Last updated: June 17, 2015
Person
Samuel Bell Maxey
Library of Congress
Quick Facts
Significance:
Confederate commander in the Trans-Mississippi Theater
Place Of Birth:
Tompkinsville, KY
Date Of Birth:
March 30, 1825
Place Of Death:
Eureka Springs, AR
Date Of Death:
August 16, 1895
Place Of Burial:
Paris, TX
Cemetery Name:
Evergreen Cemetery
Samuel Bell Maxey was a West Point graduate and officer during the Mexican War who afterward studied law and was elected a county clerk and then a district attorney, first in Kentucky and then Texas. When the Civil War erupted, Maxey raised a regiment of cavalry for the Confederacy in Texas and led it to Tennessee to join Albert Sydney Johnston's army in Memphis. In 1863 he was promoted to major general and assigned to oversee Confederate operations in the Indian Territory. Maxey saw little action in either theater. He returned to his farm near Paris, Texas at the end of the war and once more took up the law. In 1881, he was elected U.S. Senator from Texas and served two terms.