Click 👉 Today in History (general history), July 22.
On This Day in Confederate History, July 22.
1861: Confederate Brigadier General Barnard Bee died on this day after being mortally wounded in the First Battle of Manassas. He gained lasting fame for rallying his brigade behind that of Brigadier General Thomas J. Jackson. He is reported to have said, "There is Jackson standing like a stone wall! ... Rally behind the Virginians!" Bee received his fatal wound shortly thereafter.
1863: A skirmish at the Eagleport crossing of the Muskingum River in Ohio took place between about 600 cavalrymen under Brigadier General John Hunt Morgan and the local militia. The Confederate horse soldiers quickly dispersed the militiamen and crossed the river.
1864: The Battle of Atlanta, Ga. occurred on this day when Gen. John Bell Hood's Army of Tennessee attacked the Northern army of Maj. Gen. W.T. Sherman's flank, which was being defended by Federal Maj. Gen. Maj. Gen. Grenville Dodge's XVI Corps. Federal Maj. Gen. James McPherson, commander of the Army of the Tennessee, was mortally wounded and captured by Confederates while riding to Dodge's corps. McPherson died soon afterward. Hood had 40,438 men in the assault, while the blue coats had 34,863 in strong defenses. While the Confederates fought valiantly, the attacks all failed with heavy casualties. The Yankees lost about 3,400 casualties and the Confederates lost about 5,500. Among the killed on the Confederate side was Maj. Gen. William H.T. Talker and Brig. Gen. Samuel Benton.
Confederate General Birthdays, July 22.
Major General John George Walker was born on this day in 1821 in Cole City, Missouri. Although he didn't have a military education, he served as a first lieutenant in the Regiment of Mounted Rifles in the Mexican-American War. He was brevetted a captain for his gallantry at San Juan de Los Llanos and suffered a wound at Molino del Rey. Walker stayed in the army after the war until July 1861, when he resigned and joined the Confederate Army as a cavalry major. He was then promoted to lieutenant colonel of the 8th Texas Cavalry, then to colonel. Walker was promoted to brigadier general in January 1862 and led a brigade of infantry in the Army of Northern Virginia at the Battle of Sharpsburg, Md., where he was wounded. In November 1862, he was promoted to major general and given command of a whole Texas infantry division, which gained fame in the Trans-Mississippi Department as Walker's Greyhounds. His battles and campaigns included the Peninsula, Malvern Hill, South Mountain, Milliken's Bend, Mansfield, Pleasant Hill (wounded), and Jenkins' Ferry. After the Red River Campaign of 1864, he became commander of the Army of Western Louisiana, where he finished the war. Following the war, he lived temporarily in Mexico and then joined his wife in London, England. Later, he returned to the U.S. and was eventually made the U.S. Consul in Bogota, Colombia, and as Special Commissioner to the Pan-American Convention. Walker died July 20, 1893, in Washington, D.C., and was then buried in Stonewall Cemetery in Winchester, Va.
Brigadier General Hamilton Prioleau Bee was born on this day in 1822 in Charleston, South Carolina. He was the older brother of Brigadier General Barnard E. Bee, who ironically died on the same day from his mortal wound at First Manassas in 1861. The family moved to Texas in 1835, where his father, Barnard Bee Sr., became a leader in the Texas Revolution and the Texas Republic. During the Mexican-American War, Hamilton Bee served in Benjamin McCulloch's Co. A, of Col. Jack Hays' 1st Regiment of Texas Mounted Volunteers, then as a second lieutenant in Mirabeau B. Lamar's company in Col. Peter Hansborough Bell's Regiment of Texas Volunteers. After the war, he served in the State of Texas House of Representatives and was Speaker of the House. Bee was elected a brigadier general in the Texas militia in 1861 and then appointed a brigadier general in the Confederate Army. He spent much of the war in South Texas commanding there until the Red River Campaign of 1864 in Louisiana, when he led his brigade in the Battle of Mansfield, the Battle of Pleasant Hill (slightly wounded), and in various battles and skirmishes to the end of the campaign. Following the war, Bee lived with his family in Saltillo, Mexico, and didn't move back to Texas until 1876. He then became the superintendent of the farm on what would become Texas A&M University, practiced law in San Antonio, and served as Texas Commissioner of the Office of Insurance, Statistics, and History. Bee died on October 3, 1897, in San Antonio and is buried in the Confederate Cemetery in San Antonio.
