Henry Warner Slocum Totally Explained

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:For the American tennis player, see Henry Slocum (tennis player) Henry Warner Slocum (September 24 1827 – April 14 1894), was a Union general during the American Civil War and later served in the United States House of Representatives from New York. During the war, he was one of the youngest major generals in the Army and fought numerous major battles in the Eastern Theater and in Georgia and the Carolinas. Controversy arose from his conduct at the Battle of Gettysburg, where he was accused of indecision and a dilatory advance to the battlefield, earning him the derogatory nickname, "Slow Come".

Early life and career

Slocum was born in Delphi, a hamlet in Onondaga County, New York. He attended Cazenovia Seminary and worked as a teacher. He obtained an appointment to the United States Military Academy at West Point, where he did well academically—considerably better than his roommate, Philip Sheridan. He was commissioned a second lieutenant in the 1st U.S. Artillery on July 1 1852. He served in the Seminole War in Florida and at Fort Moultrie in Charleston Harbor, married Clara Rice in 1854, and was promoted to first lieutenant on March 3 1855. He resigned his commission October 31 1856, and settled in Syracuse, New York.
Slocum had studied law while bored at garrison duty in the army. He was admitted to the bar in 1858 and practiced in Syracuse. He served as the county treasurer and was elected to the State assembly in 1859. During this period he also served as an artillery instructor in the New York Militia with the rank of colonel.

Civil War

Early commands

At the outbreak of the Civil War, Slocum was appointed colonel of the 27th New York Infantry, which was a two-year regiment mustered in at Elmira, New York. He led the regiment in Maj. Gen. David Hunter's division at the First Battle of Bull Run, where his regiment suffered 130 casualties and he was wounded in the thigh. In August 1861, he was appointed brigadier general of volunteers and commanded the 2nd Brigade, Maj. Gen. William B. Franklin's 1st Division, I Corps during the Peninsula Campaign and the 1st Division, VI Corps at the Seven Days Battles, distinguishing himself at the Battle of Gaines' Mill.
On July 25, 1862, Slocum was appointed major general of volunteers to rank from July 4, the second youngest man in the Army to achieve that rank. He publicly criticized Hooker after the battle and was one of the "cabal" of generals that attempted to have him removed from command. By the summer of 1863, he was relatively young, at 36, to be a major general, but he possessed a manner that inspired confidence in his men. When Hooker was relieved of command of the Army of the Potomac, Slocum, being the most senior general in that army, was in line for command. However, he wasn't seriously considered, and agreed to serve under Meade.

Gettysburg

At the Battle of Gettysburg, Slocum received some criticism for his corps' slow march to the battlefield, which led to his derisive nickname, "Slow Come". The XII Corps stopped at Two Taverns on the Baltimore Pike, about 5 miles southeast of the battlefield, by midmorning on July 1, 1863. Sometime between 1:30 and 2 p.m., he received an urgent message from Maj. Gen. Howard requesting immediate reinforcements at Gettysburg. Slocum later claimed that he'd been unaware of the start of the battle, possibly because of an "acoustic shadow" caused by intervening hills. Officers on his staff, however, reported that by 1 p.m. they heard the sound of cannon, increasingly heavy musketry fire, and could see smoke rising high over the hills and the bursting of shells. In any event, the receipt of the message from Gen. Howard was clear evidence and unrelated to the acoustic situation.
   Historian Larry Tagg claims that Slocum "spent the entire afternoon vacillating, neither bringing forward his corps nor going ahead himself to take command by virtue of his rank." and into thinking that Meade wished to avoid a general engagement at Gettysburg. However, Meade's supplementary order to Slocum, which placed the V Corps as well as the XII Corps under his direction, explicitly made any retrograde movement dependent on the decisions of Maj. Gen. John F. Reynolds in Gettysburg. (Reynolds had been killed earlier that day, but Slocum was unaware of that fact. The actions in Gettysburg made any immediate provisions of the circular irrelevant.)
   It took the arrival of three additional messengers at Slocum's headquarters before he moved into action. Captain Daniel Hall, carrying a message sent at 3 p.m. by Gen. Howard, considered Slocum's response to Howard's request to be "anything but honorable, soldierly, or patriotic." Some students of the battle believe Slocum could have mitigated the rout of the XI Corps if he'd arrived earlier than 6 p.m. on July 1 and had marched both of his divisions directly up the Baltimore Pike to provide reinforcements. Historian Edwin Coddington, otherwise critical of Slocum's dilatory response, found that it was highly doubtful whether they could have deployed beyond the town in time to mount a counterattack in support of the retreating XI Corps.
   As the ranking general on the field, Slocum commanded the army for about six hours after the fighting that day, until Meade arrived after midnight. Meade planned an attack from the Power's Hill area into the Confederate left flank, to be led by Slocum the following day, utilizing the V Corps and the XII Corps as the army's "right wing". Slocum resisted the suggestion, claiming the terrain was too difficult for an assault, but he continued to fancy himself the right wing commander for the rest of the battle, leaving Brig. Gen. Alpheus S. Williams temporarily in command of his XII Corps during this period.
   When Meade ordered Slocum to send the entire XII Corps to assist the defense against Lt. Gen. James Longstreet's assault on the Union left flank on July 2, Slocum wisely recommended holding one brigade back in its position on Culp's Hill. This brigade, under Brig. Gen. George S. Greene, was able to hold out against a massive Confederate assault and saved the critical hill for the Union.

Western Theater

After Gettysburg, the XI Corps and XII Corps were sent to Tennessee in the Western Theater, under the command of Joseph Hooker. When Slocum found out he was going to be serving under Hooker, he submitted two letters of resignation to President Abraham Lincoln stating his derogatory opinion of Hooker as both an officer and a gentleman. Lincoln refused the resignation and assured Slocum he wouldn't have to serve under Hooker. A compromise was reached whereby one division of the corps, under Slocum, was assigned to protect the Nashville and Chattanooga Railroad while the other division served directly under Hooker. He was again elected as a Representative at Large from New York to the 48th Congress (March 4 1883 – March 3 1885). He was president of the Board of Trustees of the New York State Soldiers' and Sailors' Home in Bath, New York, and was a member of the Board of Gettysburg Monuments Commissioners. Henry Slocum died in Brooklyn, New York, and is interred at Green-Wood Cemetery, where Gen. Porter also is interred. A steamship, the General Slocum, was named for him; it had a disastrous fire onboard in 1904 with much loss of life. Fort Slocum, New York, guards the entrance to New York Harbor from Long Island Sound. A statue of Slocum is in Grand Army Plaza, Brooklyn.

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