Joseph O. Shelby
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Joseph Orville (Jo) Shelby (December 12, 1830 – February 13, 1897) was a Confederate cavalry general in the Trans-Mississippi Theater of the American Civil War.
Shelby was born in Lexington, Kentucky, to one of the state's wealthiest and influential families. He attended Transylvania University and was a rope manufacturer until 1852, when he moved to Waverly, Missouri, where he engaged in steamboating on the Missouri River and in running a hemp plantation. During the "Bleeding Kansas" regional conflict, he led a company of Kentuckians on the pro-slavery side.
In 1861, Shelby enlisted as a captain in the Confederate cavalry and later fought at Wilson's Creek. Promoted to colonel, he commanded a brigade at Prairie Grove. He led his "Iron Brigade" of Missouri volunteers on the longest cavalry raid of the war. From September 22 to November 3, 1863, Shelby's force traversed 1,500 miles throughout Missouri, inflicting more than 1,000 casualties on Union forces, and capturing or destroying an estimated $2 million worth of Federal supplies and property. He was promoted to brigadier general on December 15, 1863, after the successful conclusion of the raid.
In 1864, Shelby commanded a division in Sterling Price's Missouri raid, where he distinguished himself at the battles of Little Blue River and Westport and captured numerous towns, including Potosi, Boonville, Waverly, Lexington, and California, Missouri.
Accompanying Shelby on the Missouri battles was John Newman Edwards, who claimed to have had more horses shot out from under him than anybody else. Edwards was to use this experience at the Kansas City Times to almost single handedly create the anti-hero legend of Jesse James.
After Robert E. Lee's Confederate army in the Eastern Theater had surrendered, General Edmund Kirby Smith appointed Shelby a major general on May 10, 1865, but the promotion was never formally submitted, due to the collapse of the Confederate government. In June, Shelby and his brigade headed south 1,500 miles into Mexico to offer their services to Emperor Maximilian, who declined to put the ex-Confederates into his armed forces. However, the emperor granted the Confederates land for an American colony in Mexico, which was revoked upon the dissolution of the empire and the Maximilan's execution. Allegedly, Shelby sunk his flag in the Rio Grande River on his way to Mexico rather than surrender it to the Federals.
Shelby returned to Missouri in 1867 and resumed farming. He was appointed the U.S. Marshal for the Western District of Missouri in 1893 and retained that position until his death in 1897. He died in Adrian, Missouri, and is buried in Forest Hill Cemetery, Kansas City.
[edit] References
- Eicher, John H., & Eicher, David J., Civil War High Commands, Stanford University Press, 2001, ISBN 0-8047-3641-3.
- Biography from History of U.S. Marshals
