Stonewall Jackson and the American Civil War, Volume 1

Born in 1824, Jackson managed to enter West Point, graduating 17th in a class of 59. In his first assignments in Mexico, he performed well and was brevetted major, receiving praise from none other then Winfield Scott. After assignments in Florida and New York, he became professor of artillery and natural philosophy at the Virginia Military Institute, resigning from the Army shortly thereafter. In 1861, an unknown major in the Virginia Militia, he was sent to Richmond and made a colonel of Confederate Infantry. By June, 1861 he was made a Brigadier General. With the Battle of Bull Run--where he got his name when it was said "There is Jackson, standing like a stone wall."--he made Major General. From there on nothing could stop the fearless Jackson. Soon a close confidant of Lee, his ideas, especially in the Shenandoah Valley Campaign, dramatically altered the methods of warfare for the remainder of the Civil War. His mastery of tactics and strategy was an enormous boon to the South.His two-part attack, with Lee, on Hooker's troops at Chancellorsville and the subsequent routing of the Federal XI Corps was one of the most stirring and striking victories of the war. It was also to be Jackson's swan song when, in the dim light at sunset, he was accidently wounded by some of his own troops, and succumbed on May 10, 1863. Only two years into the war, the Confederacy lost a brilliant commander.