Braxton Bragg is a native of North Carolina, growing up just 160 minutes away in Warrenton. How is that for nativity in becoming an icon for Fort Bragg greatness? Braxton was one of six sons born to Margaret and Thomas Crosland Bragg. His older brother Thomas Bragg was the Confederate Attorney General.
Bragg’s early life was often ridiculed because of outlandish rumors of his mother being in prison for murder meaning he was born in prison. Other rumors state that he was of a poor background even though his family could send Braxton to an academy for schooling. During his time at the school though, he wrote many letters stating his undying devotion to his father but never once spoke of his mother.
Bragg decided to enter West Point at the age of 20 and did quite well graduating 5th in 1837 as an artillery officer. He served his first duty station in Florida and for his valiant service during his beginning years; he gained three brevet promotions during the Mexican-American War. In 1856, he resigned from the U.S. Army and went to Louisiana to start a plantation. Then came the Civil War and Braxton Bragg came roaring back with a vengeance.
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General Bragg finally got his first star on March 7, 1861 when he was to take over the Baton Rouge Volunteers in Louisiana. He would fight gloriously in other battles in Florida, Tennessee, Mississippi, Kentucky, Georgia, South Carolina and Virginia. But here is where history takes its turn at fate.
In October of 1864, President Davis sent Gen. Bragg to Wilmington to assume direct command of all defenses present there. Soon afterward he got news from Gen. Robert E. Lee himself to assume command of all Southern Virginia forces and North Carolina forces because Sherman was making his infamous “march to the sea.” Davis countered Lee’s orders and sent Bragg on his way to meet Sherman head on to Augusta, Savannah and Charleston and then turn right back around and go back to Wilmington in 1865. When it was all said and done, on May 9, 1865 Gen. Braxton Bragg and a few of his cabinet officers were captured but then paroled in Monticello, Georgia.
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Braxton Bragg and a close friend were taking a stroll in the town that they were now calling home (Galveston, Texas) where Bragg just collapsed. He was pronounced dead within minutes due to a “paralysis of the brain.” His body was carried back to the Magnolia Cemetery in Mobile, Alabama.
Not many people know this simple fact but not only is Fort Bragg, N.C. named after Braxton Bragg but so is a town in northwestern California where General Bragg did some time as a soldier and then Bragg Station in Texas which is now considered a ghost town.