Benjamin Stoddert Ewell - Youth, Education, Early Career

Youth, Education, Early Career

Benjamin Stoddert Ewell was born in the Georgetown section of Washington, D.C.. He was the son of Dr. Thomas Ewell and his wife Elizabeth Stoddert Ewell, and was a grandson of Benjamin Stoddert, first U.S. Secretary of the Navy.

He was graduated from the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York in 1832, and assigned to the Fourth Artillery of the U.S. Army. However, Ewell stayed on as an Assistant Professor of Mathematics at West Point from 1832 to 1835, and Asst. Professor, Natural and Experimental Philosophy there in 1835 and 1836.

In 1836, he left West Point and became an assistant engineer of the Baltimore and Susquehanna Railroad, connecting Baltimore, Maryland with Sunbury, Pennsylvania, from 1836 until 1839.

Moving to Virginia in 1839, at Hampden-Sydney College, he became Professor of Mathematics, serving from 1839–1842 and of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy from 1842 to 1846. He then moved to Lexington, Virginia where he was Professor of Mathematics and Military Science at Washington College (which later became Washington and Lee University) from 1846 to 1848.

In 1848, he accepted a position as Professor of Mathematics and Acting President of the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia. He purchased a farm in nearby James City County west of the old colonial capital city along the Richmond-Williamsburg Stage Road (now U.S. Route 60) and built a large plantation house there which became known as Ewell Hall. He was later named permanent president, and served in that capacity between 1854 and 1861.