St. George Tucker

St. George Tucker 1828 – 1863

Born in 1828, St. George Tucker was the son of Henry St. George Tucker, legislator, congressman, and judge in the early years of the Republic. Tucker was a lawyer who served as the clerk of the Senate and House of Delegates of Virginia during the 1850’s.

Having also started the Ashland Male Academy in 1857, he resigned his post as clerk and devoted full time to his classical school for boys. Tradition places the school at 304 N. Center Street, altered in the 1920’s. His literary works included poetry, a novel, Hansford: A Tale of Bacon’s Rebellion (republished as The Devoted Bride) and a song “The Southern Cross” that became a famous Civil War era song.

When the Civil War began, Tucker closed the school and organized the Ashland Grays, a company of soldiers who trained at the racecourse and later were incorporated with the Fifteenth Virginia regiment of Volunteers.

Tucker was considered a valiant leader, even after contracting consumption. For his distinguished service at the head of his troops at Malvern Hill despite his disease he was promoted to lieutenant colonel of the regiment. His worsening illness forces him from the battlefield and he died in 1863.

Sources:

“St. George Tucker,” William and Mary Quarterly, 1st ser., vol.3 (January 1898), p.193.

Lyon Gardiner Tyler, LL.D., ed., Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography, Vol. III (New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Company, 1915), s.v. “Tucker, St. George.”