Edwin Vose Sumner Edwin Vose Sumner ( January 30 , 1797 – March 21 , 1863 ) was a career United States Army officer who became a Union Army general and the oldest field commander of any Army Corps on either side during the American Civil War . His nicknames " Bull " or " Bull Head " came both from his great booming voice and a legend that a musket ball once bounced off his head . Sumner fought in the Black Hawk War , with distinction in the Mexican - American War , on the Western frontier , and in the Eastern Theater for the first half of the Civil War . He led the II Corps of the Army of the Potomac through the Peninsula Campaign , the Seven Days Battles , the Maryland Campaign , and the Battle of Fredericksburg . Early life and career . Sumner was born in Boston , Massachusetts , to Elisha Sumner and Nancy Vose Sumner . His early schooling was in Milton Academy in Milton , Massachusetts . In 1819 , after losing interest in a mercantile career in Troy , New York , he entered the United States Army as a second lieutenant in the 2nd US Infantry Regiment on March 3 , 1819 . He was promoted to first lieutenant on January 25 , 1825 . Sumner ' s military appointment was facilitated by Samuel Appleton Storrow , Judge Advocate Major on the staff of General Jacob Jennings Brown of the Northern department . ( Storrow had previously served as a mentor to Sumner in Boston . ) In recognition of their long - standing friendship , Sumner would later name one of his sons Samuel Storrow Sumner . He married Hannah Wickersham Foster ( 1804 – 1880 ) on March 31 , 1822 . They had six children together : Nancy , Margaret Foster , Sarah Montgomery , Mary Heron , Edwin Vose Jr . , and Samuel Storrow Sumner . His son Samuel was a general during the Spanish - American War , Boxer Rebellion , and the Philippine - American War . Sumner ' s daughter , Mary Heron , married General Armistead L . Long in 1860 . Sumner later served in the Black Hawk War and in various Indian campaigns . On March 4 , 1833 , he was promoted to the rank of captain and assigned to command B Company , the U . S . Dragoon Regiment ( later First US Dragoons ) , immediately upon its creation by Congress . In 1838 , he commanded the cavalry instructional establishment at Carlisle Barracks in Pennsylvania . He was assigned to Ft . Atkinson , Iowa Territory , from 1842 until 1845 . He was the fort ' s commander during most of that period . He was promoted to major of the 2nd Dragoons on June 30 , 1846 . During the Mexican - American War , Sumner was brevetted for bravery at the Battle of Cerro Gordo ( to lieutenant colonel ) . It was here that he gained the nickname " Bull Head " because of a story about a musket ball that bounced off his head during the battle . At the Molino del Rey he received the brevet rank of colonel . He was promoted to lieutenant colonel of the 1st US Dragoons on July 23 , 1848 . He served as the military governor of the New Mexico Territory from 1851 – 53 , and was promoted to colonel of the 1st U . S . Cavalry on March 3 , 1855 . In 1856 Sumner commanded Fort Leavenworth , Kansas , and became involved in the crisis known as Bleeding Kansas . In 1857 , as commander of the 1st Cavalry Regiment ( 1855 ) , he led a punitive expedition against the Cheyenne . and in 1858 he commanded the Department of the West . On January 7 , 1861 , Sumner wrote to President - elect Abraham Lincoln , advising him to carry a weapon at all times . Lt . Gen . Winfield Scott assigned Sumner as the senior officer to accompany Lincoln from Springfield , Illinois , to Washington , D . C . , in March 1861 . Civil War service . In February 1861 , Brig . Gen . David E . Twiggs was dismissed from the Army for treason by outgoing U . S . President James Buchanan , and on March 12 , 1861 , Sumner was nominated by the newly inaugurated Lincoln to replace Twiggs as one of only three brigadier generals in the regular army , with date of rank March 16 . Sumner was thus the first new Union general created by the secession crisis . He was then sent to replace Brig . Gen . Albert Sidney Johnston , then in command of the Department of the Pacific in California , and thus took no part in the 1861 campaigns of the war . When Sumner left for California , his son - in - law Armistead Lindsay Long resigned his commission and enlisted with the Confederate Army eventually becoming Robert E . Lee ' s military secretary and an artillery brigadier general . In November 1861 , Sumner was brought back east to command a division , and on May 5 , 1862 he was promoted to major general in the Union Army . When Maj . Gen . George B . McClellan began organizing the Army of the Potomac in March , Sumner was given command of one of its new corps . McClellan had not originally formed corps within the Army ; Sumner was selected as one of four corps commanders by President Lincoln , based on his seniority . The II Corps , commanded during the war by Sumner , Darius N . Couch , Winfield Scott Hancock , and Andrew A . Humphreys , had the deserved reputation of being one of the best in the Eastern Theater . Sumner , who was the oldest of the generals in the Army of the Potomac , led his corps throughout the Peninsula Campaign and the Seven Days Battles . McClellan originally formed a poor opinion of Sumner during the Battle of Williamsburg on May 5 , 1862 . During McClellan ' s absence , Sumner directed the inconclusive battle , which failed to impede the Confederate withdrawal up the Peninsula , and McClellan wrote to his wife , " Sumner had proved that he was even a greater fool than I had supposed & had come within an ace of having us defeated . " At the Battle of Seven Pines , however , Sumner ' s initiative in sending reinforcing troops across the dangerously rain - swollen Chickahominy River prevented a Union disaster . He received the brevet of major general in the regular army for his gallantry at Seven Pines . Despite this honor , during the Union retreat of the Seven Days , McClellan expressed reluctance to name a second in command during his absences , knowing that Sumner was the most senior corps commander . Sumner was wounded in the arm and hand at the Battle of Glendale . Despite his old - fashioned ideas on discipline and respect for commanding officers , the II Corps troops generally had a positive opinion of him . In the fall of 1862 , at the Battle of Antietam , Sumner was the center of controversy . A morning attack he ordered Brig . Gen . John Sedgwick ' s division to launch into the West Woods was devastated by a Confederates counterattack ; Sedgwick ' s men were forced to retreat in great disorder to their starting point with over 2 , 200 casualties . Sumner has been condemned by most historians for his " reckless " attack , his lack of coordination with the other corps commanders , accompanying Sedgwick ' s division personally and losing control of his other attacking division , failing to perform adequate reconnaissance prior to launching his attack , and selecting an unusual line of battle formation that was so effectively flanked by the Confederate counterattack . Historian M . V . Armstrong ' s recent scholarship , however , has determined that Sumner did perform appropriate reconnaissance and his decision to attack where he did was justified by the information available to him . When Maj . Gen . Ambrose Burnside succeeded to the command of the Army of the Potomac , he grouped the corps in " grand divisions " and appointed Sumner to command the right grand division . In this capacity , the old cavalry soldier took part in the disastrous Battle of Fredericksburg , in which the II Corps suffered heavy casualties in frontal assaults against fortified Marye ' s Heights . Soon afterward , on Maj . Gen . Joseph Hooker ' s appointment to command the army , Sumner was relieved at his own request , apparently disillusioned with the quarreling in the army and also thoroughly exhausted . He was reassigned to a new command in Missouri effective in the spring . Before that , Sumner went to his daughter ' s home in Syracuse , New York to rest . While there , he suffered a heart attack and died on March 21 . Grave . Sumner is buried in Section 8 , Lot 1 of Oakwood Cemetery in Syracuse . Part of the Teall family plot , the gravesite has some structural problems and issues of disrepair . The Onondaga County Civil War Round Table is currently raising funds to repair the grave and the general area .