Lafayette McLaws ( ; January 15, 1821 – July 24, 1897) was a United States Army officer and a Confederate general in the American Civil War. He served at Antietam and Fredericksburg, where Robert E. Lee praised his defense of Marye's Heights, and at Gettysburg, where his division made successful assaults through the Peach Orchard and Wheatfield, but was unable to dislodge Union forces from Cemetery Ridge. After the Knoxville Campaign, he was court-martialed for inefficiency, though this was overturned for procedural reasons. Finally he was sent to his native Georgia to resist Sherman's March to the Sea, but had to retreat through the Carolinas, losing many men through desertion, and is presumed to have surrendered with Joseph E. Johnston in April 1865. McLaws remained bitter about his court-martial, especially since the charges had been filed by James Longstreet, his friend and classmate at West Point, with whom he had served for years. Although he defended Longstreet against Lost Cause proponents who blamed him for losing the war, McLaws never fully forgave Longstreet for his actions. Early life Lafayette McLaws was born in Augusta, Georgia. He graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1842, placing 48th out of 56 cadets. McLaws served as an infantry officer in the Mexican–American War, in the West, and in the Utah War to suppress the Mormon uprising. While at Jefferson Barracks, Missouri, he married Emily Allison Taylor, the niece of Zachary Taylor, making him a cousin-in-law of future Confederates Richard Taylor and Jefferson Davis. Civil War 1861–62 At the start of the Civil War, resigning as a U.S. Army captain, McLaws was commissioned a major in the Confederate States Army. He was quickly promoted to colonel of the 10th Georgia Infantry regiment; then quickly again to brigadier general in brigade and division command in the Seven Days Battles; then, on May 23, 1862, to major general. He joined his childhood friend in Augusta and fellow West Point of '42 classmate, Maj. Gen. James Longstreet's First Corps in the Army of Northern Virginia as 1st Division commander and stayed with Longstreet for most of the war, but was left in Richmond to observe McClellan's withdrawal down the James River, and thus missed the Northern Virginia Campaign. During Robert E. Lee's 1862 Maryland Campaign, McLaws's Division was split from the rest of the corps, operated in conjunction with Maj. Gen. Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson, and