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Bushrod Johnson

Confederate Army general (1817–1880)

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 6, 2026
Entity authorityQ434337
Source-derived summary

Bushrod Rust Johnson (October 7, 1817 – September 12, 1880) was a Confederate general in the American Civil War and an officer in the United States Army. As a university professor he had been active in the state militias of Kentucky and Tennessee and on the outbreak of hostilities he sided with the South, despite having been born in the North into a family of abolitionist Quakers. As a divisional commander he managed to evade capture at the Battle of Fort Donelson, but was wounded at the Battle of Shiloh. He served under Robert E. Lee throughout the 10-month Siege of Petersburg, and surrendered with him at Appomattox.

Early life

Johnson was born in Belmont County, Ohio. He was raised as a Quaker and, before moving to the South, worked on the Underground Railroad with his uncle. He graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1840 and was commissioned a second lieutenant in the 3rd U.S. Infantry. He fought in the Seminole War in Florida and the Mexican–American War. He was forced to resign from the Army in October 1847 after being accused of selling contraband goods. He worked as a professor of natural philosophy and chemistry at the Western Military Institute, Georgetown, Kentucky (1848–1849), and professor of mathematics and engineering at the University of Nashville (1849–1861).

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Bushrod Johnson” is confederate Army general (1817–1880). The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Bushrod, Johnson and Confederate, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1817, 1880, 1840, 1847—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1817-10-07. For this dossier, Bushrod, Johnson and Confederate is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “confederate Army general (1817–1880)” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 6, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q434337. VIAF identifies the subject as 130603556. The Library of Congress control number is no2010133703. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1817, 1880, 1840 and 1847.

Critical limits

A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

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  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Bushrod Johnson” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.