Gil R.
Posts: 10821
Joined: 4/1/2005 Status: offline
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Maj. Gen. William Brimage Bate (b. 1826, d. 1905). Bate was a beloved politician who fought hard for the Confederacy, sustaining multiple debilitating wounds in the course of the war, and following the war went on to serve as both a governor and senator from Tennessee. In the pantheon of stars shining in the Tennessee sky, Bate’s is among the brightest. Bate had served as a volunteer in the Mexican War, and upon the outbreak of the Civil War, hastened to join the Confederacy where he first served as a Colonel of the 2nd Tennessee Regiment at First Manassas. Soon after, he went on to command a detachment of Gen. Patrick R. Cleburne's brigade of Gen. William J. Hardee's Corps at Shiloh, where he sustained his first major wound in the leg. Moreover, at Shiloh, Bate lost his brother, brother-in-law and a cousin. In October, 1862, Bate was promoted to Brigadier General. In February, 1863, he was again in the field, assigned to command of Gen. James E. Rains's brigade in Gen. Leonidas Polk's army after the former’s death, and in June, commanding the 9th Alabama, 37th Georgia, 15th, 37th, and 20th Tennessee and Caswell's battalion, in the division of Gen. A.P. Stewart. He took part in the Tullahoma campaign with much credit, fighting the Battle of Hoover's Gap and holding at bay the Federal advance. In this action he was in command of the Confederate forces, Stewart not arriving on the field until nightfall. General Bate and his men took a prominent part in the fighting at Chickamauga, where Gen. Braxton Bragg lauded him for coolness, gallantry and successful conduct through the engagements and in the rear guard on the retreat. Promoted to Major General in February, 1864, Bate went on to fight at Dalton, Georgia, and in the battles for Atlanta, and joined Gen. John B. Hood's Tennessee expedition for the Battles of Franklin and Nashville. At the end of the war he surrendered with the Army of Tennessee in North Carolina. During his military career, Bate, an excellent soldier, was wounded three times and had six horses killed under him. Voters remembered his commitment to duty favorably years later when he returned to his political career. He was elected governor of Tennessee in 1882 and served two terms. At the end of his second term he was elected to the U.S. Senate and took his seat on 4 March 1887. Bate died in office on 9 March 1905, not long after starting his fourth term in the Senate.
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