Joseph Lee Smith

Joseph Lee Smith (1776–1846) was an American lawyer, soldier, and jurist. He was the father of Confederate States of America General Edmund Kirby Smith.

Born in Connecticut, Smith practiced law in that state until the War of 1812, when he became a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army and served with distinction in combat. At the Battle of Stoney Creek in Ontario, Canada on June 7, 1813 quick thinking and action by Smith saved his 25th Infantry from capture.

After the war, Smith remained in the Army, rising to the position of colonel, when he was placed in command of the 3rd Infantry in 1818. Resigning from the Army shortly thereafter, he returned to his Connecticut law practice. He married Frances Kirby around 1820, and they moved to Florida Territory in 1821, when it became part of the United States. From 1823 to 1832 he was a territorial judg]. Subsequently, he practiced law in St. Augustine. He lived with his family at the Segui-Kirby Smith House, 12 Aviles St., for his entire residency in St. Augustine. After his death, the house served for a time as the St. Augustine Free Public Library. Today (2020) it houses the research library of the St. Augustine Historical Society.

His brother, Ephraim Kirby-Smith, was born in Connecticut in 1807. A graduate of the United States Military Academy, he died in combat in 1847, during the Mexican–American War.

His son Edmund Kirby Smith was born in Florida in 1824, graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1845, and served with his uncle in the Mexican–American War. He was one of seven full generals of the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War.

A later son, Ephraim Kirby-Smith, named for his brother, was born in 1884.

Alexander Darnes, son of slave Violet Pinkney, was born in Smith's house in St. Augustine. Darnes, who would remain enslaved until the end of the Civil War, would become a celebrated and successful physician, the first African-American physician in Florida.

Smith and his wife Frances are buried side by side in the Huguenot Cemetery in St. Augustine, Florida.

Further reading

• Parks, Joseph Howard (1992). General Edmund Kirby Smith, CSA. Reprint of original edition of 1954. Louisiana State University Press. ISBN 0807118001.