Major General Jesse Lee Reno

 

Jesse Lee Reno

General Jesse Lee Reno (LOC)

 was born forty years to the day before West Virginia gained statehood, on June 20, 1823. Jesse, the third of eight children, was born in Wheeling, Virginia to Lewis and Rebecca Reno. When Jesse was seven years old, his family moved to Pennsylvania. Spending his formative years in Franklin, he was appointed to the United States Military Academy at West Point in July of 1842 by Pennsylvania congressman Arnold Plumer.

Jesse finished eighth of fifty-nine in the class of 1846, perhaps the most renowned class in West Point history. He was a close friend of Thomas J. Jackson (Stonewall) of Clarksburg, Virginia (now West Virginia). Also in this class were George McClellan, Darius Couch, George Stoneman, John Gibbon, and Samuel Sturgis, generals in the Union Army and Confederate Generals A.P. Hill, George Pickett, and Cadmus Wilcox.

Reno commanded a howitzer battery and serving under General Winfield Scott during the Mexican War.  He was cited for gallant and meritorious conduct at the battle of Cerro Gordo and was brevetted First Lieutenant on April 18, 1847.  He was wounded at Chapultepec and cited for bravery. Reno was brevetted Captain on September 13, 1847.

After the Mexican War, Reno served as assistant professor of mathematics and named Secretary of the Board of Artillery. The primary duty of this board was to prepare a system of instruction for heavy artillery. In 1853, he was promoted to First Lieutenant and sent to Minnesota. There he was instrumental in the construction of a road, nearly three hundred miles in length, from the Big Sioux River to Saint Paul. That November he married Mary Blanes Cross in the nation’s capital.

Soon after, Reno was assigned as an ordinance officer at Frankford Arsenal near Philadelphia. In June of 1857, General Albert Sydney Johnston launched an expedition to Utah. Reno served under him as chief ordinance officer. When Reno returned from Utah in 1859, he was assigned to command the arsenal at Mobile, Alabama. On January 4, 1861, as the flames of secession grew, Alabama Governor Andrew Moore ordered the arsenal’s seizure shortly before Alabama seceded. Reno was then placed in command of the arsenal at Fort Leavenworth in Kansas until December of that year.

Now a Brigadier, Reno accompanied General Ambrose Burnside on an expedition to North Carolina that February. Commanding the Second Brigade, General Reno led a successful attack on Fort Bartow in February. When his units were attached to the Army of the Potomac as the Ninth Corps, Reno was given command of the Second Division of the Ninth Corps. At Second Bull Run, Reno’s division fought against the forces of his West Point classmate Thomas J. Jackson, now known as “Stonewall”. When Lee launched his Maryland campaign, Reno was promoted to command of the Ninth corps, following the elevation of Burnside to command of the right wing of the army (I and IX Corps). On September 13, 1862, prior to the Battle of Antietam, the Ninth Corps moved into position to block the path of the Confederates. A battle ensued at South Mountain on September 14, 1862. Late that afternoon, as the Confederates were being driven from Fox’s Gap, the advance slowed. While riding along his line to investigate, Reno stopped to observe the Confederate position. As he observed, a confederate sharpshooter shot him through the chest.  He fell, mortally wounded. While being taken to the rear, he saw his friend General Sturgis. Reno said, “Hallo Sam, I’m dead.”  At 7 pm, Reno said, to surgeon, Dr. Calvin Cutter, “Tell my command that if not in body, I will be with them in spirit” and with that, he expired.  Reno’s officers and men were grief-stricken.  A correspondent for the Herald observed:

Grief at any time is heart-rending; but such grief as was manifested by the staff officers and those about him it has never before been my lot to witness. The old soldier, just come from the scene of carnage knelt and wept like a child. No eye was dry among those present, and many a silent and spoken resolution was made that moment that Reno's death should be amply avenged. Thus died one of the bravest generals that was in the service of his country, one of the bright gems in the crown of Burnside, and a man whom all respected and loved.

General Ambrose Burnside issued General Order No. 17 to the IX Corps announcing the loss of Reno shortly after his death:

"The commanding general announces to the corps the loss of their late leader, Maj. Gen. Jesse L. Reno. By the death of this distinguished officer the country loses one of its most devoted patriots, the army one of its most thorough soldiers. In the long list of battles in which General Reno has fought in his country's service, his name always appears with the brightest luster, and he has now bravely met a soldier's death while gallantly leading his men at the Battle of South Mountain. For his high character and the kindly qualities of his heart in private life, as well as for the military genius and personal daring which marked him as a soldier, his loss will be deplored by all who knew him, and the commanding general desires to add the tribute of a friend to the public mourning for the death of one of the country's best defenders".

On September 17, at the Battle of Antietam, the soldiers of the Ninth Corps shouted “Remember Reno” as they went into battle.

This marker is found on the National Road near the entrance to Wheeling Park in Wheeling, WV.  Nearby is the Madonna of the Trail Monument. (P. Chacalos)

In 1889, the veterans of the Ninth Corps placed a memorial to Reno on South Mountain at Fox’s Gap. Reno Road in Washington D.C., El Reno, Oklahoma, Reno County Kansas and Reno, Nevada all were named to honor the memory of Jesse Reno. He is interred in Washington D.C. at the Oak Hill Cemetery in Georgetown.