James Blair Steedman (July 29, 1817 – October 18, 1883) was an American printer, contractor and lawyer who rose to the rank of general in the Union Army during the Civil War.

A printer by trade, as well as a soldier during the Texas War of Independence, Steedman returned to Ohio and later became a delegate in the state's General Assembly as well as President of Public Works, although he lost his campaign to become a U.S.

Col. Steedman raised a ninety-day regiment that participated in the early fighting at Battle of Philippi in western Virginia in June 1861.

At the desperate Battle of Chickamauga (Georgia), he lent valuable support to General George Thomas, and won praise for saving the remaining Union forces after their defeat.

He reunited with Thomas at Nashville (December 1864), taking heavy losses at first, but played a big part in the dramatic victory that ended the war in the west.

[1] Steedman became an editor of the North-Western Democrat and Toledo Times newspaper and a major general of the 5th Division in the Ohio State Militia in 1857, holding both positions until the beginning of the American Civil War in 1861.

[3] In 1860, Steedman was part of Ohio's delegation to the Democratic National Convention when it met in Charleston, South Carolina, and again was an active supporter of Stephen Douglas in Baltimore, Maryland.

Steedman was mustered out of the volunteer service on August 13, and was appointed a regular army colonel of the 14th Ohio on September 1,[3] shortly after the regiment re-enlisted for three years.

[3] Following the Union victory at the Battle of Shiloh in April 1862, Steedman and his brigade were sent to join Maj. Gen. Don Carlos Buell's army in Kentucky that fall.

Speed S. Fry's division of the renamed Army of the Cumberland, now under the command of Maj. Gen. William S. Rosecrans[3] During the Battle of Chickamauga in Georgia in the fall of 1863, Steedman led the vanguard of Union Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger's Reserve Corps to Maj. Gen. George Henry Thomas' aid on September 20.

Steedman is credited with "performing the most conspicuous act of personal courage recorded by any army officer during the Battle of Chickamauga"[4][5] and preventing Rosecrans' defeat turning into a Union "disaster.

"[1] Military historian Ezra J. Warner stated that "His heroism was virtually the salvation of the Union forces left on the field" at Chickamauga.

[3] Steedman also participated in much of the Atlanta Campaign,[2] and then commanded the District of Etowah in the Department of the Cumberland from June 15 to November 29, and again from January 5, 1865.

[9] A few days before the battle, Thomas found a telegram addressed to Ulysses S. Grant, now commander of all U.S. Army forces, written by Maj. Gen. John Schofield, one of his subordinates.

"[10] Thomas ordered Steedman and his three-brigade division to make a diversionary attack at 6 a.m. on December 15, thereby keeping the Confederate Army of Tennessee's right (the corps of Maj. Gen. Benjamin F. Cheatham) occupied all day and preventing them from aiding against the main assault elsewhere.