Richard "Dick" Taylor (January 27, 1826 – April 12, 1879) was an American planter, politician, military historian, and Confederate general.

He was named after his paternal grandfather, Richard Lee Taylor, a Virginian who had served in the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783).

[2] Having to leave the war because of rheumatoid arthritis, the younger Taylor agreed to manage the family cotton plantation in Jefferson County, Mississippi.

In 1850, he persuaded his father (then serving as 12th president after being elected in 1848) to purchase Fashion, a large sugar cane plantation in St. Charles Parish, Louisiana.

Steadily Taylor added acreage to the plantation and improved its sugar works at considerable expense; he also expanded its enslaved labor force to nearly 200 people.

When the American Civil War erupted, Taylor was asked by Confederate General Braxton Bragg to assist him, as a civilian aide-de-camp without pay, at Pensacola, Florida.

On July 20, he arrived in Richmond, Virginia with his regiment and received orders from LeRoy Pope Walker, Confederate States Secretary of War, to board the train and move to take part in the First Battle of Manassas; the 9th Louisiana arrived at Manassas Junction hours after Confederate forces won the battle.

On October 21, 1861, Taylor was promoted to brigadier general, commanding a Louisiana brigade under Richard S. Ewell in the Shenandoah Valley campaign led by Stonewall Jackson.

During the Valley campaign, Jackson used Taylor's brigade as an elite strike force that set a rapid marching pace and dealt swift flanking attacks.

Governor Thomas Overton Moore had insistently requested a capable and dedicated officer to assemble the state's forces to counter U.S. advances.

These clashes were fought against U.S. Maj. Gen. Nathaniel P. Banks for control of the Bayou Teche region in southern Louisiana and his ultimate objective of Port Hudson.

After these battles, Taylor formulated a plan to recapture Bayou Teche, along with the city of New Orleans, and to halt the Siege of Port Hudson.

Grant stated the official position of the U.S. government was that black U.S. soldiers were sworn military men and not insurrectionist slaves, as the Confederates asserted they were.

At these two battles, the two commanders whom Taylor had come to rely on: U.S. Brigadier Generals Alfred Mouton and Thomas Green, were killed while leading their men into combat.

The Congress of the Confederate States issued a joint resolution, which officially thanked Taylor and his soldiers for their military service during the Red River Campaign.

[7] He surrendered his department at Citronelle, Alabama, the third and last major Confederate force remaining east of the Mississippi, to U.S. General Edward Canby on May 4, 1865, almost a month after Appomattox Courthouse and was paroled three days later.

Taylor responded with irony, explaining to the officer that his ancestors had settled in Virginia in 1608; that his grandfather had commanded a regiment that fought against Hessians at Trenton in the Revolutionary War; and that his father had been president of the United States.

[8] However, most of Taylor's contemporaries, subordinates, and superiors spoke many times of his military prowess as he proved himself capable both in the field and in departmental command.

"[9] Charles Erasmus Fenner, an officer in the Confederate Trans-Mississippi Department and post-war Louisiana Supreme Court justice, asserted that "Dick Taylor was a born soldier.

Probably no civilian of his time was more deeply versed in the annals of war, including the achievements and personal characteristics of all the great captains, the details and philosophies of their campaigns, and their strategic theories and practice.

"Stonewall" Jackson and Richard S. Ewell frequently commented on their conversations with Taylor about military history, strategy, and tactics.

Stonewall Jackson recommended promoting Taylor to major general and putting him in command of Confederate forces in western Louisiana.

The first was to examine at every halt the adjacent roads and paths, their direction and condition; distances of nearest towns and cross-roads; the country, its capacity to furnish supplies, as well as general topography, etc., all of which was embodied in a rude sketch, with notes to impress it on memory.

My imaginary manoeuvres were sad blunders, but I corrected them by experience drawn from actual battles, and can safely affirm that such slight success as I had in command was due to these customs.

On April 12, 1879, eighteen years to the day since the Battle of Fort Sumter, he died of dropsy (edema related to congestive heart failure) in New York City.

His sister Mary Elizabeth, who had married William Wallace Smith Bliss in 1848, served as her father's White House hostess.