Hancock, Winfield Scott

views updated May 21 2018

Hancock, Winfield Scott (1824–86) US general. A veteran of the Mexican War, he was a Union commander in the Civil War, fighting in the Peninsular and Antietam campaigns and at Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville and Gettysburg (1863), where he was badly wounded. In 1880, he was the unsuccessful Democratic candidate for president.