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Montgomery Cunningham Meigs (; May 3, 1816 – January 2, 1892) was a career United States Army officer and civil engineer, who served as Quartermaster General of the U.S. Army during and after the American Civil War. Despite his Southern birth, Meigs strongly opposed secession and remained loyal to the Union; his record as Quartermaster General was regarded as exceptionally brilliant, both in effectiveness and in ethical probity, and Secretary of State William H. Seward viewed it as a key factor in Union victory. Meigs was one of the principal architects of Arlington National Cemetery; the choice of its location, on the grounds of the estate owned by the family of Robert E. Lee, was partly a gesture to humiliate Lee for siding with the South. ==Early life and engineering projects== Meigs was born in Augusta, Georgia, in May 1816. He was the son of Dr. Charles Delucena Meigs and Mary Montgomery Meigs.〔Hannan, p. 140.〕 His father was a nationally known obstetrician and professor of obstetrics at Jefferson Medical College〔Ferguson, p. 52.〕〔("General Montgomery Cunningham Meigs." ''Scientific American.'' January 30, 1892, p. 71. ) Accessed 2012-12-15.〕 His grandfather, Josiah Meigs, graduated from Yale University (where he was a classmate of future dictionary creator Noah Webster and American Revolutionary War general and politician Oliver Wolcott), and later was president of the University of Georgia.〔 Montgomery Meigs' mother, Mary, was the granddaughter of a Scottish family from Brigend (with somewhat distant claims to a baronetcy) which emigrated to America in 1701.〔(Browning, p. 239-240. ) Accessed 2012-12-15.〕 Meigs' father apprenticed as a physician in Philadelphia until 1812, at which time he moved to Athens, Georgia. He enrolled at the University of Pennsylvania in 1815, the same year he began to practice medicine in Georgia. Charles Meigs received his MD from the University of Pennsylvania in 1817, and that summer he moved his family—which now included one-year-old Montgomery—to Philadelphia and established a practice there.〔(Morton, p. 508. ) Accessed 2012-12-15.〕 The Meigs family was wealthy and well-connected, and Charles Meigs was a strong supporter of the Democratic Party.〔Wilson, p. 42.〕 Meigs had extremely good memory,〔Field, p. 73.〕 and his father instilled in him a sense of duty and a desire to pursue honorable causes.〔 Young Montgomery received schooling at the Franklin Institute〔〔("Obituary: Gen. Montgomery C. Meigs." ''Public Opinion.'' January 9, 1892, p. 321. ) Accessed 2012-12-15.〕 (then a preparatory school for the University of Pennsylvania).〔 Meigs learned French, German, and Latin, and studied art, literature, and poetry.〔Field, p. 74.〕 He enrolled at the University of Pennsylvania when he was only 15 years old.〔Miller, p. 6.〕 A hard worker, he was one of the top students at the university.〔 The Meigs family had extensive ties to the military and to West Point, the United States Military Academy. Montgomery Meigs, caught up in the nationalistic fervor of the time, wished to serve in the army.〔Weigley, p. 23.〕 West Point was also the only engineering school in the United States at the time.〔Herrin, p. 4.〕 Through family connections,〔Wilson p. 41-42.〕 Meigs won an appointment to West Point, entering in 1832.〔 He excelled in his studies at West Point, although he himself said he spent too much time at athletics and outdoor activities. He was among the top three students in French and mathematics, and did well in history.〔 He graduated fifth out of a class of 49 in 1836,〔 and he had more good conduct merits than two-thirds of his classmates.〔 He received a commission as a second lieutenant in the 1st U.S. Artillery, but most of his army service was with the Corps of Engineers, in which he worked on important engineering projects. In his early assignments, Meigs helped build Fort Mifflin and Fort Delaware, both on the Delaware River, and Fort Wayne on the Detroit River. He also served under the command of then-Lt. Robert E. Lee to make navigational improvements on the Mississippi River.〔Ulbrich, p. 1312; Freeman, vol. 1, pp. 140-47.〕 Beginning in 1844, Meigs also was involved with the construction of Fort Montgomery on Lake Champlain in upstate New York. His favorite prewar engineering project was the Washington Aqueduct, which he supervised from 1852 to 1860. It involved the construction of the monumental Union Arch Bridge across Cabin John Creek, designed by Alfred Rives, which for 50 years remained the longest single-span masonry arch in the world.〔("Md. bridge history includes breach that couldn't be spanned" ), ''Washington Post'', John Kelly, Wednesday, April 21, 2010〕 From 1853 to 1859, he also supervised the building of the wings and dome of the United States Capitol and, from 1855 to 1859, the extension of the General Post Office Building. In the fall of 1860, as a result of a disagreement over procurement contracts, Meigs "incurred the ill will" of the Secretary of War, John B. Floyd, and was "banished to Tortugas in the Gulf of Mexico to construct fortifications at that place and at Key West." Upon the resignation of Floyd a few months later, Meigs was recalled to his work on the aqueduct at Washington. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Montgomery C. Meigs」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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