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J.H.McL. Taylor

J.H.McL. Taylor

Federal (USA)

Lieutenant Colonel

Joseph Hancock McLean Taylor

(1836 - 1885)

Home State: Maryland

Education: US Military Academy, West Point, NY, Class of 1856;Class Rank: 31st

Command Billet: Asst Adjutant General

Branch of Service: Cavalry

Unit: Second Army Corps

Before Antietam

After graduation from West Point, he was appointed Brevet 2nd Lieutenant, 1st US Cavalry on 1 July 1856, made permanent on 16 January 1857. He was promoted to First Lieutenant on 22 April 1861, to Captain, 3rd US Cavalry on 13 May, and transferred to the 6th US Cavalry in the reorganization of 3 August 1861. He was appointed Lieutenant Colonel and AAG effective 20 August 1862.

On the Campaign

He was General Sumner's Assistant Adjutant General (AAG) on the campaign.

The rest of the War

He continued in Regular Army service, reverting to Major and AAG on 30 March 1866. He was cited by brevet for gallantry at Fair Oaks and Antietam. He served as AAG of the Departments of the South (to 1873), Texas (to 1878), the East (to 1879), the South again (to 1882), and of the Platte, where he died of disease in 1885.

References & notes

Basic service dates from Heitman1. His photo here from a group portrait taken of General Sumner and his staff at Warrenton, VA in November 1862, now at the Library of Congress.

Joseph's father was Joseph P. Taylor, Commissary General of Subsistence, USA during the War. His uncle was President Zachary Taylor. He married Mary Montgomery Meigs (1843-1930), daughter of Quartermaster General Montgomery C. Meigs, in Washington on 30 March 1864.

More on the Web

See an excellent biographical sketch from Don Caughey on Crossed Sabers, source of some details here.

Birth

6/26/1836 in KY

Death

3/13/1885; Omaha, NE; burial in Arlington National Cemetery, Virginia

Notes

1   Heitman, Francis Bernard, Historical Register and Dictionary of the United States Army 1789-1903, 2 volumes, Washington DC: US Government Printing Office, 1903, Vol. 1, pg. 947  [AotW citation 13502]