John Watts de Peyster
Encyclopedia
- For his son, see John Watts de Peyster Jr.
John Watts de Peyster, Sr. (March 9, 1821 – May 4, 1907) was an author on the art of war, philanthropist, and early Adjutant General
Adjutant general
An Adjutant General is a military chief administrative officer.-Imperial Russia:In Imperial Russia, the General-Adjutant was a Court officer, who was usually an army general. He served as a personal aide to the Tsar and hence was a member of the H. I. M. Retinue...
of the New York National Guard. He served in the New York State Militia during the Mexican-American War and American Civil War
American Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
. He was one of the first military critics and noted for his histories of the Revolutionary and Civil Wars, and also published works of drama, poetry, military history, military biography and military criticism.
Early life and background
De Peyster was born in New York CityNew York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, the son of a wealthy old Dutchess County family, and a first cousin of Maj. Gen.
Major general (United States)
In the United States Army, United States Marine Corps, and United States Air Force, major general is a two-star general-officer rank, with the pay grade of O-8. Major general ranks above brigadier general and below lieutenant general...
Philip Kearny
Philip Kearny
Philip Kearny, Jr., was a United States Army officer, notable for his leadership in the Mexican-American War and American Civil War. He was killed in action in the 1862 Battle of Chantilly.-Early life and career:...
. His great great grandfather was Abraham de Peyster
Abraham de Peyster
Abraham de Peyster was Mayor of New York City from 1691 to 1694.-Life:De Peyster was born in New Amsterdam on July 8, 1657, to Johannes and Cornelia Lubberts de Peyster. He married his second cousin, Catharina de Peyster on April 5, 1684, while visiting Amsterdam.He was appointed mayor by...
, an early Mayor of New York City, whose brother was Johannes de Peyster, also Mayor
Mayor of New York City
The Mayor of the City of New York is head of the executive branch of New York City's government. The mayor's office administers all city services, public property, police and fire protection, most public agencies, and enforces all city and state laws within New York City.The budget overseen by the...
. He studied law at Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
, although he did not graduate on account of his poor health. He had become an invalid
Invalid
Invalid may refer to:* Patient, a sick person* A person with a disability* .invalid, a top-level Internet domain not intended for real useAs the opposite of valid:* Validity, in logic, true premises cannot lead to a false conclusion...
at a young age due to a heart affliction he developed during service as a volunteer fireman. De Peyster was heavily involved as a volunteer firefighter with the No. 5 Hose Carriage during his collegiate years, including a major fire in 1836, leading to his health problems. Despite these physical difficulties, he was described by some as feisty, and even dictatorial.
He later received the degree of M.A.
Master of Arts (postgraduate)
A Master of Arts from the Latin Magister Artium, is a type of Master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The M.A. is usually contrasted with the M.S. or M.Sc. degrees...
from Columbia College, LL.D. from Nebraska College, and Ph.D.
Doctor of Philosophy
Doctor of Philosophy, abbreviated as Ph.D., PhD, D.Phil., or DPhil , in English-speaking countries, is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities...
by Franklin and Marshall College. He was one of the organizers of the New York City Police Department
New York City Police Department
The New York City Police Department , established in 1845, is currently the largest municipal police force in the United States, with primary responsibilities in law enforcement and investigation within the five boroughs of New York City...
and Fire Department
New York City Fire Department
The New York City Fire Department or the Fire Department of the City of New York has the responsibility for protecting the citizens and property of New York City's five boroughs from fires and fire hazards, providing emergency medical services, technical rescue as well as providing first response...
. Reforms he advocated through publications which were eventually implemented nationwide included a paid Fire Department, and Steam Fire Engines, and New York City was the first in the nation to adopt such measures.
He spent his entire career in the New York State Militia, being promoted to brigadier general
Brigadier general (United States)
A brigadier general in the United States Army, Air Force, and Marine Corps, is a one-star general officer, with the pay grade of O-7. Brigadier general ranks above a colonel and below major general. Brigadier general is equivalent to the rank of rear admiral in the other uniformed...
in 1851. He served as state Judge Advocate General
Judge Advocate General's Corps
Judge Advocate General's Corps, also known as JAG or JAG Corps, refers to the legal branch or specialty of the U.S. Air Force, Army, Coast Guard, and Navy. Officers serving in the JAG Corps are typically called Judge Advocates. The Marine Corps and Coast Guard do not maintain separate JAG Corps...
and eventually Adjutant General, before resigning over a conflict with Governor
Governor of New York
The Governor of the State of New York is the chief executive of the State of New York. The governor is the head of the executive branch of New York's state government and the commander-in-chief of the state's military and naval forces. The officeholder is afforded the courtesy title of His/Her...
Myron Clark in 1855. He traveled through Europe extensively as a military observer, and implemented many reforms that modernized the militia for the upcoming conflict.
American Civil War
Already a brigadier general of the state militia at the onset of the Civil War, he met with what he perceived (and declared) to be prejudiced resistance from Abraham LincolnAbraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...
when he attempted to raise regiments for the Union Army
Union Army
The Union Army was the land force that fought for the Union during the American Civil War. It was also known as the Federal Army, the U.S. Army, the Northern Army and the National Army...
. In 1861, de Peyster traveled to Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
, to solicit a commission as a brigadier general of the Regular Army
Regular Army
The Regular Army of the United States was and is the successor to the Continental Army as the country's permanent, professional military establishment. Even in modern times the professional core of the United States Army continues to be called the Regular Army...
and offered to raise two regiments of artillery, which he felt best suited his expertise and physical condition. The was met with little interest after New York had already filled its national recruitment quota of 75,000 men.
Each of his three sons served in the conflict in the Union Army. The eldest, John Watts de Peyster, Jr., performed duty as an aide-de-camp and artillery commander with the Army of the Potomac
Army of the Potomac
The Army of the Potomac was the major Union Army in the Eastern Theater of the American Civil War.-History:The Army of the Potomac was created in 1861, but was then only the size of a corps . Its nucleus was called the Army of Northeastern Virginia, under Brig. Gen...
and mustered out as a brevet
Brevet (military)
In many of the world's military establishments, brevet referred to a warrant authorizing a commissioned officer to hold a higher rank temporarily, but usually without receiving the pay of that higher rank except when actually serving in that role. An officer so promoted may be referred to as being...
brigadier general; Frederic de Peyster III, was a Colonel
Colonel (United States)
In the United States Army, Air Force, and Marine Corps, colonel is a senior field grade military officer rank just above the rank of lieutenant colonel and just below the rank of brigadier general...
and surgeon; while the youngest, Johnston L. de Peyster , was a second lieutenant in charge of a battery of artillery credited with hoisting the first Union flag over the Confederate capitol of Richmond, Virginia
Richmond, Virginia
Richmond is the capital of the Commonwealth of Virginia, in the United States. It is an independent city and not part of any county. Richmond is the center of the Richmond Metropolitan Statistical Area and the Greater Richmond area...
, after its fall.
The career militia officer had always suffered from poor health, and turned down a commission as a colonel of cavalry offered to him by New York Senator Ira Harris
Ira Harris
Ira Harris was an American jurist and senator from New York. He was also a friend of Abraham Lincoln's.-Life:Harris grew up on a farm, and graduated from Union College in 1824. Then he studied law in Albany, and in 1828 was admitted to the bar.He was a Whig member from Albany County of the New...
in June 1863 on behalf of Generals Joseph Hooker
Joseph Hooker
Joseph Hooker was a career United States Army officer, achieving the rank of major general in the Union Army during the American Civil War. Although he served throughout the war, usually with distinction, Hooker is best remembered for his stunning defeat by Confederate General Robert E...
and Alfred Pleasonton
Alfred Pleasonton
Alfred Pleasonton was a United States Army officer and General of Union cavalry during the American Civil War. He commanded the Cavalry Corps of the Army of the Potomac during the Gettysburg Campaign, including the largest predominantly cavalry battle of the war, Brandy Station...
, who may have had an eye towards de Peyster's social connections. Other notable figures with limited field experience who were promoted to brigadier general by Pleasonton at that time were Elon J. Farnsworth
Elon J. Farnsworth
Elon John Farnsworth was a Union Army cavalry general in the American Civil War, killed at the Battle of Gettysburg.-Early life and career:...
, son of a Congressman, Wesley Merritt
Wesley Merritt
Wesley Merritt was a general in the United States Army during the American Civil War and the Spanish-American War. He is noted for distinguished service in the cavalry.-Early life:...
, and George Armstrong Custer
George Armstrong Custer
George Armstrong Custer was a United States Army officer and cavalry commander in the American Civil War and the Indian Wars. Raised in Michigan and Ohio, Custer was admitted to West Point in 1858, where he graduated last in his class...
.
His treatise New American Tactics was a series of articles published in The Army and Navy Journal that advocated making the skirmish line the new line of battle, which was considered revolutionary at the time. These contributions were translated and copied into foreign military journals, including Correard's renowned Biographie des célébrités militaires des armées de terre et de mer. Such tactics were put into practice by generals including John Buford
John Buford
John Buford, Jr. was a Union cavalry officer during the American Civil War, with a prominent role at the start of the Battle of Gettysburg.-Early years:...
and were later adopted world wide. He was appointed a brevet major general
Major general (United States)
In the United States Army, United States Marine Corps, and United States Air Force, major general is a two-star general-officer rank, with the pay grade of O-8. Major general ranks above brigadier general and below lieutenant general...
in 1866 by a special act of the state legislature. His elevation to major general was the first such honor bestowed by the State of New York, or any other State in the Union.
He was a close friend of Maj. Gen. Daniel Sickles
Daniel Sickles
Daniel Edgar Sickles was a colorful and controversial American politician, Union general in the American Civil War, and diplomat....
, commander of the Union III Corps
III Corps (ACW)
There were four formations in the Union Army designated as III Corps during the American Civil War.Three were short-lived:*In the Army of Virginia:**Irvin McDowell ;**James B...
. General de Peyster wrote biographies of III Corps Generals Andrew A. Humphreys
Andrew A. Humphreys
Andrew Atkinson Humphreys , was a career United States Army officer, civil engineer, and a Union General in the American Civil War. He served in senior positions in the Army of the Potomac, including division command, chief of staff, and corps command, and was Chief Engineer of the U.S...
and Gershom Mott
Gershom Mott
Gershom Mott was a United States Army officer and a General in the Union Army, a commander in the Eastern Theater of the American Civil War.-Early life:...
during the war, and wrote highly of Buford's celebrated usage of light cavalry.
Postwar career
Tivoli, New York
Tivoli is a village in Dutchess County, New York, United States. The population was 1,118 at the 2010 census. The village, which was incorporated in 1872 from parts of Upper Red Hook Landing and Madalin, is the northernmost settlement in the county, located in the northwest part of the Town of Red...
, where he resided at his family home. In 1892 he replaced a wooden Methodist church with a brick structure that stands today. He also refurbished an old school into an industrial school for girls. An authority on fire fighting, in 1895 de Peyster erected a huge state-of-the-art brick building for the local department
Watts De Peyster Fireman's Hall
The Watts De Peyster Fireman's Hall is located on Broadway in the village of Tivoli, New York, United States. John Watts De Peyster, a resident, paid for it and gave it to the village for its fire department in 1898...
. A portrait of him resides there in present day, and it was used as a firehouse until 1986. The high Victorian structure also contained a courtroom, a jail and a large meeting room for the local government. The General eventually had a conflict with the village Mayor (his own son, Johnston de Peyster
Johnston de Peyster
Johnston Livingston de Peyster was a soldier in the Union Army during the American Civil War and later a member of the New York State Assembly from Dutchess County, New York. The son of a wealthy old Dutchess County family, de Peyster joined the Union Army at the age of eighteen...
), and de Peyster barred him from entering the building. The village government was forced to move to another building and remained there until the Firehouse was restored in 1994, returning the local government to de Peyster's building.
His writing strongly advocated Dan Sickles and his role at the Battle of Gettysburg
Battle of Gettysburg
The Battle of Gettysburg , was fought July 1–3, 1863, in and around the town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. The battle with the largest number of casualties in the American Civil War, it is often described as the war's turning point. Union Maj. Gen. George Gordon Meade's Army of the Potomac...
. Some of his works including detailing Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker
Joseph Hooker
Joseph Hooker was a career United States Army officer, achieving the rank of major general in the Union Army during the American Civil War. Although he served throughout the war, usually with distinction, Hooker is best remembered for his stunning defeat by Confederate General Robert E...
's influences on the Army of the Potomac
Army of the Potomac
The Army of the Potomac was the major Union Army in the Eastern Theater of the American Civil War.-History:The Army of the Potomac was created in 1861, but was then only the size of a corps . Its nucleus was called the Army of Northeastern Virginia, under Brig. Gen...
leading up to the battle, both positive and negative. He also issued a damning portrayal of the performance of the Union XI Corps
XI Corps (ACW)
The XI Corps was a corps of the Union Army during the American Civil War, best remembered for its involvement in the battles of Chancellorsville and Gettysburg in 1863.-Formation and the Valley Campaign:...
at the Battle of Chancellorsville
Battle of Chancellorsville
The Battle of Chancellorsville was a major battle of the American Civil War, and the principal engagement of the Chancellorsville Campaign. It was fought from April 30 to May 6, 1863, in Spotsylvania County, Virginia, near the village of Chancellorsville. Two related battles were fought nearby on...
. His writing also spoke of the brilliant accomplishments of Maj. Gen. George H. Thomas
George Henry Thomas
George Henry Thomas was a career United States Army officer and a Union General during the American Civil War, one of the principal commanders in the Western Theater....
and led to his modern consideration as one of the finest commanders of the war. In the New York Times and scholarly journals, he correctly predicted the Franco-Austrian War
Franco-Austrian War
Franco-Austrian War can refer to any of a number of wars between France and Austria:*Part of the Thirty Years' War *The Franco-Dutch War *The War of the Grand Alliance *The War of the Spanish Succession...
in 1866 and the Franco-Prussian war
Franco-Prussian War
The Franco-Prussian War or Franco-German War, often referred to in France as the 1870 War was a conflict between the Second French Empire and the Kingdom of Prussia. Prussia was aided by the North German Confederation, of which it was a member, and the South German states of Baden, Württemberg and...
of 1870. He made significant contributions to historical journal publications under the pseudonym
Pseudonym
A pseudonym is a name that a person assumes for a particular purpose and that differs from his or her original orthonym...
"Anchor" which extolled the services of Sickles and Buford, and in separate publications praised the men of the New York City Fire Department.
Battle of Saratoga
The Battles of Saratoga conclusively decided the fate of British General John Burgoyne's army in the American War of Independence and are generally regarded as a turning point in the war. The battles were fought eighteen days apart on the same ground, south of Saratoga, New York...
and in 1887 donated a memorial called the Boot Monument
Boot Monument
The Boot Monument is an American Revolutionary War memorial. Located in Saratoga National Historical Park, New York, it commemorates Major General Benedict Arnold's service at the Battles of Saratoga in the Continental Army, but contrives not to name him....
, which commemorates Benedict Arnold
Benedict Arnold
Benedict Arnold V was a general during the American Revolutionary War. He began the war in the Continental Army but later defected to the British Army. While a general on the American side, he obtained command of the fort at West Point, New York, and plotted to surrender it to the British forces...
's heroic wounding at the battle (although Arnold is not mentioned by name and the memorial only depicts his boot). In 1905, De Peyster purchased first baronial mansion of Sir William Johnson, known since 1755 as Fort Johnson, and donated it to the Montgomery County Historical Society, of Amsterdam, New York.
In 1901, he donated several thousand books and maps to the Smithsonian Institution
Smithsonian Institution
The Smithsonian Institution is an educational and research institute and associated museum complex, administered and funded by the government of the United States and by funds from its endowment, contributions, and profits from its retail operations, concessions, licensing activities, and magazines...
, along with a Moorish Yataghan he collected on his travels in 1851. De Peyster's biographer devotes six chapters to his benefactions, but does not mention his ethnological collections. Another philanthropic contribution included building the first library at Franklin and Marshall College, and donating one of the largest and most distinct rare book collections about European military history, the 1,890 volume Watts de Peyster: Napoleon Buonaparte. He collected many of the monographs while traveling in Europe conducting research for his own biography of Napoleon, entitled Napoleone di Buonaparte (1896). The monument to Abraham de Peyster, a founder of New Amsterdam
New Amsterdam
New Amsterdam was a 17th-century Dutch colonial settlement that served as the capital of New Netherland. It later became New York City....
, sculpted by George Edwin Bissell
George Edwin Bissell
George Edwin Bissell was an American sculptor.-Biography:Bissell was born New Preston, Connecticut, the son of a quarryman and marble-cutter...
, was commissioned by General de Peyster in Bowling Green
Bowling Green (New York City)
Bowling Green is a small public park in Lower Manhattan at the foot of Broadway next to the site of the original Dutch fort of New Amsterdam. Built in 1733, originally including a bowling green, it is the oldest public park in New York City and is surrounded by its original 18th century fence. At...
, the old town square of New York City. John Watts de Peyster was also a Vice President of the American Numismatic Society
American Numismatic Society
The American Numismatic Society is a New York City-based organization dedicated to the study of coins and medals.-Introduction:...
, and the namesake of Post #71 of the New York G.A.R.
Grand Army of the Republic
The Grand Army of the Republic was a fraternal organization composed of veterans of the Union Army, US Navy, US Marines and US Revenue Cutter Service who served in the American Civil War. Founded in 1866 in Decatur, Illinois, it was dissolved in 1956 when its last member died...
in Tivoli, New York
Tivoli, New York
Tivoli is a village in Dutchess County, New York, United States. The population was 1,118 at the 2010 census. The village, which was incorporated in 1872 from parts of Upper Red Hook Landing and Madalin, is the northernmost settlement in the county, located in the northwest part of the Town of Red...
. De Peyster died in 1907 of natural causes at a family residence in Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
. He willed his Tivoli manor Rose Hill to a local Children's Home.
He was the author of Life of Field Marshal Torstenson (1855), The Dutch at the North Pole (1857), Caurausius, the Dutch Augustus (1858), Life of Baron Cohorn (1860), The Decisive Conflicts of the Late Civil War, or Slaveholder's Rebellion (1867), Personal and Military History of General Philip Kearny (1869), The Life and Misfortunes and the Military Career of Brig.-Gen. Sir John Johnson (1882), and Gypsies: Some Curious Investigations, Collected, Translated, Or Reprinted from Various Sources (1887), and contributor to numerous other books, biographies, publications, and articles.
See also
- List of American Civil War generals