Mexican War Volunteers--Civil War Generals

The Battle of Buena Vista (Library of Congress)

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 have long been fascinated with this somewhat overlooked war and several years back, I began compiling a list of all those Mexican American War volunteers who went on to become generals in the American Civil War, fourteen or so years later. These men were not the West Point-trained U.S. Regulars (such as Lee, McClellan, Bragg, and so on); rather, the following are those who fought as volunteers in Mexico and then later earned their stars in the nation's fratricidal conflict.

Preceding the list of these officers, are some introductory words. I once thought of turning this into an article but that never went anywhere. . .

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U.S. Forces Under Winfield Scott Land at Vera Cruz

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The Mexican-American War has often been referred to as a training ground for a host of young army officers who would go on to rank among the Civil War’s highest-ranking commanders. From the battles of Monterrey and Palo Alto to the capture of Mexico City, these young men received first-hand experience in the school of soldiering and learned key lessons in the art of war by the likes of Generals Zachary Taylor and Winfield Scott. Tales of daring exploits and of remarkable bravery exhibited by these young officers who would later gain much fame during America’s fratricidal conflict are legion and known well to most serious students of the Civil War. Familiar is the story of twenty-four-year-old Captain Ulysses S. Grant who, although serving as the regimental quartermaster of the 4th U.S. Infantry, repeatedly rode to the front, seeing action at Resaca de la Palma, Palo Alto, and Monterrey, where he put his renowned horsemanship to good use by riding unscathed through a hail of bullets. Famous, too, is the story of Captain Robert E. Lee who, along with fellow engineer Lt. Pierre G.T. Beauregard, conducted a bold reconnaissance of Santa Anna’s left flank at Cerro Gordo and narrowly avoided detection and probable capture. We hear also of twenty-year-old Lieutenant George Brinton McClellan, another of Winfield Scott’s engineers, who had two horses shot from beneath him while scouting Mexican positions near Contreras and who was twice brevetted for gallantry. At the battle of La Hoya, we discover a young artillerist by the name of Thomas Jonathan Jackson who deployed his guns with great effect and stood steadfast, like a stonewall, amid a storm of shot and shell. Lieutenant Napoleon Jackson Tecumseh Dana was severely wounded and left for dead on the heights of Cerro Gordo, while, not too far from where he fell, Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Eggleston Johnston of the Voltigeurs, was also dangerously wounded. It was also at this same battle where Major Edwin Vose Sumner of the 2nd Dragoons was struck squarely in the forehead by a bullet, which, allegedly, simply bounced off earning him the sobriquet, “Old Bullhead.” While these officers survived their Cerro Gordo wounds, Lieutenant Thomas Ewell did not. He died hours after the fight with his brother Richard by his side. And finally, there is the oft-told tale of Lieutenant James Longstreet of the 8th U.S. Infantry who fell with a thigh wound while carrying the American flag in an attack against the walls of Chapultepac. Grabbing the flag from the wounded Longstreet, of course, was another young lieutenant who had graduated last in his West Point Class the previous year, George Edward Pickett. These and other such stories are seemingly endless and can truly fill volumes.

In addition to going on to earning great laurels or garnering much notoriety in the American Civil War, all of these men had another thing in common: they were all graduates of the United States Military Academy and were, thus, all regular army officers. Yet, of the nearly 100,000 men who served in Mexico, only about twenty-five to thirty percent—some 25,000-30,000 soldiers—were Regulars. The rest were volunteers.

Volunteer units hailed from twenty-four of the nation’s twenty-eight states as well as from the District of Columbia; Iowa and California, which at the outbreak of hostilities had yet to achieve statehood, also furnished troops. In all, between 70,000 and 75,000 volunteers, comprising the ranks of 76 regiments and several additional companies, enlisted during the war. Thousands of these men would later serve in both the blue and the gray during the Civil War. And because of their former military experiences in Mexico, most would enter America’s sectional conflict as commissioned officers primarily at the regimental level, being mustered in as lieutenants, majors, or colonels, and subsequently rising through the ranks. Take, for example, C. Roberdeau Wheat. Before organizing the famed Louisiana Tigers in 1861 and falling dead while leading his regiment at the battle of Gaines’s Mill in June 1862, the 6’4” Wheat served as captain of the Tennessee Company of Mounted Volunteers in Mexico. His is just one of countless examples of volunteer officers who served in both the Mexican and Civil Wars.

Of the thousands of Mexican-American War volunteers who would later serve in the Civil War, more than sixty would become general officers during the latter conflict. This number does not include West Point graduates who served in volunteer organizations in Mexico and as generals in the Civil War, men such as Jubal Early, Henry Naglee, Samuel R. Curtis, Lloyd Tilghman, Goode Bryan, and Humphrey Marshall. Instead, the Mexican War volunteers who later became Civil War generals, for the most part, lacked a formal military education, but exhibited an avid interest in martial endeavors and were typically members of a local militia company. And they were those who willingly left their civilian lives behind twice to serve in uniform.

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Mexican-American War Volunteers--Civil War Generals

[Note: Those names in blue became generals for the United States Army during the Civil War; those in red, for the Confederacy]

Arkansas

John Selden Roane, Colonel, Mounted Arkansas Volunteers

Albert Pike, Captain, Mounted Arkansas Volunteers

James Fleming Fagan, Arkansas Mounted Gunmen

Georgia

Alfred Iverson, 2nd Lieutenant, Battalion of Georgia Volunteers

George Thomas Anderson, 2nd Lieutenant, Independent Co. of Georgia Volunteers

Edward Lloyd Thomas, 2nd Lieutenant, Independent Co. of Georgia Volunteers

Alfred Iverson

Indiana

Robert H. Milroy, Captain, 1st Indiana Volunteers

Lewis Wallace, 2nd Lieutenant, 1st Indiana Volunteers

Nathan Kimball, Captain, 2nd Indiana Volunteers

Lovell Rousseau, Captain, 2nd Indiana Volunteers

James Lane, Colonel, 3rd Indiana Volunteers

Willis A. Gorman, Colonel, 4th Indiana Volunteers

Ebenezer Dumont, Lieutenant Colonel, 4th Indiana Volunteers

Thomas J. Lucas, 2nd Lieutenant, 4th Indiana Volunteers

Mahlon Manson, Captain, 5th Indiana Volunteers

Nathan Kimball

Kentucky

Thomas Leonidas Crittenden, Lieutenant Colonel, 3rd Kentucky Volunteers

Walter C. Whitaker, Lieutenant, 3rd Kentucky Volunteers

John Cabell Breckinridge, Major, 3rd Kentucky Volunteers

John Stuart Williams, Colonel, 4th Kentucky Volunteers

William Preston, Lieutenant Colonel, 4th Kentucky Volunteers

William Thomas Ward, Major, 4th Kentucky Volunteers

James Shackleford, 1st Lieutenant, 4th Kentucky Volunteers

Edward Hobson, 1st Lieutentnat, 4th Kentucky Volunteers

Cassius M. Clay

Green Clay Smith

Speen Smith Fry

Roger Weightman Hanson, 1st Lieutenant, Independent Kentucky Volunteers

Thomas James Churchill, 1st Kentucky Mounted Riflemen

William Thomas Ward

Illinois

John "Black Jack" Logan, 2nd Lt. Illinois Volunteers

James D. Morgan

Michael Lawler

Richard Oglesby

Leonard Fulton Ross

Isham M. Haynie

Edward Baker, Colonel, 4th Illinois Volunteers

William H.C. Wallace, Private, 1st Illinois Volunteers

Benjamin Prentiss, Captain/Adjutant, 1st Illinois Volunteers

John Logan

Maryland/D.C.

John Kenley, Major, Maryland/D.C. Volunteers

Joseph R. West

Michigan

Alpheus Starkey Williams, Lieutenant Colonel, Michigan Volunteers

Mississippi

Carnot Posey, 1st Lieutenant, 1st Mississippi Rifles

Thomas C. Hindman, 2nd Mississippi Infantry

Carnot Posey

Missouri

Sterling Price, Colonel, 2nd Missouri Infantry

William Yarnell Slack, Captain, 2nd Missouri Infantry

Mosby Monroe Parsons, Captain, 1st Missouri Regiment of Mounted Volunteers

John Dunlap Stevenson, Captain, 1st Missouri Regiment of Mounted Volunteers

James Craig

Thomas T. Crittenden

William Yarnell Slack

Ohio

Samuel Beatty, 1st Lieutenant, 3rd Ohio Volunteers

George F. McGinnis, Captain, 5th Ohio Volunteers

Robert B. Mitchell, 1st Lieutenant, 5th Ohio Volunteers

William H. Lytle, Captain, Independent Company, Ohio Volunteers

William H. Lytle

Pennsylvania

James Scott Negley, 1st Sergeant, 1st Pennsylvania Volunteers

Thomas Algeo Rowley, 2nd Lieutenant, 1st Pennsylvania Volunteers

James Nagle, Captain, 1st Pennsylvania Volunteers

Thomas Welsh, Private, native of Pennsylvania, served with 2nd Kentucky Volunteers

John White Geary, Colonel, 2nd Pennsylvania Volunteers

John White Geary

James Negley

South Carolina

Samuel McGowan, Quartermaster, Palmetto Regiment

Tennessee

William Brimmage Bate, 1st Lieutenant, 3rd Tennessee Volunteers

Benjamin Franklin Cheatham, Colonel, 3rd Tennessee Volunteers

William B. Campbell, Colonel, 3rd Tennessee Volunteers

Samuel Read Anderson, Lieutenant Colonel, 3rd Tennessse Volunteers

William Brimmage Bate

Texas
Benjamin McCullough, Colonel, Mounted Company, Independent Texas Volunteers
Thomas Green, Captain, 1st Texas Mounted Rifles

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It is evident, then, that the Mexican-American War was training ground not just for the West Pont-trained, career army men who would later reach highest echelon of command in the Civil War. It was also a training ground for the thousands of citizens-turned-soldiers who twice volunteered their services, first in 1846-47 and again in 1861, either as commissioned officers at the regimental level or as general officers.