Cushing Library Receives Gen. Burns' Civil War Papers

Thomas L. Goade of Lake McQueeney presented the papers to the library recently. The papers, which date from the 1850s to the early 1900s, include 225 manuscripts of Gen. William Wallace Burns as well as letters, legal documents and newspaper articles pertaining to Burns, his military career and his family.

"These papers give us a very personal view into the private and public life of an individual who played an important role in the Civil War," said Steven Smith, Special Collections librarian.

"They are not only a primary resource for the study of Gen. Burns' life, but they also provide contemporary information about many other significant individuals, such as Gen. George McClellan, and topics such as the invention of the Sibley tent. This collection will be useful to scholars studying many different aspects of the Civil War," he added.

Detailed accounts of battles, daily life in the military camps and relationships among officers are subjects of interest covered in the papers, he noted.

Burns' appointment to general in 1862 and request for confirmation by Sen. John Sherman, R-Ohio, is chronicled in correspondence, as is Burns' view that Gen. McClellan was the only man who could save the country from "permanent disruption" and "the army from disaster." His post­war appointments also are chronicled, Smith said.

Burns (1825­1892) of Ohio was an 1847 graduate of the U.S. Military Academy who was serving as chief commissary (similar to quartermaster) for Arkansas and Texas when the Civil War began, according to the Biographical Dictionary of the Union edited by Hubbell and Geary. He was appointed chief commissary for the Department of Ohio under Brig. Gen. George B. McClellan and served under him in the West Virginia campaign.

Burns was named brigadier general of volunteers and served in Washington, D.C., until he received his first field command as commander of the Philadelphia Brigade. In March 1863, Burns resigned his volunteer commission, reverted to his regular army rank of major, and served as chief commissary of subsistence for the Department of the Northwest until the end of the war. During Reconstruction, he was chief commissary to the Military Departments of Georgia, Florida and the South.

The Burns papers provide scholars and researchers a resource with important new information that may result in a few revisions of our knowledge of the Civil War and American history, Smith said.