Western Kansas world. [volume] (WaKeeney, Kan.) 1885-current, 1886-02-13
SOUTHERN GENERALS.
Some Men Who Attained High Rank in the
Confederate Service.

Some Men Who Attained High Rank in the
Confederate Service.
Washington Herald.
Most of the visitors to the house OF rep
resentatives noticed on the democratic
side of the chamber, a little in the rear of
the center, small man with very full
beard that shows decided tendency to
become white, and when they ask who he
is are told that it is General Wheeler, of
Alabama.
This gentleman attained the highest
military rank that was ever conferred
upon one of his age on this hemisphere,
for he was commissioned lieutenant
general in the confederate army when he
was but twenty eight years of age, and
by far the Youngest officer of his rank
ever known to either army or navy on the
North American continent, and younger
than any general officer who has held an
equivalent command on the continent of
Europe in our time, except in the case OF
one royal prince of the house of Haps-
burg.
There were twenty two lieutenant gen.
erals in the confederate army from be-
ginning to end. General Longstreet was
the senior when the war closed, and Cen
eral Ewen was next. Of the twenty two
there are still living Longstreet, Hamil-
ton, E. Kirby Smith, Wheeler, A. P.
Stewart, D. q. Hill and Buckner. OF the
five full generals made late in 1861 none
remain but Generals Johnston { J. E. J,
and Beauregard. The latter, was the first
general officer ever nominated and COM
missioned under the confederated govern
ment, and should have been its senior
general officer under the ordinary mill
tary usages, but the act creating the
military establishment OF the confed-
crate states provided that officers OF
the United States army who might &C
cept confederate commissions should take
rank according to the grade they held In
the United States army when their resig-
nations were accepted. This made Cen
eral Cooper, who was adjutant general OF
the United States army when he resigned,
the senior officer of the confederacy, and
placed General Lee (who only became q
full colonel about three months before
his resignation) and General Beauregard
(who was a major Of engineers when he
went south) at the bottom of the list.
General Beauregard took the ground that
he was the first brigadier general the
confederate states ever commissioned,
and was holding that position when at
least one of the officers promoted over
his head was yet in the United States
army, and he should have been the SEN
ior general. And the persistency with
which he unavailingly insisted upon
what he believed was his by right IN
duced the first difference Of opinion,
which soon grew into breach that was
irreconcilable, between him and Mr.. Da-
Wis.
When General Wheeler attained the
rank of lieutenant general he was just
the same age as Napoleon Bonapate was
when he took command Of the army OF
Italy and commenced career that In
briliancy is unequaled in the worlds mil
itary history. Wheeler, too, is about the
heig ht of Napoleon, who was five feet
three inches in stature, and in quickness
of movement and the facility with which
he changed his plans in an emergency
he is not unlike the great Corsican in
mental characteristics. The officers OF
the United States army will have no
more devoted and intelligent friend in the
congressional ranks than the old time
comrade In the First dragons, "Point''
Wheeler.