Ambrose Burnside in the National Governors Association (English)
• Ambrose Burnside in the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress (English)
• Ambrose Burnside in the database of Find a Grave (English)