RARE 1863 West Point Military Academy General Order 51

  

RARE 1863 West Point Military Academy General Order 51. Colonel Alexander Hamilton Bowman, Superintendent of the military academy during the Civil War, relieves Cadet William S. Beebe from his duty at West Point and instructs him to report to the Adjutant General's Office in Washington. Written in ink by Edward C. Boynton, Captain and Adjutant, dated June 11.

William Sully Beebe was commissioned on the same date as 2. He rose to the rank of Major on 8/23/64.

Beebe was awarded the Medal of Honor for action on 4/24/64 at Cane River Crossing, LA for an successful assault on a fortified position. The Confederates were in a strongly fortified position; the Union forces had orders to drive them out. The two hostile bodies clashed April 24, 1864. Beebe, of Ordnance Department of the army, was the officer whose leadership won brilliant victory for the Federals on that memorable occasion.

He led the One hundred and seventy-third New York Volunteers, commanded by Colonel Conrady, and so conspicuously distinguished himself that he was brevetted a captain and awarded the Medal of Honor. The details of the assault are told by Lieutenant Beebe himself as follows. I was ordered by the Chief of Staff to join the assaulting column, to urge the necessity of instant attack, as I knew our rear-guard was then engaged and we had to lay a pontoon-bridge to cross Cane River. The division was deployed for attack on Monett's Bluff; I stated the necessity of instant assault and offered to lead it.

The offer was declined, but on its renewal promptly accepted. I was the first man on the bluff. The color-guard immediately behind me lost five men out of eight, and the killed and wounded in an affair of ten minutes were about two hundred. William Sully Beebe served in the army until 1874 and then reenlisted to serve in the Spanish American War. He died during the war of yellow fever.

Beebe is hereby relieved from duty at the Military Academy and under instructions dated War Department, Adjutant General's Office, Washington, June 8, 1863, will repair to Washington on the 13. Day of July next, and report in person to the Adjutant General.

William Sully Beebe was born on February 14, 1841, in Ithica, N. He attended West Point Academy, graduating in 1863. He immediately entered the army, with an appointment of Second Lieutenant of Ordnance. During the Civil War, he received honors on multiple occasions. He remained in the army until 1874, when he resigned his commission.

After his resignation, he spent his time creating a theory that argued, in part, for a connection between the Biblical book of Genesis and the ancient peoples of the Americas. With the start of the Spanish-American War, Beebe reentered the army and died of yellow fever in Havana, Cuba, on October 12, 1898. Beebe, a lieutenant in the United States Army, was Chief of Ordnance in the field and Assistant Chief of Ordnance at Headquarters, Department of the Gulf, in New Orleans.

Commanded by Major General Nathaniel Prentiss Banks, Beebe on two separate occasions led regiments into battle during which he took prisoners. For this, Major General Banks recommended him to Andrew G. Thanks for looking at my auctions.