By Tom Perry
James Ewell Brown “Jeb” Stuart served in the United States Army, rising to the rank of Captain before offering his sword to his native state of Virginia. He rose to the rank of Major General commanding all the cavalry in Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia during the War Between The States.
Less well known is the military tradition Stuart is part of, dating back to the American Revolution, when his paternal great-grandfather, Major Alexander Stuart, fought with the Virginia Militia at the Battle of Guilford Courthouse. Alexander Stuart came from Augusta County in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia.
Stuart’s maternal great-grandfather, Corporal William Letcher of David Carlin’s Henry County Militia, lost his life in August 1780 at the Laurel Hill Farm in Ararat, Virginia, when he was killed by a pro-British Tory during the American Revolution. His name is etched into the new monument in front of the Patrick County Historical Society in Stuart, Virginia, denoting all the men from Patrick County who served in the American Revolution. Interestingly, it was Henry County then, as Patrick County did not exist until 1791. On Monday, June 29, 2026, the celebration of America’s 250th birthday will start at the grave of William Letcher at the J. E. B. Stuart Birthplace.
J. E. B. Stuart’s father, Archibald Stuart, served in the War of 1812. During archaeological work conducted by the College of William and Mary, a uniform button was discovered. We believe it came from J. E. B. Stuart’s father.
John Dabney Stuart, brother of J. E. B. Stuart, served as a physician in the 54th Virginia Infantry in the Army of Tennessee. Another brother, William Alexander Stuart, ran the saltworks in Saltville, Virginia, during the War. Salt was a vital part of the South’s war effort.
J. E. B. Stuart, Jr., the son formerly known as Philip St. George Cooke Stuart, served in the Spanish-American War, rising to the rank of Captain, like his father, in the U. S. Army, and as a civilian aide during World War I. He is buried in Arlington National Cemetery near the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. His maternal grandfather was Brevet Major General Philip St. George Cooke, a Virginian by birth, who remained with the Union during the Civil War, prompting his son-in-law, J. E. B. Stuart, to rename his only son. John Rodgers Cooke was the son of PSG Cooke and was himself a Confederate Brigadier General.
J. E. B. Stuart IV rose to the rank of Colonel, serving part of his time during the Vietnam Conflict. Lt. Colonel J. E. B. Stuart V served as an Orthopedic Surgeon in the U. S. Army. His brother John graduated from the Virginia Military Institute.
J. E. B. Stuart VI, a graduate of Virginia Tech, is a Navy JAG lawyer in the Tidewater of Virginia, and yes, he has a son with his name born this summer. Roman numeral VI served as the model for the recently installed statue of young J. E. B. Stuart at Laurel Hill in Ararat, Virginia.
Stuart appears in other military contexts, such as the M3 Stuart/light tank, a US light tank of World War II, first introduced into service in the British Army in early 1941. Later, an improved version of the tank entered service as the M5 in 1942, to be supplied to British and other allied Commonwealth forces under lend lease, before the entry of the United States into the War.
The Haunted Tank World War II is a comic book, which centers on the ghost of 19th-century Confederate general J. E. B. Stuart, who is sent by the spirit of Alexander the Great to act as a guardian over his two namesakes, Lieutenant Jeb Stuart (named Jeb Stuart Smith in the early stories, eventually shortened to Jeb Stuart) and the M3 Stuart he commands.
Operation Jeb Stuart III was a major U.S. Army operation during the Vietnam War, conducted by the 1st Cavalry Division from May 17 to November 3, 1968, along the border of Quang Tri and Thua Thien Provinces in northern South Vietnam. The primary objectives were to destroy Viet Cong infrastructure and conduct rice denial operations to starve enemy forces of supplies, involving cordons, small-unit patrols, and offensive actions against enemy base areas.
Jeb Stuart III is a fictional character in Harry Turtledove’s alternate history novels, a Confederate artillery captain during a fictional “Great War” inspired by the real Jeb Stuart. In real life, J. E. B. Stuart III, the grandson of the Civil War general, was an engineer for Consolidated Edison in New York during World War II. He and his son J. E. B. Stuart IV are buried beside their ancestor in Richmond’s Hollywood Cemetery.
The military tradition is strong in the Stuart family from the American Revolution through today. It was my honor to speak for the Wharton Stuart Sons of Confederate Veterans Camp at their annual program to honor those who served from Patrick County in the War Between the States at the courthouse in Stuart.
On Saturday, April 18, the J. E. B. Stuart Birthplace will be part of Park Day, started 30 years ago by the American Battlefield Trust, where volunteers can work at historical sites across the nation to help preserve the many places associated with our past. Laurel Hill’s many histories begin with indigenous peoples, the American Revolution, the Antebellum South, including slavery, Stuart’s role in the Civil War, and the Dinky Railroad, which ran from Mount Airy to Kibler Valley in Patrick County. I take these articles and compile them into an annual book to raise money to help preserve Laurel Hill Farm. The first book is available at www.jebstuart.org.
