Joseph "Fighting Joe" Wheeler (September 10, 1836 – January 25, 1906) was a military commander and politician of the United States of America and, during the American Civil War, the Confederate States of America. He was a cavalry general in the Confederate States Army during the Civil War, and then a general in the United States Army during both the Spanish-American and Philippine–American Wars near the turn of the twentieth century. For much of the Civil War, he was the senior cavalry general in the Army of Tennessee and fought in most of its battles in the Western Theater.

Between the Civil War and the Spanish–American War, Wheeler served multiple terms as a U.S. Representative from the state of Alabama as a Democrat.

Although of old New England ancestry (descended from the English Puritans who came to New England during the Puritan migration to New England), Joseph Wheeler was born near Augusta, Georgia, and spent some of his early childhood growing up with relatives in Derby, Connecticut while also spending about half of each year in Georgia. Joseph Wheeler and Julia Knox Hull Wheeler were his parents. He was the grandson of Brigadier General William Hull, a veteran of the American Revolution.

Despite his being partially brought up in the northern United States, and being appointed to the United States Military Academy at West Point from the state of New York, Wheeler always considered himself a Georgian and Southerner.^{[citation needed]}

Wheeler entered West Point in July 1854, barely meeting the height requirement at the time for entry. He graduated on July 1, 1859, placing 19th out of 22 cadets, and was commissioned a brevet second lieutenant in the 1st U.S. Dragoons. He attended the U.S. Army Cavalry School located in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and upon completion was transferred on June 26, 1860, to the Regiment of Mounted Rifles stationed in the New Mexico Territory.

It was while stationed in New Mexico and fighting in a skirmish with Indians that Joseph Wheeler picked up the nickname "Fighting Joe." On September 1, 1860, he was promoted to the rank of second lieutenant.

At the start of the Civil War, Wheeler entered the Confederate States Army on March 16 as a first lieutenant in the Georgia state militia artillery and then was assigned to Fort Barrancas off of Pensacola, Florida, reporting to Maj. Gen. Braxton Bragg. His resignation from the U.S. Army was accepted on April 22, 1861. He was ordered to Huntsville, Alabama, to take command of the newly formed 19th Alabama Infantry Regiment and was promoted to colonel on September 4.

Wheeler and the 19th Alabama fought well under Bragg at the Battle of Shiloh in April 1862. During the Siege of Corinth in April and May, Wheeler's men on picket duty repeatedly clashed with U.S. patrols. Serving as acting brigade commander, Wheeler burned the bridges over the Tuscumbia River to cover the Confederate retreat to Tupelo, Mississippi.