Early Years and Civil War
Edmund Randolph Cocke was born at Oakland, one of two Cumberland County plantations owned by his parents, William Armistead Cocke and Elizabeth Randolph Preston Cocke, on March 25, 1841. In 1856 he matriculated at Washington College (later Washington and Lee University). Intellectually gifted but shy and sometimes indolent, Cocke ranked near the bottom of his class during the first of his two years at that institution. Nevertheless, in 1858 the College of New Jersey (later Princeton University) accepted him as a transfer student with sophomore standing.
During the secession crisis Cocke abandoned his studies, returned to Virginia, and on April 23, 1861, enlisted in the Black Eagle Rifles, a Cumberland County militia unit that mustered into Confederate service as Company E of the 18th Virginia Infantry Regiment. Elected second lieutenant in June 1861, he became first lieutenant in mid-1862 and captain in January 1863. The Black Eagle Rifles performed with distinction at the First Battle of Manassas (1861) and fought in most of the Army of Northern Virginia‘s early campaigns. During George E. Pickett‘s charge at the Battle of Gettysburg, Cocke suffered a superficial wound, but more than one-third of the men in his command were killed, including one of his brothers. The shattered company saw only limited action in the remaining years of the Civil War. Cocke served in 1865 as major of the 18th Virginia, without formal promotion to that rank. On April 6, 1865, he was captured during the Battles of Sailor’s Creek. Briefly confined in Washington, D.C., he spent two months in the prisoner-of-war camp at Johnson’s Island, Ohio. On June 9 he swore allegiance to the United States and was paroled.