American Civil War Confederate Army Officer. Nicknamed "The Gray Ghost' he achieved the rank of colonel in the Confederate Army and served as a cavalry battalion commander. His command, the 43rd Battalion, 1st Virginia Cavalry, known as Mosby's Rangers or Mosby's Raiders, was a partisan ranger unit noted for its lightning quick raids and its ability to elude Union Army pursuers and disappear, blending in with local farmers and townsmen. His father was descended from English settlers who came to the American Virginia Colony in the early 17th century. He began his education at a school called Murrell's Shop and when his family moved to Albemarle County, Virginia (near Charlottesville) around 1840, he attended school in Fry's Woods before transferring to a Charlottesville school at the age of ten. He was small and sickly as a child and was often the target of bullying and would respond by fighting back. In 1847 he enrolled at Hampden-Sydney College in Hampden Sidney, Virginia but left after two years when he could not pass his mathematics class. In October 1850 he entered the University of Virginia at Charlottesville, Virginia but was expelled in 1853 after shooting another student who was bullying him and was arrested, convicted, and spent some time in jail. There he managed to study law and in December 1853 he obtained a pardon from the Virginia governor. The following year he was admitted to the bar, and he established a law practice in Howardsville, Virginia. He was outspoken against slavery and secession but joined the Confederate Army as a private at the outbreak of the American Civil War. After impressing Confederate General J.E.B. Stuart with his ability to gather intelligence, he was promoted to the rank of 1st lieutenant and assigned to Stuart's cavalry scouts. He helped Stuart develop attack strategies and was responsible for Stuart's "Ride around McClellan" during the Peninsula Campaign. Captured by Union cavalry, he was imprisoned in the Old Capitol Prison in Washington DC for ten days before being exchanged. In January 1863, General Stuart, with Lee's concurrence, authorized him to form and take command of the 43rd Battalion Virginia Cavalry, which was later expanded into Mosby's Command, a regimental-sized unit of partisan rangers operating in Northern Virginia. In March 1863 he was promoted to the rank of captain and then to major. That same month he carried out a daring raid far inside Union lines at the Fairfax County, Virginia courthouse where his men captured three Union officers, including Brigadier General Edwin H. Stoughton. The following year he was promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel and in September 1864 Union forces executed seven of his men who had been captured out of uniform in Front Royal, Virginia. The following November he retaliated and ordered seven Union prisoners to be executed, but only three were actually hung. From then on, both sides treated all captured prisoners as "prisoners of war" and no more executions were carried out. In December 1864 he was promoted to the rank of colonel and in the same month was shot by Union forces through a window while having dinner in a family in a Southern home. He managed to hide his coat, which would have revealed his rank, and when the Union commander entered the home, he did not recognize him and declared his wound mortal and left. He miraculously recovered from the wound and returned to his unit two months later. After General Robert E. Lee's surrender at Appomattox, Virginia on April 9, 1865, he refused to surrender and disbanded his unit, travelling southward in hopes to meet up with Confederate General Joseph Johnston's forces in North Carolina. With a $5,000 bounty on his head, he managed to elude capture around Lynchburg, Virginia until the end of June, when Union General Ulysses S. Grant intervened and pardoned him. After the war, he became an active Republican and was a campaign manager in Virginia when Grant ran for the US presidency. In 1878 he was appointed US consul to Hong Kong, serving until 1885. After returning to the US, he worked as a lawyer in San Francisco, California with the Southern Pacific Railroad and later the Department of the Interior. From 1904 until 1910 he was an assistant attorney in the Department of Justice. He died at the age of 82. The John Singleton Mosby Museum is located in Warrenton, Virginia, at the historic Brentmoor estate where he lived from 1875 until 1877.
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Colonel John S. Mosby, Soldier,
Diplomat and Lawyer, is Dead
After Long Illness.
FRIEND OF GENERAL- GRANT
Washington, May 30, Colonel
John S. Mosby, the most famous confederate raider of the civil war, died
here today after a long illness. He was a native of Virginia and was 82
years old.
Colonel Mosby's death, his physicians said, was due solely to old
age, and he was conscious and interested in what was going on about
him until an hour before he passed away.
Until six months ago when he went
into a sudden decline he was a
familiar sight about the streets of the
capital, apparently ' vigorous despite
his age. lie will be buried at his
ancestral home at Warenton, Va.,
probably Thursday, and some survivors of his noted command will be
his pall bearers. His death on
Memorial day was affecting to many.
Colonel Mosby dared death over
fifty years ago when at the head of a
band of a few hundred Confederate
raiders he rode up and down the
Shenandoah Valley, capturing out
posts, destroying supply trains, and
cutting off means of communication.
It has been estimated that he often
neutralized the force of over 15,000
federals in the valley.