Sickles
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
DANIEL EDGAR, an American military officer; born in New York City, Oct. 20, 1825. He studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1844; was elected to the State Legislature in 1847; became city attorney of New York, and was elected State Senator in 1855. In 1856 the Democratic party of New York elected him to Congress, where he remained till 1861. At the outbreak of the Civil War he organized the "Excelsior Brigade" of New York volunteers, and was commissioned one of its colonels. He was conspicuous for bravery and heroic endurance in the Peninsular campaign; was in the battles near Richmond, Va., in 1862, commanding a brigade; and led a division at the battle of Antietam, Sept. 17, the same year. He was in command of a corps at Chancellorsville, May 2 and 3, 1863, where he was severely wounded. For brilliant achievements at Fredericksburg he was promoted major-general of volunteers. He commanded the 3d Army Corps at Gettysburg, July 2, 1863, and in this engagement lost a leg. He was assigned to the command of the 2d Military District, which included North and South Carolina, in April, 1867. In consequence of having supported the policy of Congress instead of that of President Johnson, he was removed, Aug. 26, 1867; and in 1869 was retired from the army. He was minister to Spain in 1869-1873, when he resigned, returned to New York City, and subsequently held several important president civil posts, among them that of of the Civil Service Commission. He was also a Democratic member of Congress in 1893-1897. He was made a Commander, Medal of Honor Legion, 1902. He died in 1914.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
Every date in Collier's 1921 sketch still holds, but the entry is remarkable for what it leaves out: in 1859 Sickles, then a sitting congressman, shot dead Philip Barton Key — son of Francis Scott Key — in Lafayette Square across from the White House for his affair with Sickles's wife, and was acquitted in what is generally cited as the first successful use of a temporary-insanity plea in an American court. Modern biographies lead with that episode and with the fierce argument over Gettysburg, where his unordered advance of the 3d Corps to the Peach Orchard on July 2, 1863 wrecked his line and cost him the leg; historians still divide over whether it broke Longstreet's attack or nearly broke the Union army. Collier's notes his Medal of Honor Legion post but not that he received the Medal of Honor itself, in 1897, for Gettysburg. The amputated leg he donated to the Army Medical Museum is still on public display, now at the National Museum of Health and Medicine in Silver Spring, Maryland.
Written for this edition, 2026.