Lafayette McLaws


Lafayette McLaws was a United States Army officer and a Confederate general in the American Civil War. He served at Antietam and Fredericksburg, where Robert E. Lee praised his defense of Maryes Heights, and at Gettysburg, where his division made successful assaults through the Peach Orchard and Wheatfield, but was unable to dislodge Union forces from Cemetery Ridge. After the Knoxville Campaign, he was courtmartialed for inefficiency, though this was overturned for procedural reasons. Finally he was sent to his native Georgia to resist Shermans March to the Sea, but had to retreat through the Carolinas, losing many men through desertion, and is presumed to have surrendered with Joseph E. Johnston in April 1865.

McLaws was born in Augusta, Georgia. He graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1842, placing 48th out of 56 cadets. McLaws served as an infantry officer in the MexicanAmerican War, in the West, and in the Utah War to suppress the Mormon uprising. While at Jefferson Barracks, Missouri, he married Emily Allison Taylor, the niece of Zachary Taylor, making him a cousininlaw of future Confederates Richard Taylor and Jefferson Davis.

Source: Wikipedia


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