Longstreet, James

Longstreet, James (1821–1904), Civil War general.Born in South Carolina, Longstreet grew up in Gainesville and Augusta, Georgia. Graduating from West Point in 1842, he served in the Mexican War and was a major when, in June 1861, he resigned, offering his services to the Confederacy.

Longstreet was commissioned brigadier general in June 1861, major general in October 1861, and lieutenant general in October 1862. Except for medical leave when wounded in the Wilderness to Petersburg Campaign, he led the First Corps of the Army of Northern Virginia from its establishment in 1862 to the surrender at Appomattox in 1865. He fought in every major battle in the East except Chancellorsville, and took the First Corps west on detached service to participate in the Confederate victory at the Battle of Chickamauga in September 1863.

Robert E. Lee selected Longstreet as his second in command, and although authorities differ, it can be agreed that Longstreet, not “Stonewall” Jackson, was Lee's most trusted and perhaps most talented subordinate. Outstanding in combat, Longstreet was an excellent corps‐level commander and one of the most modern soldiers of his day. He helped to popularize the use of extensive field fortifications and foreshadowed later Prussian doctrine by favoring the use of maneuver to compel the enemy to attack at a disadvantage. He argued that Northern civilian morale should be the true target of overall Confederate strategy. Longstreet was immensely popular with his men, who called him “the Old Bulldog.”

During Reconstruction, Longstreet settled in New Orleans and joined the Republican Party. He held a variety of political patronage positions until his death in 1904. Viewing him as a traitor to the white South, many former comrades turned against him and attacked his military record. His enemies' lies and fabrications, particularly in relation to the Battle of Gettysburg, where he was unfairly accused of deliberately delaying the attack on the second day, were accepted uncritically by later historians, such as Douglas Southall Freeman, who misrepresented both Longstreet's personality and his record.
[See also Civil War: Military and Diplomatic Course; Confederate Army.]

Bibliography

William Garrett Piston , Lee's Tarnished Lieutenant: James Longstreet and His Place in Southern History, 1987.
Jeffry D. Wert , General James Longstreet: The Confederacy's Most Controversial Soldier, 1993.

William Garrett Piston