Lawyer, Confederate Politician, Confederate Brigadier General. He was born in Jefferson County, Georgia, but as a child, his family moved to Athens, Georgia (including brother Howell Cobb, a future Congressman, Speaker of the House, Governor, Secretary of the Treasury, and Civil War Confederate Major General). He attended the University of Georgia, graduated at the top of his class, and, after reading law with Joseph Henry Lumpkin, gained admission to the Bar in 1842. In 1844 he married Marion Lumpkin, Judge Lumpkin's daughter. They had two sons, who died in infancy, and four daughters. He was Assistant Secretary to the State Senate during the late 1840s. From 1849 to 1857, he was a state supreme court reporter. Early in his career he developed a reputation as a talented constitutional lawyer with a great capacity for work. This was demonstrated in the 20 volumes of Georgia supreme court reports he edited and in the digest of Georgia laws he published in 1851. The latter has been described as "unique in America" for its methodology and comprehensiveness. During the late 1850s, while his brother urged loyalty to the Union and compromise on slavery, he crusaded for secession, his speeches strongly influencing the Georgia general assembly and the state's citizens. At the state secession convention of 1861, he advocated formation of the Confederacy. In time, he was appointed to the Provisional Confederate Congress and helped write the new nation's constitution. He also served as chair of the Committee on Printing and was active in the establishment of the judicial system for the new nation. Soon after the war broke out, he surprised many by rejecting further political posts to recruit a military unit in Georgia. Though lacking military experience, he received a colonelcy and command of a mixed force of infantry and cavalry afterward known as Cobb's Legion. He served diligently in North Carolina, on the Virginia peninsula, and in the James River fortifications. His lack of military training was a handicap but he soon became a proficient soldier (leading his regiment into battles at Seven Days, Second Manassas, and Antietam). In September 1862, his men suffered heavily at Antietam. Six weeks later he left the remnants of his Legion when he was given a brigade in McLaws' division in the Army of Northern Virginia. On December 13, 1862, his command, Cobb's "Irish Brigade", held the now-famous stone wall and sunken road near the top of Marye's Heights at Fredericksburg, Virginia. Late in the day, while his troops repulsed one of 6 attacks on their position, Cobb's thigh was lacerated by shrapnel from an exploding artillery shell. His femoral artery severed and he bled to death after being carried to the rear. Despite medical aid, he died in a house on the battlefield. From where he was wounded, he could see the house where his mother was born and his parents wed.