Gil R.
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Here's the edited version.
Maj. Gen. James Lawson Kemper (b. 1826, d. 1895). Kemper was born in Mountain Prospect, Virginia, but had no military training. He graduated from Washington College (now Washington and Lee College) in 1842, becoming a lawyer. After the start of the Mexican war, he enlisted and became a captain and assistant quartermaster in the 1st Virginia Infantry in 1847, but he had joined the service too late to see any combat action. By 1858 he was a brigadier general in the Virginia Militia. He also served three terms as a Virginia congressman, rising to become the Speaker of the House of Delegates and the chairman of the Military Affairs Committee, where he was a strong advocate of state military preparedness. At the start of the Civil War, Kemper served as a brigadier general in the Provisional Army of Virginia, and then a colonel in the Confederate Army, commanding the 7th Virginia Infantry. His regiment was assigned to Gen. A.P. Hill’s brigade in Gen. James Longstreet’s division of the Confederate Army of the Potomac from June 1861 to March 1862, seeing its first action at the First Battle of Bull Run. After a heroic effort at Seven Pines during the Peninsula Campaign, Kemper was promoted to brigadier general in June 1862, and briefly commanded a division in Longstreet's Corps. Upon the return to duty of wounded Maj. Gen. George Pickett, Kemper reverted to brigade command, the highest role in which he would serve in combat. At the Second Battle of Bull Run, Kemper's brigade took part in Longstreet's surprise attack against Pope’s left flank, almost destroying Pope’s Army of Virginia. At the Battle of Antietam he was south of the town of Sharpsburg, defending against Burnside's assault on the afternoon of September 17, 1862. He withdrew his brigade in the face of the Union advance, exposing the Confederate right flank, and the line was saved only by the hasty arrival of Hill's division from Harper’s Ferry. At Gettysburg, Kemper arrived with Pickett's division late on the second day of battle, July 2, 1863. His brigade was one of the main assault units in Pickett’s Charge, advancing on the right flank of Pickett's line (and, thus, on the right flank of the entire assault). After crossing the Emmitsburg Road, his brigade was hit by flanking fire, driving it to the left and disrupting the cohesion of the assault. Kemper rose on his spurs to urge his men forward, shouting "There are the guns, boys, go for them!" This bravado made him a more visible target and he was wounded by a bullet in the abdomen and thigh and captured by Union troops. He was rescued by Confederate forces, but was too critically injured to be transported during the retreat from Gettysburg and was left behind to be treated, and was recaptured. Newspaper accounts at the time claimed he was killed in action and Gen. Robert E. Lee sent condolences to Kemper’s family. He was exchanged on September 19, 1863, but until the end of the war he was too ill for combat, and commanded the Reserve Forces of Virginia, gaining a promotion to major general in September 1864. It had not been possible to remove the bullet that had wounded him at Gettysburg, and he suffered from groin pain for the rest of his life. After the war he worked as a lawyer and served as Governor of Virginia (1874-1878). He died in Walnut Hills, Virginia, where he is buried. (Bio by Scott Jennings)
Leadership: 6
Tactical: 3
Initiative: 3
Command: 3
Cavalry:
Teaches: Steady (14), Random (-1)
Start date: 34 or 35
“Death” date: 62
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Printable Version
Major General James Lawson Kemper CSA (b1826 -d 1895 - 
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