The greatest beards of the Civil War, in one chart

[struggle4progress]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/10/30/the-greatest-beards-of-the-civil-war-in-one-chart/

[Recursion]

1. I keep my beard somewhere between Grant and Lee

I think I'd need Lee's gray hair to really pull off a full Lee beard (I probably won't have to wait all that long, given my family history).

My brother does an honest-to-God Ambrose Burnside.

[Ferretherder]

2. Ambrose Burnside, who, I'm sure you know,...

...gave us the name 'sideburns', for that swath of hair in front of the ears - a feature of prodigious note in the countenance of the general.

[Recursion]

3. Burnside is an odd figure. Probably the best Corps commander the Union had

But any formation larger than that he absolutely could not command.

[Ferretherder]

4. Very true. Help me out here,...

...was Burnside in command at the battle of 'Mary's Heights'? (spelling) It was a complete debacle for the Union army - wave after wave of frontal charges on well fortified positions!

[Recursion]

5. Yes. It's more commonly called the Battle of Fredericksburg

But Marye's Heights (thus, incidentally) was the biggest sub-action of that battle. It's been compared to the charge of the Light Brigade in the Crimean war -- Lee said after the battle "It is well that war is so terrible, or we should grow too fond of it".

Burnside missed several key opportunities by refusing to seize the town early when he had the chance, with the result that they had to fight house to house and then move across a low field towards fortified heights. He never should have ordered that charge.

To his credit, he attempted after the third failed charge to charge the Confederate lines himself on horseback, but was talked down from that.

[1939]

6. Burnside a great corps commander?

As examples of his failures as a corps commander, i give you:

Antietam-Burnside's Bridge

Petersburg-Battle of the Crater

Grant was pretty upset at Burnside's unreliability as IX Corps commander during the entire Overland Campaign and relived him after the Crater debacle (where he got a division of US Colored Troops slaughtered).

[Yupster]

7. He kicked Longstreet's butt in Knoxville though

That was kind of a surprise.

[1939]

10. He didn't have to manuever or anything.

All he had to do was sit there and hold fast. Probably Longstreet's worst effort of the war and took him out of the running to replace Bragg and get promoted.

[oneshooter]

8. Ambrose Burnside was totally bald by his 25 year.

[Lizzie Poppet]

9. Nat Borchers approves of this thread.