Benjamin Franklin Cheatham
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1820-1885
Benjamin Franklin Cheatham was born in Nashville, Tennessee, on
October 20, 1820. He became a farmer, but maintained a strong
interest in military affairs. Serving as a captain and a colonel of
Tennessee in the Mexican War, he became well-known for his abilities
as a commander, his boldness and his ferocity as a fighter. Cheatham
went on to become a major general in the Tennessee State Militia, but
left the state to take part in the 1849 California Gold Rush. He
returned to Tennessee in 1853. Early in the war, Gov. Isham G.
Harris, a close friend of Cheatham, commissioned Cheatham a brigadier
general, and later a major general., in the Provisional Army of
Tennessee. He received a commission in the Confederate Army on July
9, 1861, and was promoted to major general on March 10, 1862. He took
part in the Battles of Belmont, Shiloh, Perryville, Stone's River,
Chickamauga, Missionary Ridge, Kennesaw Mountain, Atlanta and
Nashville. Although he was a talented commander, his career was not
without controversy. He was tried in a military court for culpable
errors in the Confederate defeat at Spring Hill, but was cleared of
all charges. After the trial, Cheatham returned to military duty in
North Carolina, surrendering with it in April of 1865. Following the
Civil War, Cheatham went back to farming in Tennessee, and ran
unsuccessfully for a seat in the US House of Representative in 1872.
After writing an account of the Spring Hill incident, which was later
published, he served as superintendent of the state prison. From 1885
to his death on September 4, 1886, Cheatham was postmaster in
Nashville, Tennessee.
