Background
William Hardee was born on October 12, 1815, in Camden County, Georgia, United States. His parents were Sarah Ellis and Major John Hardee.
West Point, New York, United States
In 1838, William Joseph Hardee graduated from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, New York, United States.
military officer Soldier writer
William Hardee was born on October 12, 1815, in Camden County, Georgia, United States. His parents were Sarah Ellis and Major John Hardee.
William Joseph Hardee entered the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, New York, in 1834, graduated in 1838, and accepted a commission in the army.
William Joseph Hardee then participated in the invasion of Mexico during the Mexican War (1846-48), during which he was captured and returned via a prisoner exchange. He subsequently rode under General Zachary Taylor and, because of his valor on the battlefield, received two field promotions. After the war, he led units of Texas Rangers and soldiers in Texas. Recalled to Washington, D.C., he wrote Rifle and Light Infantry Tactics, which would become the most widely read military manual during the Civil War. Following his wife's death in 1853, Lieutenant Colonel Hardee served as the commandant of cadets at West Point.
When Georgia seceded from the Union in 1861, Hardee resigned his commission and accepted the rank of colonel in the new Confederate army. Aware of the considerable supply and training problems his troops faced, Hardee surrounded himself with the best staff and commanders he could find.
Hardee was quickly promoted to brigadier general, then major general, and was given a corps command in Kentucky. After a severe defeat at the hands of Union General Ulysses S. Grant's troops, his corps joined General Braxton Bragg's Army of Tennessee, and Hardee, now a lieutenant general, saw his greatest strategic success in Tennessee at the Battle of Murfreesboro, December 1862. The battle ended in a stalemate, however, with some 23,000 killed on both sides.
Through the course of 1863, Hardee wooed Mary Foreman Lewis, an Alabama plantation owner, and in January 1864 they were married. During the same period, Hardee learned that he did not like Bragg or his strategies, and he and others challenged Bragg's leadership. After another harsh defeat near Chattanooga, Tennessee, Bragg resigned, and Hardee briefly assumed command of the army in December 1863. For reasons unknown, Hardee declined permanent command, and General Joseph E. Johnston replaced him.
In the Atlanta campaign, Hardee commanded a corps in the army, first under Johnston and then under General John Bell Hood, who replaced Johnston in July 1864. After repeated Confederate defeats outside Atlanta that summer - for which Hood blamed Hardee - Hardee secured a transfer to another department. He later commanded the Confederate forces that unsuccessfully defended Savannah against Union general William T. Sherman in December 1864, after his march to the sea. By the end of the war, Hardee had reunited with the Army of Tennessee in North Carolina and surrendered with that army in April 1865.
Hardee wrote Rifle and Light Tactics, which would become the standard for both armies during the American Civil War. In early 1861, Hardee resigned his commission in the U.S. Army and was subsequently appointed brigadier general by the Confederacy. In March 1862, Hardee joined the Army of the Mississippi, led by Hardee’s old commander, General Albert Johnston. Wounded at Shiloh on April 6, 1862, Hardee was promoted to lieutenant general later that year. In September 1864 he assumed command of Confederate forces that attempted to block General William Tecumseh Sherman’s march through Georgia. Following Lee’s surrender at Appomattox Courthouse, Hardee surrendered his forces at Archdale, North Carolina, on April 26, 1865.
Hardee managed the family’s two plantations in Demopolis, Alabama after the war, and then settled in Selma, Alabama, where he served as president of the Selma and Meridian Railroad. In 1868 he published his second work, "The Irish in America."
Hardee's ability to solve difficult problems earned him both the respect of the men under his command as well as the nickname "Old Reliable."
Quotes from others about the person
"It might be said that every officer of the war went into battle with a sword in one hand and a copy of Hardee’s manual in the other." - Nathaniel Cheairs Hughes
During the Second Seminole War, Hardee was stricken with illness and, during his hospitalization, met and married Elizabeth Dummett. She died of tuberculosis in 1853. William and Elizabeth had 3 children: William Joseph Hardee, Anna Dummett Hardee Chambliss, Noble Andrew Hardee.
In 1864 William married Mary Foreman Lewis.