Edmund Kirby Smith

Edmund Kirby Smith (May 16, 1824 – March 28, 1893) was a career United States Army officer who served with the Confederates during the Civil War, as one of only seven officers to reach the rank of Full General.

Wounded at First Bull Run, he distinguished himself during Braxton Bragg's invasion of Kentucky, before being made commander of the Trans-Mississippi Department (Texas, Louisiana, Western Arkansas) in January 1863. After the Mississippi fell to the Union, this isolated zone became virtually an independent nation, nicknamed 'Kirby Smithdom'. In the Red River Campaign of Spring 1864, he commanded the victorious General Richard Taylor, who defeated the combined army/navy assault under Nathaniel Banks.

On May 26, 1865, he surrendered his army at Galveston, Texas, before fleeing abroad to avoid arrest for treason. His wife negotiated his return. After the war, Smith worked in the telegraph and railway industries, as well as serving as a college professor.

Early life and the U.S. Army

Edmund Kirby

Edmund Kirby (8 April 1838 – 24 April 1920) was an English architect. He was born in Liverpool, and educated at Oscott College in Birmingham. He was articled to E. W. Pugin in London, then became an assistant to John Douglas in Chester. He travelled abroad in France and Belgium, and had started to practice independently in Liverpool by 1867, initially having offices in Derby Buildings, Fenwick Street. Between 1880 and 1914, his offices were in Union Buildings, Cook Street, Liverpool. In 1905 Kirkby took his two sons, Francis Joseph and Edmund Bertram, into partnership. He retired in 1917, and died in 1920. His practice continued after his death, until it merged with Matthews and Goodman in 2011.

Most of Kirby's works were in Northwest England, with occasional examples in North Wales, Staffordshire, Shropshire, and elsewhere. He was an architect to the Roman Catholic Church, and most of his ecclesiastical works were for this denomination. His most notable work in this genre is the Sodality Chapel for St Francis Xavier's Church, Liverpool. In 1869 he designed Sacred Heart Church in Hindsford which Pevsner described as a "pretty church". His Anglican churches include St Michael and All Angels, Little Leigh, and St Cross, Appleton Thorn. He also designed and carried out work on commercial and domestic properties, including Dee House, Chester.

Edmund Kirby (army officer)

Edmund Kirby (March 11, 1840 – May 28, 1863) was a U.S. Army officer who was killed during the Battle of Chancellorsville.

He was born in Brownville, New York to Major Edmund Kirby (1794-1849), an army paymaster, and Eliza Brown. He was a second cousin of Confederate general Edmund Kirby Smith, and his mother was a daughter of former U.S. Army Commander Jacob Brown. He graduated from West Point in the class of May 1861 (which also included Adelbert Ames and Emory Upton), shortly after the outbreak of the war. Commissioned a second lieutenant in Battery I, 1st US Artillery, now known as 1st U.S. Artillery, he was promoted to first lieutenant just eight days later. He served in the First Battle of Bull Run, the Battle of Ball's Bluff, the Peninsula Campaign and the Battle of Antietam as a battery commander of Battery I 1st Artillery.

On May 3, 1863, during the Battle of Chancellorsville, he took command of the 5th Maine Battery. He supervised the evacuation of the artillery guns, but was heavily wounded by case-shot and was carried off the battlefield by private John F. Chase, who would receive the Medal of Honor thanks to Kirby's recommendation. He was transported to a hospital in Washington, D.C., where his injured leg was amputated. Despite receiving medical attention, he contracted an infection.