GEORGE HENRY THOMAS
Thomas, George H., major-general, one of the ablest,
purest and most successful of the military
chieftains of the Civil war, was born in Southampton county, Va., July 31,
1816. His early opportunities of education were good and at the age
of twenty he had just entered upon the study of law when his friends
secured him an appointment as cadet at the military academy at West Point.
He entered in 1836 and, after a thorough and solid rather than a brilliant
course, he graduated in 1840, ranking twelfth in a class of 42 members
among whom were Sherman, Ewell, Jordan, Getty, Herbert, Van Vliet and others who
afterward attained celebrity. Assigned to duty on the day of
graduation as second lieutenant in the 3d artillery, he served in the
regular army for twenty years, during which time he rendered honorable and
faithful service in the Florida war from 1840 to 1842; in command of
various forts and barracks from 1842 to 1845; in the military occupation
of Texas in 1845-46; in the Mexican war from 1846 to 1848 participating in
nearly all its leading battles in the Seminole war in 1849-50; as
instructor in artillery and cavalry at West Point from 1851 to 1854; on frontier
duty at various posts in the interior of California and Texas, leading
several expeditions against the Indians from 1855 to the autumn of 1860.
During these twenty years he was repeatedly brevetted for gallant and
meritorious services, rising through all the grades to a captain of
artillery, and in 1855 was made a major of the 2nd cavalry, which regiment
he commanded for three years. He was wounded in a skirmish with the
Indians at the headwaters of the Brazos river in Aug., 1860, and the
following November went east on a leave of absence. During the
winter of 1860-61 he watched with the most painful anxiety the culmination
of that conflict of opinion which preceded the war. Relinquishing his
leave of absence he reported for duty at Carlisle barracks, Pa., April
14,- the day when the flag went down at Sumter-and less than 48 hours
after the first shot was fired. On May 27 he led a brigade from
Chambersburg across Maryland to Williamsport, rode across the Potomac in
full uniform at the head of his brigade on June 16, to invade Virginia and fight
his old commanders; a few days afterward he led the right wing of Gen.
Patterson's army in the battle of Falling Waters and defeated the Confederates
under Stonewall Jackson. After serving through the brief campaign of
the Shenandoah Gen. Thomas entered upon that wider sphere of action in
which he was destined to win an undying reputation. At Gen. Robert
Anderson's request Sherman and Thomas were made brigadier-generals of volunteers
and assigned to his command- the Department of the Cumberland. The first
month's work that Thomas performed in the department was at Camp Dick Robinson,
Ky. where he mustered into service eleven regiments and three batteries of
Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky and Tennessee troops, which he organized into the
first brigade, and which formed the nucleus of the division, then of the
corps and finally of the great army which he afterward so long commanded.
He was soon placed in command of the 1st division of the army and on Dec.
31 was ordered to move against Zollicoffer, who commanded a large force
occupying the road leading from Cumberland gap to Lexington, Ky. In
pursuance of this order Gen. Thomas fought and won the battle of Mill
Springs, which was by far the most important military success that had yet
been achieved west of Virginia, and with the exception of the defeat of
Marshall near Prestonburg a few days before, it was the first victory in
the department. In this battle Gen. Thomas laid the foundation of
his fame in the Army of the Center. From Nov. 30, 1861, to Sept. 30,
1862, he commanded a division of Gen. Buell's army without intermission, except
that during the months of May and June he commanded the right wing of the Army
of the Tennessee and around Corinth. On Sept. 30, 1862, he was
appointed second in command of the Army of the Ohio, having previously
refused the chief command, and served in that capacity in the battle of
Perryville and until Oct. 30, 1862, when the old name of Department the
Cumberland was restored and Gen. Rosecrans assumed command. That officer
reorganized the army into three distinct commands-right, left and
center-and assigned Thomas to the center, which consisted of five
divisions. He held this command in the battle of Stone's river and
until Jan. 9, 1863, when the 14th army corps was created by order of the war
department, and Thomas commanded it during the summer campaign in middle
Tennessee and the Chickamauga campaign. On Sept. 27, 1864, after the
capture of Atlanta, he was ordered by Gen. Sherman to return with a
portion of his army into Tennessee and defend that state against Hood's
invasion. Thus Thomas was confronted by that veteran army which had
so ably resisted Sherman on his march to Atlanta, and had to meet it with
an effective force of about 40,000 infantry and 7,000 cavalry, having to remount
the latter, provide transportation, and almost to organize and supply a
new army. Although severely checked by Schofield at Franklin, Tenn.,
Hood gathered head and threatened Nashville. Then the government and
country waited impatiently for Thomas to attack, but be would not move until he
was ready. He thought he "ought to be trusted to decide when the
battle should be fought," and to know better than any one hundreds of
miles away. Grant called him "slow," Sherman commented on his
"provoking, obstinate delay," and Stanton, still actuated by the partisan
bitterness that had caused him to secure the removal of two successful
commanders, wrote to Grant: "This looks like the McClellan and Rosecrans
strategy of do nothing and let the enemy raid the country." Urgent
despatches and orders rained in upon him, but he said they might remove him
if they liked and complained to one of his generals, "They are treating me
like a boy." An order removing him was actually made on Dec. 9, but
happily revoked. On Dec. 13 Gen. Logan was started for Nashville
with orders to take the command on his arrival if Thomas had not moved,
and two days later Grant himself set out thither. On the road both
received the great news of the battle of Dec. 15. Thomas had at
length attacked, driving the enemy eight miles, and Hood, "for the first
and only time, beheld a Confederate army abandon the field in confusion."
On the next day Thomas completely redeemed his promise to "ruin Hood,"
whose army was broken to pieces and chased out of Tennessee. But
even here the victor was blamed as dilatory in the pursuit, although the reward
of his splendid services could no longer be kept back. When he received
his commission as major-general in the regular army his friend and medical
director, seeing that he was deeply moved, said: "It is better late than
never, Thomas." "It is too late to be appreciated," he replied; "I earned this
at Chickamauga," and afterward, "I never received a promotion they dared to
withhold." But the nation was by this time ready to recognize Gen. Thomas'
merits and to understand that it was solely by his remarkable abilities, without
the influence of powerful friends, that he had attained a position second
to that of no officer of the army. Honors and rewards were pressed upon
him, but with a simple dignity of character he declined them all, satisfied with
having done his duty. After the war he was placed in command
successively of the most important and difficult military departments,
often under circumstances of great responsibility and delicacy, but his
conduct gave general satisfaction. Gen. Thomas' death was the result
of apoplexy and occurred in San Francisco, Cal., March 28, 1870.