Benjamin Stoddert Ewell

Background

Benjamin S. Ewell was born on June 10, 1810, in Washington, District of Columbia, the son of Dr. Thomas Ewell, of the United States navy, and Elizabeth Stoddert, daughter of the first secretary of the navy.

Education

After attending the preparatory department of Georgetown College, Ewell entered the United States Military Academy from Virginia and graduated third in the class of 1832.

He was commissioned second lieutenant in the 4th Artillery and detailed as assistant professor at West Point, where for three years he taught mathematics and for another year natural philosophy.

Career

Ewell resigned from the army, September 30, 1836, to become principal assistant engineer of the Baltimore & Susquehanna Railroad.

Upon its completion in 1839, he accepted the professorship of mathematics and natural philosophy at Hampden-Sidney College, Virginia, and remained there seven years.

During 1846 - 1848 Ewell was the first incumbent of the Cincinnati professorship of mathematics and military science in Washington College (now Washington and Lee University), Virginia.

In 1848 he was elected professor of mathematics and acting president of William and Mary College, and in 1854 became the institution’s sixteenth president. In May 1861, the college suspended activities. Nearly all of the professors and students entered the Confederate army. Ewell, himself a strong Unionist, was convinced that secession was unwise and unconstitutional. Nevertheless he invested practically his entire fortune in Confederate bonds and, although beyond the age for active service, organized the 32nd Virginia Infantry and was appointed its colonel.

After helping General Magrudcr to fortify the Virginia peninsula, Ewell was made assistant adjutant-general to Joseph E. Johnston and served with ability as his chief-of-staff and closest friend, personal and official, until March 20, 1865, when he resigned.

After the war, declining more lucrative professorships at Hampden-Sidney and Washington College, Ewell returned to the presidency of William and Mary. He successfully opposed the projected removal of the institution to Richmond, restored the buildings which Federal troops had burned in 1862 (the main building had been burned in 1859 and rebuilt under Ewell’s guidance), organized a faculty, and in 1869 reopened the college.

During the next few years, supported by strong statements from Generals Grant and Meade, he sought governmental reimbursement for the restoration of the burned buildings, and, although he was not immediately successful, the Fifty-second Congress indemnified the college for its losses. Meanwhile the cost of repairs and increased operating expenses had diminished the endowment fund, efforts to raise money by subscription had failed, and in 1881 the college was again compelled to close. For seven years Colonel Ewell, unaided, husbanded its scanty revenues. He spent on the college thousands of dollars of his own money, only a pittance of which was ever repaid, kept up inclosures and buildings as'best he could, and guarded the institution’s charter by driving in from his farm at stated intervals to ring the bell which announced that the college still lived.

In 1888 the board of visitors requested the state legislature to combine the college with the educational system of the commonwealth - an idea which Ewell favored - and the application was successful. Ewell now declined any further active connection with the college, but was named president emeritus and held this office until his death on June 20, 1894, in Williamsburg, Virginia.

Achievements

• Benjamin Stoddert Ewell was a well-known Confederate army officer, civil engineer and educator, who was best-remembered for his long tenure as the sixteenth president of the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg before, during and after the American Civil War. Benjamin Ewell's tireless efforts to restore the historic school and its programs during and after Reconstruction became legendary in Williamsburg and at the College and were ultimately successful, with funding from both the U. S. Congress and the Commonwealth of Virginia. The unincorporated community of Ewell in James City County and Ewell Station located along the Peninsula Extension of the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway (C&O) which was built through the area in 1881 by Collis P. Huntington, were named for him. Ewell Hall, the historic plantation house he built at the former Ewell Farm eventually became the restored centerpiece of a cemetery, Williamsburg Memorial Park, between Williamsburg and Lightfoot in James City County. Ewell Hall at the College of William and Mary is named for him. In 1987, the Student Association of the College of William and Mary established an award in his honor.

Views

Quotations: "No institution of learning in the South lost so much by the civil war, by actual destruction of property, and by consequent inability to resume its exercises as soon as peace was declared. .. The College, if this prayer be granted, will rise with renewed vigor, with improved faculties to repay any benificence (sic) which Congress may bestow, by giving again back to the Union what money can not buy, another host of mighty men to guard constitutions and laws, and to love the nation as devotedly as even its liberties. "

Personality

His students, who affectionately termed him "Old Buck, " loved him for what were perhaps his most noticeable characteristics : his love of his fellow man, his consideration for others, and his faculty of bringing out the best in those with whom he came in contact.

Connections

Father:

Thomas Ewell

Mother:

Elizabeth Ewell (Stoddert)

Sister:

Rebecca Ewell

Sister:

Elizabeth Stoddart Ewell

Brother:

William Stoddart Ewell

Brother:

Thomas Ewell

Brother:

Richard Stoddert Ewell

Brother:

Paul Hamilton Ewell

Friend:

Joseph Eggleston Johnston

Joseph Eggleston Johnston was a career United States Army officer, serving with distinction in the Mexican–American War (1846 - 1848), and Seminole Wars.