George Van Stavoren Kelley

George Van Stavoren Kelley was born on March 23, 1843, in Massillon, Ohio. He came of age during one of the most turbulent periods in American history, and while still a young man he entered military service for the Union during the American Civil War. His wartime career would eventually place him in command of Company A of the 104th Ohio Infantry and lead to an act of courage at the Battle of Franklin for which he received the Medal of Honor.

Kelley served in the United States Army with the 104th Ohio Infantry, a volunteer regiment organized largely from northeastern Ohio. The regiment entered Federal service in 1862 and was soon sent toward Kentucky, where Union forces were responding to Confederate operations threatening Cincinnati and other strategic areas. During the following years the 104th Ohio served in Kentucky and East Tennessee and later joined the campaigns that carried Union forces through Georgia and back into Tennessee.

By the later stages of the war, Kelley had risen to the rank of Captain and commanded Company A. Captain is both his verified rank during the action for which he received the Medal of Honor and the highest military rank currently established for his wartime service. His position placed him in direct command of infantrymen at a time when Union forces were engaged in some of the most difficult campaigning of 1864.

During 1864, the 104th Ohio Infantry served within the broader operations of the Union XXIII Corps. After campaigning in Georgia, Federal forces eventually moved back toward Tennessee as Confederate General John Bell Hood attempted to carry the war northward. Hood's Army of Tennessee hoped to defeat Union forces before they could consolidate around Nashville, producing a series of rapid marches and engagements that culminated in the Battle of Franklin.

On November 30, 1864, Union troops under Major General John M. Schofield established defensive positions at Franklin, Tennessee. The Confederate Army of Tennessee approached during the afternoon, and Hood ordered a massive frontal assault against the Federal lines. Thousands of Confederate soldiers advanced across open ground toward prepared Union positions in one of the largest and bloodiest infantry attacks of the Civil War.

The 104th Ohio Infantry occupied part of the Union defensive line near the Carter House and cotton gin area, where some of the most severe fighting occurred. The Confederate attack reached the Federal defenses and in several places temporarily penetrated or disrupted the Union line. Combat became extremely close, with soldiers firing at short range and fighting around earthworks, fences, buildings, and defensive positions.

Captain George V. Kelley was in the midst of this fighting with Company A. During the battle he captured a Confederate battle flag believed to have belonged to troops from Lieutenant General Benjamin F. Cheatham's Corps. Regimental and battle flags were of enormous importance during Civil War combat. They served as practical rallying points through smoke and confusion, but they also represented the identity and honor of the units carrying them.

Capturing an enemy flag therefore required a soldier to enter an exceptionally dangerous part of the battlefield. Color guards were usually positioned near the center of formations and were defended by soldiers who understood both the tactical and symbolic importance of their flags. For Kelley to seize a Confederate flag during the violent fighting at Franklin meant exposing himself directly to enemy soldiers during a battle dominated by close-range combat.

The fighting continued for hours. Confederate troops repeatedly attacked the Union defenses but suffered devastating losses. Numerous Confederate generals and thousands of soldiers were killed, wounded, or captured. The Union line remained intact long enough for Schofield's army to withdraw toward Nashville during the night. The Battle of Franklin became one of the most destructive engagements ever fought by the Confederate Army of Tennessee.

Kelley's capture of the Confederate flag was formally recognized very quickly. On February 13, 1865, only a little more than two months after the battle, he was awarded the Medal of Honor for his action at Franklin. His official citation was concise, recognizing the capture of a flag believed to have belonged to Cheatham's Corps of the Confederate States Army.

The Medal of Honor was still a relatively new decoration when Kelley received it. Congress had authorized an Army Medal of Honor during the Civil War as a national award for soldiers who distinguished themselves through extraordinary conduct. In an era before the United States had developed the extensive system of valor decorations used in later wars, the Medal of Honor served as the country's principal recognition for exceptional military heroism.

For the project database, Kelley's decoration belongs to the Medal of Honor 1862–1895 Army period because it was issued on February 13, 1865. The date of the heroic action was November 30, 1864, but the award itself also falls squarely within the original Civil War-era Army Medal of Honor period. No additional clasp, star, or other device has been verified for his Medal of Honor.

The Medal of Honor is the only individual military decoration currently verified for inclusion in Kelley's final medal record. His service unquestionably identifies him as a Union Army veteran of the Civil War, but qualifying wartime service alone is not sufficient under the project rules to create entitlement to an additional campaign medal.

The later Army Civil War Campaign Medal is therefore not included in his verified rack. Kelley died in 1905, before the Army formally established that campaign medal in the following years. Under the client's Civil War medal rules, there is no basis for adding it to his individual record. His final verified medal count consequently remains one: the Medal of Honor.

Kelley's military service continued after the Battle of Franklin. The 104th Ohio remained with Federal forces during the final months of the war and subsequently operated farther east as Union armies closed in on the remaining Confederate forces. The regiment eventually participated in operations in North Carolina before the conflict came to an end in 1865.

By the summer of 1865 the 104th Ohio Infantry's wartime service was ending. Kelley returned to civilian life after having risen to Captain and having received the nation's highest military decoration while still only in his early twenties. His transition from a young Ohio soldier to a company commander and Medal of Honor recipient had taken place within only a few years.

After the war, Kelley returned to civilian life in Ohio. In 1866 he married Fannie Bliss. His life subsequently took him westward, and he eventually settled in Colorado. Historical accounts associate his later years with ranching in the Denver area, reflecting the broader westward movement of many Civil War veterans during the decades following the conflict.

Kelley later married Louisa Talitha Holloway in Colorado in 1890. By then more than twenty-five years had passed since the Battle of Franklin, but his Medal of Honor remained a permanent recognition of the action he had performed as a young captain during the Civil War.

George Van Stavoren Kelley died on November 4, 1905, in Denver, Colorado, at the age of sixty-two. He was buried at Riverside Cemetery in Denver. His life had carried him from his birthplace in Massillon, Ohio, through the battlefields of the Civil War and eventually to the American West.

Kelley's enduring military legacy is centered on the Battle of Franklin. On November 30, 1864, while commanding Company A of the 104th Ohio Infantry in one of the most violent engagements of the war, he captured a Confederate battle flag believed to belong to Cheatham's Corps. The act placed him directly in the danger of close combat and symbolized the determination with which Union soldiers defended their line that evening.

For that action, Captain George Van Stavoren Kelley received the Medal of Honor on February 13, 1865. With no additional individual military decoration currently supported by sufficient recipient-specific evidence, the Medal of Honor remains his single verified award and the defining official recognition of a wartime career that culminated in extraordinary courage at Franklin.