Click 👉TODAY IN HISTORY (general history) Feb. 3.
ON THIS DAY IN CONFEDERATE HISTORY, Feb. 3.
1862: War at Sea: At Southampton, England, the Confederate steamer Nashville leaves the port, and the U.S.S. Tuscarora moves to intercept the Southern vessel. However, the British Warship HMS Shannon prevents the confrontation in English waters in line with British neutrality.
1863: Second Battle of Fort Donelson, Tenn. Confederate cavalry under generals Fighting Joe Wheeler and Nathan Bedford Forrest attack Fort Donelson. The Federals hold the fort. The Yankees lost 12 dead and 30 wounded, while the Confederates suffered 100 dead and 400 wounded.
1864: At Richmond, President Davis recommends suspension of habeas corpus for such crimes as spying, desertion, and associating with the enemy.
1865: Carolinas Campaign. At River's Bridge and Dillingham's Crossroads along the Salkehatchie River, Confederate troops battle Sherman's Federals as they approach Charleston, South Carolina.
CONFEDERATE GENERAL BIRTHDAYS, Feb. 3.
General Joseph Eggleston Johnston was born on this day in 1807 in Farmville, Virginia. Of Scottish heritage, his grandfather was from Scotland, and his father was a Revolutionary War veteran. He graduated from West Point in 1829 in the same class as Robert E. Lee. Johnston was 13th in a class of 46 cadets. Johnston resigned from the army in 1837 to study civil engineering. He did serve, as a civilian engineer, in the Second Seminole War and was wounded but was back in the army in 1838 as a first lieutenant with the topographical engineers and received brevet captaincy for the battle in which he was wounded. In the Mexican-American War, he was on the staff of Gen. Winfield Scott and the Siege of Vera Cruz and was wounded in the Battle of Cerro Gordo. His army career prospered in between wars and in 1860 was promoted to Quartermaster General with the rank of brigadier general. He resigned in 1861, the highest-ranking officer to do so when his native state left the Union. Johnston was made a full general in August 1861 in the Confederate Army. He was the ranking general at the First Battle of Manassas on July 21, 1861, but let Gen. Beauregard handle it tactically since Beauregard was more familiar with the ground. Johnston and President Jefferson Davis had a falling out early in the war that greatly hampered his service. Johnston was one of the developers of the famous St. Andrew's Cross Style Confederate Battle flag, along with General Beauregard and William Porcher Miles. He led the army in the Peninsula Campaign and was severely wounded in the Battle of Seven Pines in 1862. On November 24, 1862, still recovering from his wound, he was given command of the Dept. of the West, which was primarily a desk job. His continuing trouble with his wound also plagued him. He did lead an attempt to relieve the Siege of Vicksburg in 1863, but his army was too small to even attempt to break the siege. President Davis appointed Johnston to the command of the Army of Tennessee on Dec. 27, 1863, and gave the Northern Army under Sherman fits in the Atlanta Campaign in 1864 with his Fabian tactics. But President Davis, dissatisfied with Johnston's tactics, relieved him of the command and gave it to Gen. John Bell Hood. The change proved to be a disaster for the Confederacy. Johnston was again appointed to the much-diminished Army of Tennessee in the final days of the war, for the Carolinas Campaign, but it was too little too late and he surrendered the army on April 26, 1865. Johnston worked at various jobs after the war, wrote his memoir, and engaged in the various post-war controversies left over from the conflict, with Jefferson Davis and others. He died on Feb. 19, 1891, and was buried at Green Mount Cemetery in Baltimore, Maryland.
Brigadier General George Thomas "Tige" Anderson was born on this day in 1824, in Covington, Georgia. Anderson was attending college when the Mexican-American War broke out and left his studies to serve as a second lieutenant with the Georgia cavalry. After that war, he served in the Georgia militia as a major general of the 11th Division but entered the U.S. Army in 1855 as a captain in the 1st Cavalry Regiment but resigned in 1858. During the War for Southern Independence, he became colonel of the 11th Georgia Infantry and fought in most of the major battles of the Army of Northern Virginia. He was promoted to brigadier general on Nov. 1, 1862, and was wounded at Gettysburg. Anderson surrendered with General Lee at Appomattox on April 9, 1865. Following the war, he became a railroad freight agent in Atlanta and then the police chief and tax collector in Anniston, Ala. He died there on April 4, 1901, and was buried in Edgemont Cemetery.
Brigadier General Nathan George Evans was born on this day in 1824 at Marion, South Carolina. He attended West Point and graduated in 1848 36th in a class of 38 cadets. His service in the U.S. Army as a second lieutenant was with the 1st U.S. Dragoons and 2nd U.S. Dragoons mostly at frontier outposts. Evans resigned from the U.S. Army on Feb. 27, 1861. At the First Battle of Manassas, he led a small brigade as a colonel made up of the 4th South Carolina Infantry and the 1st Special Battalion (Wheat's) Louisiana Volunteers (the famous Louisiana Tigers) and held off an overwhelming Yankee flanking force long enough for reinforcements to make a crucial stand on Henry House Hill. Evans was promoted to brigadier General effective to July 21, 1861, the date of the First Manassas. He then led his brigade at the battles of Ball's Bluff, Secessionville, Second Manassas, Sharpsburg, Kinston, and in the Vicksburg Campaign. Evans was severely injured in a buggy accident in Charleston, S.C. in 1864 and was never returned to command of his brigade. Following the war, he became a school principal and died on Nov. 23, 1868, in Midway, Alabama. Evans was interred in Tabernacle Cemetery in Cokesbury, Alabama.
Brigadier General William Lowther "Mudwall" Jackson was born on this day in 1825 in Clarksburg, Virginia. Prior to the war, he was a lawyer and Democrat politician who was a lieutenant governor of Virginia. During the War for Southern Independence Jackson became the lieutenant colonel of the 31st Virginia Infantry Regiment and served in the Western Virginia Campaign in the battles of Rich Mountain and Cheat Mountain. Jackson was promoted to colonel and served on the staff of Stonewall Jackson in 1862. In 1863, he raised the 19th Virginia Cavalry and served in the Jones-Imboden Raid and then under Brig. Gen. Albert G. Jenkins at the Battle of Cloyd's Mountain and Early's Valley Campaign of 1864 and was promoted to brigadier general on Dec. 19, 1864. His brigade disbanded on April 15, 1865. Jackson refused to surrender and headed west but finally decided to take his parole on July 26, 1865, in Brownsville, Texas on July 26, 1865. He lived for a short time in Mexico and returned to West Virginia to practice law and then relocated to Louisville, Ky. where he became a circuit judge. He died March 26, 1890, in Louisville and was buried at Cave Hill Cemetery.
