Author: J. Tracy Power

assistant professor of history and director of the college archives at Newberry College, Newberry, South Carolina
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Alexander Swift Pendleton (1840–1864)

Alexander Swift Pendleton was a Confederate staff officer in the Army of Northern Virginia during the American Civil War (1861–1865). Nicknamed Sandie, he was best known for his service under Confederate general Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson, who died following the Battle of Chancellorsville (1863), but he also served under Jackson’s successors Richard S. Ewell and Jubal A. Early. Henry Kyd Douglas, a fellow member of Jackson’s staff, called him “the most brilliant staff officer in the Army of Northern Virginia and the most popular with officers and men.”

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A. P. Hill (1825–1865)

A. P. Hill was a Confederate general in the Army of Northern Virginia during the American Civil War (1861–1865). Behind Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson and James Longstreet, “Little Powell,” as he was sometimes called, was Robert E. Lee‘s most trusted lieutenant, best known for leading his Light Division in headlong charges but just as effective when making stubborn defensive stands. Though usually reserved and courteous, he also was notoriously short-tempered. An argument with Longstreet almost led to a duel, while a dispute with Jackson put Hill under arrest as his division entered Maryland in 1862. Still, he fought hard and well at Antietam (1862) and Chancellorsville (1863), and after Jackson’s death he took over the army’s new Third Corps. For the remainder of the war, Hill’s generalship and administrative skills were sometimes lackluster, at other times inspired, and he was forced to miss parts of campaigns due to illness. Exactly a week before Lee’s surrender at Appomattox, he was killed outside Petersburg.

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Jubal A. Early (1816–1894)

Jubal A. Early was a lawyer, a politician, and a Confederate general in the Army of Northern Virginia during the American Civil War (1861–1865). An excellent brigade and division commander, he was quick and aggressive on the offensive and steady and tough on the defensive. While, at times, he was outstanding in independent command or temporary corps command, especially at Chancellorsville (1863), he was less successful leading the Army of the Valley during the Shenandoah Valley Campaign of 1864. Known as “Old Jube,” Early was opinionated and critical of others but slow to see his own faults. In an army famous for its religious revival, he was notoriously quick-tempered, witty, and profane; Robert E. Lee called him “my bad old man.” Prematurely bent by arthritis, he was described by one Confederate in 1861 as “a plain farmer-looking man … but with all, every inch a soldier.” In his later years, Early became preeminent in debates over the war, working to venerate Lee and isolate James Longstreet, who had once been Lee’s second in command. In so doing, Early helped to invent the highly influential Lost Cause view of the war. As long as Early was alive, one of his former soldiers wrote, “no man ever took up his pen to write a line about the great conflict without the fear of Jubal Early before his eyes.”

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