His Post Army Career

September 1865-Summer 1875 New Orleans
Longstreet chose New Orleans as his residence enroute to Texas where he had expected to settle. Several prominent Confederate generals resided there after the war, including P.G.T. Beauregard, Sam Hood, and Simon Buckner, as well as his favorite artillery unit, the Washington Artillery of New Orleans.

January 1, 1866 - Cotton Brokerage -, Longstreet, Owen & Company, located at 37 Union Street. March 1, 1866, Presidency of the Great Southern and Western Fire, Marine and Accident Insurance Company. He unsuccessfully sought the presidency of the Mobile and Ohio Railroad but was made president of the Southern Hospital Association.

1867-Letters
March 18, 1867- Longstreet was one of the first ex-Confederate officers to answer an inquiry from the New Orleans Times asking former Confederates living in New Orleans to offer guidance on how citizens should respond to the federal reconstruction laws. His response is published on this date recommending Southerners submit to the new laws. He wrote to “let us accept the terms as we are in duty bound to do.”

April 6, 1867- A second letter is published from Longstreet later to be published in the NY Times 13 April 1867. In it he supports the suffrage of the Negro and backs the federal reconstruction law which kicks off a national debate.

June 1868 - Receives Pardon; More correctly this was an amnesty, which had been refused previously in November 1865 by President Johnson even after strong representations from Grant. During the next session of Congress, however, General Pope had sent in a list of names of men from Georgia seeking amnesty for them. To this list Grant added Longstreet’s name. The wheels of government ground slowly and it was not until this time that the amnesty was received. The timing of the receipt of the amnesty was a coincidence but fanned the paranoia of the “Lost Cause” advocates in the South. Joins Republican Party - Moreover he advised the Southern state governments to extend civil and voting rights to freed slaves, much to the chagrin of his former confederate comrades.

March 1869-1870 - Accepts the position of Surveyor for the Port of New Orleans at a salary of $6000 p.a.

April 2, 1870- at the first stockholders meeting of "The New Orleans, Jackson and Great Northern Railroad", Longstreet was elected to the Board of Directors. Five days later he was elected Vice President and about two months later, on June 8, he was elected President of the Railroad.

May 13, 1870- he was appointed Adjutant General of the State of Louisiana, which put him in control of the State's militia. He received a commission as Brigadier General in the state militia (1872), with responsibility for the command of the militia, police and all civil forces within New Orleans. In 1870, he was named president of the newly organized New Orleans and Northwestern Railroad with an annual salary of $3000. His commercial enterprises and his political appointments gave him a comfortable income of about $15,000.00 a year.

June 1873- Named to the four-year position on the Levee Commission of Engineers.

September 14, 1874 - Emboldened by the federal hands-off policies, 3,500-armed White Leaguers assembled in New Orleans on September 14, 1874, and demanded that carpetbag Republican Gov. William Kellogg resign. Opposing the White League were 3,600 policemen and black militia troops under the command of ex-Confederate General James Longstreet. The White Leaguers charged the line, captured Longstreet, and pushed his men to the river, where they either surrendered or fled. The attackers occupied the city hall, statehouse, and arsenal. Total casualties in the one-hour fight that has become known as the Battle of Liberty Place were 38 killed and 79 wounded. He was pulled him from his horse and held overnight as prisoner. It was about 4 o'clock on the afternoon of Sept. 14, 1874. In the melee, he was shot in the leg. The whole thing lasted only one day and was near the Custom House on Canal St.

1875 - Moves to Gainesville, Georgia and purchases a small farm and the Piedmont Hotel.

1877 - Converts to Catholicism

September 7, 1878 - Rutherford B. Hayes had appointed him deputy collector of internal revenue. He remained in the position for only a few months, before accepting the position of postmaster in Gainesville, Georgia in January, 1879.

May 1880 - President Rutherford B. Hayes appoints Longstreet ambassador to Turkey. President Garfield, another former Union general, nominated him to a four-year term as U.S. Marshall for Georgia, a position he had long desired. He served in that capacity for slightly over three years.

With the election of President Grover Cleveland Longstreet had no prospects of receiving another position and he went into semi-retirement in Gainesville, Georgia. There he operated the Piedmont Hotel, and enjoyed raising turkeys, tending an orchard, and nurturing his vineyard and was famous for his wines made from scuppernong grapes. His wife, Louise died in December of 1889. His Park Hill farmhouse burns along with his barn under what was considered at the time as suspicious circumstances. He began to write his memoirs, but the task was to take five years. The memoir was first published in 1896. “From Manassas to Appomattox.”

September 1897- Longstreet married Helen Dortch at the governor's mansion in Atlanta. She was a native Georgian and assistant state librarian at the time of the marriage, and only 34 years old.
Relocating to Washington, D.C., he secured an appointment as U. S. Commissioner of Railroads by the newly elected President William McKinley. He attended many military and Civil War related reunions, including the 100th Anniversary of the U.S. Military Academy in 1902.

January 2, 1904- James Longstreet died of pneumonia in the morning while visiting his daughter's home in Gainesville, just six days short of his 83rd birthday.