Editing George B. McClellan (section)

===Ohio===
At the start of the Civil War in 1861, McClellan's knowledge of what was called "big war science" and his railroad experience suggested he might excel at military logistics. His old report from his tour in the Crimean war was quickly rushed for publication. This placed him in great demand as the [[Union (American Civil War)|Union]] mobilized its militia and its armies. The governors of Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New York, the three largest states of the Union, actively pursued him to command their states' militia. McClellan expressed desire to command the state militia of his home state of Pennsylvania, but when the dispatch did not arrive to him as early as he expected it, he departed Illinois for Pennsylvania with the intent of commanding its state militia. On his way there, he stopped at Columbus to discuss the military situation in the Ohio valley with Ohio governor [[William Dennison Jr.|William Dennison]]. Dennison was impressed with McClellan and offered him command of the state militia on the spot, which he accepted. [[Andrew Gregg Curtin|Pennsylvania's governor]] had in fact already sent a wire to McClellan offering him command of the Pennsylvania state militia, but he did not receive this until the next day. McClellan was commissioned a major general of volunteers and took command of the Ohio militia on April 23, 1861. Unlike some of his fellow Union officers who came from [[Abolitionism in the United States|abolitionist]] families, he was opposed to federal interference with slavery. For this reason, some of his Southern colleagues approached him informally about siding with the Confederacy, but he could not accept the concept of [[secession]].<ref name="GB5P3" />

On May 3 McClellan re-entered federal service as commander of the [[Department of the Ohio]], responsible for the defense of the states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and, later, western Pennsylvania, western Virginia, and Missouri. On May 14, he was commissioned a major general in the regular army. At age 34, he outranked everyone in the Army except Lt. Gen. Winfield Scott, the general-in-chief. McClellan's rapid promotion was partly due to his acquaintance with [[Salmon P. Chase]], [[United States Secretary of the Treasury|Treasury Secretary]] and former Ohio governor and senator.<ref name="MGy5D" />

As McClellan scrambled to process the thousands of men who were volunteering for service and to set up training camps, he also applied his mind to grand strategy. He wrote a letter to Gen. Scott on April 27, four days after assuming command in Ohio, that presented the first proposal for a strategy for the war. It contained two alternatives, each envisioning a prominent role for himself as commander. The first would use 80,000 men to invade Virginia through the [[Kanawha River|Kanawha Valley]] toward [[Richmond, Virginia|Richmond]]. The second would use the same force to drive south instead, crossing the Ohio River into Kentucky and Tennessee. Scott rejected both plans as logistically unfeasible. Although he complimented McClellan and expressed his "great confidence in your intelligence, zeal, science, and energy", he replied by letter that the 80,000 men would be better used on a river-based expedition to control the [[Mississippi River]] and split the Confederacy, accompanied by a strong [[Union blockade]] of Southern ports. This plan, which would require considerable patience of the Northern public, was derided in newspapers as the [[Anaconda Plan]], but eventually proved to be the outline of the successful prosecution of the war. Relations between the two generals became increasingly strained over the summer and fall.<ref name="JHYTr" />