Ormsby M . Mitchel Ormsby MacKnight ( or McKnight ) Mitchel ( August 28 , 1810 , or possibly 1809 , – October 30 , 1862 ) was an American astronomer and major general in the American Civil War . A multi - talented man , he was also an attorney , surveyor , professor , and publisher . He is notable for publishing the first magazine in the United States devoted to astronomy . Known in the Union Army as " Old Stars " , he is best known for ordering the raid that became famous as the Great Locomotive Chase during the American Civil War . The U . S . communities of Mitchell , Indiana , Mitchelville , South Carolina , and Fort Mitchell , Kentucky were named for him , as was an impact crater on the planet of Mars . Early life and career . Mitchel was born in Union County , Kentucky , but grew up in Lebanon , Ohio . He was educated in Lebanon , Ohio and afterward at West Point in 1825 , where he was a classmate to Robert E . Lee and Joseph E . Johnston . He graduated in 1829 , placing 15th out of 46 graduates . Mitchel stayed at West Point as assistant professor of mathematics for three years . After holding several military positions while studying law , he went to Cincinnati , passed the bar and became an attorney . He also filled the office of Chief Engineer of the Little Miami Railroad - then in process of construction . Subsequently in 1836 , he became Assistant Professor of mathematics , philosophy , and Professor of astronomy at Cincinnati College , and during this incumbency achieved a national renown as an astronomical lecturer and builder of a great observatory ( Cincinnati Observatory ) . He was instrumental in establishing the college ' s law school , and on his first vacation , surveyed and recommended the route of the planned Little Miami Railroad between Cincinnati and Springfield , Ohio . Conceiving a desire to possess a fine telescope , he began by striving to awaken interest in the subject of astronomy through a series of lectures . The first was heard by 16 people ; but the last was listened to by an enraptured audience of 2 , 000 . Availing himself of the enthusiasm thus generated , he organized the Cincinnati Astronomical Society with 300 members at $ 25 each , and started for Europe to find his telescope . His search was long , but successful and , returning , he plunged into the struggle to secure a suitable observatory . In the person of the eccentric but immensely capable Nicholas Longworth he found a helpful coadjutor . Upon the land which was donated by Mr . Longworth ( located on the summit of Mt . Adams ) . Professor Mitchell began the foundation of his building and John Quincy Adams , then more than 77 years of age , delivered an address at the laying of the cornerstone . At this period of undertaking , the plucky little professor ( he was small in stature and most delicately formed ) has collected $ 3 , 000 , and $ 6 , 500 necessary to complete his work . The times were hard and the subscriptions came in so slowly that he determined to collect them in person . Where money could not be procured , he took provisions or anything in the world that had negotiable value . This " potpourri " of valuables he marketed and turned into cash as best he could . Nor was this all that the indefatigable professor had to do . Many of his subscriptions being in work and materials no collectors would accept them as his assets and he undertook to make them available by buying all the materials , hiring all the men and superintending all the work , at which task he labored like a miniature titan . The ascent to the place of construction was steep . Therefore he built an kiln and burned the lime ; he purchased a sand pit also and often shoveled its contents into the wagon with his own hands . These herculean laborers , arduous as they were , constituted but the advocation of the busy man for , all the time , he carried on his classes , teaching five hours a day from eight until one . Each Saturday exhausted his funds and on Monday he had to begin collecting again . But , nothing daunted or discouraged the invincible enthusiast , he stuck resolutely to his task until it was done , and in March , 1845 he had the satisfaction of hoisting his telescope into place . At the time , it was the second - largest refracting telescope in the world . There was no salary attached to the office of astronomer in this new observatory and the consecrated star - gazer supported himself by civil engineering on the route of the Ohio & Mississippi Railroad ( Ohio and Mississippi Railway ) and by lecturing anywhere and everywhere . These lectures are among the most brilliant ever delivered in America . For a time , Cincinnati lost his inspirational presence . In 1859 , Mitchel accepted the position of astronomer of the Dudley Observatory in Albany , New York ( a position which he held until 1861 ) , where he continued his pioneering work on the development of telegraphic determination of longitude . Although , he did not wholly relinquish a connection with the one he had built in Cincinnati . Mitchel helped establish observatories for the United States Navy and at Harvard University . He also published the first monthly magazine in the United States devoted specifically to astronomy . When the war broke out , the scholar - whose patriotism was a passion - turned soldier . He happened to be in New York when the news of the fall of Sumter came and , being asked to speak at a public meeting , poured out the deep emotions of his fervid soul in a passionate appeal whose eloquence produced an effect like that of the orations or Demosthenes , Cicero and Burke . Men and women wept aloud ; the cheering drowned his words and the speech he made has been regarded as worthy to be placed alongside abolitionists Lincoln , Sumner , Phillips , and Beecher . His previous record and this great address procured for Mitchell and high position in the US Army and his career as a soldier began . General Ormsby M . Mitchell died in 1862 in South Carolina , a victim of yellow fever , while a soldier in the American Civil War . Civil War . During the Civil War , he entered the Union Army with a commission as brigadier general of volunteers . He first organized the northern Kentucky defenses around Cincinnati . He commanded the Department of the Ohio from September to November 1861 . During this time , he conspired with espionage agent James J . Andrews on plans to steal a train in Georgia and disrupt a railroad vital to the Confederate States Army coincident with Mitchel ' s planned attack on Chattanooga , Tennessee . The raid failed , as did Mitchel ' s military operation . Andrews and a number of his men were captured . Andrews himself was among eight men who were tried in Chattanooga . They were hanged in Atlanta by Confederate forces , but were later buried in the National Cemetery at Chattanooga in 1887 . Although a military failure , the story of Andrew ' s Raid became known to American history as the Great Locomotive Chase , and has been retold in publications and film . The pursuit of Andrews ' Raiders formed the basis of the Buster Keaton silent film " The General " and a dramatic 1956 Walt Disney film , " The Great Locomotive Chase " . General Mitchel led a division in the Army of the Ohio from December 1861 to July 1862 , and was placed in charge of the defense of Nashville , Tennessee , with headquarters in the vicinity of Shelbyville , Tennessee . He became famous when he seized the city of Huntsville , Alabama in April 1862 without a shot being fired , after he led his troops there from Shelbyville in a surprise maneuver . He was promoted to major general for his efforts . In September 1862 , he assumed command of the X Corps and the Department of the South at Hilton Head , South Carolina , but died in Beaufort of yellow fever shortly after assuming his post . He is buried in Green - Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn , New York .