First CSA General Beauregard traveled by steamship from New York to New Orleans and immediately began giving military advice to the local authorities in his home state of
Louisiana, which included further strengthening Forts St. Philip and Jackson, which guarded the Mississippi approaches to New Orleans. He hoped to be named commander of the Louisiana state army, but was disappointed that the state legislature appointed
Braxton Bragg. Aware that Beauregard might resent him, Bragg offered him the rank of colonel. Instead Beauregard enrolled as a private in the "
Orleans Guards", a battalion of
French Creole aristocrats. At the same time, he communicated with Slidell and the newly chosen President Davis, angling for a senior position in the new Confederate States Army. Rumors that Beauregard would be placed in charge of the entire Army infuriated Bragg. Concerned about the political situation regarding the Federal presence at Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, Davis selected Beauregard to take command of Charleston's defenses. Beauregard seemed the perfect combination of military engineer and charismatic Southern leader needed at that time and place. Beauregard became one of the most frequently described generals in Confederate chronicles, and almost all of which noted his foreign French visage. Biographer
T. Harry Williams describes the Beauregard gave as "courteous, grave, sometimes reserved and severe, sometimes abrupt with people who displeased him." Many compared his appearance to that of a French marshal. Beauregard was accompanied by a sizable military staff, which included many former politicians serving as aides. He received gifts from admiring women across the Confederacy, which fueled rumors about womanizing, some of which had anti-Creole bases. Beauregard became the first Confederate
general officer, appointed a
brigadier general in the Provisional Army of the Confederate States on March 1, 1861.
Start of the Civil War, Fort Sumter Arriving in Charleston on March 3, 1861, Beauregard met with Governor
Francis Wilkinson Pickens and inspected the defenses of the harbor, which he found to be in disarray. He was said to display "a great deal in the way of zeal and energy ... but little professional knowledge and experience." Major Robert Anderson at Fort Sumter wrote to Washington, D.C., that Beauregard, who had been his student at West Point in 1837, would guarantee that South Carolina's actions be exercised with "skill and sound judgment." Beauregard wrote to the Confederate government that Anderson was a "most gallant officer". He sent several cases of fine brandy and whiskey and boxes of cigars to Anderson and his officers at Sumter, but Anderson ordered that the gifts be returned. By early April, political tensions were mounting and Beauregard demanded that Sumter surrender before the arrival of a planned Union expedition to re-provision the fort. Early on the morning of April 12, negotiations with Anderson had failed. Beauregard ordered the first shots of the American Civil War to be fired from nearby Fort Johnson. The
bombardment of Fort Sumter lasted for 34 hours. After a heavy bombardment from batteries ringing the harbor, Anderson surrendered Fort Sumter on April 14. Biographer
T. Harry Williams described the extravagant praise from throughout the Confederacy that "The Hero of Fort Sumter" received for his victory: "He was the South's first
paladin."
First Bull Run (First Manassas) , July 21, 1861 Summoned to the new Confederate capital of Richmond, Virginia, Beauregard received a hero's welcome at the railroad stations along the route. He was given command of the "Alexandria Line" of defenses against an impending Federal offensive that was being organized by Brig. Gen.
Irvin McDowell (one of Beauregard's West Point classmates) against the Confederate railroad junction at Manassas. Beauregard devised strategies to concentrate the forces of (full) General Joseph E. Johnston from the
Shenandoah Valley with his own, aiming not only to defend his position, but to initiate an offensive against McDowell and Washington. Despite his seniority in rank, Johnston lacked familiarity with the terrain and ceded tactical planning of the impending battle to Beauregard as a professional courtesy. President Davis considered many of Beauregard's plans to be impractical for an army as inexperienced as the Confederates could field in 1861; throughout the war, Davis and Beauregard would argue about Beauregard's tendencies to devise grand strategies based on formal military principles. Davis believed he lacked a pragmatic grasp of logistics, intelligence, relative military strengths, and politics. The
First Battle of Bull Run (First Manassas) began early on July 21, 1861, with an element of surprise for both armies—both McDowell and Beauregard planned to envelop their opponent with an attack from their right flank. McDowell struck first, crossing
Bull Run and threatening Beauregard's left flank. For a while, Beauregard persisted in moving his troops for an attack on his right flank (McDowell's left, toward
Centreville), but Johnston urged him to travel with him to the threatened flank at
Henry House Hill, which was weakly defended. Seeing the strength of the Union attack at that point, Beauregard insisted that Johnston leave the area of immediate action and coordinate the overall battle from a position to the rear. Beauregard rallied the troops, riding among the men, brandishing regimental colors, and giving inspirational speeches. The Confederate line held. As Johnston's final troops arrived from the Shenandoah Valley, the Confederates launched a counterattack that routed the Union Army, sending it streaming in disorder back toward Washington.
Frank E. Vandiver writes of the beginning of the battle that There is no doubt that [Beauregard] verged on hysteria most of the early hours - a dizzying array of orders and counterorders, plans and counterplans, misplaced and castaway units were ample proof of his demoralization.
William C. Davis credits Johnston with the majority of the tactical decisions that led to the victory, judging that Beauregard acted chiefly as a dime novel general, leading the charge of an individual regiment, riding along the line to cheer the troops, accepting the huzzas of the soldiers and complementing them in turn. The closest he came to a major tactical decision was his fleeting intention to withdraw from the Henry Hill line when he briefly mistook the advance of Johnston's reinforcements for the arrival of fresh Union troops. Nonetheless, Beauregard received the bulk of the acclaim from the press and general public. On July 23, Johnston recommended to President Davis that Beauregard be promoted to full general. Davis approved, and Beauregard's date of rank was established as the date of his victory, July 21.
Confederate battle flag design After Bull Run, Beauregard advocated the use of a standardized battle flag other than the
"Stars and Bars" Confederate national flag to avoid visual confusion with the
U.S. flag. He worked with Johnston and
William Porcher Miles to create the Confederate Battle Flag. Women visiting Beauregard's army contributed silk material from their dresses to create the first three flags, for Beauregard, Johnston, and
Earl Van Dorn; thus, the first flags contained more feminine pink than martial red. However, the official battle flag had a red background with white stars. Throughout his career, Beauregard worked to have the flag adopted, and he helped to make it the most popular symbol of the Confederacy. As the Army went into winter quarters, Beauregard caused considerable friction with the Confederate high command. He strongly advocated an invasion of
Maryland to threaten the flank and rear of Washington. With his plan rebuffed as impractical, he requested reassignment to New Orleans, which he assumed would be under Union attack in the near future, but his request was denied. He quarreled with Commissary General
Lucius B. Northrop (a personal friend of Davis) about the inadequate supplies available to his army. He issued public statements challenging the ability of the Confederate
Secretary of War to give commands to a full general. And he enraged President Davis when his report about Bull Run was printed in the newspaper, which suggested that Davis's interference with Beauregard's plans prevented the pursuit and full destruction of McDowell's army and the capture of Washington.
Shiloh and Corinth , April 6–7, 1862 Having become a political liability in Virginia, Beauregard was transferred to
Tennessee to become second-in-command to General
Albert Sidney Johnston (no relation to Joseph E. Johnston) in his
Army of Mississippi, effective March 14, 1862. The two generals planned the concentration of Confederate forces to oppose the advance of Maj. Gen.
Ulysses S. Grant before he could combine his army with that of Maj. Gen.
Don Carlos Buell in a thrust up the
Tennessee River toward
Corinth, Mississippi. The march from Corinth was plagued by bad weather, which delayed the army's arrival by several days, and during that time, several contacts were made with Union scouts. Because of this, Beauregard felt the element of surprise had been lost and recommended calling off the attack, but Johnston decided to proceed with the plan. In the
Battle of Shiloh, which began April 6, 1862, the Confederates launched a surprise attack against Grant's
Army of the Tennessee, which despite days of prior reports of Confederate troop movements, were completely unaware that the entire Army of Mississippi was coming directly at them. Once again a more senior general named Johnston deferred to the junior Beauregard in planning the attack. The massive frontal assault was marred by Beauregard's improper organization of forces—successive attacks by corps in lines long, rather than assigning each corps a discrete portion of the line for a side-by-side assault. This arrangement caused intermingling of units and confusion of command; it failed to concentrate mass at the appropriate place on the line to affect the overall objectives of the attack. In midafternoon, Johnston, who was near the front of the battle action, was mortally wounded. Beauregard, positioned in the rear of the army to send reinforcements forward, assumed command of the army and Johnston's overall Western department (officially designated "Department Number Two"). As darkness fell, he chose to call off the attack against Grant's final defensive line, which had contracted into a tight semicircle backed up to the Tennessee River at Pittsburg Landing. Beauregard's decision was one of the most controversial of the Civil War. Numerous veterans and historians have wondered about the aftermath if the assault had gone forward into the night. Beauregard believed that the battle was essentially won and his men could finish off Grant in the morning. He knew the terrain to be crossed (a steep ravine containing a creek named Dill Branch) was extremely difficult and Grant's defensive line was heavy with massed artillery and supported by gunboats in the river. Unbeknownst to Beauregard, Buell's
Army of the Ohio began arriving that afternoon, and he and Grant launched a massive counterattack on April 7. Overwhelmed, the Confederates retreated to Corinth. Beauregard's preliminary report framed the battle as a victory, as did an address to his troops, although Beauregard did express concern to the Confederate government regarding the safety of Corinth and the Mississippi Valley. There was widespread public criticism of Beauregard's handling of Shiloh, which was the first time this had happened to him since the start of the war; many in the general public did not believe the claim of Shiloh as a victory. Grant was temporarily disgraced by the surprise attack and near defeat, causing his superior, Maj. Gen.
Henry W. Halleck, to assume field command of the combined armies. Halleck cautiously and slowly approached Beauregard's fortifications at Corinth; his action became derisively called the
Siege of Corinth. Beauregard withdrew from Corinth on May 29 to
Tupelo, Mississippi. He was able to deceive Halleck into thinking the Confederates were about to attack; he ran empty trains back and forth through the town while whistles blew and troops cheered as if massive reinforcements were arriving. Beauregard retreated because of the overwhelming Union force and because of contaminated water supplies in Corinth. In April and May, the Confederates lost almost as many men to death by disease in Corinth as had been killed in battle at Shiloh. Nevertheless, his leaving the critical rail junction at Corinth without a fight was another controversial decision. When Beauregard went on medical leave without requesting permission in advance, President Davis relieved him of command and replaced him with Gen.
Braxton Bragg.
Return to Charleston submarine, Dec 6, 1863 At Beauregard's request, his allies in the Confederate Congress petitioned Davis to restore his command in the West. Davis remained angry at Beauregard's absence and told him he should have stayed at his post even if he had to be carried around in a litter. He wrote, "If the whole world were to ask me to restore General Beauregard to the command which I have already given to General Bragg, I would refuse it." Beauregard was ordered to Charleston and took command of coastal defenses in South Carolina,
Georgia, and Florida, replacing Maj. Gen.
John C. Pemberton. The latter was promoted to lieutenant general and transferred to command the defenses of
Vicksburg, Mississippi. Beauregard was unhappy with his new assignment, believing that he deserved command of one of the great Confederate field armies. He performed successfully, however, preventing the capture of Charleston by Union naval and land attacks in 1863. On April 7, 1863,
Rear Admiral Samuel Francis Du Pont, commander of the
South Atlantic Blockading Squadron, led a union
ironclad attack against Fort Sumter that was repulsed by highly accurate artillery fire from Beauregard's forces. In July through September 1863, union land forces under Brig. Gen.
Quincy A. Gillmore launched a series of attacks on
Fort Wagner on
Morris Island and other fortifications at the mouth of the harbor, while Rear Adm.
John A. Dahlgren attempted to destroy
Fort Sumter. Because the latter operation failed, the successful seizure of Morris Island was not effective in threatening Charleston. During this period, Beauregard promoted innovative naval defense strategies, such as early experimentation with
submarines,
naval mines (called "torpedoes" in the Civil War), and with a small vessel called a torpedo-ram. A swift boat fitted with a torpedo on a pole projecting from its bow under water, it could be used to surprise an enemy vessel and impale it underneath the water line. He was also busy devising strategies for other generals in the Confederacy. He proposed that some of the state governors meet with Union governors of the Western states (what are called the
Midwest states today) for a peace conference. The Davis administration rejected the idea, but it caused considerable political maneuvering by Davis's enemies in the Congress. Beauregard also proposed a
grand strategy—submitted anonymously through his political allies so that it was not tainted by his reputation—to reinforce the Western armies at the expense of Robert E. Lee's army in Virginia, destroy the Federal army in Tennessee, which would induce Ulysses S. Grant to relieve pressure on Vicksburg and maneuver his army into a place where it could be destroyed. The Confederate Army would continue to Ohio, and induce the Western states to ally with the Confederacy. Meanwhile, a fleet of torpedo-rams built in England could be used to recapture New Orleans, ending the war. There is no record that his plan was ever officially presented to the government. While visiting his forces in Florida, which had just repelled a Union advance near
Jacksonville, Beauregard received a telegram that his wife had died on March 2, 1864. Living in Union-occupied New Orleans, she had been seriously ill for two years. A Northern-leaning local newspaper printed an opinion that her husband's actions had exacerbated her condition. This so fanned negative popular opinion that 6,000 people attended her funeral. Union Maj. Gen.
Nathaniel P. Banks provided a steamer to carry her body upriver for burial in her native parish. Beauregard wrote that he would like to rescue "her hallowed grave" at the head of an army.
Richmond , May 31 – June 12, 1864 In April 1864, Beauregard saw little opportunity for military glory because he foresaw that there would be no more significant assaults against Charleston, and prospects for a major field command were unlikely. He requested a leave to recover from fatigue and a chronic throat ailment, but he instead received an order to report to
Weldon, North Carolina, near the Virginia border, to play a key role in the defense of Virginia. His new assignment, the Department of North Carolina and Cape Fear, also included Virginia south of the
James River. When he took command on April 18, he renamed it, on his own initiative, the Department of North Carolina and Southern Virginia. The Confederates were preparing for the spring offensive of Union Lt. Gen.
Ulysses S. Grant and were concerned that attacks south of Richmond could interrupt the critical supply lines to Richmond and the army of Robert E. Lee. As Grant moved south against Lee in the
Overland Campaign, Union Maj. Gen.
Benjamin Butler launched the surprise
Bermuda Hundred Campaign with landings up the James River. Beauregard successfully lobbied with Jefferson Davis's military adviser, Braxton Bragg, to prevent significant units of his small force from being transferred north of Richmond to the aid of Lee. His timely action, coupled with the military incompetence of Butler, bottled up the Union army, nullifying its threat to Petersburg and Lee's supply line. Now that this sector was stable, pressure began to rise to transfer troops from Beauregard's front to Lee's. Beauregard did send a division (Maj. Gen.
Robert Hoke's) to Lee for the
Battle of Cold Harbor, but Lee urgently wanted more and took the step of offering Beauregard command of the right wing of the
Army of Northern Virginia for his cooperation. Beauregard replied in a
passive–aggressive manner, "I am willing to do anything for our success, but cannot leave my Department without orders of War Department." After Cold Harbor, Lee and the Confederate high command were unable to anticipate Grant's next move, but Beauregard's strategic sense allowed him to make a prophetic prediction: Grant crossed the James River and attempted to seize Petersburg, which was lightly defended, but contained critical rail junctions supporting Richmond and Lee. Despite persistent pleas to reinforce this sector, Beauregard could not convince his colleagues of the danger. On June 15, his weak 5,400-man force—including boys, old men, and patients from military hospitals—resisted an assault by 16,000 Federals, known as the
Second Battle of Petersburg. He gambled by withdrawing his Bermuda Hundred defenses to reinforce the city, assuming correctly that Butler would not capitalize on the opening. His gamble succeeded, and he held Petersburg long enough for Lee's army to arrive. It was arguably his finest combat performance of the war. Beauregard continued commanding the defenses of Petersburg in the early days of the
siege, but with the loss of the Weldon Railroad in the
Battle of Globe Tavern (August 18–21), he was criticized for not attacking more forcefully and he became dissatisfied with the command arrangements under Lee. He hoped for an independent command, but his desires were thwarted in two instances: Lee chose Lt. Gen.
Jubal Early to lead an expedition north through the Shenandoah Valley and threaten Washington, and Davis chose Lt. Gen.
John Bell Hood to replace the faltering Joseph E. Johnston in the
Atlanta campaign.
Return to the West , December 15–16, 1864 After the fall of Atlanta in September 1864, President Davis considered replacing John Bell Hood in command of the
Army of Tennessee and he asked
Robert E. Lee to find out if Beauregard would be interested. Beauregard was indeed interested, but it is unclear whether Davis seriously considered the appointment, and in the end decided to retain Hood. Davis met with Beauregard in
Augusta, Georgia, on October 2 and offered him command of the newly created Department of the West, responsible for the five Southern states from Georgia to the Mississippi River, with the armies of Hood and
Richard Taylor under his ostensible command. However, it was a thankless job that was limited to logistical and advisory responsibilities, without true operational control of the armies unless he should join them in person during an emergency. Nevertheless, anxious to return to the field, he accepted the assignment. The major field operation of the fall was Hood's
Franklin-Nashville Campaign, an invasion of Tennessee, which he undertook under Beauregard and Davis' orders. Beauregard always kept in touch with Hood, despite all the obstacles facing the latter general's way. The two later developed a friendship that lasted until Hood's death in 1879, after which Beauregard became chairman of the Hood Relief Committee; he arranged for the publication of Hood's memoirs,
Advance and Retreat, in order to care for the orphaned Hood children. While Hood traveled through Alabama and into Tennessee, Union Maj. Gen.
William Tecumseh Sherman began his
March to the Sea from Atlanta to
Savannah, which focused Beauregard's attention back to Georgia. He was ineffective in stopping, or even delaying, Sherman's advance. He had inadequate local forces and was reluctant to strip defenses from other locations to concentrate them against Sherman. Furthermore, Sherman did an excellent job of deceiving the Confederates as to the intermediate and final targets of his march. Savannah fell on December 21, and Sherman's army began to march north into South Carolina in January. Also in late December, Beauregard found out that Hood's army had been severely weakened in its defeat at the
Battle of Nashville; there were very few men in fighting condition who could oppose Sherman's advance. Beauregard attempted to concentrate his small forces before Sherman could reach Columbia, South Carolina, the state capital. His urgent dispatches to Richmond were treated with disbelief—Davis and Robert E. Lee (now the general in chief of all the Confederate armies) could not believe that Sherman was advancing without a supply line as quickly as Beauregard was observing him do. Also concerned about what he considered Beauregard's "feeble health," Lee recommended to Davis that he be replaced by Joseph E. Johnston. The change of command came on February 22 and Beauregard, although outwardly cooperative and courteous to Johnston, was bitterly disappointed at his replacement. For the remainder of the war, Beauregard was Johnston's subordinate, assigned to routine matters without combat responsibilities. Johnston and Beauregard met with President Davis on April 13, and their assessment of the Confederate situation helped convince Davis that Johnston should meet with Sherman to negotiate a surrender of his army. The two surrendered to Sherman near
Durham, North Carolina, on April 26, 1865, and were paroled in
Greensboro on May 2. Beauregard traveled to Mobile and then took a U.S. naval transport to his hometown of New Orleans. In August that year, Beauregard's house was surrounded by troops who suspected he was harboring
Edmund Kirby Smith. All the inhabitants were locked in a cotton press overnight. Beauregard complained to General
Philip Sheridan who expressed his annoyance at his erstwhile enemy's treatment. ==Post-bellum career==