Latest 6th Grade Graduation Party Invitations News

Brigadier General Julius Penn

Image by Robert of Fairfax American Civil War Soldiers database: Julius Penn enlisted as a Captain on 23 April 1861 at the age of 43. Joined Company E, 22nd Infantry Regiment Ohio on 27 Apr 1861. Promoted to Full Major on May 23rd, 1861. Mustered Out Company E, 22nd Infantry Regiment Ohio on Aug 19th, 1861 at Athens, OH. Partial Transcription of Memoriam, RGK1958: In Memory of General Julius Augustus Penn, United States Army Extract from Sixty-sixth Annual Report of the Association of Graduates of the United States Military Academy, West Point, NY, June 11th, 1935. JULIUS AUGUSTUS PENN NO. 3165 CLASS OF 1886 [Classmate of General John J Pershing] Died May 13th, 1934, at Batavia, Ohio, aged 69 years. Brigadier General Julius A. Penn was born February 19th, [about 1865], in Matoon, Coles County, Illinois, the son of Major Julius A. Penn and Mary Brock Penn. Answering a frequent question I shall state here that he is not a lineal descendant of William Penn the Founder, as there are no Penns living who are lineal descendants. The Generals Mother was of Scotch descent. A very strong religious nature and her unusual unselfishness were predominant characteristics. Major Penn [the father of BGen Penn] spent the greater part of his life in the practice of law in Batavia, Ohio. At the call of the President of the United States, April 17th, 1861, for volunteers for the suppression of treason, he organized the first company to leave Batavia for the Civil War and left with the company as its Captain. He was later promoted to major. Major Penn cast his vote for the first Prohibition candidate for President and was a most ardent advocate of the cause. His advice to his son on this subject held good through the years. General U.S. Grant had known Major Penn when they were boys in Clermont and Brown Counties. On the Generals return to Batavia to visit relatives after the Civil War he addressed Major Penn as Julius and took his son, embryo brigadier-general, on his knee, an incident never forgotten by the boy. The original muster roll of the above mentioned company and the Majors epaulets and sash are still in existence in Batavia. Julius A. Penn, Jr. was dubbed Pennie by a small girl who could not say Julius and he was called by this affectionate nickname for many years. Pennie spent his boyhood days in and around Batavia and was an honored member of the first class to graduate from the Batavia Hishg School. He took a completive examination with thirty boys of the 6th District of Ohio at Hamilton, Ohio, in 1881. Hon. H.L. Morey took this method of deciding who should be sent to West Point. Penn stood number one but lacked a year of being old enough. The number two young man was sent and failed in the January examination. He returned to his Ohio district and Julius Penn helped him secure enough signatures to a petition for reinstatement. Since his principal failed the second time, Penn was now old enough. Through the recommendation of Judge James B. Swing, he received the appointment of Hon. H. L. Morey and entered the Academy June, 1882. Major Penn died June 6th, 1882 with the knowledge that his son had reached West Point safely and with the satisfaction that his son should receive an education in a school which he himself had always wanted to attend. A condensed résumé of the services of General Penn follows. Upon his graduation from the United States Military Academy, July 1, 1886, General Penn was appointed a second lieutenant, 13th Infantry, and in the course of promotion reached the grade of colonel on March 2nd, 1917. While an officer of the Regular Army, he held commissions in the United States Volunteers as Captain, Assistant Quartermaster, from May 30, 1898 to November 30th, 1898, as Major, 34th Infantry, from July 11th, 1899 to April 17th, 1901, and as temporary brigadier general from August 30th, 1917, to March 1st, 1919. He was retired as a colonel, December 5th, 1924 because of disability in line of duty, and was advanced on the retired list, to his highest war time rank of brigadier general in accordance with the provisions of legislation enacted June 21st, 1930. General Penn was a graduate of the Army War College, and valedictorian when he graduated from the Infantry and Cavalry School at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas in 1891. His thesis Mounted Infantry was published in one of the service journals. He was detailed in the General staff Corps from September 15th, 1906, to August 11th, 1909 and in the Adjutant Generals Department from October 8th, 1919 to July 11th, 1922. In the early years of his military service, General Penn was on frontier duty in the Southwest and West. He took part in an expedition against the Bannock Indians in Wyoming and Idaho in 1865 and was Instructor of Military Tactics at Omaha High School, Omaha, Nebraska. During the War with Spain he served a Assistant Brigade Adjutant, and Brigade and Division Quartermaster a Chickamauga, G