A graduate of West Point’s class of 1837, Bragg served in the Mexican War and rose to the rank of Lt. Colonel before he left the army in 1856 to become a Louisiana planter. At the outbreak of the war, he took command of the Peninsula-Mobile area as a major general. He fought with Johnston at Shiloh, and in 1862 as a full general, he took command of the Army of the Tennessee. He suffered major losses at Stone’s River, Chattanooga and Missionary Ridge. He was talented as an organizer and strategist, but is generally faulted for serious personality and intellectual defects. This image was probably taken during the 1856 - 61 period as he is in civilian clothes and sports side whiskers, but not the moustache and full beard we generally see in his uniformed images. CDV has no backmark.