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He served in the U.S. Senate during the outbreak of the American Civil War, but was expelled after joining the Confederate Army. He was appointed Confederate Secretary of War in 1865. Breckinridge was born near Lexington, Kentucky, to a prominent local family.
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- John C. Breckinridge: Early Life
- John C. Breckinridge: Political Career
- John C. Breckinridge: Civil War
- John C. Breckinridge: Later Life
John Cabell Breckinridge was born in Lexington, Kentucky, on January 16, 1821. His grandfather had served in the U.S. Senate and as attorney general under President Thomas Jefferson, and his father was a prominent lawyer and state politician. Breckinridge attended Centre College in Kentucky before studying law at Princeton. He then returned to Kent...
Breckinridge began his political career in 1849, when he won a seat in the Kentucky House of Representatives. In 1851 he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives as a Democrat and served until 1855. During this time Breckinridge established himself as a leading Southern politician, known for his eloquent speeches on the House floor. His met...
Viewed as a traitor in the North, Breckinridge travelled to Virginia and offered his services to the Confederacy. Commissioned a brigadier general in November 1861, he was placed in command of the so-called “Orphan Brigade,” a Kentucky unit whose troops felt abandoned by their home state. Breckinridge commanded the Reserve Corps at the Battle of Sh...
Fearing capture by the Union Army, Breckinridge fled to Cuba at the end of the Civil War and then proceeded to the United Kingdom and Canada. Reunited with his family in Toronto, he then embarked on an extended tour of Europe. Breckinridge would remain in exile until 1869, when a presidential pardon allowed him to safely return to the United States...
Aug 6, 2024 · John C. Breckinridge (born January 21, 1821, near Lexington, Kentucky, U.S.—died May 17, 1875, Lexington) was the 14th vice president of the United States (1857–61), an unsuccessful presidential candidate of Southern Democrats (November 1860), and a Confederate officer during the American Civil War (1861–65). Buchanan, James; Breckinridge ...
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Siding with the slaveholding faction of his native state during the secession crisis of 1861, Breckinridge resigned and accepted a post in the Confederacy as a brigadier general, and was quickly promoted to major general in April of the following year.
Dec 8, 2021 · Less than a year later on April 14, 1862, following the Battle of Shiloh, Breckinridge was promoted to Major General. On July 9, 1864, Breckinridge participated in the Battle of Monocacy. He was the second highest ranking officer in Lieutenant General Jubal Early's Army of the Valley District.
On January 16, 1865, Confederate President Jefferson Davis appointed Breckinridge as his final Confederate Secretary of War. Breckinridge realized the costly toll the war had on the South and by late February of 1865 he concluded that the Confederate cause was hopeless.
Mar 16, 2024 · Biography of John C. Breckinridge, who represented Kentucky in the House and Senate before serving as a general officer in the Confederate Army and as the fifth, and final, Confederate Secretary of War. He was Vice President under James Buchanan.