Sponsor: CWRT Congress
 

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Irvin McDowell was a prominent figure during the early months of the Civil War.  With so much at stake, he was called upon to lead the Union’s largest Eastern Theater army.  Pressed by the media and Lincoln to move into Virginia to defeat the Confederates, McDowell led his neophyte army out to the plains of Manassas and was soundly defeated.  Following that disaster, he held an independent command in northern Virginia during the Peninsula Campaign and served under General John Pope during Second Bull Run.

Historian Gene Schmiel and his co-author Frank Simione, Jr. used available sources to create a synthesis of the man and his career to fill in the sizeable gap in the historiography.  Find out what became of this enigmatic Civil War figure.