KISSING COUSINS

General Richard Stoddert Ewell

 

Lizinka Brown Campbell Ewell

 Lizinka Campbell was born in St, Petersburg Russia on February 24, 1820. Her mother was a close friend of a Russian Czarina named Lizinka and her father was the U.S. ambassador to Russia appointed by president James Monroe. Lizinka's father had been a powerful politician from Tennessee named George Washington Campbell. He served in both houses of Congress, was U.S. ambassador to Russia, a U.S. Secretary of the Treasury and a Tennessee State Supreme Court justice before his death in 1848. Richard Stoddard Ewell was born on February 8, 1817 in Washington D.C. He would attend West Point and become a career army officer serving not only in the U.S. Army but the Confederate Army under General's Stonewall Jackson and Robert E. Lee. Ewell was Lizinka Campbell's 1st cousin and he would fall madly in love with her as a teenager. Lizinka would grow into a beautiful woman but apparently her attraction for Richard was not as strong as his was for her. He sought her hand in marriage but she married James Percy Brown a wealthy lawyer who owned plantations in Tennessee, Mississippi and Alabama. I guess the choice between living on a army officers pay and the prospect of moving to remote military posts was less appealing than marrying a wealthy lawyer that could sustain the lifestyle she had been used to. Lizinka would eventually have two children with her husband. He had been the attache to the U.S. ambassador to France when they were engaged and his family had connections to both the French and U.S. aristocracy making Lizinka feel right at home.

Richard never stopped loving Lizinka and he remained a bachelor well into middle age. No other woman could rise to her level in his eyes. As a soldier he spent years in the desert sun of New Mexico and Arizona fighting the Apache and later serving in the Mexican War. Richard also belonged to the Southern aristocracy but he led a hard life. His skin became like leather from the sun. Lizinka's children were young when her husband died. She decided to move into her fathers home in Nashville. Just across the street from the state capital on Charlotte Avenue where Legislative Plaza is today. The house no longer exists. She was not only a beautiful woman but shrewd in the way she managed her fathers inheritance which increased her personal wealth even more. At the beginning of the American Civil War Ewell joined the Confederate Army. He served under Thomas J. (Stonewall) Jackson very capably during Jackson's famous Shenandoah Valley campaign. Lizinka's son served as an aide to Ewell. He had always corresponded with Lizinka over the years and was concerned for Lizinka's safety living in Nashville. Lizinka fled the city just before the Union army captured Nashville on February 25, 1862. Military governor Andrew Johnson confiscated her home and lived there until he was elected Vice President under Abraham Lincoln. During the Second Bull Run campaign in August 1862 Ewell's knee was shattered at the battle of Groveton and his leg had to be amputated. While recuperating in Richmond Lizinka nursed him back to health and they fell in love. He proposed to her and they were married on May 25, 1863. Richard was a great stepfather to her children and grandfather to her grandchildren not having children of his own. 

General Ewell returned to the Confederate army during Lee's Chancellorsville campaign. When Stonewall Jackson was mortally wounded he recommended Ewell as his successor. Ewell was given command of Jackson's 2nd Corps upon his death. When Lee's Gettysburg campaign commenced after Lee's victory at Chancellorsville Ewell seemed to handle his new 2nd Corps with the same speed and skill that Jackson might have handled it. He reached the Pennsylvania state capital of Harrisburg before being recalled by Lee to concentrate at Gettysburg. Ewell was the third highest ranking general in the Confederate army behind only Robert E. Lee and James Longstreet. His military reputation declined after Gettysburg because of his failure to capture Cemetery Hill which he had a good chance to do on the first day of the battle. Being overly cautious might have been the result of losing a leg but some of the blame has to go to Lee. His orders were vague. Lee ordered Ewell to take Cemetery Hill "if practicable". Historian James McPherson believes Jackson would have found it "practicable" but let it be noted that Jackson even failed to act decisively in the Peninsula campaign, which was out of character for him. Ewell did well during the battle of the Wilderness but acted indecisively at the battle of Spotsylvania. So much so that Lee relieved him of command of the 2nd Corps sending him to defend the Richmond. Ewell had a shining moment when he was able to defend the city with only 200 men until reinforcements could arrive. Ewell was captured with his entire command at Sailors Creek  during the Appomattox campaign and was imprisoned in Boston Harbor until July 1865.

Ewell's troops on the 1st day at Gettysburg

After Lizinka and Ewell were married she began managing Ewell's affairs even to the point of writing his dispatches and managing his couriers. Lee's soldiers resented this and Ewell gained a reputation for being "henpecked". So much so that she was blamed by many for Ewell's military failures and the subject of idle gossip which tended to alienate the couple from social circles. After the war the couple moved to Spring Hill Tennessee and lived on a farm that she had inherited. They were progressive farmers and Ewell was was elected president of the Maury County Agricultural Society and president of the Board of Trustees of the Columbia Institute. In January 1872 General Ewell became very sick. The doctor diagnosed him with typhoid pneumonia. Lizinka began nursing him until she also came down with the disease. Lizinka Campbell Brown Ewell died on January 22, 1872. The family was afraid to tell Ewell that his wife had died due to his weakened state. He was finally told about Lizinka's death on the day of her burial. General Richard Stoddert Ewell died on January 25, 1872. They were both buried in Nashville's City cemetery and his last wishes were that there would be nothing disrespectful to the United States be written on his tombstone. On the window where they attended church these words were written. “R.S.E., 1818-1872, L.C.E., 1820-1872 – In their deaths they were not divided.”

The Ewell farm in Spring Hill Tennessee

The Ewell's graves in Nashville's Old City Cemetery