LCV Winter 2012 - (Page 90)

leave the Union. Beauregard held the office for under a His troops were proud to serve under “the Little Black week before returning home at the request of Louisiana Frenchman,” as they sometimes called him. Women, who Governor Thomas o. moore. showered him with flowers, gifts and adoring letters, At first, the impending war brought only more affronts idolized him. His hot, quarrelsome temperament never to the proud Creole’s sense of destiny. He had expected cooled and his arguments with Davis over strategy, which he often conducted through moore to appoint him as commander newspaper interviews, continued of the state’s army, but the command even after the South’s defeat. went instead to Braxton Bragg, a man he detested. To dramatize his feelings a PosTWar career in The of injustice, Beauregard ostentatiously PrivaTe secTor enrolled as a private in a Creole battalion, the orleans Guards, but he With the war over, Beauregard did not remain an enlisted man for returned to New orleans, swallowed long. Slidell, intervening on his pride and swore an oath of Beauregard’s behalf with Confederate loyalty to the United States. He explored several prospects for President Jefferson Davis, arranged for serving as an officer in foreign his brother-in-law’s commission as armies and received an offer from the brigadier general. His first assignment Khedive of Egypt to command his was to seize Fort Sumter at Charleston, forces, but the agreement was South Carolina. The decision to entrust Beauregard withdrawn after strong protests from with the war’s opening act was the U.S. consul general in Cairo. recognition of his reputation as a Beauregard benefited from the capable if headstrong officer. pardon of most high-ranking Beauregard would enjoy a remarkable Confederate officials issued by record of service to the Confederacy, President Andrew Johnson on July 4, fighting and winning its first battle 1868. By act of Congress in 1876, In his later years, P.G.T. Beauregard became an author and and surrendering in 1865 after Robert Beauregard was finally granted the businessman and was appointed to many commissions. right to hold public office. Afterward, E. Lee offered his sword to Ulysses S. he served as Louisiana’s adjutant general (1879-1888) and Grant. In between, he was active in every phase of the was elected in 1888 as New orleans’ commissioner of conflict. He won the South’s second major victory, the battle of Bull Run (1861) at manassas, Virginia. He commanded public works. southern forces in the West where he was defeated at Shiloh His greatest achievements after the Civil War, (1862) but only after inflicting serious casualties on Grant’s however, were in the private sector and in publicizing his forces. From there he returned to wartime accomplishments. By october Charleston (1863) and conducted a 1865 he was already employed as masterful defense of the city. In 1864 chief engineer and general he was given command of the superintendent of the New orleans, Jackson & Great southern approaches to the Northern Railroad, where he Confederate capital of Richmond, Virginia. As the war drew to a close, consummated his reputation as he fought rearguard actions in the South’s premiere engineer. Georgia and the Carolinas. A bold Within months rail lines wrecked by and imaginative leader, he was war were returned to service and sometimes sloppy with before long, the company was restored implementing his strategy. The to prosperity. When Beauregard was flamboyant general encouraged dispatched on trips to the North and to such innovations as ironclad England to negotiate credit for the gunboats (a year before the Monitor railroad, he was greeted by crowds of engaged the Merrimack) and a well-wishers and swarms of journalists submarine attack on a Union eager to interview the exotic Southern hero who seemed to have stepped from warship. the pages of a Walter Scott romance. He No Confederate leader cut a became president of the railroad but was profile more colorful than removed in 1870 through the machinations of Beauregard. He spoke easily and often with journalists, whose Louisiana’s Republican-controlled accounts painted him as a Napoleon Reconstruction legislature. In 1866 Beauregard in gray, a symbol of Southern General P. G. T. Beauregard devoted himself to the railroad and transit gallantry. With his mediterranean businesses after the Civil War. He tested a cable railway system using an complexion, soft French accent and overhead cable in New Orleans in 1868 or 1869. Nothing came of it. He usually signed his name without the initial “P.” vivid flights of rhetoric, he stood in contrast to the austere Robert E. Lee and prickly Jefferson Davis. 90 LoUISIANA ENDoWmENT FoR THE HUmANITIES • Winter 2012-13 NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY'S THE PAGEANT OF AMERICA ARCHIVE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

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