Winfield Scott Hancock (February 14, 1824 – February 9, 1886) was a career U.S. Army officer who served with distinction in the Mexican-American War and as a Union general the American Civil War. Hancock was noted in particular for his personal leadership at the Battle of Gettysburg in 1863. A military historian wrote, "No other Union general at Gettysburg dominated men by the sheer force of their presence more completely than Hancock." After the Civil War, Hancock was the Democratic nominee for President of the United States in 1880, but was defeated by Republican James Garfield. He was known to his Army colleagues as "Hancock the Superb."