GEORGE H. THOMAS■ July 31, 1816 Born, one of nine children, on a
small plantation in Southampton County, Virginia.
■ 1836 Enters West Point. Befriends William
Tecumseh Sherman while at the Academy.
■ 1840 Graduates from West Point. Commissioned
Second Lieutenant in the 3rd Artillery.
■ 1841–1842 Serves with distinction in the
Seminole Wars.
■ 1843–1847 Posted to forts and installations
including Fort McHenry and New Orleans.
■ 1847 Serves at Monterrey and Buena Vista
during the War with Mexico. Brevetted to major.■ 1851–1853 Instructor of Cavalry and Artillery at
West Point. Marries Frances Lucretia Kellogg.
■ 1855 Serves at Fort Yuma and is promoted to
major in the Regulars, then posted to the 2nd
Cavalry in Texas where he serves under both
Col. Albert S. Johnston and Lt. Col. Robert E. Lee.
■ 1861 Remains loyal to the Union when Virginia
secedes. Promoted to colonel and then brigadier
general. Serves in the Shenandoah Valley and
then transfers west to Kentucky.
■ January 1862 Promoted to major general
following the Battle of Mill Springs—the first
decisive Union victory in the West.
■ January–October 1863 Takes command of
Fourteenth Corps after the Battle of Stones River.
Leads Tullahoma Campaign. Succeeds Rosecrans
as commander of the Army of the Cumberland.
■ 1864 Leads Army of the Cumberland as part of
Sherman’s advance on Atlanta. Blocks Hood’s
advance into Tennessee after the fall of Atlanta,
and decisively defeats him at Nashville.
■ 1865 Remains in Tennessee as commander of
occupation forces at war’s end.
■ March 28, 1870 Dies in San Francisco, after
serving his last years as commander of the
Military Division of the Pacific.TIMELINETHOMAS’S MEMORIAL IN WASHINGTONCampaign that preceded Chickamauga,
it was Thomas who led the Union
advance, and at Chattanooga in
November 1863, it was the Army of
the Cumberland, now under his direct
command, that stormed the Rebel
works on Missionary Ridge, winning
the battle for Ulysses S. Grant.
Thomas’s Army of the Cumberland
was also central to General Sherman’s
Atlanta Campaign in 1864. The
logistical, intelligence, and staff work of
Thomas’s command were integral to
Thomas’s military headquarters
This small cabin on Snodgrass Hill served as Thomas’s
headquarters during the final phases of the Battle of
Chickamauga, in which the general and his men
resolutely repulsed repeated Confederate assaults.
the advance against Joseph E. Johnston,
and later it was Thomas who stopped
the Confederates under John Bell Hood
at Peachtree Creek on July 20, in their
first attempt to end the siege of Atlanta.
When Hood moved north to sever
Sherman’s supply and communication
lines in Tennessee, Thomas was sent to
stop him. At Franklin on November 30,John M. Schofield, under Thomas’s
command, repulsed Hood’s assaults and
bought time for Thomas to concentrate
all available forces at Nashville. Thomas
waited almost too long to assemble his
troops, so Grant became impatient and
actually began the journey west to
intervene personally. But Thomas had
the situation under control, and as
soon as the wet ground had dried
sufficiently for a successful assault, he
attacked Hood in a vicious two-day
battle that all but destroyed the
Confederate Army of Tennessee. For
this victory Thomas now became
known as “The Sledge of Nashville.”Shunning politics
Thomas was a key general in the
Reconstruction period. He earned a
reputation as a friend to freed slaves
and refused promotion to lieutenant
general, knowing the Senate had to
confirm the appointment and would
necessarily politicize it. To that end he
burned his private papers before his
death in 1870, from a stroke.Roll of honor
A certificate presented to the next of kin acknowledged
the services of those who died serving the Army of the
Cumberland. Six scenes from the Civil War depict the call
to arms, fields of combat, and grieving relatives.“[He] looked upon the lives of
his soldiers as a sacred trust,
not to be carelessly imperiled.”
LT. COL. HENRY VAN NESS BOYNTON, WHO FOUGHT UNDER THOMAS IN 1863BATTLE OF BUENA VISTA