Promotions

Date	To Rank	Full/Brevet	Army/Vol	Comments
	2nd Lieut	Full	Vol	Co B 20th TN Inf
05/01/62	Colonel	Full	Vol	20th TN Inf (est day)
07/29/64	Brig-Gen	Full	Vol

Thomas Benton Smith, entering the Confederate service in the Twentieth Tennessee, first stood the crucial test at Shiloh, where the colonel of the regiment, J. A. Battle, was captured. When Breckinridge attacked Baton Rouge on August 5, 1862, Smith had been promoted to colonel of the regiment. On this occasion he commanded one of the two brigades of the division of Gen. Charles Clark.

The Confederates were at first successful, defeating the enemy in the field, though exposed to the fire of the Federal fleet as well as of the army. General Breckinridge says in his report of the battle: "Colonel Smith, commanding Fourth brigade, composed of the consolidated Tennessee regiments and the Twenty-second Mississippi, was ordered forward, and moved against the enemy in fine style."

At the Battle of Murfreesboro, Gen. William J. Hardee bears this testimony concerning Colonel Smith: "The Twentieth Tennessee, of Preston's brigade, vainly endeavored near the river to carry a battery, and after a heavy loss, including their gallant commander, Col. T. B. Smith, who was severely wounded, were compelled to fall back under cover."

At the Battle of Chickamauga, Colonel Smith was again ready for duty. At the opening of the Atlanta campaign in May, 1864, Colonel Smith appears at the head of Tyler's brigade, its gallant commander having been disabled by a wound. On July 29, 1864, he was commissioned brigadier-general.

His brigade embraced the Second, Tenth and Twentieth Tennessee, the Thirty-seventh Georgia, the Fiftieth, Thirtieth and Thirty-seventh Tennessee, consolidated, and a Georgia battalion of sharpshooters. Throughout the battles of the Atlanta Campaign, from Dalton to Jonesboro, General Smith led the old Tyler brigade and won new fame for himself and his command.

He accompanied the army in the same capacity in the Tennessee Campaign, participated in the Battle of Franklin and the Siege of Murfreesboro; and at Nashville on the fateful 16th of December he was with his gallant men fighting against overwhelming disaster until captured. Two others of General Bate's brigade commanders, Major Lash and Gen. H. R. Jackson, shared his fate as a prisoner of war.

General Bate, in his report, said of Smith that he bore himself with heroic courage, both through good and evil fortune, always executing orders with zeal and alacrity, and bearing himself in the face of the enemy as became a reputation theretofore bravely won.