Jeb Stuart (Civil War Library)

Hardly any biography could contain the robust and romantic Jeb Stuart, but John W. Thomason Jr. goes as far as anyone ever has in pinning down the quality of the Confederate cavalry commander. Virginia-bred, James Ewell Brown Stuart graduated from West Point, where he was called Beauty, and rode with the Mounted Rifles against the Apaches and Comanches on the western frontier. When Virginia seceded from the Union, Jeb Stuart joined the Confederate army. His lightning-like raids became legendary. From Bull Run to Brandy Station he served as Robert E. Lees eyes and ears, becoming a major general at the age of twenty-eight. Less than three years later Stuarts meteoric career ended with his death in a cavalry charge.