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Leonidas Polk

Leonidas PolkAKA Philemon Leonidas Polk

Born: 10-Apr-1806
Birthplace: Raleigh, NC
Died: 14-Jun-1864
Location of death: Pine Mountain, GA
Cause of death: War
Remains: Buried, Christ Church Cathedral, New Orleans, LA

Gender: Male
Religion: Anglican/Episcopalian
Race or Ethnicity: White
Sexual orientation: Straight
Occupation: Military, Religion

Nationality: United States
Executive summary: Confederate general

Military service: Confederate Army

American soldier, was born at Raleigh, North Carolina, on the 10th of April 1806, and was a cousin of James Knox Polk, President of the United States. He was educated at West Point, but afterwards studied theology and took orders in the Protestant Episcopal Church in 1831. In 1838 he became missionary bishop of the South-West, Arkansas, Indian Territory, Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi, and in 1841 he was consecrated bishop of Louisiana. His work in the Church was largely of an educational kind, and he played a prominent part in movements for the establishment of higher educational institutions in the South. At the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861 he resigned his bishopric and, like many other clergymen and ministers of religion, entered the army which was raised to defend the Confederacy. His rank in the hierarchy and the universal respect in which he was held in the South, rather than his early military education, caused him to beappointed to the important rank of major-general. He fortified the post of Columbus, Kentucky, the foremost line of defense on the Mississippi, against which Brigadier-General Ulysses S. Grant directed the offensive reconnaissance of Belmont in the autumn. In the following spring, the first line of defense having fallen, Polk commanded a corps at Shiloh in the field army commanded by Albert Sidney Johnston and Beauregard. In October 1862 he was promoted lieutenant-general, and from that point he commanded one of the three corps of the army of Tennessee under Braxton Bragg and afterwards was in charge of the Department of Alabama, Mississippi and East Louisiana. He was killed in the fighting in front of Marietta, while reconnoitering near Pine Mountain, Georgia, on the 14th of June 1864. His son W. M. Polk, authored the general's Life in 1893.

Father: William Polk
Mother: Sarah Hawkins
Brother: Lucius Junius Polk (b. 16-Mar-1802, d. 3-Oct-1870)
Sister: Lucinda Davis Polk (b. 12-Jan-1804)
Sister: Mary Brown Polk (b. 1-Sep-1808, d. 1-Mar-1835)
Brother: Alexander Hamilton Polk (b. 10-Sep-1810, d. 8-Sep-1930)
Brother: Rufus King Polk (b. 15-May-1814, d. 25-Feb-1843)
Brother: George Washington Polk (b. 12-Jul-1817, d. 8-Jan-1892)
Sister: Eliza Hawkins Polk (b. 1820)
Brother: Philemon Hawkins Polk (b. 6-Mar-1820)
Sister: Susan Spratt Polk (b. 25-May-1822, d. 10-Jul-1909)
Brother: Andrew Jackson Polk (b. 10-Aug-1824)
Wife: Francis A. Devereux (m. 6-May-1830, d. 16-Apr-1875)
Son: Alexander Hamilton Polk (b. 27-Jan-1831, d. 2-Oct-1872)
Daughter: Frances Devereux Polk Skipwith (b. 27-Nov-1835, d. 15-Mar-1884)
Daughter: Katherine Polk Gale (b. 16-Aug-1838, d. 8-Feb-1916)
Daughter: Sarah Rachel Polk Beake (b. c. 1840)
Daughter: Susan Rebecca Polk Jones (b. 16-Apr-1842)
Daughter: Elizabeth Devereux Polk Huger (b. 29-Jun-1843, d. 14-Nov-1918)
Son: William Mecklenburg Polk (b. 15-Aug-1844)
Daughter: Lucia Polk Chapman (b. 22-Oct-1848, d. 19-Mar-1883)

    University: University of North Carolina
    University: US Military Academy, West Point
    Administrator: Founder, University of the South

    Relieved of Command
    Slaveowners
    Exhumed 1945



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