Robert E. Lee might never have commanded the Army of Northern Virginia at all, if not for a single Union shell. Before Lee, that army belonged to Joseph Johnston, a West Point graduate and Mexican War veteran who resigned his United States Army commission to fight for Virginia in 1861.
In May 1862, Johnston was badly wounded at the Battle of Seven Pines, and Jefferson Davis handed his command to Lee instead. Johnston recovered and took over in the Western theater, where he built a reputation as a general who would rather retreat in good order than risk his army in a costly fight. During the defense of Atlanta in 1864, he fell back again and again in front of Sherman's larger force, trading ground for time rather than risking a decisive battle.
Davis eventually lost patience and relieved him that July, replacing him with the far more aggressive John Bell Hood. Hood's attacks that followed cost the Army of Tennessee dearly, and many historians today believe Johnston's caution was the wiser course all along. After the war, Johnston and Sherman became unlikely friends. He reportedly stood bareheaded in freezing rain at Sherman's funeral in 1891, out of respect for his old enemy, and fell ill not long after.
