Army of the Potomac

The Union’s principal field army in the Eastern Theater of the American Civil War, fighting Confederate forces in Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania.

George B. McClellan: A Union general who commanded the Army of the Potomac during its 1862 Peninsula Campaign and Maryland Campaign. His cautious leadership defined the army’s early campaigns and drew Lincoln’s repeated frustration.
Peninsula Campaign: A 1862 Union campaign in Virginia that advanced toward Richmond before Confederate counterattacks forced a retreat. McClellan’s first major attempt to capture the Confederate capital ended without taking it.
First Battle of Bull Run: The first major land battle of the American Civil War, fought in Virginia in July 1861. The Union defeat exposed the need for a trained, organized force in the East.
Emancipation Proclamation: A 1863 executive order that declared enslaved people in areas still rebelling against the United States to be free. Antietam gave Lincoln the military opportunity to issue its preliminary announcement.
Joseph Hooker: A Union general who commanded the Army of the Potomac from January to June 1863. He reorganized the army before its defeat at Chancellorsville.
Battle of Antietam: A September 1862 battle in Maryland that ended Robert E. Lee’s first invasion of the North. The army halted Lee’s advance, enabling Lincoln to announce the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation.
George B. McClellan's reorganization of the Army of the Potomac: The 1861–1862 effort by George B. McClellan to train, equip, and organize the Union army around Washington. It turned the early war’s scattered forces into a disciplined field army.
Ulysses S. Grant: The Union general who became general-in-chief in 1864 and directed the Union’s coordinated campaigns against the Confederacy. He accompanied the Army of the Potomac and set its strategy against Lee in 1864.
George G. Meade: A Union general who commanded the Army of the Potomac from June 1863 through the end of the Civil War. His command began days before Gettysburg and continued through the Overland Campaign.
Battle of Chancellorsville: A May 1863 battle in Virginia in which Robert E. Lee defeated a larger Union force. Hooker’s army suffered a major defeat despite its numerical advantage.

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