Charles Pomeroy Stone
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Charles Pomeroy Stone (September 30, 1824 – January 24, 1887) was a United States Army officer, engineer, and surveyor who served as a Union general during the American Civil War.
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[edit] Early life and career
Stone was born in Greenfield, Massachusetts, a son of the village doctor in a family of proud Puritan heritage. He graduated from the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1845 and was commissioned a brevet second lieutenant of ordnance. He served with Major General Winfield Scott's army in the Mexican-American War and was brevetted first lieutenant for Molino del Rey and captain for Chapultepec. After Mexico, he traveled through Europe for two years, learning European armies' ordnance techniques. He spent five years as Chief of Ordnance of the Pacific Department, locating sites for forts and arsenals, and establishing the Benicia Arsenal in California. In 1856, Stone resigned from the Army and was employed by the Mexican government as a surveyor, leading a scientific expedition in Sonora, Mexico.
[edit] Civil War
At the outbreak of secession, Stone found himself in Washington writing his report on Sonora. After a dinner with his former commander General Scott, Stone was requested to be Inspector General of the District of Columbia Militia at the rank of Colonel as of January 1, 1861, and was thus the first volunteer officer mustered into the Union Army before the Civil War. In this role, he secured the capital for the arrival of President-elect Abraham Lincoln, and was personally responsible for security at the new president's inaugural. Stone was appointed Colonel of the 14th U.S. Infantry regiment on May 14 and a brigadier general of volunteers in August, to rank from May 17. He commanded a brigade in Robert Patterson's Army of the Shenandoah during the First Bull Run campaign and afterward commanded a division, the Corps of Observation, guarding the fords on the upper Potomac River.
In October 1861, he sent a portion of his command to attack a suspected Confederate camp near Leesburg, Virginia, and it was soundly defeated at the ensuing Battle of Ball's Bluff. His subordinate, Colonel (and United States Senator) Edward D. Baker, arguably the most at fault for the defeat, was killed in battle. Stone bore the brunt of much public criticism; the United States Congress Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War was established in the wake of Senator Baker's congressional eulogies and anger over the defeat. Under a cloud for suspected disloyalty and treason, Stone was arrested just after midnight on February 9, 1862, on orders of Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan, who was acting under orders from Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton, dated January 28. Contrary to Army regulations, no charges were ever filed against Stone, but he was confined for 189 days in Fort Lafayette and later Fort Hamilton. Stone was released without explanation or apology on August 16, 1862.
Without assignment until May 1863, Stone was ordered to the Department of the Gulf, serving as a member of the surrender commission at Port Hudson and in the Red River Campaign as Maj. Gen. Nathaniel P. Banks's chief of staff. However, on April 4, 1864, Stanton ordered Stone mustered out of his volunteer commission as a brigadier general and he reverted to his rank of colonel in the regular army. He served briefly as a brigade commander in the Army of the Potomac in the Siege of Petersburg, but finally resigned from the Army in September 1864.
[edit] Postbellum career
After the war, Stone was an engineer for the Dover Mining Company, and then, in 1870, served thirteen years as chief of staff and general aide-de-camp for the khedive Ismail in the Egyptian Army, during which he was given the rank of lieutenant general and the title of Ferik Pasha.
Stone later returned to the United States, where he served as the Chief Engineer for the construction of the Statue of Liberty's pedestal and concrete foundation. He died in New York City and is buried in West Point National Cemetery.
Stone was married twice, first in 1853 to Maria Clary with whom one daughter was born. Maria died in Washington, D.C., shortly after Stone's release from Fort Hamilton. While serving in 1863 New Orleans, Stone fell in love with and married a distant relation, Jeanne Stone. Charles and Jeanne Stone had two daughters and a son, John Stone Stone, who later became a pioneer in the field of wireless telegraphy.
[edit] References
- Eicher, John H., and Eicher, David J., Civil War High Commands, Stanford University Press, 2001, ISBN 0-8047-3641-3.
- Warner, Ezra J., Generals in Blue: Lives of the Union Commanders, Louisiana State University Press, 1964, ISBN 0-8071-0822-7.
- U.S. Army selected biographical sketches
- National Park Service Statue of Liberty information
