Stuart The Death of General J.E.B. STUART:

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Brev. Brig. Gen'l
Honored Fallen Comrade
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The Late Gen. J.E.B. Stuart--His Last Hours--How He Received His Death Wound.
Published: May 26, 1864, The NEW YORK Times...

From a long obituary of STUART -- whom the rebels call the "flower of Cavaliers" -- in the Richmond Examiner, we clip as follows:

"No incident of mortality, since the fall of the great JACKSON, has occasioned more painful regret than this. Major-Gen. J.E.B. STUART, the model of Virginian cavaliers and dashing chieftain, whose name was a terror to the enemy, and familiar as a household word in two continents, is dead, struck down by a bullet from the dastardly foe, and the whole Confederacy mourns him. He breathed out his gallant spirit resignedly, and in the full possession of all his remarkable faculties of mind and body, at twenty-two minutes to 8 o'clock, Thursday night, at the residence of Dr. BREWER, a relative, on Green-street, in the presence of Drs. BREWER, GARNETT, GIBSON and FONTAINE, of the General's staff, Rev. Messrs. PETERKIN and KEPPLER, and a circle of sorrow-stricken comrades and friends.

We learn from the physicians in attendance upon the General that his condition during the day was very changeable, with occasional delirium and other unmistakable symptoms of speedy dissolution. In the moments of delirium the General's mind wandered, and, like the immortal JACKSON, (whose spirit, we trust, his has joined,) in the lapse of reason, his faculties were busy with the details of his command. He reviewed in broken sentences all his glorious campaigns around MCCLELLAN's rear on the Peninsula, beyond the Potomac, and upon the Rapidan, quoting from his orders, and issuing new ones to his couriers, with a last injunction to "make haste."

JEFF. DAVIS VISITS STUART.

About noon, Thursday, President DAVIS visited his bedside, and spent some fifteen minutes in the dying chamber of his favorite chieftain. The President, taking his hand, said: "General, now do you feel?" He replied, "Easy, put willing to die, if God and my country think I have fulfilled my destiny and done my duty." As evening approached, the General's delirium increased, and his mind again wandered to the battle-fields over which he had fought, then off to wife and children, and off again to the front. A telegraphic message had been sent for his wife, who was in the country, with the injunction to make all haste, as the General was dangerously wounded. Some thoughtless or unauthorized person, thinking, probbably, to spare his wife pain, altered the dispatch to "slightly wounded," and it was thus she received it and did not make that haste which she otherwise would have done to reach his side.

As evening wore on the paroxysms of pain increased, and mortification set in rapidly. Though suffering the greatest agony at times, the General was calm, and applied to the wound, with his own hand, the ice intended to relieve the pain. During the evening he asked Dr. BREWER how long he thought he could live, and whether it was possible for him to survive through the night. The doctor, knowing he did not desire to be buoyed by false hopes, told him frankly that death -- the last enemy -- was rapidly approaching. The General nodded, and said, "I am resigned if it be God's will; but I would like to live to see my wife. But God's will be done." Several times he roused up and asked if she had come.

To the doctor, who sat holding his wrist and counting the fleeting, weakening pulse, he semarked, "Doctor, I suppose I am going fast now. It will soon be over. But God's will be done. I hope I have fulfilled my duty to my country and my duty to my God."

At 7 1/2 oclock it was evident to the physicians that death was setting its clammy seal upon the brave, open brow of the General, and told him so -- asked if he had any last message to give. The General, with mind perfectly clear and possessed, then made dispositions of his staff and personal effects. To Mrs. Gen. R.E. LEE he directed that the golden spurs be given as a dying memento of his love and esteem of her husband. To his staff officers he gave his horses. So particular was he in small things, even in the dying hour, that he emphatically exhibited and illustrated the ruling passion strong in death. To one of his staff, who was a heavy built man, he said, "You had better take the larger horse; he will carry you better." Other mementoes he disposed of in a similar manner. To his young son, he left his glorious sword.

His worldly matters closed, the eternal interests of his soul engaged his mind. Turning to Rev. Mr. PETERKIN, of the Episcopal Church, and of which he was an exemplary member, he asked him to sing the hymn commencing,

"Rock of ages cleft for me, Let me hide myself in thee,"

he joining in with all the voice his strength would permit. He then joined in prayer with the ministers. To the doctor he again said: "I am going fast now; I am resigned; God's will be done." Thus died Gen, J.E.B. STUART.

HOW HE RECEIVED HIS DEATH WOUND.

Dr. BREWER, the brother-in-law of Gen. STUART, has furnished us with some particulars, obtained from the General's own lips, of the manner in which he came by his wound. He had formed a line of skirmishers near the Yellow Tavern, when, seeing a brigade preparing to charge on his left. Gen. STUART and his staff dashed down the line to form troops to repel the charge. About this time the Yankees came thundering down upon the General and his small escort. Twelve shots were fired at the General at short range, the Yankees evidently recognizing his well-known person. The General wheeled upon them with the natural bravery which has always characterized him, and discharged six shots at his assailants.

The last of the shots fired at him struck the General in the left side of the stomach. He did not fall, knowing he would be captured if he did, and, nerving himself in his seat, wheeled his horse's head and rode for the protection of his lines. Before he reached them his wound overcame him, and he fell, or was helped, from his saddle, by one of his ever-faithful troopers, and carried to a place of security. Subsequently he was brought to Richmond in an ambulance. The immediate cause of his death was mortification of the stomach, induced by the flow of blood from the kidneys and intestines into the cavity of the stomach.

Gen. STUART was about 35 years of age. His oldest offspring died a year ago while he was battling for his country on the Rappahannock. When telegraphed that the child was dying, he sent the reply, "I must leave my child in the hands of God; my country needs me here; I cannot come."
 
Good post - today's the day, isn't it? :frown: I'm afraid that person who altered the message to Flora was my husband's ancestor Walter Q Hullihen! Stuart called him 'Honeybun'. Later, when the Stuart equestrian statue was unveiled in the early 1900s, Hullihen did the speech for it. That was the last roundup for Stuart's surviving staff officers. Venable was the one who got General - the big black horse Stuart was riding when he was shot. Venable was at the dedication of the monument and, when Hullihen got very, very, VERY long-winded, stood up and yanked the preacher's coat tails. There was a pot luck waiting. Jeb would have laughed!
 
Here's how Snooks will remember it all (it's fiction of course)(or is it?):

Desperately sawing at the reins, I managed to gain some control over my horse, which had chosen the moment to cavort and gambol in some imagined circus audition. In seconds the Virginians were on me but my civilian outfit saved me from the unhealthy attentions that they were visiting upon the fleeing Federals. And there suddenly was Jeb Stuart, almost close enough to touch, roaring defiance at the Yankees and urging his men on, on! He was magnificent—the very God of battle come to earth, invulnerable and ever victorious, bathed in light and glory. Well, that don’t bother a bullet, does it?
Jeb saw me and reined his stallion in to complete stillness. I can see him now, that ridiculous hat and feather, his shell jacket hanging somewhat unbuttoned and a smile dawning across his face. It seemed we stood in a cocoon of quietness and while a mixed bag of triumphant rebels and skedaddling Yanks flowed around us, he came closer, staring hard at my face.
“Comber! By jingo, it is you! They said you were lost at Gettysburg but I knew you couldn’t be kept away from the fight! This is famous, Comber. And look—I have something for you.” He reached beneath the opened flap of his shell jacket, smiling broadly now—Beauty Stuart, old ‘Jine the Cavalree’ himself. No von Borcke, no Sweeney, no Hagan—just me and whatever it was he had to give me. Nothing else mattered to him then. Stupidly romantic as ever.
I never heard the shot that sent a bullet tearing into his left side, though his stomach and out of his back. I didn’t hear the shot that felled my horse either. The sounds of warfare though, they came crashing back into the moment as Stuart slumped in the saddle and I tumbled to the ground alongside his fallen plumed hat—he as good as dead and me uninjured which is a d--n sight better than good, I can tell you. He stared at me in hurt bewilderment as I stood up to support him, bowed over his horse’s neck.
“I am shot. I wasn’t...I stopped moving,” he explained earnestly. “Not sporting...of those people... not at all. Here...Comber this...is yours” and he pulled his hand from inside the jacket but it was empty. “Ah...no...you must reach in...and get it.”
I hated to even touch him but he, wounded and in great pain, was so distressed that he hadn’t handed me whatever it was that I reached in to find an envelope, soaking up his blood. With tears in my eyes I read, “Col. Harry Comber CSA, in care of J.E.B. Stuart, General commanding CSA cavalry Brandy Station or as forward” and the blood mixed with the ink, smearing and obscuring his name even as I looked at it.
“Good,” gasped Stuart. “Job done... never thought you were dead... letter from a true love... wanted to find you... or find her if you had died... when this war is done. Tell her... maybe you did fall at Gettysburg. Can’t let a lover wonder.”
Good Lord—this prize idiot was dying and it was all just another part of the romance of life to him, the life he’d so joyously embraced. In his place I’d be cursing my luck and damning the world to perdition, though it seems now that when my time comes it’ll probably be in bed with a brandy in one hand and a comfortable piece of some Ohio doxie in t’other. No matter.
A trooper picked up the fallen reins of Stuart’s horse and we moved to the rear with me still supporting him doubled over in pain in the saddle. I remember Fitz Lee riding up to us, his face pale and Stuart telling him to take command and to drive those people away. The Yankees were driven despite their having a better than two to one advantage of numbers. But the glory days of the Confederate cavalry were past and gone. The Union troops did not stay driven long and in the end too many of those in grey and brown were falling back past Stuart’s ambulance as he cried out to them to do their duty and go back.
“Comber,” he gritted out, “I would rather die than be whipped” and he lapsed into unconsciousness as the ambulance bumped and jolted its sad way back to Richmond and the beaten rebels retreated over the Chickahominy into the dark safety of the night.
“Well you were whipped Jeb,” I whispered. “It’s a **** shame but it looks like you have to do the other part as well.” And I placed beside him the trampled hat and the broken plume that I’d picked up such a short time ago.
There’s not much to say after that. The ambulance took Stuart and me to the home of his brother-in-law, Dr. Charles Brewer where we waited all day with many a visitor but there never was any hope. Von Borcke says Jefferson Davis turned up and Stuart gave him the God, country, destiny and duty speech. All I know is that Jeb asked Brewer in the afternoon if he might make it through to the night—worried you see that his Flora might not arrive in time to say goodbye.
If you read the memoirs of that hopeless blowhard von Borcke you’d think Stuart saved what little energy he had to inflate Heros like a balloon when all others had conveniently left the room, telling him how wonderful he was, wishing him happy and asking him to take care of Flora and the children as if there weren’t plenty of others better suited to that.
Stuart actually saved his breath in the vain hope of seeing Flora but she didn’t make it by just three hours—although von Borcke claimed it was only one hour and then she only came at all because he was the only one to think of summoning her. Jeb’s last words at about 7:30 p.m. were not to toot von Borcke’s horn at all but to say he knew he was checking out of life’s wonderful hotel and God’s will should be done.
He was a Holy Roller all right, was our Jeb, but if I were God, I think I’d have done a little miracle for that man. Heaven knows you just had to like him. With all the weeping of the women and the red-eyed strength of the men, I found myself a corner of another room and fell asleep.

The battle at Yellow Tavern on May 11, 1864 was a brutal affair with its origins in Sheridan’s boast to Meade as earlier noted. Ten thousand Union troopers engaged Stuart’s four thousand five hundred in a fight that dragged on for over three hours. Snooks is perhaps somewhat cruel to refer to the rebels as “whipped.” They certainly could not stop the Federal cavalry from doing as it wished, but they did hold their hill far more successfully than they had any right to do. Sheridan took his men off to the gates of Richmond, decided not to risk any further adventures and rode to safety with Butler’s impotent force near Deep Run. Sheridan and his cavalry re-joined Grant at Chesterfield Station on May 24th after achieving little of any lasting value other than to deprive the Army of the Potomac of its eyes and ears for two weeks. Only the almost incidental death of Stuart enabled Sheridan to say it had all been worthwhile.
 
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Rather eerily, Flora Cooke Stuart passed May 10, 1923, and was buried May 12 beside her husband. She never remarried, supported herself by teaching and was helping raise her grandchildren when she took a bad fall and smacked her head on some steps. She never wore anything but black...and Jeb wouldn't have liked that. He was forever trying to get her into something bright!
 
I still think JEB should have retained command of Jackson' corp after Chancellorsville. I don't think it would have changed the war's outcome, but he would have been pretty aggressive along the lines of Jackson going forward.

I think he had ambitions along those lines, but Lee needed him where he was. He did a good job, considering he didn't exactly know what Jackson had been planning - Jackson's coat didn't know! When he was told that Jackson had wanted him for command, which was so, he replied, "I had rather know that Jackson said that, than to have the appointment." Jackson died May 10, the year before Stuart died. Stuart was just about the only person who dared joke with Stonewall and get away with it! He did it regularly.
 
Thanks everyone for sharing! And today is the day, isn't it? Such a tragedy- for the Confederacy and for a young man who had a life to live and a wife and family to go home to.
 
I think he had ambitions along those lines, but Lee needed him where he was. He did a good job, considering he didn't exactly know what Jackson had been planning - Jackson's coat didn't know! When he was told that Jackson had wanted him for command, which was so, he replied, "I had rather know that Jackson said that, than to have the appointment." Jackson died May 10, the year before Stuart died. Stuart was just about the only person who dared joke with Stonewall and get away with it! He did it regularly.
"If I thought my coat knew my plans, I would burn it" I've always loved that quote.
 
View attachment 67570


The Late Gen. J.E.B. Stuart--His Last Hours--How He Received His Death Wound.
Published: May 26, 1864, The NEW YORK Times...

From a long obituary of STUART -- whom the rebels call the "flower of Cavaliers" -- in the Richmond Examiner, we clip as follows:

"No incident of mortality, since the fall of the great JACKSON, has occasioned more painful regret than this. Major-Gen. J.E.B. STUART, the model of Virginian cavaliers and dashing chieftain, whose name was a terror to the enemy, and familiar as a household word in two continents, is dead, struck down by a bullet from the dastardly foe, and the whole Confederacy mourns him. He breathed out his gallant spirit resignedly, and in the full possession of all his remarkable faculties of mind and body, at twenty-two minutes to 8 o'clock, Thursday night, at the residence of Dr. BREWER, a relative, on Green-street, in the presence of Drs. BREWER, GARNETT, GIBSON and FONTAINE, of the General's staff, Rev. Messrs. PETERKIN and KEPPLER, and a circle of sorrow-stricken comrades and friends.

We learn from the physicians in attendance upon the General that his condition during the day was very changeable, with occasional delirium and other unmistakable symptoms of speedy dissolution. In the moments of delirium the General's mind wandered, and, like the immortal JACKSON, (whose spirit, we trust, his has joined,) in the lapse of reason, his faculties were busy with the details of his command. He reviewed in broken sentences all his glorious campaigns around MCCLELLAN's rear on the Peninsula, beyond the Potomac, and upon the Rapidan, quoting from his orders, and issuing new ones to his couriers, with a last injunction to "make haste."

JEFF. DAVIS VISITS STUART.

About noon, Thursday, President DAVIS visited his bedside, and spent some fifteen minutes in the dying chamber of his favorite chieftain. The President, taking his hand, said: "General, now do you feel?" He replied, "Easy, put willing to die, if God and my country think I have fulfilled my destiny and done my duty." As evening approached, the General's delirium increased, and his mind again wandered to the battle-fields over which he had fought, then off to wife and children, and off again to the front. A telegraphic message had been sent for his wife, who was in the country, with the injunction to make all haste, as the General was dangerously wounded. Some thoughtless or unauthorized person, thinking, probbably, to spare his wife pain, altered the dispatch to "slightly wounded," and it was thus she received it and did not make that haste which she otherwise would have done to reach his side.

As evening wore on the paroxysms of pain increased, and mortification set in rapidly. Though suffering the greatest agony at times, the General was calm, and applied to the wound, with his own hand, the ice intended to relieve the pain. During the evening he asked Dr. BREWER how long he thought he could live, and whether it was possible for him to survive through the night. The doctor, knowing he did not desire to be buoyed by false hopes, told him frankly that death -- the last enemy -- was rapidly approaching. The General nodded, and said, "I am resigned if it be God's will; but I would like to live to see my wife. But God's will be done." Several times he roused up and asked if she had come.

To the doctor, who sat holding his wrist and counting the fleeting, weakening pulse, he semarked, "Doctor, I suppose I am going fast now. It will soon be over. But God's will be done. I hope I have fulfilled my duty to my country and my duty to my God."

At 7 1/2 oclock it was evident to the physicians that death was setting its clammy seal upon the brave, open brow of the General, and told him so -- asked if he had any last message to give. The General, with mind perfectly clear and possessed, then made dispositions of his staff and personal effects. To Mrs. Gen. R.E. LEE he directed that the golden spurs be given as a dying memento of his love and esteem of her husband. To his staff officers he gave his horses. So particular was he in small things, even in the dying hour, that he emphatically exhibited and illustrated the ruling passion strong in death. To one of his staff, who was a heavy built man, he said, "You had better take the larger horse; he will carry you better." Other mementoes he disposed of in a similar manner. To his young son, he left his glorious sword.

His worldly matters closed, the eternal interests of his soul engaged his mind. Turning to Rev. Mr. PETERKIN, of the Episcopal Church, and of which he was an exemplary member, he asked him to sing the hymn commencing,

"Rock of ages cleft for me, Let me hide myself in thee,"

he joining in with all the voice his strength would permit. He then joined in prayer with the ministers. To the doctor he again said: "I am going fast now; I am resigned; God's will be done." Thus died Gen, J.E.B. STUART.

HOW HE RECEIVED HIS DEATH WOUND.

Dr. BREWER, the brother-in-law of Gen. STUART, has furnished us with some particulars, obtained from the General's own lips, of the manner in which he came by his wound. He had formed a line of skirmishers near the Yellow Tavern, when, seeing a brigade preparing to charge on his left. Gen. STUART and his staff dashed down the line to form troops to repel the charge. About this time the Yankees came thundering down upon the General and his small escort. Twelve shots were fired at the General at short range, the Yankees evidently recognizing his well-known person. The General wheeled upon them with the natural bravery which has always characterized him, and discharged six shots at his assailants.

The last of the shots fired at him struck the General in the left side of the stomach. He did not fall, knowing he would be captured if he did, and, nerving himself in his seat, wheeled his horse's head and rode for the protection of his lines. Before he reached them his wound overcame him, and he fell, or was helped, from his saddle, by one of his ever-faithful troopers, and carried to a place of security. Subsequently he was brought to Richmond in an ambulance. The immediate cause of his death was mortification of the stomach, induced by the flow of blood from the kidneys and intestines into the cavity of the stomach.

Gen. STUART was about 35 years of age. His oldest offspring died a year ago while he was battling for his country on the Rappahannock. When telegraphed that the child was dying, he sent the reply, "I must leave my child in the hands of God; my country needs me here; I cannot come."

Great post CSA.
 
Good post!

I've always loved the character that Stuart was. So dashing and audacious. So cavalier! He was the embodiment of a cavalryman. He was the model on which Southern horseman were tailored from the first charge he led at Bull Run.

God made that man for that exact time and place. It seems that very few people are perfectly suited for their roles in life. Stuart, Jackson, Lee, Forrest, Sherman, Grant, Sheridan, and Lincoln.... All of these men, plus a few more I cannot think of, were built for the exact place and time they were in.
 
Excellent Post CSA ! Always thought that Stuart had been shot in the Liver, but I now know that it was in the left side of the stomach.
General Fitz Lee said at the Veterans Banquet 0n 28th October 1875 of the wounded Stuart:
' His voice- I can even now hear- after the fatal shot was fired,as he called out to me as I rode up to him, " Go ahead,Fitz,Old Fellow, I know you will do what is right", and constitutes my most precious legacy'
 
Rather eerily, Flora Cooke Stuart passed May 10, 1923, and was buried May 12 beside her husband. She never remarried, supported herself by teaching and was helping raise her grandchildren when she took a bad fall and smacked her head on some steps. She never wore anything but black...and Jeb wouldn't have liked that. He was forever trying to get her into something bright!
And thanks to her, there is a Girls school still in Staunton, Va., named 'Stuart Hall school for Girls" where she taught.

Although now is just called Stuart Hall School.

https://www.stuarthallschool.org/
 
Excellent Post CSA ! Always thought that Stuart had been shot in the Liver, but I now know that it was in the left side of the stomach.
General Fitz Lee said at the Veterans Banquet 0n 28th October 1875 of the wounded Stuart:
' His voice- I can even now hear- after the fatal shot was fired,as he called out to me as I rode up to him, " Go ahead,Fitz,Old Fellow, I know you will do what is right", and constitutes my most precious legacy'
Torso shots...not a pleasant want to go. I read some accounts of Johnston Pettigrew's death...ouch.
 
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