This talk of brevets though has me with a question for our military history buffs. Would the extremely high number of deaths during the Civil War explain why so many were able to rise through the ranks quickly despite many not having military experience? Hate to use Nathan Bedford Forrest as an example but he was a guy with no military experience at the start of the war who started as a private but ended it a general. You never really read about that during WWII where someone started out a private and made it that far. Hell, you don’t even really read about captains making it that far by WWII’s end. So question I guess, was it the causalities that allowed for such rapid advancement.