JUBAL

ANDERSON

See also:

• EARLY
• JUBAL ANDERSON EARLY (1816-1894)

EARLY (1816-1894)  , American soldier and lawyer, was born in Franklin county, Virginia, on the 3rd of November 1816, and graduated at the U.S . Military Academy in 1837 . He served in the Seminole War of 1837-38, after which he resigned in order to practise law in Franklin county, Va . He also engaged in state politics, and served in the Mexican War as a major of Virginia volunteers . He was strongly opposed to secession, but thought it his duty to conform to the action of his state . As a colonel in the Confederate army, he rendered conspicuous service at the first battle of Bull Run (q.v.) . Promoted brigadier-general, and subsequently major-general, Early served throughout the Virginian campaigns of 1862-63, and defended the lines of Fredericksburg during the battle of Chancellorsville . At Gettysburg he commanded his division of Ewell's corps . In the campaign of 1864 Early, who had now reached the rank of lieutenant-general, commanded the Confederate forces in the Shenandoah Valley . The action of Lynchburg left him free to move northwards, his opponent being compelled to march away from the Valley . Early promptly utilized his advantage, crossed the Potomac, and defeated, on the Monocacy, all the troops which could be gathered to meet him . He appeared before the lines of Washington, put part of Maryland and Pennsylvania under contribution, and only retired to the Valley when threatened by heavy forces hurriedly sent up to Washington .

He then fought a successful action at

Winchester, reappeared on the Potomac, and sent his cavalry on a raid into Pennsylvania . A greatly superior army was now formed under General Sheridan to oppose Early . In spite of his skill and energy the Confederate leader was defeated in the battles of Winchester and Fisher's Hill . Finally, on the 19th of October, after inflicting at first a severe blow upon the Federal army in its camps on Cedar Creek, he was decisively beaten by Sheridan . (See SHENANDOAH VALLEY CAMPAIGNS.) Waynesboro (March 1865) was his last fight, after which he was relieved from his command . General Early was regarded by many as the ablest soldier, after Lee and Jackson, in the Army of Northern Virginia, and one of the ablest in the whole Confederate army . That he failed to make headway against an army far superior in numbers, and led by a general of the calibre of Sheridan, cannot be held to prove the falsity of this judgment . After the peace he went to Canada, but in 1867 returned to resume the practice of law . For a time he managed in conjunction with General Beauregard the Louisiana lottery . • He died at Lynchburg, Va., on the and of March 1894 . General Early was for a time president of the Southern Historical Society, and wrote, besides various essays and historical papers, A Memoir of the Last Year of the War, &c . (1867) .