Hayes’s division skirmished with John Hunt Morgan’s cavalry during the Battle of Buffington Island (July 19, 1863). On October 24, 1862, army officials promoted Hayes to colonel and assigned him to command the first brigade of the Kanawha Division as a brevet brigadier general. Injured at the Battle of South MountainĪt the Battle of South Mountain (September 14, 1862), Hayes received a gunshot wound in the arm, the first of five injuries he received during the war. On October 24, 1861, army officials promoted Hayes to lieutenant colonel. Soon after receiving his commission, he took part in the Battle of Carnifex Ferry (September 10, 1861) in western Virginia. Battle of Carnifex FerryĪlthough Hayes lacked any formal military training, he proved to be an able and active leader throughout the war. Dennison appointed Hayes as a major in the 2 nd Regiment Ohio Volunteer Infantry on June 27, 1861. Nevertheless, once the war began, Hayes lobbied Ohio Governor William Dennison for a military command. Unlike most Republicans, Hayes did not favor warfare to prevent the South from seceding from the Union when sectional differences escalated prior to the outbreak of the Civil War. A staunch abolitionist, Hayes’s defense of escaped slaves raised his profile in the newly emerging Republican Party. While living in Cincinnati, Hayes became engaged to Lucy Ware Webb in 1851, and the couple married on December 30, 1852. Hoping to expand his practice, Hayes moved to Cincinnati, Ohio in 1850 and opened a law office with John W. LawyerĪfter graduating from Harvard, Hayes joined the Ohio bar and opened his own law practice in Lower Sandusky in 1845. Hayes then attended Harvard Law School and graduated in 1845. He entered Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio in 1838, and graduated with honors in 1842.
In 1837, he attended a preparatory school in Middletown, Connecticut.
Hayes attended common schools in Delaware before enrolling in the Methodist Norwalk Seminary in Norwalk, Ohio, in 1836. Sophia Hayes raised Hayes and his older sister with help from her brother, Sardis Birchard, a prosperous businessman who lived in Lower Sandusky (modern-day Fremont), Ohio. Hayes never knew his father, who died ten weeks before his son’s birth. He was the son of Rutherford Hayes and Sophia Birchard. Rutherford Birchard Hayes was born on October 4, 1822, in Delaware, Ohio.