Leonidas Polk was born on April 10, 1806, in Raleigh. His father, William Polk, distinguished himself as a soldier in the American Revolution (at Brandywine, Germantown, and Camden), maintained a close relationship with Andrew Jackson, and contributed to the advancement of education in North Carolina. His mother, Sarah Hawkins, was the sister of North Carolina Governor William Hawkins. Many members of the Polk family settled in Tennessee and by 1840 held a "commanding position."
Leonidas Polk attended the University of North Carolina for two years (1821-1823) before entering the U.S. Military Academy. During his final year, Dr. Charles P. McIlvaine, a newly assigned chaplain, converted Polk to the Episcopal church. After only six months of service, Polk resigned his commission and entered the Virginia Theological Seminary.
After a short assignment as an assistant rector in Richmond, Leonidas Polk resigned because of poor health and traveled and studied. In 1834 he assumed his duties at St. Peter's Parish in Columbia, Tenn., surrounded by his relations.
In 1838 Polk was consecrated missionary bishop of the Southwest. This extensive area of scattered settlements comprised the states of Arkansas, Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, and a section of the Indian Territory. During the first six months of 1839, he familiarized himself with the region, having "traveled 5,000 miles, preached 44 sermons, baptized 14, confirmed 41, consecrated one church and laid the cornerstone of another." His journeys on horseback across most of the lower South gave him a knowledge of the area rivaled by few of the Confederate high command.
Polk settled in Louisiana in 1841, having been consecrated bishop of Louisiana in that year. For twelve years he attempted unsuccessfully to manage a vast sugar plantation at Bayou la Fourche while performing his ecclesiastical duties. For the four hundred slaves Polk controlled at Leighton, he proved to be an enlightened master, marrying them with a ceremony in the "big house" and establishing a Sunday school on the place. In 1849 cholera swept away one hundred slaves, and in 1854 Polk lost the plantation because of heavy debts.
In the five years preceding the Civil War, Polk's chief concern was the establishment of the University of the South. To supply the Episcopal clergy for the Middle South and to educate properly the lay leadership, he labored to raise funds adequate to erect "a university which would rival the establishment at Harvard or Yale." Through the assistance of Bishop Stephen Elliott and many others, about ten thousand acres were purchased at Sewanee, Tennessee, and on 19 October 1860 Polk laid the cornerstone for the university.
In the spring of 1861, President Jefferson Davis and many other Southerners urged Leonidas Polk to enter the Confederate army. Despite his lack of military experience, Polk accepted the appointment as a major general, considering it "a call of Providence." Passionately committed to the Confederacy, he felt that it was his duty to enlist in times when "constitutional liberty seems to have fled." Polk's presence was an emotional asset to the Confederacy throughout the war and offset his limitations as a commander.
In the summer and fall of 1861, he accepted responsibility for the defense of the Mississippi River, the importance of which he continually stressed. Despite successes with the occupation of Columbus in September and the defeat of Ulysses S. Grant's force at Belmont in November, Polk's efforts failed, largely because of Albert Sidney Johnston's insistence on the consolidation of the western forces of the Confederacy. Polk resigned in November 1861, when Johnston withdrew five thousand men from Columbus but was placated by Davis.
At Shiloh Polk earned a reputation for courage and displayed an ineptitude for logistics. During the invasion of Kentucky in 1862, he upheld his combat record but worked at cross purposes with his commander, Braxton Bragg, thereby helping to undermine the campaign. Commissioned lieutenant general in October, Polk succeeded in fielding a corps noted for high morale and dogged fighting. At Murfreesboro, in December 1862 his corps sustained frightful losses and accomplished little with repeated frontal attacks. The spring of 1863 found Polk continually quarreling with Bragg and urging Davis to have Bragg replaced. The Bragg-Polk controversy raged following Chickamauga, and Davis settled the irreconcilable conflict by sending Polk to Mississippi. Polk's actions at Chickamauga were open to criticism but hardly justified Bragg's demand for a court-martial.
Following the disaster at Chattanooga in November 1863, Polk rejoined the army now commanded by his friend Joseph Johnston. Under Johnston, Polk proved himself to be an able, competent corps commander. His corps maneuvered well and fought well. The end came at Pine Mountain in June 1864. Polk and his staff were observing the enemy lines when Union artillerymen spotted them. Polk ordered his staff of the hill but remained for the last look. A shell from a ten-pounder hit him, killing him instantly.
Leonidas Polk was the first bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Louisiana and was for that reason sometimes known as "The Fighting Bishop." During the American Civil War, he achieved the rank of Lieutenant General, something that the Geneva Conventions have made since impossible (clergy can only serve in the military in non-combatant roles). He founded the University of the S.
Leonidas Polk was a devout Christian whose beliefs influenced his daily life, even prompting him to run his plantations along religious lines rather than in the sole pursuit of economic prosperity.
In 1830 Polk was ordained a deacon in the Protestant Episcopal Church, and in May 1831 he was advanced to the priesthood. He was appointed missionary bishop of the Southwest in 1838 and was made a bishop of Louisiana in 1841.
Leonidas Polk was a strong defender of what he saw as Southern values, such as the family, the role of Christianity in informing the public and private morality, and the idea that different classes of people should know their place in society.
He proposed that religious education should be extended to blacks.
Quotes from others about the person
"He was as white as a piece of marble, and a most remarkable thing about him was, that not a drop of blood was ever seen to come out of the place through which the cannonball had passed. My pen and ability are inadequate to the task of doing his memory justice. Every private soldier loved him. Second, to Stonewall Jackson, his loss was the greatest the South ever sustained. When I saw him there dead, I felt that I had lost a friend whom I had ever loved and respected and that the South had lost one of her best and greatest generals." - Sam Watkins
"'Bishop Polk' was ever a favorite with the army, and when any position was to be held, and it was known that 'Bishop Polk' was there, we knew and felt that 'all was well. The army had suffered a severe loss. It was not that Polk had been a spectacular corps officer. His deficiencies as a commander and his personal traits of stubbornness and childishness had played no small role in several of the army's disasters in earlier times. The loss was one of morale and experience. Polk was the army's most beloved general, a representative of that intangible identification of the army with Tennessee." - Thomas L. Connelly
"The value of this work is not that it rescues Polk from the generally poor judgment of history, but rather that it does see the war from his perch, as it were, often in considerable detail, while giving us some useful insights into Confederate strategy and command in the West." - New York Military Affairs Symposium
"Easily the best and most comprehensive combined treatment of Polk’s ecclesiastical and military careers. For anyone seeking the most well-rounded reassessment of Polk’s generalship and the insights that might provide into Confederate command relationships and failures in the western theater, Horn's study is essential reading." - Civil War Books and Authors
In 1830 Leonidas Polk married Frances Ann Devereux, the daughter of John Devereux of Raleigh. They became the parents of eight children: Alexander Hamilton, Frances Devereux, Katherine, Sarah, Susan R., Elizabeth D., William Mecklenburg, and Lucia.
While in the United States Military Academy Leonidas Polk developed a close friendship with Jefferson Davis.
Leonidas' friend Bishop Stephen Elliott of Georgia presided at the service, delivering a stirring funeral oration.
