Marcus Joseph Wright

Wright was born in Purdy, Tennessee. He was admitted to the Tennessee bar, and practiced law at Memphis. He was clerk of the common law and chancery court.Warner, Ezra J. Generals in Gray: Lives of the Confederate Commanders. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1959. {{ISBN|978-0-8071-0823-9}}. p. 346 He was lieutenant colonel of a Tennessee militia regiment designated the 154th Tennessee militia regiment. His brother was John Vines Wright.{{Cite news |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/110684525/in-congress-54-years-ago-13-jun-1908/ |title=In Congress 54 Years Ago |date=1908-06-13 |newspaper=The Baltimore Sun |page=2 |via=Newspapers.com |access-date=2022-10-04}}{{Open access}}

File:Marcus Joseph Wright.jpg

Wright's militia regiment was mustered into Confederate States Army service as the 154th Senior Tennessee Infantry. In 1861, Wright was ordered to establish a fortification at Randolph, Tennessee, on the Mississippi River. Fort Wright was Tennessee's first military training camp in the Civil War and is named after Marcus Joseph Wright.{{cite web | title=Diary of Brigadier-General Marcus J. Wright, C.S.A. | url=http://docsouth.unc.edu/fpn/wrightmarcus/wright.html | work=Documenting the American South | publisher=University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill | year=1989 | accessdate=2009-03-29}}{{cite web |url=http://tennesseeencyclopedia.net/entry.php?rec=1387 |title=Tipton County |author=Angela Wallace Finley |accessdate=2008-10-04 |publisher=The Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture }} Later in the war Wright was the Confederate military governor of Columbus, Kentucky, from February 1862 until its evacuation, and with his regiment was present at the Battle of Belmont and the Battle of Shiloh, where he was wounded. He served on the staff of Major General Benjamin F. Cheatham during General Braxton Bragg's invasion of Kentucky where he fought at the Battle of Perryville.

Wright was promoted to brigadier general on December 13, 1862, and fought in the Tullahoma Campaign, at the Battle of Chickamauga and the Battle of Missionary Ridge. In 1863-64 he was in charge of the district of Atlanta. After the evacuation of the city he commanded at Macon, Georgia. At the end of the war, he commanded the District of North Mississippi and West Tennessee. He was paroled May 19, 1865 at Grenada, Mississippi.

File:The Grave of Marcus J. Wright, CSA, Arlington National Cemetery, VA, 2012.jpg

After the war, Wright returned to the practice of law at Memphis, He was Sheriff of Shelby County from 1870 to 1872, and for a time was assistant purser of the United States Navy Yard in Memphis, Tennessee.McCaslin, Richard B. Portraits of Conflict: A Photographic History of Tennessee in the Civil War. Fayetteville, Ark.: University of Arkansas Press, 2007, p. 40. He became the editor of the Columbia, Tennessee, Journal newspaper, and on September 2, 1875, he married Pauline Womack of Alabama."Personal." Memphis Daily Appeal. September 5, 1875. Wright later moved to Washington, D.C., to practice law.

In 1878, Wright was appointed agent of the United States War Department for collecting Confederate military records."Fed. and Confed." Washington Post. July 16, 1878. He worked on this project until June 1917. He published numerous magazine articles and several books, including:

• Life of Gov. William Blount (1884)
• Life of General Scott (1894)
• Analytical Reference (1904)
• Tennessee in the War (1908)
• General Officers of the Confederate Army (1911)
• The Social Evolution of Woman (1912)

Wright died in Washington, D.C., on December 27, 1922, and was buried in Arlington National Cemetery on the south side of the Confederate Memorial."Gen. Wright Funeral Today." Washington Post. December 29, 1922. He is one of only two former Confederate generals interred in the cemetery (the other being Joseph Wheeler).Johnson, Clint. In the Footsteps of Robert E. Lee. Winston-Salem, N.C.: John F. Blair Publisher, 2001, p. 30.

{{portal|American Civil War|Biography}}

• List of American Civil War generals (Confederate)

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• {{NIE}}

• Marcus Joseph Wright. [http://docsouth.unc.edu/fpn/wrightmarcus/menu.html Diary of Brigadier-General Marcus J. Wright, C.S.A.: April 23, 1861 - February 26, 1863]. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 1989.
• Eicher, John H., and David J. Eicher, Civil War High Commands. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001. {{ISBN|978-0-8047-3641-1}}.
• Johnson, Clint. In the Footsteps of Robert E. Lee. Winston-Salem, N.C.: John F. Blair Publisher, 2001.
• Sifakis, Stewart. Who Was Who in the Civil War. New York: Facts On File, 1988. {{ISBN|978-0-8160-1055-4}}.
• Warner, Ezra J. Generals in Gray: Lives of the Confederate Commanders. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1959. {{ISBN|978-0-8071-0823-9}}.

• [http://www.arlingtoncemetery.net/mjwright.htm Arlington National Cemetery biography of Wright]
• {{Gutenberg author |id=7381| name=Marcus Joseph Wright}}
• {{Internet Archive author |sname=Marcus Joseph Wright}}
• [https://openlibrary.org/a/OL1045168A Works by Marcus Joseph Wright] at Open Library
• [https://archive.org/stream/menofmarkinamerica00gate#page/n513/mode/2up Men of Mark in America] Biographical Sketch

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Category:People of Tennessee in the American Civil War

Category:American biographers

Category:Confederate States Army brigadier generals

Category:People from McNairy County, Tennessee

Category:1831 births

Category:1922 deaths

Category:Burials at Arlington National Cemetery