Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 1.djvu/732

684 wealth and friends, and typifying the flower of the social development of that period. He served in the senate of the State from 1856 to 1861, and was a delegate to the Charleston and Baltimore national conventions of 1860. As chairman of the committee on Federal Relations of the Louisiana senate of 1861, he secured the passage of an act calling a State convention, and in that latter body held the chairmanship of the Military and Defense committee. After the passage of the ordinance of secession he visited General Bragg at Pensacola, until called back to assume command of the Ninth Louisiana regiment of infantry and hasten with it to Richmond. Reaching Manassas after the battle he was assigned to Walker’s brigade, which also included the Sixth, Seventh and Eighth Louisiana regiments. On Walker s transfer to another command, Taylor, though once refusing promotion, was persuaded by the insistence of the senior colonels and President Davis, to accept the command of the brigade and the rank of brigadier-general. With this gallant brigade, in the division of Richard S. Ewell, he participated in the battles of Front Royal, Cross Keys, Winchester and Port Republic, of Jackson s campaign in the Shenandoah valley. At Port Republic, General Taylor and his Louisianians were assigned to attack the enemy’s left, and their intrepid conduct was especially commended by their great commander. The Federal batteries finally left in their hands by the defeat of the enemy were presented to the brigade. Soon after the close of the Seven Days battles before Richmond, Taylor was promoted major-general upon the recommendation of Stonewall Jackson, and was assigned to the command of the district of Louisiana, embracing all of that State west of the Mississippi. Here he encountered the most arduous duty. Confederate authority had ceased to exist since the fall of New Orleans; fortifications at Barataria, Berwick’s Bay, and other points, had been abandoned; industry was paralyzed, and soldiers, arms, munitions and money were