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Major-General Patrick R. Cleburne, one of the most brilliant soldiers of the Confederate States, a native of County Cork Ireland, was born on St. Patrick's Day and became the only product of the Emerald Isle to become a Confederate major general. When twenty-two years of age he joined the British army as a private, and there took his first lessons in drill and discipline. For good conduct he was promoted to the rank of corporal. After failing the language requirements for a druggist's degree, (his father was a country doctor in the old country), he served with the British 4lst Regiment of Foot as an officer for a number of years before purchasing his way out. After remaining three years in the British army he procured his discharge and came to America. Emigrating to America, he became a druggist and then a highly successful property attorney. He settled in Arkansas, became a hard student, was admitted to the bar, and the year 1861 found him practicing law in Helena, enjoying in his profession and in society the honorable position which his toil and native worth had gained for him.
He was among the first to answer the call to arms. He raised a company and with it joined the First, afterward known as the Fifteenth Arkansas regiment, of which he was almost unanimously elected colonel. He served in Arkansas before being named as commander of the state unit. At the head of the Yell Rifles, he then transferred with William J. Hardee to central Kentucky & was promoted to brigadier general. His first campaign was with General Hardee in Missouri & went with Hardee to Bowling Green, Ky. He had during this short military service so impressed his superiors that he was assigned to command of a brigade, and on March 4, 1862, was commissioned brigadier-general. At Shiloh and during the siege of Corinth he proved that his abilities had not been overestimated, and during the reorganization of the army at Tupelo he brought his brigade to a very high state of discipline and efficiency. He had that valuable combination of qualifications for command which enabled him to enforce discipline and at the same time secure the esteem and confidence of his troops. At Richmond, Ky., he commanded a division whose impetuous charge had much to do with winning the magnificent victory over "Bull" Nelson's army. Though painfully wounded in this battle, a few weeks later he led his men in the fierce conflict at Perryville, with his usual success. Promoted to major general, he commanded a division at Murfreesboro, during the Tullahoma Campaign, and at Chickamauga.
On December 13, 1862, he was commissioned major-general. He was in the memorable attack upon the right of the Federal army at Murfreesboro, which drove the Union lines until the mass in front became at last too thick for further penetration. At Missionary Ridge, in command at the tunnel, he defeated Sherman, capturing flags and hundreds of prisoners, and when involved in the general defeat, he made a heroic fight at Ringgold gap and saved Bragg's artillery and wagon train. In recognition of this gallant exploit, the Confederate Congress passed the following joint resolution: "Resolved, that the thanks of Congress are due, and are hereby tendered to Maj.-Gen. Patrick R. Cleburne, and the officers and men under his command, for the victory obtained by them over superior forces of the enemy at Ringgold gap in the State of Georgia on the 27th day of November, 1863, by which the advance of the enemy was impeded, our wagon trains and most of our artillery saved, and a large number of the enemy killed and wounded."
Always pensive and observant, he realized the deplorable state of morale in the army, and the straitened conditions of the Confederacy in general were working against the goal of independence. He had a solution which he earnestly believed would turn the tide in favor of the South, both militarily and politically, and on January 3, 1864, he met with Gen. Joseph Johnston and other high command personalities in Dalton, Georgia to read his proposal on emancipating the slaves and enlisting them in the Confederate army.
As 1863 was fading into 1864, with the cause he loved and served valiantly being inexorably ground to defeat, Cleburne proposed what for many Southerners was the unthinkable to the Confederate government. Cleburne drafted a well-considered, written proposal that would arguably become the nearly invincible Cleburne's ironic legacy, his only failure. In the January 2 proposal, presented to General Joe Johnston and the rest of the command structure of the exhausted Western army, Cleburne suggested that Southern slaves be offered freedom in return for service in the Confederate army.
Though Gen. Johnston declined to send it on to Richmond, Gen. William Walker, who considered the idea close to treason, forwarded a copy to Confederate President Jefferson Davis. Davis ordered Johnston to suppress any mention of the idea, saying it was "injurious to the public service." Bragg, failed as a field commander, yet now a military advisor to Davis, said, "We must mark the men (who backed the idea) ... and feel they will bear watching." Cleburne's advancement into the army's top echelons ground to a halt.
His concept was shocking to some, endorsed by others, but ultimately rejected by President Jefferson Davis at the urging of his military advisor in Richmond, Braxton Bragg.
Patrick Cleburne accepted his superiors suggestions to suppress his proposal on enlisting slaves, and accompanied his friend William J. Hardee as best man to Hardees' wedding in Demopolis, Alabama. Cleburne met Susan Tarleton, the 24-year-old daughter of a Mobile, Alabama planter, and was love struck. He proposed to her before his ten-day furlough was up, and she agreed to become engaged to him.
Through the campaigns of 1863, Cleburne became more outspoken along with his superior and mentor William J. Hardee on the incompetence of Gen. Braxton Bragg. After the Battle of Chickamauga and the Chattanooga Campaign, Cleburne achieved lasting military fame for his defense of Tunnel Hill on Missionary Ridge in Tennessee and at the Battle of Ringgold Gap in North Georgia. His brilliant tactical command in the use of his small force, and strategic utilization of terrain remain among the most compelling in military history to study.
One of the most brilliant episodes of the Atlanta campaign of 1864 was Cleburne's victory at Pickett's mill over Howard's corps of Sherman's army. Again at Chickamauga Cleburne made a charge, in which his men by desperate valor won and held a position that had been assailed time and again without success. A favorite of Jefferson Davis, he is credited with covering the retreat from Chattanooga after his splendid defense of Tunnel Hill.
That winter he proposed that in order to reinforce the Confederate armies slavery would have to be abolished in a "reasonable time" and blacks be recruited for military service on the promise of their freedom. The proposal was rejected by the Richmond authorities and would not be passed by the Confederate Congress until a couple of months after Cleburne's death. Cleburne went on to command his division, and briefly the corps, through the Atlanta Campaign and then with Hood into middle Tennessee. "We are going to carry the war into Africa, but I fear we will not be as successful as Scipio was." According to Dr. Charles E. Nash, in writing a biographical sketch of Gen. Patrick Ronayne Cleburne, these were the general's words when asked by Dr. Nash what his friend Cleburne thought of the upcoming Tennessee Campaign in early November 1864.
The Tennessee Campaign found Cleburne increasingly thoughtful and pensive. He had more on his mind than the setbacks of his military career as an impetus for his apparent gloom. In June Cleburne had received official word confirming the death of his younger brother, Capt. Christopher Cleburne, who was killed in the battle of Cloyd's Farm in Virginia while serving in John Hunt Morgan's Cavalry. With the fall of Atlanta and the ensuing brief period of inactivity, Cleburne had also hoped he might take leave of the army in October for the purpose of pursuing his romantic interest with his betrothed, Miss Susan Tarleton. Cleburne had hinted in his letters that he hoped he would return to his command, from this leave, a married man. After four long years of rigorous campaigning, it was obvious to friends and staff that their general was increasingly absorbed with reflection on his future beyond the bloody battlefields of war.
The derailment of his plans may have set the tone for Cleburne's words in a speech to his men at Powder Springs, Georgia, on October 2nd. Perhaps the Irish born general had some intuition of what lay ahead for himself and his men on their return to Tennessee. A spectator, John L. McKinnon, recorded the stirring words of the general in his postwar writings: "If this cause that is so dear to my heart is doomed to fail, I pray heaven may let me fall with it, while my face is toward the enemy and my arm battling for that which I know to be right."
From the beginning of the campaign, Hood's army of an estimated 32,000 was plagued with delays and bad luck. Due to an inadequate and overburdened railroad system, the army sat idle at Tuscumbia, Alabama, while commissary officers struggled to obtain twenty day's rations before the march could commence. The stores were hauled from Cherokee Station to Tuscumbia by wagon, a distance of fifteen miles. The supply system was barely able to keep up with daily demand, much less stockpile the needed rations for the campaign. The weather became Hood's incontestable enemy in November. For the entire month, the rain fell in torrents, turning the campsite into a sea of mud and mire. The swollen Tennessee River frequently washed away railroad bridges and hampered the work of stringing the pontoons for the crossing. The sodden days, bone-chilling nights, inadequate rations, and endless delays took their toll on the morale of the Army of Tennessee's thinly-clad soldiers throughout the entire month.
These soldiers were hardened veterans, survivors of four years of hard marching and blood-letting on the fields of Alabama, Tennessee, Georgia, Kentucky and Mississippi. With the anticipated arrival of Forrest's Cavalry on November 14 through the 16th, animated talk of the upcoming offensive campaign began to bolster the sagging morale. Many would be returning to their homes for the first time in two years, and they were glad to be advancing northward at last after months of frustrating retreat
General Cleburne had doubts about John Bell Hood's generalship from the moment Hood replaced Joseph E. Johnston as commander of the Army of Tennessee. Hood's poor performance as a corps commander under Johnston showed a lack of the solid leadership qualities needed for command of an army.In the awful carnage at Franklin, November 30, 1864, Cleburne, the "Stonewall Jackson of the West," gave his last battle order. He became the senior of six Confederate generals to die in this fight, which did little more than commit mass suicide against the Union works. Within twenty paces of the Union line, pierced by three wounds, he fell, and on the battlefield expired. His death was a disheartening blow to the army of Tennessee, and was mourned throughout the whole South. His death was a calamity to the Confederate cause perhaps only exceeded by the death of Stonewall Jackson. First buried in the pauper's section of Rose Hill Cemetery in Columbia TN, he was moved to Saint James Episcopal Church in Mt. Pleasant TN upon the insistance of friend Lucius Polk. Cleburne's remains were later removed to Helena, Arkansas.
His military assignments included: captain, Company F, lst Arkansas State Troops (early 1861); colonel, lst Arkansas State Troops (early 1861); colonel, 15th Arkansas (designation change July 23, 1861); commanding 2nd Brigade, lst (Hardee's) Division, Army of Central Kentucky, Department #2 (fall 1861 - March 29, 1862); commanding 2nd Brigade, Hardee's Division, Army of the Mississippi July 2 - August 15, 1862); commanding 2nd Brigade, Buckner's Division, Left Wing, Army of the Mississippi (August 15-30, October - October 8, and October - November 20, 1862); commanding 2nd Brigade, Buckner's Division, Hardee's-Breckinridge's Corps, Army of Tennessee (November 20 - December 1862); major general, CSA (December 20, 1862 to rank from the 13th); commanding the division (December 1862 - November 30, 1863); commanding division, Hardee's (Polk's old)- Cheatham's Corps, Army of Tennessee (November 30, 1863 - January 1864, January-August 3 1, and September 2 - November 30, 1864); and commanding the corps (August 31 - September 2, 1864).
"Life has always been a small matter with me when duty points the way," wrote Patrick R. Cleburne to his brother on the eve of war in 1861. Newly elected Captain of a company of militia called the Yell Rifles raised in Phillips County, Arkansas, his words would become synonymous with his conduct over the next four years.
Even though Jefferson Davis called him ``the Stonewall of the West,'' and Robert E. Lee described him as a ``meteor shining from a clouded sky,'' Cleburne, being foreign-born and an outspoken critic of ineffective officers (including his own commander), was often passed over for promotion. He also stirred controversy when he proposed abolishing slavery and enlisting ex-slaves in the army.
Despite his disappointments, he achieved a superb record as an innovative division commander and was faithful to the Southern cause. After the capture of Atlanta, though the war had clearly been lost, the army's new commander fought on, rashly expending lives. Cleburne, though aware of the likely outcome, stayed with his troops and was killed at the Battle of Franklin at the age of 36.
Consecrated on Sept. 4, 1842, by James Hervey Otey, first Episcopal Bishop of Tennessee, St. John's Church at Ashwood in Maury Co. TN church was built by Leonidas Polk, then Missionary Bishop of the Southwest and his three brothers, George, Lucius, and Rufus, who divided a grant received from their father, Col. William Polk, of North Carolina.
Bishop Leonidas Polk later served as a general in the Confederate Army of Tennessee and was killed in action in Georgia in 1864. On his march northward with Gen. Hood late in 1864, a group of the officers rode by, Gen. Patrick Cleburne, one of Bragg's staff officers, commented, "It is almost worth dying for, to be buried in such a beautiful spot." It is said to have reminded him of his boyhood church back in Ireland.
Just two or three days later Cleburne's body, along with those of fellow Generals Granbury and Strahl, were carried from the Battle of Franklin and and laid on the front porch of the Carnton Plantation in Franklin. After a brief burial in Columbia's Rose Hill Cemetery, he was buried in St. John's Cemetery in Mt. Pleasant. Some years later their remains were removed and interred in cemeteries nearer their homes in other states.
On Nov. 30, the army, now under the command of the irascible, one-legged John Bell Hood , stood before a nearly impregnable Federal fortification at Franklin, Tennessee. Hood ordered a frontal assault. The men of the Army of Tennessee knew they were headed to destruction. "Few of us will ever return to Arkansas," Gen. Daniel Govan told Cleburne. "Well, Govan," Cleburne replied, "if we are to die, let us die like men." Cleburne mounted his horse, and before the day was over he was shot dead.
Gen. William Hardee later said, "Where his division defended, no odds broke its lines; where it attacked, no numbers resisted its onslaught, save only once - and there is the grave of Cleburne and his heroic division."
Below: The final, tragic, moments of Patrick R. Cleburne, as painted by artist Don Troiani. Click on artwork to visit his website.
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