he was engineer-in-chief of the city’s department of docks. With Orange, N.J., as his next principal residence, he became governor of New Jersey (1878–1881). During his term he effected great reforms in the administration of the state and in the militia. He was offered, but declined, a second nomination. During his last years he made several tours of Europe, visited the East, and wrote much for the magazines. He also prepared monographs upon the Civil War, defending his own action. He died suddenly of heart-disease on the 29th of October 1885 at Orange.
McClellan was a clear and able writer and effective speaker; and his Own Story, edited by a friend and published soon after his death, discloses an honourable character, sensitive to reproach, and conscientious, even morbidly so, in his patriotism. He carried himself well in civil life and was of irreproachable private conduct. During the Civil War, however, he was promoted too early and rapidly for his own good, and the strong personal magnetism he inspired while so young developed qualities injurious to a full measure of success and usefulness, despite his great opportunities. The reasons for his final displacement in 1862 were both civil and military, and the president had been forbearing with him. As a soldier he possessed to an extraordinary degree the enthusiastic affection of his men. With the army that he had created the mere rumour of his presence was often a spur to the greatest exertions. That he was slow, and perhaps too tender-hearted, in handling armed masses for action may be admitted, and though admirable for defensive war and a safe strategist, he showed himself unfitted to take the highly essential initiative, both because of temperament and his habitual exaggeration of obstacles and opposing numbers. But he met and checked the armies of the Confederacy when they were at their best and strongest, and his work laid the foundations of ultimate success.
His son, George Brinton McClellan (b. 1865), graduated in 1886 at Princeton (from which he received the degree of LL.D. in 1905), and became a newspaper reporter and editor in New York City. He identified himself with the Tammany Hall organization, and in 1889–1892 was treasurer of the New York and Brooklyn Bridge under the city government. In 1892 he was admitted to the bar, and was elected to the board of aldermen, of which he was president in 1893 and 1894. In 1895–1903 he was a Democratic representative in Congress; in 1903 he was elected mayor of New York City on the Tammany ticket, defeating mayor Seth Low, the “Fusion” candidate; and in 1905 he was re-elected for a four-year term, defeating William M. Ivins (Republican) and William R. Hearst (Independence League). He published The Oligarchy of Venice (1904).
Besides the report mentioned above, General McClellan wrote a Bayonet Exercise (1852); Report on Pacific Railroad Surveys (1854); Report on the Organization, &c., of the Army of the Potomac (1864), a government publication which he himself republished with the addition of a memoir of the West Virginian campaign. He also wrote a series of articles on the Russo-Turkish War for The North American Review. See memoir prefaced to McClellan’s Own Story, and Michie, General McClellan (“Great Commanders” series).
McCLERNAND, JOHN ALEXANDER (1812–1900), American
soldier and lawyer, was born in Breckinridge county, Kentucky,
on the 30th of May 1812. He was admitted to the bar in
Shawneetown, Illinois, in 1832; in the same year served as a
volunteer in the Black Hawk War, and in 1835 founded the
Shawneetown Democrat, which he thereafter edited. As a
Democrat he served in 1836 and in 1840–1843 in the Illinois
House of Representatives, and in 1843–1851 and in 1859–1861 was
a representative in Congress, where in his first term he vigorously
opposed the Wilmot proviso, but in his second term was a strong
Unionist and introduced the resolution of the 15th of July 1861,
pledging money and men to the national government. He
resigned from congress, raised in Illinois the “McClernand
Brigade,” and was commissioned (May 17, 1861) brigadier-general
of volunteers. He was second in command at the battle
of Belmont (Missouri) in November 1861, and commanded the
right wing at Fort Donelson. On the 21st of March he became a
major-general of volunteers. At Shiloh he commanded a division,
which was practically a reserve to Sherman’s. In October 1861
Stanton, secretary of war, ordered him north to raise troops
for the expedition against Vicksburg; and early in January
1864, at Milliken’s Bend, McClernand, who had been placed in
command of one of the four corps of Grant’s army, superseded
Sherman as the leader of the force that was to move down the
Mississippi. On the 11th of January he took Arkansas Post.
On the 17th, Grant, after receiving the opinion of Admiral Foote
and General Sherman that McClernand was unfit, united a part
of his own troops with those of McClernand and assumed command
in person, and three days later ordered McClernand back
to Milliken’s Bend. During the rest of this Vicksburg campaign
there was much friction between McClernand and his colleagues;
he undoubtedly intrigued for the removal of Grant; it was
Grant’s opinion that at Champion’s Hill (May 16) he was
dilatory; and because a congratulatory order to his corps was
published in the press (contrary to an order of the department
and another of Grant) he was relieved of his command on the
18th of June, and was replaced by General E. O. C. Ord. President
Lincoln, who saw the importance of conciliating a leader
of the Illinois War-Democrats, restored him to his command in 1864, but McClernand resigned in November of that year. He was district judge of the Sangamon (Illinois) District in 1870–1873, and was president of the National Democratic Convention
in 1876. He died in Springfield, Illinois, on the 20th of September
1900.
His son, Edward John McClernand (b. 1848), graduated at the U.S. Military Academy in 1870. He served on the frontier against the Indians, notably in the capture of Chief Joseph in October 1877, became lieutenant-colonel and assistant adjutant-general of volunteers in 1898, and served in Cuba in 1898–99. He was then ordered to the Philippines, where he commanded various districts, and from April 1900 to May 1901, when he was mustered out of the volunteer service, was acting military governor.
MACCLESFIELD, CHARLES GERARD, 1st Earl of (c. 1618–1694), eldest son of Sir Charles Gerard, was a member of an old Lancashire family, his great-grandfather having been Sir Gilbert Gerard (d. 1593) of Ince, in that county, one of the most distinguished
judges in the reign of Elizabeth. His mother was
Penelope Fitton of Gawsworth, Cheshire. Charles Gerard was educated abroad, and in the Low Countries learnt soldiering, in which he showed himself proficient when on the outbreak of the Civil War in England he raised a troop of horse for the king’s service. Gerard commanded a brigade with distinction at Edgehill, and gained further honours at the first battle of Newbury and at Newark in 1644, for which service he was appointed to the chief command in South Wales. Here his operations in 1644 and 1645 were completely successful in reducing the Parliamentarians to subjection; but the severity with which he ravaged the country made him personally so unpopular that when, after the defeat at Naseby in June 1645, the king endeavoured to raise fresh forces in Wales, he was compelled to remove Gerard from the local command. Gerard was, however, retained in command of the king’s guard during Charles’s march from Wales to Oxford, and thence to Hereford and Chester in August 1645; and having been severely wounded at Rowton Heath on the 23rd of September, he reached Newark with Charles on the 4th of October. On the 8th of November 1645 he was created Baron Gerard of Brandon in the county of Suffolk; but about the same time he appears to have forfeited Charles’s favour by having attached himself to the party of Prince Rupert, with whom after the surrender of Oxford Gerard probably went abroad. He remained on the Continent throughout the whole period of the Commonwealth, sometimes in personal attendance on Charles II., at others serving in the wars under Turenne, and constantly engaged in plots and intrigues. For one of these, an alleged design on the life of Cromwell, his cousin Colonel John Gerard was executed in the Tower in July 1654. At the Restoration Gerard rode at the head of the king’s life-guards in his triumphal entry into London; his forfeited estates were restored, and he received lucrative offices and pensions. In 1668 he retired from the command of the king’s guard to make room for the duke of
