James J . Andrews James J . Andrews ( c . 1829 – June 7 , 1862 ) was a Kentucky civilian who worked for the Union Army during the early years of the American Civil War . He led a daring raid behind enemy lines on the Western and Atlantic Railroad , famously known as the Great Locomotive Chase . The mission failed and Andrews and seven fellow raiders were executed by the Confederates on the charge of spying . Biography . Andrews was born in Holiday ' s Cove , Virginia ( now Weirton , West Virginia ) . He moved to Kentucky , where he found employment as a house painter and singing coach . During the Civil War , he was engaged in buying contraband merchandise ( including quinine ) and smuggling it between the military lines . While serving as a secret agent and scout in Nashville , Tennessee , for Major General Don Carlos Buell in the spring of 1862 , he devised a plan to take eight men to steal a train in Atlanta , Georgia , and drive it north . They would disrupt Confederate communications in western Tennessee and burn the long railroad bridge over the Tennessee River at Bridgeport . The mission failed when the required engineer failed to show up at the designated meeting place . In April , Andrews proposed a new scheme to Major General Ormsby M . Mitchel to seize a locomotive in northern Georgia and drive it to Chattanooga , Tennessee , where he would rendezvous with Mitchel ' s attacking Union Army . On April 12 , 1862 , Andrews , another civilian , William " Bill " Campbell , and 22 volunteers from three Ohio infantry regiments garbed in civilian clothes , stole a locomotive known as " The General " at Big Shanty , near Kennesaw , Georgia . They headed north , destroying tracks and telegraph wires along the way in an effort to discourage pursuers and render the railroad useless for supplying the Confederate troops in Tennessee . William Allen Fuller , the conductor of the stolen train pursued the train hijackers on foot , by handcar , and in a variety of other locomotives , most notably the " Texas " , in which he gave chase for in reverse . After an chase , the " General " lost power just north of Ringgold , Georgia , and Andrews and his raiders scattered . He was captured soon afterwards and identified as the leader . He was court - martial ed in Chattanooga and sentenced to hang in one week as a spy . Andrews escaped from Swims Jail on June 1 , but was quickly recaptured the next day . On June 7 , he was taken to Atlanta ahead of the advancing Union army by train over the same tracks that he had used during the raid . Andrews was ineptly hanged at about 5 : 00 that afternoon ( the scaffold was so low that his feet touched the ground and he most likely died of strangulation as opposed to the internal decapitation that causes death in a proper hanging ) , near the present day intersection of 3rd and Juniper Streets , NE . Andrews ' body was temporarily buried at the site of execution . His remains were removed to the Chattanooga National Cemetery on October 16 , 1887 , and a gravestone and monument to the raid was erected near the Ohio Memorial ( Section H , Grave No . 12 , 982 ) . He was engaged to Elizabeth Layton of Flemingsburg , Kentucky at the time of his execution . After learning of her fiancé ' s death , Layton became distraught and apparently never recovered and died two years later , her family believed of a " broken heart " . As a civilian , Andrews was ineligible for the Medal of Honor that was presented to most of the raiders . Walt Disney made a movie of Andrews ' exploits in 1956 called " The Great Locomotive Chase " starring Fess " Davy Crockett " Parker as Andrews . Buster Keaton ' s 1927 feature - length comedy masterpiece " The General " was also loosely based on the incident .