mikeejay2
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Maj. Gen. Montgomery Cunningham Meigs (b 1816 - d 1892) Meigs was born in Augusta, Georgia. While a boy, he moved with his family to Pennsylvania, and he initially attended the University of Pennsylvania, but was appointed to West Point and graduated in 1836. He received a commission as a 2nd Lieutenant in the 1st U.S. Artillery, but most of his army service was with the Corps of Engineers, in which he worked on important engineering projects. In some of his early assignments, Meigs assisted in the construction of Fort Mifflin on the Delaware River and Fort Wayne on the Detroit River. . He also worked with then Lt. Robert E. Lee to make navigational improvements on the Mississippi River. His favorite engineering project before the war was the Washington Aqueduct, which he supervised from 1852 to 1860. It involved the design of the monumental bridge across Cabin John Branch, which for fifty years remained unsurpassed as the longest masonry arch in the world. In the fall of 1860, as a result of a disagreement over procurement contracts, Meigs "incurred the ill will" of the Secretary of War, John Floyd, and was "banished to the Gulf of Mexico to construct fortifications at Key West." Upon the resignation of Floyd a few months later, Meigs was recalled to his work on the aqueduct at Washington. Just before the outbreak of the Civil War, Meigs was quietly charged by Lincoln and Secretary of State Seward with drawing up a plan for the relief of Fort Pickens, Florida, by means of a secret expedition. In April 1861, together with Lt. David Porter of the Navy, he carried out the expedition, embarking under orders from the President without the knowledge of either the Secretary of the Navy or the Secretary of War. In May, 1861, Meigs was promoted to brigadier general and Quartermaster General of the Army. He established a reputation for being efficient, hard-driving, and scrupulously honest. He molded a large and somewhat diffuse department into a great tool of war. He was one of the first to fully appreciate the importance of logistical preparations in modern military planning, and under his leadership, supplies moved forward and troops were transported over long distances with ever greater efficiency. Meigs's services during the Civil War included command of Grant’s supply base for his Overland Campaign (1864), command of a division of War Department employees in the defenses of Washington at the time of Early‘s raid (July 1864), personally supervising the refitting and supplying of Sherman’s army at Savannah (Jan 1865), reopening Sherman's lines of supply (March – April 1865). He was promoted to major general in July, 1865. A staunch Unionist despite his southern roots, Meigs detested the Confederacy. He recommended that the historic Custis Mansion in Arlington, Virginia, (R. E. Lee’s home) be used as a military burial ground. Based on this recommendation, Arlington National Cemetery was created in 1864. Some saw his recommendation to use the Mansion as a burial ground for Union troops as an act of revenge on old colleague Lee, who he regarded as a traitor. In 1865, Meigs was in the honor guard at Abraham Lincoln's funeral. As Quartermaster General after the Civil War, Meigs supervised plans for the new War Department building (1866–67), the National Museum (1876), the extension of the Washington Aqueduct (1876), and for a hall of records (1878). In 1866–68, to recuperate from the strain of his war service, he visited Europe, and from 1875 to 1876 made another visit to study the organization of European armies. Meigs died in Washington after a short illness and he is buried in Arlington National Cemetery. A General Order issued at the time of his death declared that "the Army has rarely possessed an officer ... who was entrusted by the government with a great variety of weighty responsibilities, or who proved himself more worthy of confidence."
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