Of the tens of thousands of men who died in combat in the war, possibly as many as half lost their lives in vain. Lee's charges at Malvern Hill and Gettysburg, Burnside's at Fredericksburg, Grant's at Vicksburg, and many others left the dead strewn everywhere for no discernible military gain. The Sioux would never have followed men who led such bloody, futile assaults, but the Americans made heroes out of these generals--and the higher a general's losses, it seemed, the greater the hero he became.