Joseph R. Anderson
Confederate Army general
Died when: 79 years 204 days (954 months)Star Sign: Aquarius
Joseph Reid Anderson (February 16, 1813 – September 7, 1892) was an American civil engineer, industrialist, politician and soldier.During the American Civil War he served as a Confederate general, and his Tredegar Iron Company was a major source of munitions and ordnance for the Confederate States Army.
Starting with a small forge and rolling mill in the mid-1830s, It was a flourishing operation by 1843 when he leased it.
He eventually bought the company outright in 1848 and forcefully and aggressively built Tredegar Iron Works into the South's largest and most significant iron works.
When the Civil War broke out he entered the Army as a brigadier general in 1861.Shortly after he was wounded and then resigned from the Army returning to the iron works.
It was the Confederacy's major (and for much of the war only) source of cannons and munitions, employing some 900 workers, most of whom were slaves.
His plant was confiscated by the Union army at the end of the war, but returned to him in 1867 and he remained president until his death.
Anderson was very active in local civic and political affairs.
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