Francis Henney Smith Francis Henney Smith ( October 18 , 1812 – March 21 , 1890 ) was an American military officer , mathematician and educator . After graduating from West Point and a brief service in the United States Army , he became the first Superintendent of the Virginia Military Institute on its establishment in 1839 , and held that post until shortly before his death . His superintendency included the four years of the American Civil War , during which he served as a major general in the Virginia militia and a colonel in the Confederate States Army . Early life . Smith was born in Norfolk , Virginia . He married Miss Sarah Henderson on June 9 , 1835 at West Point , New York . They had seven children . Smith graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1833 and served as a second lieutenant in the United States Army until he resigned his commission on May 1 , 1836 . Thereafter , he was a professor of mathematics at Hampden - Sydney College from 1836 to 1839 . Upon the establishment of the Virginia Military Institute in Lexington on November 11 , 1839 , Smith was named its first superintendent . Some time before the Civil War , he was appointed colonel in the Virginia Militia . Smith was the author of " An Elementary Treatise on Algebra " ( 1858 ) and co - author of " The American Statistical Arithmetic , Designed for Academies and Schools " ( 1845 ) , " Best Methods of Conducting Common Schools " ( 1849 ) and " College Reform " ( 1850 ) and translator of " An Elementary Treatise on Analytical Geometry " ( 1860 ) . Smith is also known as Sigma Nu International Fraternity ' s spiritual founder . American Civil War . At the outbreak of the Civil War , Smith was appointed a Brevet Brigadier General in the Virginia Militia on April 24 , 1861 , then a colonel in the 9th Virginia Infantry Regiment on July 7 , 1861 . He was often absent and returned to VMI when it reopened in late 1861 . He was dropped as colonel of the 9th Virginia Infantry Regiment in the reorganization of May 8 , 1862 and then was Colonel of the VMI Infantry battalion between April 30 , 1862 and May 18 , 1862 , May 11 , 1864 and June 27 , 1864 and March 1865 and April 1865 . At some date not shown in the references , possibly coincident with his appointment as " major general of cadets , " he was appointed a major general in the Virginia Militia . He was appointed " major general of cadets " on December 18 , 1861 according to the inscription below his statue shown in the accompanying image . Regardless whether the date of that appointment coincided with the date of his appointment as major general in the Virginia Militia , his appointments in the Confederate Army were only to positions with the rank of colonel . Major General John C . Breckinridge was commanding Confederate forces in the Department of Southwest Virginia during a critical time in the 1864 campaign in the Shenandoah Valley . Although he did not want to use the VMI cadets in battle , Breckinridge requested that Smith send them to reinforce his outnumbered army when Union forces began to move into the valley . On May 12 , 1864 , Smith sent almost the entire Corps of Cadets of VMI , leaving behind only 27 cadets to guard the Institute , to help hold off the advance of the Union Army under Major General Franz Sigel from the northern end of the valley . Smith , who was ill , also stayed behind . The cadets were led by 24 - year old Commandant of Cadets and VMI teacher Scott Ship . On May 15 , 1864 , the VMI Cadets earned distinction and fame at the Battle of New Market as the only Corps of Cadets in United States history to fight as a unit in battle . Ten cadets were killed and forty - seven were wounded in their valiant defense of the center of the Confederate line at a critical point in the battle . The Union forces were defeated and Sigel withdrew them to Mount Jackson and then to his headquarters at Cedar Creek , Virginia . On June 11 , 1864 , Major General David Hunter , who had replaced Sigel after New Market , ordered a retaliatory attack , his troops burning and shelling VMI ' s campus , forcing the relocation of classes to Richmond , where they remained until the city fell in April 1865 . Classes returned to the Lexington campus in October , after the conclusion of the war . Later life . Smith oversaw the reconstruction of VMI after its destruction , and remained as superintendent until December 31 , 1889 . He died in Lexington on March 21 , 1890 , at the age of 77 , and is buried in Stonewall Jackson Memorial Cemetery . His correspondence is retained by VMI .