Daniel Ruggles

Ruggles was born in Barre, Massachusetts, on January 31, 1810. In 1833 he graduated from the United States Military Academy in West Point, New York as 34th out of 43 cadets; among those George W. Cullum and Rufus King. He was appointed a brevet 2nd Lieutenant in the 5th U.S. Infantry Regiment and was posted in Wisconsin. He spent the next years in the Midwest with border duty and recruiting services. In 1839, by now a 1st Lieutenant, Ruggles participated in the war against the Seminoles in Florida. In 1840 he returned to the Canada–US border; and Ruggles stayed until 1845 when he took part in the occupation of Texas.[1]

Ruggles and the 5th Infantry, under command of Lt. Col. James S. McIntosh, were part of the 2nd Brigade under Col. David E. Twiggs. Participating in the Texas Campaign Ruggles fought in the battles of Palo Alto and Resaca de la Palma; his solid services securing him a promotion to Captain on June 18, 1846.

Doing recruiting services after the end of the campaign Ruggles and the 5th Infantry joined Gen. Winfield Scott's army for the Mexico City Campaign, fighting at Vera Cruz, San Antonio, Churubusco, Molino del Rey, Chapultepec and Mexico City. Ruggles was breveted for Gallant and Meritorious Conduct to Major after Churubusco and to Lieutenant Colonel after Chapultepec.[1]

After the war ended he was posted for frontier duty in Texas and the surrounding territories. Participating in the Utah Expedition in 1858 and 1859, Ruggles went on leave of absence for health reasons and stayed absent until the beginning of the American Civil War.[1]

Despite being from the abolitionist stronghold of Massachusetts, Ruggles married a woman from Virginia and held Confederate beliefs.[2] With the outbreak of the Civil War, Ruggles resigned his commission in the U.S. Army on May 7, 1861[3] Appointed a Brigadier General of Militia and Colonel in the Provisional Army of Virginia he was given command of the Aquia District in May 1861.[4] There Ruggles set up shore batteries to block the Chesapeake Bay. After exchanging fire with the Union Navy Ruggles' troops resisted a landing party and prevented a Union beachhead in the Battle of Mathias Point.

On August 9, 1861, he was promoted to Brigadier General and assigned command of a brigade in Gen. Braxton Bragg's Army of Pensacola in Florida, although he was a known abolitionist. Simultaneously commanding the District of Northern Alabama, Ruggles's brigade moved westwards into Mississippi with Bragg in February 1862. Ruggles now was assigned to command a division in Bragg's Corps in the Army of Mississippi. Under overall command of General Albert Sidney Johnston they marched northwards for the Shiloh Campaign.[4]

During the battle of Shiloh (Union name Pittsburg Landing) on April 6–7, 1862, Gen. Ruggles, on Sunday, April 6, saw repeated Confederate charges against the Union line known as "The Hornets Nest" fail. He sent word to his commanders to "Get every gun you can find." Subsequently, artillery was collected from every part of the field and lined up in a row of 62 cannons, now known as "Ruggles's Battery" (the biggest concentration of Artillery ever assembled in the history of North America up to that point), which hammered the Hornets Nest until the last Confederate charge broke the Union line at around 5:30 p.m., forcing it to surrender, 12 hours after the battle had started.

He fought with General John C. Breckinridge, the former Vice President of the United States, in the 1862 campaign to regain control of Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The combined Breckinridge-Ruggles forces were unable to regain the capital city.[5]

From August 15 to August 29, 1862 Ruggles was in command of the Port Hudson position on the Mississippi in Louisiana and supervised the planning and initial construction of fortifications in that region. On the 29th he was ordered by Breckinridge to move with some of his troops to the state of Mississippi to aid Earl Van Dorn in his attempt to recapture Corinth, Mississippi[6] in the ensuing Second Battle of Corinth.

"Most of the predatory warfare [after the fall of Vicksburg, in 1863], was waged by Federal troops stationed on the Memphis-Charleston Railroad [in southern Tennessee], and near it in [northern] Mississippi. On the eastern part of that frontier, Brig. Gen. Ruggles commanded Ferguson's brigade of Confederate cavalry, and ten or twelve field pieces...This disposition had been made by Lt. Gen. Pemberton."[7]

For the rest of the war he performed mostly administrative duties and was named as the head of the prison system in 1865. He oversaw the final exchange of Union prisoners of war at the end of the conflict.

After the war, Ruggles was a real estate agent and a farmer in Virginia. He later served as a member of the West Point Board of Visitors.[3] He died in Fredericksburg, Virginia in 1897; and rests there in the Confederate Cemetery.

• List of American Civil War generals (Confederate)

• Cullum, George W. (1891). Biographical Register of the Officers and Graduates of the United States Military Academy, Volume 1 (3rd ed.). West Point, NY.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
• Eicher, John H.; Eicher, David J. (June 2002). Civil War High Commands. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press (published 2001). ISBN 978-0-8047-3641-1.
• Hewitt, Lawrence Lee (1987). Port Hudson, Confederate Bastion on the Mississippi. Louisiana State University Press. ISBN 0-8071-1961-X.
• Joseph Eggleston Johnston, "Narrative of Military Operations Directed During the Late War Between the States", New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1874
• Sifakis, Stewart (1988). Who Was Who in the Civil War. New York: Facts On File. ISBN 978-0-8160-1055-4.
• U.S. War Department; The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies; Series I, Washington, D.C.; 1880–1898
• Warner, Ezra J. (1959). Generals in Gray: Lives of the Confederate Commanders. Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press. ISBN 978-0-8071-0823-9.
• John D. Winters, The Civil War in Louisiana, Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1963, ISBN 0-8071-0834-0

• "Daniel Ruggles". Find a Grave. Retrieved 2008-02-13.
• Daniel Ruggles in Cullum's Register online on Bill Thayer's Web
• Daniel Ruggles University of Southern Mississippi Archives
• Early Suggestion to Arm Negroes for the Confederacy