Leonard Covington

Leonard Wailes Covington (October 30, 1768 – November 14, 1813) was a United States Army Brigadier General and a member of the United States House of Representatives.

Born in Aquasco, Prince George's County, in what was then the British Province of Maryland, Leonard Covington joined the United States Army as a Cornet in March 1792. He was promoted to Captain in 1794 and served in the Northwest Indian War (1785–1795) under Anthony Wayne, where he distinguished himself at Fort Recovery and the Battle of Fallen Timbers. He resigned from the military at the conclusion of the Northwest Indian War.

In 1809, Leonard Covington returned to the Army as Colonel of light dragoons, having served as a Representative (Democratic-Republican Party) from Maryland in the Ninth Congress (1805–1807). He was in command at Fort Adams on the lower Mississippi River and participated in the 1810 takeover by the United States of the Republic of West Florida, in today's Florida Parishes, Louisiana. He served in the War of 1812, being promoted to Brigadier General in August 1813. Leonard W. Covington was mortally wounded in the Battle of Crysler's Farm and died three days later at French's Mills, New York.

At the time of his death, Brig. Gen. Covington and his family were residents of Washington in the Mississippi Territory, in a home named Propinquity, built in 1810 near the large military installation, Fort Dearborn, where Covington commanded the Regiment of Light Dragoons. During this period, the town of Washington was the capital of the Mississippi Territory. Mrs. Leonard Covington was the former Rebecca Mackall, his first cousin and a relative of the family of General James Wilkinson. The Covingtons had at least four children: Levin, Rebecca, Benjamin, and Edward.

• Covington, Georgia
• Covington, Kentucky
• Covington, Louisiana
• Covington, New York
• Covington, Ohio
• Covington, Pennsylvania
• Covington, Tennessee
• Covington, Virginia
• Covington County, Alabama
• Covington County, Mississippi
• Fort Covington, New York
• Covington Theological Seminary in Rossville, Georgia.

• ^ Gannett, Henry (1905). The Origin of Certain Place Names in the United States. Govt. Print. Off. p. 94. 
• Leeper, Clare D'Artois (2012). Louisiana Place Names: Popular, Unusual, and Forgotten Stories of Towns, Cities, Plantations, Bayous, and Even Some Cemeteries. LSU Press. p. 75. ISBN 978-0-8071-4740-5.