"Greatest generals who died in action " Topic

Including those who died of wounds

Gustavus Adolphus
Karl XII
Stonewall Jackson

Others?

McPherson
Lannes
Desaix
Sir John Moore
Maurice Rose

Major-General Charles George Gordon CB
George Armstrong Custer

Montcalm and Wolfe

Including those who died of wounds.

That could get dicey.
Joshua Chamberlain was wounded severely at Petersburg. He was given a brevet promotion to brigadier general assuming he would die.
He recovered. At the end of the Civil War he was a brevet Major General.
50 years later, he died from complications from his wounds at the age of 85.

So, think that stipulation over.

Cyrus the Great
Gustavus Adolphus
Stonewall Jackson
Patrick Cleburne

Leonidas

Graf v. Schwerin

Sir Isaac Brock

George Armstrong Custer

Ah, this is obviously some strange usage of the word 'greatest' that I wasn't previously aware of. :)

Sir Issac Brock
Tecumseh (OK it was a small battle, but he still died!)
Richard III
Davy Crockett (Ok, he was a Colonel)
George Anderson at Antietam (Brigadier so it depends if you think a Brigadier is a General)
AS Johnson at Shiloh (big unanswered question of how good he could have been)

Then there's poor oldHerbert Lumsden, who survived WWI and the Afrika Korps to get killed on the bridge of the USS Neew Mexico by a kamikaze attack in 1945

Plus the other above

Nathaniel Lyon at Wilson's creek

Pyrrhus

Major-General Sir Isaac Brock, KB
Lieutenant-General Sir Thomas Picton, GCB
Major-General James Wolfe
Lieutenant-General Sir John Moore, KB
Major-General Robert Ross
John Talbot, 1st Earl of Shrewsbury, KG
Major-General Robert Craufurd
Brigadier John Nicholson, CB

Harold Godwinson
Richard I

Bessieres

Maj Gen John Reynolds, USA
Maj Gen Patrick Cleburne, CSA

Jeb Stuart

Nelson. Admiral being equivalent rank to General.

Ben McCulloch at Pea Ridge

Harald Hardrada had a very interesting life and military career before Stamford Bridge.

One can make a very strong case for Alexander the Great. He had been wounded so many times, and a few could have carried him off.
Whatever disease or poison he finally died from at the age of 33, his overall health was very compromised by his wounds.

Every few years, some physician somewhere whose specialty happens to be "Betenson's Pox" will publish a paper that Alex died from Betenson's Pox.
Or Carraway's Disease.
Or Flemington's Catarrh.
Or typhus or malaria. Why get fancy?
Recovery from none of them being helped by his many wounds he only partially recovered from. And of course alcohol abuse.

Brasidas

El Cid

Jackson
Cleburne
McPherson
Reynolds

To the list above add Pender

FM James Keith

LG Herbert Lumsden

Custer?!?! really guys, I mean c'mon look at his war record from the civil war and the fact that he foolishly attacked a vastly superior force without making a thorough and proper reconnaissance not to mention he vastly underestimated his enemy. He obviously never read "The Art of War".

He had to be nominated. You don't have to vote for him.

Does it matter that Custer was only a colonel when he died?

I don't think his rank is the issue….

Herbert Lumsden.
William 'Strafer' Gott.

Marcellus

And a Scipio or two.

Major General Maurice Rose

The attack you are speaking about regarding Custer is obviously what happened at Gettysburg, and that charge saved the Federal army from being hit in their rear. And yes, Custer was a great general.

I am Spartacus. Well, he was Spartacus.
Hamilcar Barca of Carthage in Spain

George Armstrong Custer
His Civil War record was fabulous (the alleged plagiarist Stephen Ambrose would disagree). Those who think he foolishly attacked an overwhelming number of Indians at the Little Big Horn obviously have not read Small Wars: A Tactical Textbook for Imperial Soldiers by the British Colonel C.E. Callwell. Everything Custer did at the Little Big Horn was on the approved list of tactics for disciplined, trained forces on one side and irregular forces of rebels, native armies or guerrillas on the other.

Interestingly COL Callwell's 500+ page historical study points out that if you want to win in this type of warfare, you have to take risks that you would never take against conventional forces. You will nearly always be successful, but if you lose, you will not only lose the battle, you will probably be annihilated.

Lasalle

Tom

John Graham of Claverhouse, 1st Viscount Dundee

LT

athun25

I am Spartacus. Well, he was Spartacus.

Thank you Senator Booker.

Charles the Bold

General Roosevelt of the 4th US infantry in ww2

A lot of choices. No one mentioned US WWII Gen. Simon Bolivar Buckner Jr.

The OP was asking for "greatest".
Digging for obscurity doesn't satisfy that.

Ouch, Winston draws blood again!!

George A. Custer was not a General when he died. He was a Lt. Colonel.

Another one for Ben McCulloch at Pea Ridge.

Patrick Cleburne

Thank you Rallynow, take THAT all you who scoffed at my post, nyaah nyaah!

My adult response.

Ouch, Winston draws blood again!!

Yes, but he did it with a smile !

A few not so far mentioned:

Maarten Tromp (Admiral)
Peter Bagration
Maximilian von Browne

…and if the qualifier is 'died in action' rather than 'killed in battle':

Attila the Hun