Thomas Ewing Jr. (August 7, 1829 – January 21, 1896) was an attorney, the first chief justice of Kansas and leading free state advocate, Union Army general during the American Civil War, and two-term United States Congressman from Ohio, 1877–1881. He narrowly lost the 1879 campaign for Ohio Governor.
Early life and career
Ewing was born in Lancaster, Ohio. His father, Thomas Ewing Sr., was a very successful lawyer and Whig politician at the national level. Although Ewing Sr. was an Irish Protestant, his wife, Maria Wills Boyle, converted the family to Catholicism. The younger Ewing was a foster brother of William Tecumseh Sherman and became his brother-in-law when Sherman married Ewing's sister, Eleanor "Ellen" Ewing Sherman. Two other brothers were also Civil War generals—Charles Ewing and Hugh Boyle Ewing. Thomas Ewing Jr.'s relationship with Sherman was close throughout their lives.
Thomas Ewing Jr. began his education at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. He left Brown University to become private secretary to President Zachary Taylor from 1849 to 1850 (concurrent with his father's term in Taylor's Cabinet). He then studied and practiced law from 1852 to 1856 in Cincinnati, Ohio. He graduated from Cincinnati Law School in 1855.
Ewing married Ellen Cox of Piqua, Ohio, on January 18, 1856. He moved to Leavenworth, Kansas in 1856, where he became a member of the Leavenworth Constitutional Convention of 1858. He was a stockholder and leading advocate of a transcontinental railroad through his early ownership of the Leavenworth, Pawnee and Western Railroad, which later was sold to other investors and became part of the Union Pacific Railroad. A moderate on the issue of slavery, his efforts to defeat the Lecompton Constitution helped Kansas enter the Union as a free state but without the bloody fight against the federal government advocated by other free state men like James H. Lane and John Brown. He was a delegate from Kansas to the Peace Conference of 1861 and was elected the first chief justice of the new state of Kansas in 1861.
Civil War
Ewing resigned his judgeship in 1862 to enter the military. He recruited the 11th Kansas Infantry and was elected as its first colonel. His regiment fought in James G. Blunt's division in the battles of Old Fort Wayne, Cane Hill, and Prairie Grove.
Although he possessed no military experience before the civil war, Ewing was promoted to brigadier general on March 13, 1863, for his leadership at the Battle of Prairie Grove. He was given command of the District of the Border, which comprised Kansas and western Missouri. Ewing was responsible for General Order № 11, issued in retaliation for William Quantrill's raid on Lawrence, Kansas, where 450 raiders shot and killed 150 men and boys. The order commanded that civilians with southern sympathies living in four Missouri counties be expelled, and if they did not leave voluntarily, they would be forced out by Union cavalry. While this was part of an effort to suppress bushwhackers in the region it left a black mark on his legacy.
In September and October 1864, as deputy commander of the St. Louis district under William Rosecrans, Ewing played a major part in thwarting Sterling Price's invasion of Missouri by commanding a successful defense at Fort Davidson at Pilot Knob, Missouri. His command of 1500 heavily outnumbered soldiers (900 effectives) and a few black civilians fought off repeated attacks from a force of about 15,000 Confederates, buying additional time for the Union army to strengthen the defenses around St. Louis. Instead of surrendering, Ewing and his men successfully eluded Price's force during the night and fought a fighting withdrawal to Rolla, Missouri. On February 23, 1865, Ewing resigned to return to civilian life, tendering his resignation directly to his good friend, the President, a month before Lincoln's assassination. On February 24, 1866, President Andrew Johnson nominated Ewing for appointment to the brevet rank of major general of volunteers to rank from March 13, 1865 and the U.S. Senate confirmed the nomination on May 4, 1866.