Brigadier General John Herbert Kelley

"Before we leave the War Between the States, Randy, I want to tell you a little about John Herbert Kelley, who was born in Carrollton on March the thirty-first, eighteen forty. The Kelley family was of Irish extraction, and is descended in this country from Gresham Kelley of South Carolina. Gresham Kelley's son Moses had settled in Jones' Valley near early Birmingham and several children of Moses Kelley became prominent in Alabama. Isham Harrison Kelley prepared for the law at the University of Alabama and practiced in Carrollton. Now Isham Kelley married Elizabeth Herbert, the daughter of Mrs. Harriet Herbert, who had moved from Loundes County to Tuscaloosa and later married Mr. Hawthorne. Carl Eggett, when he wrote Annals of Northwest Alabama, quoted Nelson F. Smith, who wrote, AIsham Kelley was a good lawyer and a respectable man. He was considered a rising young lawyer of Carrollton; however, his health declined and he went to Cuba, hoping the climate over there would help him, but he died in Cuba in eighteen and forty-four, leaving a widow and two sons, John Herbert Kelley, about whom we are talking, and Rollin Kelley. Their mother, Elizabeth Herbert Kelley, was the daughter of John and Harriet Waters Herbert, and she lived only three years after the death of her husband, having died in Woodland, Mississippi, and leaving the two orphans with her, uh, their maternal grandmother, Mrs. Harriet Herbert Hawthorne.

Fortunately, John Herbert Kelley, the one who had been born here in Carrollton, had many relatives who had great influences. General Moses Kelley, of Jefferson, was an uncle of this young boy, and he was an early settler and farmer in Jefferson County, and had served the public in many capacities. He had represented Jefferson County in both branches of the General Assembly, and was a brigadier general of the militia, and later became judge of probate for Jefferson County. You can find an account of his life in Reminesceses of Public Men in Alabama. General Moses Kelley's fidelity to the many public trusts committed to him his dedication of his friends. He had a kind disposition and a gentle manner; he was a Jacksonian Democrat, having served under the famous general during the Indian War and was always faithful to his old commander. Moses Kelley died in eighteen sixty-six, having lived to see a short but brilliant career of this nephew, John Herbert Kelley. When John Herbert Kelley was only sixteen or seventeen years of age, his maternal uncle, the Honorable P. T. Herbert, who was a member of Congress succeeded in having John Herbert appointed a cadet to West Point, where he entered in eighteen fifty-seven. Although two years younger, John Herbert Kelley was a classmate and friend of the gallant John Pelham of Alabama, and a significant friendship, since their careers were so distinguished in Alabama military history.

Within a few months of young Kelley's graduation from West Point, the State of Alabama seceded from the Union, and most of the people went to war. We became involved in a terrible and tragic war that tore our country apart for a long, heart-rending four years. But John Herbert Kelley, like other youths in Alabama, youths in Alabama, wanted to fight. John Herbert Kelley left the Academy on December the twenty-ninth, eighteen and sixty, and went to Montgomery to offer his services to his native state. He was commissioned a second lieutenant of artillery in the regular army of the Confederate States, and sent to Fort Morgan, and then went as a captain on the staff of General Hardee into Missouri. He early showed his military promise, and September the twenty-third, eighteen sixty-one was commissioned Major of the Fourteenth Arkansas. Kelley fought with great bravery at Shiloh, where he commanded the Ninth Arkansas Battalion, and a month later for his gallantry on the field was promoted Colonel of the Eighth Arkansas. He commanded his regiment at Perryville, and during the battle, according to T. M. Owen, Kelley personally captured Colonel Mitchell Giddy, of the Twenty-second Indiana regiment.

At the battle of Murphreesburo, Kelley was severely wounded, and was furloughed for three weeks. But such was his devotion to duty that he was able to return in two weeks. And at Chickamauga he commanded a brigade of Buckner's Corps, and won high accommodations for his skill in battle. General Cleburne once said, A I know of no better officer of his grade in the army. Generals, praise, Craxton and Liddell also praised him very highly. One can only look at the picture of Kelley that is in Edward Warren's book, Generals in Gray, and see the determination, intelligence, and courage mirrored in this young face.

After his successful termination of the Sequatchie Valley Raid in October of eighteen and sixty-three, General Wheeler was authorized to select four officers for promotion to brigadier general, and Wheeler designated John Herbert Kelley was one worthy of this promotion. He was commissioned a brigadier general to rank from, on November sixth, eighteen sixty-three, one of the youngest general officers in the Confederate army at that time. General Kelley was placed in command of a division of cavalry in Wheeler's corps, and as Edward Warren has said, made a handsome reputation during the Atlanta Campaign.

Kelley's career was signaled by, by a series of brilliant achievements. He death occurred while leading a charge at Franklin, Tennessee. Kelley was mortally wounded in this engagement on September the second. Left in the care of the family of William M. Harrison, five miles south of town, he died a few days later, probably on the fourth. He was first buried in the yard of the Harrison home, but later his remains were interred in Mobile in eighteen sixty-six. Among the young, noble heroes who laid down their lives for the cause of the South during this great conflict, there is none whose name shines out with more luster on the roll of fame, with more tender affection by their fellow countrymen, than those of John Pelham and John Herbert Kelley."