re: The Battle of Gettysburg - 157th Anniversary | Day Two - Prologue #1 | July 2, 1863

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staff work

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In 1859, the US Army had no military training schools to train Staff Officers. West Point cadets at that time received very little training whose purpose was to develop their battlefield command skills. This is the reason why Staff Work in both Union and Confederate armies was, as a whole, quite poor. There was no organized system that assigned staff officers to perform Personnel, Intelligence, Operations and Logistics management for the Army Commander.

IMHO, both Union and Confederate armies emulated Napoleon's method of waging war - the Army Commander manages every function and assigns an Officer from a pool of Officers to perform a function as it occurs to the Commander to order someone to perform that function.

A staff system is an organization that automatically performs various functions delegated to them by the system itself and the Army Commander. The Army Commander uses the staff work product to make his Command Decisions during the campaign and the battle.

The armies of the American Civil War had no such staff system in place.