Click 👉Today in History (general history) Sept. 16.
On this Day in Confederate History, Sept. 16.
1861: New Orleans Campaign: Confederate forces evacuated Ship Island, Mississippi and a landing party from the USS Massachusetts take possession of it. The Federals use it as a staging area for the invasion of Louisiana under the command of Brig. Gen. Benjamin "Beast" Butler in April 1862.
1862: Battle of Sharpsburg (Antietam): Both Gen. Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia and Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan's Army of the Potomac preliminary actions at Sharpsburg Maryland along Antietam Creek in preparation for the big battle the next day, the bloodiest day in American military history. Lee is greatly outnumbered with 38,000 effective troops engaged versus McClellan's 87,164 men. On the 16th, McClellan launched an attack on Maj. Gen. John Bell Hood's Division in the East Woods. The fighting ceased at nightfall except for continuing artillery fire.
1863: Skirmishing continues in the Chickamauga Campaign in Georgia at Gordon's Mills, on Chickamauga Creek where Lt. Gen. Braxton Bragg's Army of Tennessee has concentrated. Maj. Gen. William Rosecrans concentrated the Army of the Cumberland at Alpine, Ga. Confederates have 65,000 men and the Federals had 60,000.
1864: Forrest's Raid of 1864: Maj. Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest launches a cavalry raid into Northern Alabama and Middle Tennessee to interrupt Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman's supply line and communications.
Confederate General Birthdays, Sept. 16.
Major General George Washington Custis Lee was born on this day in 1832 at Fortress Monroe, Va. to Robert E. Lee and Mary Custis Lee. He graduated first in his class of 46 cadets and served in the Army Corps of Engineers. He resigned from the U.S. Army in 1861 and joined the Confederate Army in the Confederate Engineers working on fortifications around Richmond, Va. He also served on President Davis' staff as an aide-de-camp and was promoted to brigadier general in 1863 and given command of troops around Richmond. He was promoted to major general in 1864 and led troops in the Battle of Sayler's Creek and was captured on April 6, 1865. After the war, Lee was a professor at the Virginia Military Institute and president of Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Va. He also won a famous court case recovering his property, the Arlington, aka the Custis-Lee Mansion, which had been confiscated by the Northern government during the war and turned into a cemetery. Lee then sold the property to the government for $150,000 which was a fortune in those days. He died Dec. 13, 1913, in Alexandria, Va., and was buried in University Chapel near his family in Lexington.
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