The U.S. Confederate soldier Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson was born in Clarksburg, Virginia (which is now in West Virginia), on January 21, 1824, the third child of Jonathan Jackson, an attorney, and Julia Beckwith Neale. He was educated at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and graduated in 1846, at which time he fought in the Mexican War. Due to ill health, he resigned from the army and lectured on military matters, but he entered the Confederate army on the outbreak of war in 1861. He soon earned his nickname, at the First Battle of Bull Run. As General Barnard E. Bee tried to rally his beleaguered men, he shouted to them: “Look! There is Jackson’s brigade standing behind you like a stone wall!” (Douglas, 1940, p. 10).
Jackson showed himself to be a brilliant military strategist, often against larger Union armies. For example, his Stonewall Brigade distinguished itself in the Shenandoah Valley and at Richmond, the Second Battle of Bull Run, Harper's Ferry, Antietam, Fredericksburg, and Chancellorsville. At Chancellorsville he was accidentally shot by his own men; he died eight days later, on May 10, 1863.
Jackson studied war and military matters all his life, and was probably one of the greatest generals who ever commanded an American army. He was described as “a bold leader, probably the boldest the war produced” (Douglas, 1940, p. 62). Indeed, it was this boldness in unnecessarily visiting the front that led him to receive his fatal wound: an event that may well have lost the war for the southern states (Bevin, 1996). He was entirely indifferent to shells and bullets flying around him.
It appears that Stonewall Jackson meets the criteria for Asperger Syndrome, with clear evidence of a qualitative impairment in social interaction and restricted, repetitive, and stereotyped patterns of behavior, interests, and activities. Although individuals with Asperger Syndrome demonstrate major problems in social relationships, many are capable of great creativity because of their ability to focus on a single topic — in this case, on the field of battle and in military affairs. Jackson had “no moments of deplorable indecision and no occasion to lament the loss of golden opportunities” (Douglas, 1940, p. 62).
Family and Childhood
In 1826, Jackson’s sister Elizabeth and his father died of typhoid; Julia Jackson gave birth to her fourth child, Laura, the day after her husband died. The family slid into poverty. Julia remarried; her new husband disliked the children and they were sent to live with relatives. Julia died in childbirth in 1831. Thomas’s brother, Warren, died of tuberculosis in 1841.
Social Behavior
Jackson meets the criterion of a qualitative impairment in social relationships (American Psychiatric Association, 1994). He failed to develop peer relationships, and showed a lack of spontaneously seeking to share enjoyment and interests with other people, and of emotional reciprocity (Henry, 1979).
At school he was “shy and unsociable, retaining much ... awkwardness” (Henry, 1979, p. 581). However, on the battlefield, he was extremely brave and disregarded his own safety; indeed, he was promoted on the battlefield for heroism.
After his first sight of Jackson at law school, Henry Kyd Douglas (author of I Rode with Stonewall; 1940) remarked to a classmate that Jackson was “such an oddity!” The classmate replied that “Old Jack is a character, genius, or just a little crazy. He lives quietly and don’t meddle. He’s as systematic as a multiplication table and as full of military as an arsenal. Stiff, you see, never laughs, but as kind hearted as a woman’ (p. 233). (“Old Jack” was just 36 years of age at the time.)
Henry (1979) describes Jackson as “a withdrawn, morose, isolated personality of eccentric habits and with a hypochondriacal preoccupation which bordered on the bizarre” (p. 580). (Other individuals thought to have shown Asperger Syndrome, such as Newton and the Austrian mathematician Kurt Gédel, were also hypochondriacal.) During the Civil War, there were rumors that he was “mad,” and some fellow officers resented his aloof, high-handed way of conducting his campaigns: “Like many another great soldier, he was at first called ‘crazy,’ but it was soon found out that he was always sober and in his right mind” (Douglas, 1940, p. 237).
The people of Lexington considered Jackson to be one of their local eccentrics, but despite his shyness and odd ways he was respected by members of his church. People considered his appearance odd, “and this, combined with his reserve and awkwardness in company, made him the object of many jokes and derisive comments” (Henry, 1979, p- 581). He had a shy, introverted and secretive personality and it has been said that he rarely if ever laughed.
According to Douglas (1940), Jackson “was not always in pleasant accord with officers next in rank to him and was apt to judge them harshly” (this is reminiscent of Viscount Montgomery); “The general always kept himself very much apart and, although he was uniformly polite to all persons who came to see him, he did not encourage social calls” (p. 39).
Jackson never discussed his plans, and didn’t offer advice to his superiors, nor ask it of his subordinates. He is reported to have said, “If my coat knew what I intended to do, I'd take it off and throw it away” (Douglas, 1940, p. 235). “This ignoring of the officers next in rank to him detracted much from his personal popularity with them, especially as he had no individual magnetism to attract them” (p. 47). Nonetheless, his army “had unbounded confidence in their leader and he in them” (p. 70), and “Never in the history of warfare has an army shown more devotion to duty and the wishes of one man” (p. 135). Jackson judged himself more harshly than anyone else did.
Narrow Interests/Obsessiveness
Jackson was an avid reader of military history and studied Napoleon’s campaigns intensively. He was capable of very intense, focused concentration. This extreme focus on a single topic can have enormous benefits, and it is probably impossible for anyone to produce work of true genius without it.
Henry (1979) pointed out that Jackson was “hard working, personally brave and absolutely honest. He was also grim and humorless and was noted for a remarkably single-minded, inflexible ... persistence in any task he undertook” (p. 580). He “was not thought by those who knew him best to be a good judge of character generally, yet his opinion of the generals opposing him was always wonderfully correct” (Douglas, 1940, p. 62). He was a brilliant strategist, described by an experienced federal officer as the “supremest flanker and rearer” the world had ever seen (Douglas, 1940, p. 220). In particular, he had a great ability to mystify, mislead, and surprise the enemy (Bevin, 1996).
Jackson was also preoccupied with religion and became a devotedly committed Christian of the stern, puritanical, biblical type. His difficulty with superiors was seen in 1850 when he was posted to Fort Meade in Florida. Before long, he was involved in an extraordinary and unpleasant dispute with his commanding officer, Major French. When Jackson accused French of immoral behavior, French counter-accused Jackson of insubordination. Here Jackson showed his “implacable and vindictive characteristics,” and indeed his attack on French was “pitiless, narrow minded and legalistic” (Henry, 1979, p. 581).
Routines/Control
According to Douglas (1940), Jackson “seldom, if ever, complained, and never uselessly and apologetically to those under him, nor to those above him. Determined to deserve good fortune, he never quailed before disaster; but trusting in God, himself, and his army he always commanded success” (p. 34). Douglas continued, “He regulated his conduct, personal and military, in accordance with his own ideas of right and wrong; he acknowledged accountability to no one but God and his superior officers” (p. 35). He was incorrigible in disregarding his own ease and comfort.
A servant said that he “could always tell the military atmosphere by Jackson’s devotions: that he didn’t mind his daily prayers, but when he got up in the night to pray, “Then I began to cook rations and pack up for there will be hell to pay in the morning” (Douglas, 1940, p. 155). Douglas (1940) also noted that Jackson “read newspapers only for the facts they contained, when he read them at all. Their criticisms upon his movements or those of his associates he ignored. After a while he stopped reading them altogether” (p. 35).
Jackson remained “aloof and secretive and drove his soldiers mercilessly; and his discipline was almost inhuman but the troops marched and fought and died for him with remarkable devotion” (Henry, 1979, p. 584). His need for control was sometimes evident when he clashed with other officers, such as General Charles S. Winder.
Jackson could get by on five minutes of sleep snatched here and there: “He could sleep in any position, in a chair, under fire, or on horseback” (Douglas, 1940, p. 234).
Language/Humor
Jackson rarely laughed and talked very little. As we have seen, he was described as grim and humorless. We do not know whether he showed idiosyncratic use of words or repetitive patterns of speech.
Lack of Empathy
Douglas (1940) noted that General Jackson was always as hard as nails in the performance of a duty. Although he had a kind heart, he was inexorable in the execution of the law, and was never known to temper justice with mercy. Also, he always wanted to get rid of inefficient officers.
In one case early in the war, he did not allow an officer a short furlough to visit his dying wife, despite the man’s impassioned appeal: “In cold, merciless tones, he replied, ‘Man, man, do you love your wife more than your country? and turned away. The wife died and that soldier never forgave Stonewall Jackson” (Douglas, 1940, p. 235).
At the Virginia Military Institute in Lexington, Jackson was a very bad teacher and extremely unpopular with his students. The cadets considered him a strange character: grim, aloof, unable to communicate with them in or outside the classroom, who subjected them to petty and relentless discipline (Henry, 1979). The authorities made an unsuccessful attempt to remove him from the job.
The general “had the least possible knowledge of music” (Douglas, 1940, p. 121). Henry (1979) reported an embarrassing incident when Jackson and his staff, as guests in a house, were being entertained by a young lady at the piano. Jackson asked her to play Dixie, saying that he thought it was very beautiful, whereupon the young lady replied that she had sung it just a few minutes earlier.
Naivety/Childishness
There does not appear to be much specific evidence for these traits in Jackson, but a few instances apply. He was shot at Chancellorsville after what Douglas (1940) described as an unnecessary visit to the front with a small number of his staff to investigate enemy movements — this would appear to be naive behavior. In another example, he also showed reckless courage that even General Robert E. Lee thought excessive.
Nonverbal Communication
Jackson appears to have shown limited facial expression. He was “the worst-dressed, worst mounted, most faded and dingy-looking general” that anyone had ever surrendered to (Douglas, 1940, p. 162).
Douglas (1940) described Jackson’s expression as “thoughtful, and, as a result I fancy of his long ill health ... generally clouded with an air of fatigue ... With high, broad, forehead, small sharp nose, thin, pallid lips generally tightly shut, deep-set eyes, dark, rusty beard, he was certainly not a handsome man” (p. 234).
While under fire, Jackson “rode along quietly, with his chin thrown out as usual and his cap close over his eyes, in apparent unconcern. I was wondering if this unconsciousness of the ‘deadly imminent’ shot flying through the air was simply indifference to danger, or the action of nerve and will-power; and this may have caused me, involuntarily, to imitate his bearing” (Douglas, 1940, p. 58).
Motor Skills
Jackson was ungainly: “in all his movements from riding a horse to handling a pen, the most awkward man in the army ... He rode boldly and well, but not with ease or grace ... He was not a man of style” (Douglas, 1940, p. 234).
Conclusion
There is no doubt that Stonewall Jackson met the criteria for Asperger Syndrome, which presents enormous challenges in terms of social relating and empathizing with others but can be hugely beneficial for a leader, as shown in this case. Stonewall Jackson was better prepared for the American Civil War than any other general.
- Michael Fitzgerald, Former Professor of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry
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