General Benjamin Grubb Humphreys, commander of the Mississippi Brigade after the death at Gettysburg of its fiery brigadier General William Barksdale, wasn’t as aggressive as his predecessor.

In fact, in the first big battle of his command, Chickamauga, Humphreys played second-fiddle to General Joseph Brevard Kershaw. Kershaw and his South Carolina brigade took far more casualties than the Mississippians whose brigade Kershaw commanded in the Georgia battle as part of a scratch-division.

So many more casualties (scores more, indicating their greater aggressiveness in the fight) that General James Longstreet, in his after-action report praise, awarded Kershaw a “distinction.” Of Humphreys, Longstreet only said that he deserved an “honorable mention.”