“We have never been whipped and we never can be!"

DURING THE THIRTEEN months after General Robert E. Lee took command on the first day of June 1862, the Army of Northern Virginia compiled a record of battlefield successes second to none in the annals of American military history. The names of victories at the Seven Days, Cedar Mountain, Second Manassas, Fredericksburg, and Chancellorsville now adorned Southern battle-flags. This is even as it can plausibly be said that Antietam (Sharpsburg), where the army fought a Federal force twice its size to a standstill, might have been the Rebels’ most impressive fight.By the summer of 1863, the Army of Northern Virginia, characterized by its “very democratic equality,” in one Georgia soldier’s words, represented the aspirations of not only its seemingly invincible commander and the fighting men in the ranks but also the infant Southern nation.1

These Confederate successes stemmed from Lee’s aggressive and skillful employment of the army’s most highly efficient combat unit: the brigade. The best of these tactically flexible, hard-hitting brigades possessed the capability to function independently to achieve victory on their own on the battlefield. And one of the foremost of these crack units by the time of the Gettysburg campaign was General William Barksdale’s Mississippi Brigade, which was composed of some of Lee’s hardest fighting veterans.

Earning a well-deserved reputation for hard-hitting offensive capabilities since the war’s early days, the 13th, 17th, 18th, and 21st Mississippi Infantry Regiments of Barksdale’s Brigade played prominent roles in each of their battles. Most Magnolia State soldiers had received their baptismal fire at First Bull Run on July 21, 1861, contributing to that rout of Union forces. Then, barely three months later, at Ball’s Bluff, the Mississippi Rebels reaped a one-sided success with a fierce bayonet charge that annihilated a sizeable task force under a close friend of President Abraham Lincoln, Colonel Edward D. Baker, who had made the fatal mistake of crossing the Potomac from Maryland to Virginia on a bloody October 21, 1861.

Lincoln had named his son, Edward Baker Lincoln, in his friend’shonor. Having introduced president-elect Lincoln during his inaugural address, the handsome, gentlemanly Baker, a U.S. Senator from Oregon, whose political ambitions and flowery quotations of classical poetry were limitless, led his men recklessly into a Confederate trap. He was killed when a Mississippi bullet tore through his brain, just before the Rebels’bayonet charge literally drove the Yankees off the 100-foot-high river bluff and into the Potomac. Private Ezekiel Armstrong, 17th Mississippi, penned in his diary how the Mississippians “whipped five times our number in a fair fight.”

With early successes like these, Barksdale’s Mississippi Brigade early became the pride of the Magnolia State and well known across the Confederacy. Lee consistently relied upon the brigade as one of his shock units that could be depended upon in a crisis situation. One aristocratic officer of the Richmond Howitzers, Lieutenant Robert Stiles, emphasized that “Barksdale … was my general, commanding the infantry brigade I knew and loved best of all in Lee’s army.”2

Presenting insight into those key qualities that made them elite fighting men, Lieutenant Stiles explained how his artillerymen from the Confederacy’s capital “were closely associated with these sturdy fellows and became strongly attached to them. This Mississippi brigade was, in many respects, the finest body of men I ever saw. They were almost giants in size and power. In the color company of the 17th Regiment, when we first met them, there were thirty-five men more than six feet one inch high [when the average height of a Civil War soldier was around five foot, five inches ], and in the 21st there was one man six feet seven inches in height, and superbly formed, except that his shoulders were a trifle too square and too broad in proportion. They were healthy and hardy, even ruddy, which was surprising, coming as they did from a region generally regarded as full of malarial poison. They were bear hunters from the swamps and canebrakes and, naturally enough, almost without exception fine shots … as a body, they were very young men and brimful of irrepressible enthusiasm, equally for play and for fight. The laugh, the song, the yell of the rebel charge burst indifferently from their lips; but in any and every case the volume of sound was tremendous…. At times they seemed about as rough as the bears they had hunted, yet they were withal simple -minded and tender-hearted boys … how could I help loving these simple, brave, great-hearted fellows?"3

But the Virginian’s analysis was more colorful than accurate. Most of these young men and boys were middle-class yeoman farmers, who had been toughened by swinging the ax and plowing the fields. But they were familiar with hunting, which went hand-in-hand with everyday life in rural Mississippi, for sport and to put food on the table. A young farm boy of Barksdale’s Brigade, Private Joseph A. Miller, who was destined to lose his life in this brothers’ war, reflected on better times in his diary on April 18, 1863: “How gloriously I would enjoy [to be] either out fishing, or with my little shot gun on my shoulder, roaming the grand old botom [sic] of Tuscalossa in quest of game. I wish I was at home today and down in the bottom hunting squirels [sic].”⁴ And with the white-tailed deer of Mississippi’s dark forests in mind, Private Pickney M.Lewis, 17th Mississippi, described in a letter how his brother Private Benjamin Lewis, known as “Benny,” “is as hearty as a buck.”⁵

Hailing from a yet untamed frontier region just east of the Mississippi River, these “bear hunters,” in Lieutenant Stiles’ estimation, were indeed tough and durable. Many of the men experienced difficult lives on small farms carved out of the thick pine, oak, and cypress forests along the dark-hued rivers that led either south to the Gulf of Mexico, or west to the Mississippi. General Barksdale’s men were products of distinctive cultural and geographic regions known as the Gulf Coast Meadows, the Piney Woods, the Mississippi River lowlands, and the Central Prairie. They came from rural communities with Choctaw Indian names like Ala-muthca, located near the Alabama border, and others with more conventional names such as Columbus, located on a site known to the Indians as Possum Town, and small agricultural communities with unique names like Sunflower, which was on the fertile Mississippi River plain about halfway between Vicksburg and Memphis.

Barksdale’s soldiers were molded by iron discipline imposed by capable officers, who were also mostly community leaders. With a sense of admiration, one Confederate officer explained how the Mississippi Rebels were indeed the “splendid soldiers that they were, they obeyed orders, held their own fire [to ensure that] Almost every man struck was killed, and every man killed shot through the brain [and later] their comrades had gone into the woods as soon as it was light, brought out the bodies and laid them in rows, with hands cross upon the breast, but eyes wide-staring.” By the time of the dramatic showdown at Gettysburg, Barksdale’s Mississippians were seasoned experts at vanquishing large numbers of their opponents with considerable tactical skill, business-like efficiency, and superior marksmanship. They had perfected their bloody trade on the gory battlefields of Virginia and Maryland, where lethal skills were refined at the expense of a good many Union soldiers. The high-spirited Rebels of the Mississippi Brigade, in one Confederate soldier’s words, “were ready to fight anything, from his Satanic Majesty down; but they were a very poor set indeed as to judging when not to fight, or when to stop fighting.”6

Another factor that explained the Mississippi brigade’s elite quality was the burning desire to save their threatened home state. By June 1863, Mississippi had been invaded and Vicksburg was under siege by President Lincoln’s favorite western commander, Ulysses S. Grant. Grant’s invaders, economic hardship, and the Confederate government’s neglect led to a severe crisis situation across Mississippi. Ironically, thousands of Mississippi troops, including Barksdale’s men, had been early shipped east to defend Richmond, leaving the Magnolia State vulnerable. Few Mississippians ever imagined that the war would meantime descend upon their home state with such unbridled fury.⁷

Consequently, by the time of the Gettysburg Campaign, Mississippi Brigade members were eager for revenge, itching to strike a blow to redeem their invaded homeland. In a late October 1862 letter to his mother Maria, Lieutenant William Cowper Nelson, 17th Mississippi, wrote, “Ifeel uneasy about letters [because] they bring intelligence that the hateful invaders were once more in our country.”⁸ Then, in a January 15, 1863 letter to Maria, a worried Lieutenant Nelson admitted how, “I am afraid our beautiful home has been desolated by the ruthless hands of the vileinvader. I wonder if ever I shall be” home again.⁹

Despite being a political general without formal military training, therefore often subject to close scrutiny from professional soldiers, especially West Pointers, William Barksdale contradicted negative stereotypes. He became the 13th Mississippi’s commander during the 1862 Peninsula Campaign. More like a father than a commanding officer to the men, Barksdale was the very heart and soul of the Mississippi Brigade by the time of the battle of Gettysburg. Standing straight and tall, the large-boned, bulky general possessed a distinguished bearing and inspirational command presence that paid high dividends on the battlefield. Like a zealous Crusader waging righteous war in the Holy Land, Barksdale’s sheer size and shoulder-length white hair gave him an almost regal appearance.

One secret of Barksdale’s success was his distinctive personal leadership style distinguished by a sense of egalitarianism and democratic tendencies. He was on familiar terms with the common soldier in theranks, treating them fairly. The popular general often intimately mingled freely with his men. A respected Mississippi Congressman who had ensured that Mississippi was the second Southern state to secede from the Union, he interacted with his boys with an easy familiarity. Barksdale, consequently, early endeared himself to his men of all origins, ranks, and classes.

Most of all, Barksdale was a resilient, hard-nosed fighter and resourceful battlefield commander. He was naturally aggressive, especially when his fighting blood was up or when on the verge of success. Mirroring the qualities of his elite brigade, Barksdale’s chief characteristics—aggressiveness, a hard-hitting style, and tactical flexibility—contradictedthe stereotype of the incompetent, almost useless, political general in gray.

Barksdale was distinguished by sharp, typically Scots-Irish features and a face that displayed strong character and determination. One Mississippi soldier emphasized the importance of Barksdale’s leadership style, describing him as “brave, patriotic and kind. He felt a personal interest in every man in his brigade; he was proud of his men, and never doubted them. He believed they would follow him, nor was he mistaken.” Barksdale placed his faith in the importance of discipline and seemingly endless drill to create an elite soldiery and instill tactical flexibility at the brigade level to meet any battlefield emergency. His hard-fighting brigade became a lethal tool in his hands and one that could overcome the odds and achieve gains far out of proportion to its size.

Born on August 21, 1821 in Smyrna in Rutherford County, Tennessee, of Virginia-born parents, William Barksdale, Jr., persevered through a life that early presented him with a host of challenges. He was born at the same farm, just southeast of Nashville, from which his father had marched off to the War of 1812. Hence, unlike many of Lee’s aristocratic, upper-class generals, nothing had come easy for Barksdale. As a youth he struggled with the drudgery of farm life, scratching out ameager existence. Personal qualities that made him a resourceful, unorthodox, and flexible commander, such as a deep-seated stubborn streak, penchant for independent thought and action, and a deeply-imbedded streak of defiance toward authority were early evident.

In many ways, the free-thinking Barksdale was a natural Rebel long before the sectional crisis so cruelly tore America apart. “Quick to rebel against an encroachment upon what he considered to be his personal rights ,” he had often clashed with an authoritarian teacher. Barksdale grew up independent and self-reliant after his parents died (mother Nancy Harvey Lester in 1825 and his father, William B. Barksdale, Sr., ten years later). As an orphan, he was left on his own “to work out his own destiny,” after the family’s hardscrabble Tennessee farm was sold to pay off debts. But Barksdale made the most of his misfortunes by trying harder to succeed, transforming setbacks into positives. As on the field of Gettysburg, he seemed to perform better when the odds were stacked against him. Most of all, Barksdale was determined to overcome adversity, defying cruel twists of fate.

Knowing what it took to succeed in the harsh frontier world of mid-Tennessee, Barksdale understood that a decent education was the key to a better life. Therefore, he attended Clinton College and then Union Seminary near Spring Hill, Tennessee, located just south of the state capital of Nashville. A lively interest in the military also developed in Barksdale, who relished his father’s and grandfather’s wartime stories. Grandfather Nathaniel B. Barksdale, a Virginian born in 1760, fought in the American Revolution before settling in Tennessee in 1808. His own father, William Sr ., had helped to defeat the assaulting formations of British regulars while serving with General Andrew Jackson at Chalmette, just south of New Orleans, in January 1815. At age sixteen and along with brothers Harrison, who was killed in battle at Tupelo, Mississippi, Fountain, and Ethelbert, he attended the University of Nashville, gaining more knowledge from a high-quality education.

Barksdale then studied law in Columbus, Mississippi, and soon became a promising attorney. Intelligent and flexible in thought, he possessed a fine legal mind, and before age twenty-one, earned his license to practice law. He then opened up a legal practice in Columbus, the county seat of Lowndes County. Here, at this busy commercial town located near the sluggish Tom big bee River in east central Mississippi, Barksdale’s law firm became “one of the ablest in the South.” The young lawyer earned a widespread reputation for an eloquent command of language, while demonstrating considerable finesse in the courtroom. More important, Barksdale was also known for his egalitarian sense of justice and fairness across Mississippi and the South.

A strong advocate of states’ rights of the Thomas Jefferson mold, Barksdale also gained recognition as the hard-working editor of a popular newspaper, the Columbus Democrat, in 1844. This experience transformed him into an artful writer and later a masterful orator as a Southern spokesman. Also a Mason and a civic leader, Barksdale became a respected member of the Columbus community.

As one Mississippian recalled, Barksdale was “no ordinary citizen.As a citizen, his manly frankness and sterling virtues won him friends; as a lawyer, his genial nature and commanding talents secured audiences.” Not long after the Mexican-American War’s outbreak in April 1846, Barksdale departed Columbus for what was initially seen as a grand adventure south of the border with his friends and neighbors in uniform. He served capably as the Inspector of the Second Brigade, Fourth Division of the Army of the State of Mississippi.

After enlisting as a private but gaining a captain’s rank, Barksdale then became a staff officer of the Second Mississippi Infantry Regiment.Another equally tough-minded Mississippi politician, Colonel Jefferson Davis, led the First Mississippi Regiment (First Mississippi Rifles) during a dramatic showdown against a powerful army commanded by Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, the victor at the Alamo in March 1836. Here, at the battle of Buena Vista, Davis played a key role in saving Zachary Taylor’s Army amid the mountains of northern Mexico. With the Americanleft collapsing before Santa Anna’s onslaught on February 23, 1847, Colonel Davis boldly took the initiative and led a spirited counterattack.Davis thwarted the Mexican onslaught with only a relative handful of Mississippi riflemen, whose marksmanship rose to the fore. Ignoring a wound, Davis then formed his troops in a V-shaped formation to repulse a large number of Mexican lancers. Consequently, Taylor’s less than 5,000 men escaped what appeared certain defeat at the hands of Santa Anna’s 15,000 troops.

In Mexico, Barksdale was often “seen coatless, with a big sword, at the very front when fighting was promised.”10 In a letter to his wife, Varina Howe Davis, the Confederacy’s future president wrote modestly—in the tradition of a Southern gentleman planter—how the “Mississippians did well” at the battle of Buena Vista.¹¹ After the warended, Barksdale returned to Columbus to resume the practice of law. He then embarked on a political career, running for a seat in the state legislature. Barksdale rose to prominence during the emerging sectional crisis amid the heated debates of the Compromise of 1850, after he won a landslide election to a congressional seat.

Barksdale initially sought a permanent settlement to the sectional crisis without war. He was anything but the stereotypical fire-eater, swollen with the blindness of sectional pride. He resisted regional and nationalist fantasies (especially the idea of an easy victory over Northerners if it came to war) that consumed a generation of Southern leaders, thanks partly to his humble origins that kept him solidly grounded. Following his moderate convictions despite their unpopularity in antebellum Mississippi, he early served as a Union Democrat. Barksdale, nevertheless, won election to the state convention of 1851. During these debates, he declared that “no occasion for the exercise of the right [of secession] existed.” But Barksdale’s often unpopular opinions created a good many enemies, thanks partly to the chivalric code of ethics of a hypersensitive Southern male culture. The inevitable physical clashes resulted, including violent deaths, in the name of honor, politics, and personal pride. When Barksdale accidently encountered one political opponent, Reuben Davis, who had been his former Mexican War regimental commander, in a Vicksburg hotel, a violent clash ensued on July 1, 1853. An unarmed Barksdale was stabbed nearly a dozen times in the melee. He survived the vicious attack only by knocking Davis unconscious with one blow.

Barksdale first journeyed to Washington, D.C. in 1852 to enter the stage of national politics. Here, at the nation’s capital he served with distinction in the House of Representatives, becoming a leading Southern spokesman for states’ rights. Mississippi Congressman Barksdale served his people faithfully from 1853 to 1861, turning reluctantly to secession—while preferring a peaceful exit from the Union—as the South’s best recourse. After learning his painful lesson from the Vicksburg altercation with Davis at the Hotel Washington and with sectional passions reaching new heights, Barksdale prudently armed himself with a Bowie knife, a weapon carried by Colonel Davis’ men at Buena Vista and later by Barksdale’s Mississippi Brigade soldiers.Barksdale’s fighting spirit became evident in the halls of Congress. Here, he maintained his reputation first earned in the Mexican War and from the wild brawls on the Mississippi frontier. Embracing the traditional cultural values of Southern antebellum society, he was known to never turn away from an insult, which led to at least one duel. Barksdale’sfiery temperament gained publicity on a national level. One Mississippianre called how Barksdale “was as prompt to resent any [attack on the South] as a personal injury to himself.” Indeed, Barksdale acted as a personal guardian to Congressman Preston A. Brooks of South Carolina, when “Bully” Brooks caned the unfortunate Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner in the famous 1856 incident on the Senate floor. And on February 6, 1858, Barksdale played a prominent role during a wild melee among at least a dozen Congressmen in a physical confrontation over “Bloody Kansas.” Congressman Galusha Grow of Pennsylvania landed a blow to Barksdale’s head during the melee. The blow knocked off the Mississippian’s wig, revealing not only his bald head but also his vanity.Undeterred, Congressman Barksdale instantly replaced the hairpiece on his head before continuing the fistfight.

When not battling fellow Congressmen in the House of Representatives or political rivals on the dusty streets of Mississippi towns, Barksdale came to passionately embrace the Southern dream of an independent nation. A Northern writer described how Barksdale “had done much to bring on the war.” He declared how, “the army that invades the South to subjugate her will never return; their bodies will enrich Southern soil.” Ironically, it was Barksdale himself who would never return from an invasion of northern soil.

Barksdale was not only successful professionally but also in his personal life. He lived in Columbus with wife Narcissa Saunders Barksdale, who hailed from neighboring Louisiana. He had married the pretty young woman in 1849, and Narcissa was a loving wife.

Days after Mississippi seceded from the Union, on January 9, 1861 (the second state to do so after South Carolina), Barksdale resigned from Congress. Embracing the new revolution like his forebears back in 1775, Barksdale had known Jefferson Davis on intimate terms since the Mexican -American War. At Davis’s insistence, Barksdale was chosen as the quarter master-general of the Army of Mississippi, which was organized by John J. Pettus, Mississippi’s governor, before the state’s troops enlisted in Confederate service. But this position was only a desk job, and not to the liking of the ambitious Barksdale, who was eager for action.

Barksdale was clearly ill-suited for the bureaucratic duties of a meticulous quartermaster-general, shuffling papers at a desk all day. He consequently departed his prestigious position to enlist as a humble private in the 13th Mississippi Infantry Regiment, when newly elected President Davis called for volunteers to join the Confederate Army. He was shortly elected the 13th Mississippi’s colonel on May 14, 1861 by a land slide vote. Stout of build, tall, and barrel-chested, Colonel Barksdale commanded respect, which was needed to tame unruly, independent-minded Mississippi volunteers. At a solid 240 pounds, the bulky general knew how to throw his weight around both on and off the battlefield. But beyond the rough exterior and sharp tongue, well-honed to a cutting edge in Congressional debates, Barksdale was also a compassionate commander. He was early concerned about his men’s welfare, and did whatever he could to assist the common soldiers in the ranks: a redeeming quality that endeared him to his troops, who were willing to follow him to hell and back if necessary. During exhausting marches in hot summer weather, Barksdale often sacrificed his own comfort to help sick or exhausted privates. He allowed these flagging men to ride behind him on horseback to prevent them from falling behind.

At First Manassas just west of Washington on July 21, 1861, not long after the 13th Mississippi was dispatched to Virginia, Colonel Barksdaleled his troops from a reserve position and entered the battle on the left in the early afternoon. As part of the final offensive effort, he led a successful bayonet charge that scattered the Federals, pushing them off their perch on Henry Hill, initiating the Federal Army’s rout. More recognition came for Barksdale when he led his 13th Mississippi in the surprising victory in the battle of Ball’s Bluff, Virginia, thanks to yet another frontal assault with the bayonet. Spying a tactical opportunity since the Unionists were vulnerable with the Potomac River to their backs, Barksdale launched an assault that carried everything before it. Thus Barksdale’sname, as a promising military leader, was early known across the South.Fawning Southern ladies even penned flowery poems about Colonel Barksdale and his Mississippi “saviors” after the Ball’s Bluff victory.Southern journalists wrote in detail about Colonel Barksdale’s hard-hitting attack that drove the Yankees into the Potomac during the near annihilation of the Federal task force.

Additional bloody fighting for Barksdale’s Mississippi Rebels followed in the spring of 1862, when General George B. McClellan’s Army of the Potomac launched a massive offensive to capture Richmond by advancing up the Virginia Peninsula. Barksdale’s 13th Mississippi first came under fire at Yorktown, where George Washington and his Frenchallies won the most decisive victory of the American Revolution. On June 29 the Mississippi Brigade’s commander, General Richard Griffith, fell at the battle of Savage’s Station, the fourth of the Seven Days battles, when “at least half a shell” struck him in the groin. A handsome, dark-haired leader of promise, Griffith went down to rise no more. Like Barksdale, a Mississippi politician and a close friend of the Confederacy’s president, Griffith had served in Jefferson Davis’ First Mississippi Rifles during the Mexican-American War.

Barksdale, the senior colonel, became the Mississippi Brigade’s commander. Under his steady leadership, this rough hewn command of back-woodsmen and yeomen farmers of the 13th, 17th, 18th, and 21st Mississippi Regiments gained a lofty reputation. The Mississippi Brigade then suffered heavily during the attack on Malvern Hill, where McClellan’stroops made their last stand before the James River, on July 1, 1862. In his first battle as brigade commander, Barksdale led the attack. When a color bearer was cut down, Barksdale grabbed the flag of one Mississippiregiment and then inspired his cheering troops onward into murderous artillery fire pouring off the high ground. In this assault, which also came under fire from Union gunboats in the James, one third of the Mississippi Brigade was either killed or wounded—the highest loss of any brigade at Malvern Hill.

After the brutal Seven Days fighting, Lee declared that Barksdale demonstrated the “highest qualities of the soldier.” Continuing to gain respect throughout the army (a relative rarity for a Southern politician without formal military training), Barksdale gained a hard-earned brigadier general’s rank on August 12, 1862. He then took official command of the Mississippi Brigade, though having led the unit since the fight at Savage’s Station.12

Most of all, Barksdale worked hard to transform his Mississippi Brigade into a lethal fighting machine second to none in the Army of Northern Virginia, in part by instilling the value of drill and discipline into the very fiber of his troops. Exemplifying the general’s determination to create the best soldiers possible, Private Robert A. Moore, Company G (Confederate Guards of Holly Springs), 17th Mississippi, described in his diary how “Gen. Barksdale generally closes the drill with the bay onet charge .” His unorthodox leadership style made Barksdale not only a popular, but also a highly effective commander. As Private John Saunders McNeily, 21st Mississippi, explained: “of the comfort of his men he was most considerate, would tolerate no neglect or denial of their rights, or imposition on them from any one.”¹³ But from beginning to end, perfection in drill and discipline was always Barksdale’s foremost priority in creating a crack brigade. Having enlisted to “do his bit,” Sergeant Major Charles C. Cummings, 17th Mississippi Infantry, recalled how “We were taught to drill with hands placed tight to the seams of pants.”¹⁴

Even in bad weather, including in wintertime, when other brigade commanders cancelled drills and inspections, Barksdale focused on the task at hand. Private Joseph A. Miller, Company K (Magnolia Guards), 17th Mississippi, who was fated to be killed in battle, described in his diary how Barksdale conducted one inspection on “a cold windy, disagreeable day. I thought I would freeze before they got through, Old Barksdale inspected us.”15

Most of all, Barksdale exemplified the feisty, combative nature and fighting spirit of the Mississippi Brigade. He possessed “a thirst for battle glory,” wrote one Mississippian, who got his personal wish for a fighting general. Inspiring by example, Barksdale was a leader who dared to go where many other high-ranking officers would not go in a crisis situation. He gained popularity by taking the same risks and enduring the same dangers as the common soldiers in the ranks, and especially in leading a charge.

Before the great clash of arms at Gettysburg, Barksdale’s pluck and fighting spirit was most convincingly demonstrated at Fredericksburg on December 11. The Mississippi general ignored the orders of his division commander, burly General Lafayette McLaws, to disengage and retirefrom his advance position along the river to rejoin the main army on the heights behind the town. Instead, the stubborn Barksdale refused to budge, ordering his troops to continue to fight on and delay the attackers as long as possible. At Fredericksburg it was as if the Mississippian was waging his own private war. However, Barksdale’s defiance of orders earned admiration—instead of arrest—from his corps commander, General James Longstreet. Clearly, these combative fighting men from Mississippi were just the kind of never say-die soldiers who could win a victory in a key battlefield situation, such as at Gettysburg.¹⁶