Henry Brainerd McClellan was an American soldier and educator.
Background
Henry Brainerd McClellan was born on October 17, 1840, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was of distinguished Scotch-Irish and English ancestry. His parents were Dr. Samuel McClellan and Margaret Carswell (Ely), both of Connecticut families. His great-grandfather, Gen. Samuel McClellan, commanded the 5th Brigade, Connecticut Militia, in the Revolutionary War; his maternal grandfather, Rev. Ezra Stiles Ely, moved to Philadelphia and donated part of the land for Jefferson Medical College, of which Dr. Samuel McClellan and his brother, Dr. George McClellan, 1796-1847, were the founders.
Education
Henry McClellan was graduated from Williams College in August 1858 when not yet eighteen years old. He had already determined to enter the ministry, but since he was so young his family decided that he should teach for a few years. Consequently, for the next two and a half years he tutored in a private family in Cumberland County, Va. , and here, under the influence of older persons, acquired a firm belief in state's rights. Only a short time before his death he laughingly declared that he was still a rebel, reconstructed but absolutely unrepentant.
Career
In 1861, McClellan entered the Confederate army as a private in the 3rd Virginia Cavalry. He was handicapped not only by his lack of military training but by his Northern birth and affiliations. Three of his brothers served in the Federal army, while his first cousin, Gen. George B. McClellan, was twice commander of the Army of the Potomac. Despite these obstacles he rose in two years, at the age of twenty-three, to the position of assistant adjutant-general and chief of staff of the cavalry of the Army of Northern Virginia. In 1862-63, he was adjutant of the 3rd Virginia Cavalry and from 1863 to the end of the war he served, with the rank of major, as assistant adjutant-general and chief of staff, first to Gen. J. E. B. Stuart and then to Wade Hampton.
After the Bristoe (Va. ) campaign in October 1863, Stuart reported McClellan as having been at his side "night and day" and that he was "greatly indebted" to McClellan "for the clearness with which orders and dispatches were transmitted". After Stuart was wounded at Yellow Tavern, McClellan went to the bedside of his dying chief, who gave him his bay horse as a final evidence of his esteem. Two days later, May 14, 1864, McClellan was assigned to duty at Lee's headquarters and, on August 11, 1864, was made assistant adjutant-general and chief of staff under Wade Hampton. He served under Hampton in his subsequent campaigns, including that with Johnston's army in the Carolinas. McClellan was notified that his commission as lieutenant-colonel had been issued, but since he did not receive it until after Lee's surrender, he modestly disclaimed the rank. After the close of the war, he resided for some years in Cumberland County, Virginia. In 1870, he became principal of Sayre Female Institute, Lexington, Kentucky, which he conducted successfully until shortly before his death.
Achievements
McClellan was the founder of the Sayre Female Institute.
