Death of Gen. William P. Sanders

William Price Sanders, a Kentuckian raised in Natchez, finished 41st at West Point in 1856. He was a cousin of Jefferson Davis, yet stayed with the Union. His roommate there, Edward Porter Alexander, commanded the Confederate forces that wounded him. Sanders was shot on November 18, 1863, probably by a sharpshooter in Bleak House's tower, and died the next day at the Lamar House. The Senate never confirmed his brigadier's star. He was buried secretly, then moved to Chattanooga National Cemetery, and Fort Loudon was renamed for him.

What the plaque says

Death of Gen. William P. Sanders Brig. Gen. William P. Sanders, using dismounted cavalry to hold off the Confederate advance from the west, was fatally wounded on this ridge, November 18, 1863, dying the next day.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Blount Mansion — 2.1 mi
  The 1792 frame house of William Blount, governor of the Southwest Territory, Knoxville's only National Historic Landmark, where the people he enslaved are named.
• Beck Cultural Exchange Center — 3.3 mi
  Knoxville's Black history museum and archive, opened in 1975 in the 1912 Dandridge Avenue house the community bought for $22,500.
• Green McAdoo Cultural Center — 15 mi
  The 1935 school in Clinton that sent twelve Black students down Foley Hill to desegregate Clinton High School in August 1956, now a museum with bronze statues of the Clinton 12.
• Museum of Appalachia — 17 mi
  John Rice Irwin's 65-acre collection of moved log cabins and mountain objects north of Knoxville, opened in 1969, with a cabin believed to be Mark Twain's father's.

More markers nearby

• Longstreet's Headquarters — 0.4 mi
• The Assault Upon Fort Sanders — 1.0 mi
• Fort Sanders — 1.2 mi
• General Clifton Bledsoe Cates 1895-1970 United States Marine Corps — 1.3 mi