Civil War
At the outbreak of the Civil War, Keyes was promoted to colonel of the 11th U.S. Infantry on May 14, 1861. He then served briefly on the staff of New York Governor Edwin D. Morgan until June 25, 1861, overseeing that state's raising of militia.
At the First Battle of Bull Run, Keyes commanded the 1st Brigade, 1st Division (Tyler), and then led Keyes's Brigade, before assuming command of a division from November 9, 1861, to March 13, 1862. In August 1861 he was promoted to the rank of brigadier general of volunteers with date of rank of May 17, 1861, the third-ranking brigadier general in the Army. He was then given command of IV Corps, leading it from its inception on March 3, 1862, until its discontinuation on August 1, 1863. When Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan's Peninsula Campaign against Richmond was organized in the spring of 1862, Keyes led in unexceptionable fashion.
Keyes saw action at Lee's Mill, Yorktown, Bottom's Bridge, Savage's Station, Seven Pines (Fair Oaks), Charles City Cross Roads, Malvern Hill, and Harrison's Landing. For gallantry at Fair Oaks, Keyes received the brevet of brigadier general in the regular army. After the Army of the Potomac left the Peninsula, the IV Corps remained behind as a part of Maj. Gen. John Adams Dix's Department of Virginia. On March 12, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln nominated Keyes for promotion to the grade of major general, U.S. Volunteers, to rank from May 5, 1862 and the U.S. Senate confirmed the award on March 13, 1862. In addition to the IV Corps, he commanded the Yorktown District, VII Corps, and the division at Suffolk. Among Keyes's other actions were the raid to White House, Virginia, on January 7, 1863, and the expedition to West Point, Virginia, on May 7, 1863.
During the Gettysburg Campaign in 1863, Keyes fell afoul of General John Adams Dix's strategic plan to demonstrate heavily against Richmond in order to divert Confederate reinforcements from General Robert E. Lee's army in Pennsylvania. Keyes retreated from a position near what is now Tallysville, Virginia, in the face of what Dix deemed to be inferior forces, so Dix had Keyes removed from command.
Although Keyes asked for an investigation of the charges that led to his removal, the request was never granted. He then served on various boards and commissions, including the board for retiring disabled officers from July 15, 1863, until his resignation and retirement from the army on May 6, 1864.
Read more about this topic: Erasmus D. Keyes
Famous quotes related to civil war:
“I wish to see, in process of disappearing, that only thing which ever could bring this nation to civil war.”
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)
“They have been waiting for us in a foetor
Of vegetable sweat since civil war days,
Since the gravel-crunching, interminable departure
Of the expropriated mycologist.”
—Derek Mahon (b. 1941)
“To the cry of ‘follow Mormons and prairie dogs and find good land,’ Civil War veterans flocked into Nebraska, joining a vast stampede of unemployed workers, tenant farmers, and European immigrants.”
—For the State of Nebraska, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)