Stovall received his initial education at Wesleyan Academy in Wilbraham, Massachusetts, and then he returned home and enlisted as a private in the Georgia State volunteers in 1835.

[1] Stovall entered the United States Military Academy at West Point on July 1, 1836, but resigned a year later in 1837[2] due to poor health.

Stovall married Sarah G. McKinne in 1842, and he moved to an estate near Rome, located in Floyd County in 1846, where he was again a merchant and a militia captain, serving with the Cherokee Volunteer Artillery.

[1] Following the Kentucky Campaign from June to October 1862, Stovall was ordered to join Gen. Braxton Bragg's Army of Tennessee, and fought during the Battle of Stones River from December 31 to January 2, 1863.

[9] After the American Civil War ended in 1865, Stovall worked as a cotton broker, then became a merchant of farming supplies.