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Thomas Jonathan "Stonewall" Jackson (January 21,
1824 – May 10, 1863) was an American teacher
and soldier. He became a famous Confederate States
of America|Confederate general during the American
Civil War, and was killed during the conflict.
Jackson is often considered one of the most gifted
battlefield commanders in American history, and
his death was a severe setback for the
Confederacy.

==Childhood==
Thomas Jonathan Jackson was the third child of
Julia Neale Jackson (1789–1831) and Jonathan
Jackson (1790–1826), an attorney. Both of
Jackson's parents were natives of Virginia. The
family already had two young children and were
living in Clarksburg, West Virginia|Clarksburg, in
what is now West Virginia, near Pittsburgh, when
Thomas, their third son, was born. 

Two years later, tragedy struck the family when
Jackson's father and sister Elizabeth (age six)
died of typhoid fever. Jackson's mother gave birth
to Thomas' sister Laura Ann the next day. Julia
Jackson was widowed at 28 and was left with much
debt, selling all the family's possessions to pay
them. She declined family charity and moved into a
small one-room house. Julia took in sewing and
taught school to support herself and her three
young children for about four years. In 1830, she
remarried, but her new husband, also an attorney,
did not like his stepchildren, and there were
continuing financial problems. Then, after giving
birth to Thomas' half-brother, she died of
complications, leaving her three children
orphaned. Julia was buried in an unmarked grave in
a homemade coffin in a small town along the James
River and Kanawha Turnpike in Fayette County, West
Virginia|Fayette County.     



Jackson was seven when his mother died, and he and
his sister Laura Ann were sent to live with their
paternal uncle, Cummins Jackson, who owned a grist
mill in Jackson's Mill (near present-day Weston,
West Virginia|Weston near Pittsburgh). Cummins
Jackson was strict to Thomas Jackson, often giving
his own views on things. Thomas Jackson looked up
to Cummins as a schoolteacher. Their older
brother, Warren, went to live with other relatives
on his mother's side of the family, but he died of
tuberculosis in 1841 at the age of 20.  

Jackson helped around his uncle's farm, tending
sheep with the assistance of a sheepdog, driving
teams of oxen and helping harvest the fields of
wheat and corn. Formal education was not easily
obtained, but he attended school when and where he
could. Much of Jackson's education was
self-taught. He would often sit up at night
reading by the flickering light of burning pine
knots. The story is told that Thomas once made a
deal with one of his uncle's slaves to provide him
with pine knots in exchange for reading lessons.
This was in violation of a law in Virginia at that
time that forbade teaching a slave to read or
write, but nevertheless, Jackson taught the man as
promised. In his later years at Jackson's Mill,
Thomas was a teacher|schoolteacher.

In 1842, Jackson was appointed to the United
States Military Academy at West Point, New
York|West Point, New York. Because of his
inadequate schooling, he had difficulty with the
entrance examinations. As a student, he had to
work several times harder than most cadets to
absorb lessons. However, displaying a dogged
determination that was to characterize his life,
he became one of the hardest working cadets in the
academy. Thomas Jackson graduated 17th out of 59
students in the Class of 1846.

== U.S. Army, the Mexican War ==

Young Lieutenant Jackson began his U.S. Army
career in the First Artillery Regiment. He was
sent to fight in the Mexican War from 1846 to
1848. Again, his unusual character emerged. When
he refused what he felt was a "bad order", to
withdraw his troops, he was confronted by another
superior. He explained his rationale, and claimed
that, with only 50 more troops, he could persevere
and win the particular situation. His judgment
proved correct, earning field promotion to the
temporary rank of major. 

He served at Veracruz, Contreras, Chapultepec, and
Mexico City, eventually earning two brevets. While
serving in Mexico, Jackson first met Robert E.
Lee.

== Virginia Military Institute ==

In the spring of 1851, Thomas Jackson was offered
and accepted a newly created position to teach at
the Virginia Military Institute (VMI), in
Lexington, Virginia. He became Professor of
Natural and Experimental Philosophy and Instructor
of Artillery. Jackson's teachings are still used
at VMI today because they are military essentials
that are timeless, to wit: discipline, mobility,
assessing the enemy's strength and intentions
while attempting to conceal your own, and the
efficacy of artillery combined with infantry in a
literal combined attack. However, despite the
quality of his work, he was not popular as a
teacher. The students mocked his apparently stern,
religious nature and his eccentric traits. Little
as he was known to the white inhabitants of
Lexington, he was revered by the slaves, to whom
he showed uniform kindness, and for whose moral
instruction he worked unceasingly. During this
time Jackson even began a Sunday school for
blacks, both slave and free.  
 
While an instructor at VMI, in 1853, Thomas
Jackson married Elinor "Ellie" Junkin, whose
father was president of Washington and Lee
University|Washington College in Lexington. A son
was born to them but unfortunately, Ellie died
during childbirth and the newborn child died
immediately following the birth. 

After a tour of Europe, in 1857, Jackson married
again. Mary Anna Morrison was from North Carolina,
where her father was the first president of
Davidson University. They had a daughter named
Mary Graham on April 30, 1858, but the baby died
less than a month later. Another daughter was born
in 1862, shortly before her famous father's death.
The Jacksons named her Julia Laura, after his
mother and sister.  

In November 1859, at the request of the governor
of Virginia, Major William Gilham led a contingent
of the VMI Cadet Corps to Charles Town, West
Virginia|Charles Town to provide an additional
military presence at the execution by hanging on
December 2, 1859 of militant abolitionist John
Brown (abolitionist) | John Brown following his
raid on the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, West
Virginia | Harpers Ferry. Major Jackson was placed
in command of the artillery, consisting of two
howitzers manned by 21 cadets.

== American Civil War ==

In 1861, as the American Civil War broke out,
Jackson became a drill master for some of the many
new recruits in the Confederate Army. On April 27,
1861, Virginia Governor John Letcher ordered
Colonel Jackson to take command at Harpers Ferry,
where he would assemble and command the famous
"Stonewall Brigade", consisting of the 2nd, 4th,
5th, 27th, and 33rd Virginia infantry regiments.
All of these units were from the Shenandoah Valley
region of Virginia. 

During the charge that took place at Harpers
Ferry, Colonel Jackson jumped in front of a
soldier who was about to be killed by a sword
thrust and killed the man that was attacking the
soldier. After the Battle of Harpers Ferry,
because of his bravery, he was promoted to
brigadier general. 

Jackson rose to prominence and earned his nickname
after the first battle of First Battle of Bull
Run|Bull Run (known as the First Battle of
Manassas, Virginia|Manassas in the South) in July
1861, when Brigadier General Barnard E. Bee
exhorted his own troops to reform by shouting,
"There stands Jackson like a stone wall. Rally
behind the Virginians!" Jackson was quickly
promoted to divisional command.

In May and June of 1862, he was given an
independent command in the Shenandoah
River|Shenandoah Valley.  There he soundly
thrashed the Union forces by a combination of
great audacity, excellent knowledge and shrewd use
of the terrain, added to the ability to inspire
his troops to great feats of marching and
fighting. With fewer than 17,000 men, he defeated
60,000 Union troops through a series of lightning
marches and brilliant battles. Stonewall Jackson's
reputation for moving his troops earned them the
description of "foot cavalry". 

In the spring of 1862, George B.
McClellan|McClellan led the Peninsula Campaign, a
major Union advance from Hampton Roads at Fort
Monroe up the Virginia Peninsula between the York
and James Rivers. Union forces reached the
defenses of Richmond on June 1. After the campaign
in the Shenandoah Valley ended in mid-June,
Jackson and his troops were called to Richmond,
Virginia to help there. By utilizing a railroad
tunnel under the Blue Ridge Mountains he knew of
which had been engineered and built by VMI founder
Claudius Crozet, and then transporting troops to
Hanover County, Virginia|Hanover County on the
Virginia Central Railroad, Jackson and his forces
made a surprise appearance in front of McClellan
at Mechanicsville. Reports had last placed
Jackson's forces in the Valley, and their presence
near Richmond added greatly to the Union
commander's overestimation of the strength and
numbers of the forces before him. This proved a
crucial factor in McClellan's decision to retreat
toward the James River.   

Jackson's troops served well under Robert E. Lee
in the series of battles known as the Seven Days
Battles, but Jackson's own performance in those
battles is generally considered to be lackluster.
The reasons are disputed, although a severe lack
of sleep after the grueling march and railroad
trip from the Shenandoah Valley was probably a
significant factor.  Both Jackson and his troops
were completely exhausted.

Jackson was now a corps commander under Lee. At
the Second Battle of Bull Run (or the Second
Battle of Manassas in the South), he helped to
administer the Federals another defeat on the same
ground as in 1861. When Lee decided to invade the
North, Jackson took Harpers Ferry, then hastened
to join the rest of the army at Sharpsburg,
Maryland, where they fought McClellan in the
Battle of Antietam.  The Confederate forces held
their position, but the battle had been extremely
bloody for both sides, and Lee took the Army of
Northern Virginia back across the Potomac River,
ending the invasion.

Jackson's troops held off a ferocious Union
assault at Fredericksburg, Virginia.  At the
Battle of Chancellorsville, Jackson's forces
flanked the Union Army|Union army, and in an
intense battle deep in the tangled woods drove
them back from their lines.  Darkness ended the
assault, and by bad luck Jackson and his staff
were mistaken for a Union cavalry force by
Confederate troops and fired upon.  Jackson was
hit by three bullets; his left arm had to be
amputated by Hunter McGuire|Dr. Hunter McGuire,
and he died seven days later of pneumonia.
Jackson's dying words: "Let us cross the river and
rest in the shade of the trees".

Upon hearing of Jackson's death, Robert E. Lee
mourned the loss of both a friend and a trusted
commander.  The night Lee learned of Jackson's
death, he told his cook, "William, I have lost my
right arm" (deliberately in contrast to Jackson's
left arm) and "I'm bleeding at the heart".

== Legacy ==


Jackson is considered one of the great characters
of the Civil War. He was profoundly religious, a
deacon in the Presbyterian Church. He disliked
fighting on Sunday, though that did not stop him
from doing so. He loved his wife very much and
sent her tender letters. In command Jackson was
extremely secretive about his plans and extremely
punctilious about military discipline. He
generally wore old, worn-out clothes rather than a
fancy uniform, and often looked more like a
moth-eaten private than a corps commander. He was
known to chew lemons regularly during marches, a
habit he had acquired during his time in Mexico.
He held a lifelong belief that one of his arms was
longer than the other, and thus usually held the
"longer" arm up to equalize his circulation. He
was described as a "champion sleeper", even
falling asleep with food in his mouth
occasionally. He also became noted throughout the
Confederate Army for leading his troops in
complete circles.

The South mourned his death; he was greatly
admired there. Many theorists through the years
have postulated that if Jackson had lived, Lee
might have prevailed at Gettysburg.  Certainly
Jackson's iron discipline and brilliant tactical
sense were sorely missed, and might well have
carried an extremely close–fought battle. He is
buried at Lexington, Virginia, near Virginia
Military Institute|VMI, in the Stonewall Jackson
Memorial Cemetery. He is memorialized on Georgia
(U.S. state)|Georgia's Stone Mountain, in
Richmond, Virginia|Richmond on historic Monument
Avenue, and in many other places.

After the War, his wife and young daughter Julia
moved from Lexington to North Carolina. Mary Anna
Jackson wrote two books about her husband's life,
including some of his letters. She never
remarried, and was known as the "Widow of the
Confederacy", living until 1915. His daughter
Julia married, and bore children, but she died of
typhoid fever at the age of 26 years. 
    
A former Confederate soldier who admired Jackson,
Captain Thomas R. Ranson of Staunton, Virginia,
also remembered the tragic life of Jackson's
mother. He went to the tiny mountain hamlet of
Ansted, West Virginia|Ansted in Fayette County,
West Virginia, and had a marble marker placed over
the unmarked grave of Julia Neale Jackson in
Westlake Cemetery, to make sure that the site was
not lost forever.

West Virginia's Stonewall Jackson State Park is
named in his honor. Nearby, at Stonewall Jackson's
historical childhood home, his Uncle's grist mill
is the centerpiece of a historical site at the
Jackson's Mill Center for Lifelong Learning and
State 4-H Camp. The facility, located near Weston,
West Virginia|Weston, serves as a special campus
for West Virginia University and the WVU Extension
Service.

The United States Navy submarine USS Stonewall
Jackson (SSBN-634)|U.S.S. Stonewall Jackson (SSBN
634), commissioned in 1964, was named for
Lieutenant General Thomas Jonathan "Stonewall"
Jackson. The words "Strength -- Mobility" are
emblazoned on the ship's banner. The words are
taken from letters written by General Jackson, and
were said to apply to the Polaris submarine as
well as to the tactics he used so successfully.
The submarine was decommissioned in 1995.

Jackson was played by Stephen Lang in the film
adaptation of Gods and Generals

==See also==
*George Francis Robert Henderson (biographer)

==References==
*Alexander, Bevin. Lost Victories: The Military
Genius of Stonewall Jackson. Hippocrene Books,
2004. ISBN 0781810361.
*Bill Bryson | Bryson, Bill, A Walk in the Woods
*Ken Burns | Burns, Ken, The Civil War, PBS
television series, 1990.
*Douglas Southall Freeman|Freeman, Douglas
Southall. Lee's Lieutenants. 3 volumes. Simon and
Schuster, 1942.
:1911

==External links==
*http://www.vmi.edu/archives/jackson/jackson.html
VMI website about Jackson
*http://www.sonofthesouth.net/leefoundation/Stonew
all_Jackson_Pictures.htm Stonewall Jackson
Pictures

commons|Thomas Jonathan Jackson