Daniel H. Hill

Daniel H. Hill

Daniel Harvey Hill was born in South Carolina in 1821. He served in the Mexican War where he won two brevets. Hill resigned from the army in 1849 and obtained work teaching mathematics at Washington College in Lexington, Virginia.

The brother-in-law of Thomas Stonewall Jackson, Hill became superintendent of North Carolina Military Institute, in 1859. On the outbreak of the American Civil War he joined the Confederate Army. Appointed as a major general in July, 1862, Hill was given the task of negotiating the exchange of prisoners with General John A. Dix of the Union Army. They decided that the rate of exchange was one general for every 60 enlisted men, a colonel for 15, a lieutenant for 4 and a sergeant for 2.

Hill fought at Antietam (September, 1862) before being sent to defend Richmond during the Gettysburg Campaign. After being sent to aid General Braxton Bragg at Chickamauga (September, 1863), Hill recommended his dismissal for incompetence. However, President Jefferson Davis rejected the idea and instead relieved Hill of his command.

Hill returned to action when he joined General Joseph Johnston, commander of Confederate forces along the Mississippi in 1863. Johnson was unable to stop William Sherman taking Atlanta and Hill was with Johnson surrendered to Sherman at Durham Station on 26th April, 1865.

After the war Hill was president of the University of Arkansas (1877-84) and the Georgia Military Academy (1885-89). Daniel Harvey Hill died in 1889.