Gouverneur Kemble Warren

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Warren, Gouverneur Kemble (1830–1882) U.S. army officer and military engineer. Born in Cold Spring, New York, in 1830, Gouverneur K. Warren was graduated from West Point in 1850 and was commissioned in the Corps of Topographical Engineers. Before the Civil War, he conducted surveys in the Mississippi delta, the Dakotas, and Nebraska. With Captain Andrew A. Humphreys, Warren studied possible routes for a transcontinental railroad. He was an assistant professor of mathematics at West Point when the Civil War began and left to accept a commission as lieutenant colonel of the 5th New York Volunteer Infantry. He later was assigned to military engineering duties and served as the chief engineer of the Army of the Potomac. He distinguished himself on the second day of the Battle of Gettysburg (1863) by organizing the defense of the key Union position on Little Round Top. He was then named to command the II Corps, and then the V Corps, of the Army of the Potomac, serving with distinction until the Battle of Five Forks (1865) where he was summarily relieved of command. Following the Civil War, Warren conducted various surveying projects and repeatedly sought rectification of his relief at Five Forks, which he received from a court of inquiry in December 1879. He died in 1882.

Gouverneur Kemble Warren , 1830–82, Union general in the American Civil War, b. Cold Spring, N.Y. An army engineer, he assisted in the survey of the Mississippi delta and also engaged in surveying in the West. In the Civil War he commanded a brigade of the Army of the Potomac in the campaigns of 1862, distinguishing himself particularly at Gaines's Mill in the Seven Days battles. In the Gettysburg campaign Warren, who was then chief engineer, saved the Round Tops by promptly diverting troops to their defense, July 2, 1863. He took part in the indecisive operations following Gettysburg and saw action in the Wilderness campaign and in the fighting around Petersburg (1864–65). At Five Forks (Apr. 1, 1865) Gen. Philip H. Sheridan, alleging dilatoriness on Warren's part, removed him from command. Warren made repeated requests for an official examination of Sheridan's charges; soon after his death in 1882, a court of inquiry exonerated him. After the war he continued in the engineers corps. His Account of the 5th Army Corps (1866) is a vindication of his conduct.