Beauregard, G. T. (Gustave Toutant), 1818-1893. | Tulane University Special Collections

Name: Beauregard, G. T. (Gustave Toutant), 1818-1893.

Historical Note: Pierre Gustave Toutant de Beauregard was born at his family's plantation in St. Bernard Parish, near New Orleans, Louisiana. He was the son of Jacques Toutant-Beauregard, a planter, and Helene Judith de Reggio. He was educated in private schools in New Orleans and New York, then attended the U.S. Military Academy (West Point), graduating second in the class of 1838. As a commissioned officer, he was involved in engineering projects in Florida and Louisiana. In 1841, he married Marie Laure Villère, whose grandfather was the first native-born governor of Louisiana. They had two sons; she died in 1850. G. T. Beauregard served with distinction in the U.S. Army during the Mexican War. Returning to Louisiana, he resumed engineering duties, and married Caroline Deslonde in 1860, who died in 1864. With the secession of Louisiana, he had resigned his commission in 1861, and enlisted in the Confederate Army as a private in a volunteer company. Jefferson Davis appointed Beauregard a brigadier general in the CSA; he served in Charleston, S.C., supervising the bombardment of Fort Sumter, as well as at Manassas, Virginia. He was promoted to full general and assigned to the western theater in 1862, where he had responsibilities to oversee Confederate armies in Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, and the Carolinas. After the war, Beauregard returned to New Orleans, becoming president of the New Orleans, Jackson & Mississippi Railroad from 1865 to 1870. He became manager of the Louisiana State Lottery Company in 1877, then commissioner of public works in New Orleans in 1888. He died in 1893, and his remains were interred in Metairie Cemetery.

Sources: Manuscripts Collection 240

Note Author: sp

Records or Manuscript Collections Created by Beauregard, G. T. (Gustave Toutant), 1818-1893.