Julius Peter Garesché

Soldier; born 26 April, 1821, near Havana, Cuba; killed at the battle of Stone River, Tennessee, U.S.A. 31 December, 1862.

He was sent to Georgetown College, Washington, in 1833, and remained there four years. There he was appointed to the U.S. Military Academy, at West Point, and graduated with the class of 1841, receiving his commission as a second-lieutenant in the Fourth Artillery. The five subsequent years were spent on the frontier and in garrison duty. During the Mexican War he served with distinction, and was appointed assistant adjutant-general, with the rank of captain in 1855. Wherever he was stationed, Garesché always took an active part in the affairs of the Church. In Washington he organized the first local conference of the St. Vincent de Paul Society, and during his residence at the capital acted as its president. He contributed frequently on Catholic, social and political questions, to the New York “Freeman’s Journal” and “Brownson’s Quarterly Review”, and in September, 1851, in recognition of his services to the Church, received from Pius IX the decoration of a Knight of St. Sylvester. When the Civil War broke out, he declined a commission as brigadier-general of volunteers, and was made chief of staff, with the rank of lieutenant-colonel in the regular army, to General William S. Rosecranz. In this capacity he participated in the operations of the Army of the Cumberland. At the battle of Stone River, he was killed by a cannon-ball, while leading a column in a gallant attempt to regain a lost day.