Kentuckiana Genealogy: Interesting Stories: Civil War Personalities

By carol milner (63.147.57.84) on Thursday, October 27, 2005 - 11:37 pm:

I have always enjoyed learning-history is a par-
ticular favorite! Thank you for sharing these
little known facts with me . Please carry on!
I am also a genealogy buff and have come here to
see if my ancestor, Thomas Philemon Davis might
be noted here in.
carol milner

By Board Administration (Admin) (205.188.208.69) on Monday, March 03, 2003 - 09:01 pm:

President Lincoln had four Brothers-in-law who served in the Confederate Army.


At Lynchburg, Virginia, in June 1864, there were present on the field of battle ex-Vice President of the United States Gen. John C. Breckinridge, and future Presidents Maj. William McKinley and Gen. Rutherford B. Hayes. Other Union Generals who later became President were U. S. Grant, Chester A. Arthur, James A. Garfield and Benjamin Harrison.


General George Custer was the last man in his class at West Point, but he later outranked the other 33 when he was promoted to Major General of Volunteers in 1865. Only one classmate, Adelbert Ames, received an equivalent rank, and he was the last surviving member who died in Ormand, FL, in 1933--57years after Custer's death at Little Big Horn.


Jefferson Davis graduated 23rd in his class at West Point. He served in the House of Representatives and the United States Senate, was a Colonel in the Mexican War, and served as Secretary of War in President Pierce's Cabinet from 1853-1857.


Of the original 26 members of the Confederate Senate, 14 were former United States Congressman.


Robert E. Lee and P.G.T. Beauregard had both served as Superintendent of the United States Military Academy. William Tecumsah Sherman was Superintendent of the Louisiana Seminary of Learning and Military Academy on the eve of the Civil War.


Confederate Generals Joseph E. Johnston and Samuel Cooper held high positions in the United States Army in 1861. Johnston was the Quartermaster General and Cooper the Adjutant General. Johnston in later years was a pallbearer at the funerals of General U. S. Grant, Admiral David D. Porter and William T. Sherman. He had faced all three in battle, and his death is said to have been brought on by pneumonia contracted at General Sherman's funeral.


Gen. George B. McClellan, "Stonewall" Jackson and General George Pickert were graduated in the same class at West Point. Pickert received his appointment to the Academy through John Todd Stuart, Lincoln's law partner.


Commodore Franklin Buchanan, first Superintendent of the U.S. Naval Academy and Commander of the Washington Navy Yard when the Civil war began, cast his lot with the South. Later, in command of the C.S.S. Virginia, he destroyed the U.S.S. Congress on which his brother was an officer.