USA > Virginia > Albemarle County > Albemarle County > Memorial history of the John Bowie Strange Camp, United Confederate Veterans, including some account of others who served in the Confederate Armies from Albemarle County > Part 3
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In Colonel Jones' section at Maplewood the little memorial crosses mark the graves of five Confederate officers, namely :
The above mentioned General John M. Jones ;
Lieutenant James L. Daniel, Company B, Nineteenth Regi- ment Virginia Volunteers, killed in battle near Richmond, 1862;
Major T. T. Hill, Judge Advocate of his brother A. P. Hill's Corps ;
Lieutenant Thomas Russell Hill, Lieutenant in Poague's Bat- talion; and
Captain Walter Bowie, Captain in the Fortieth Regiment, In- fantry, Virginia Volunteers.
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GENERAL LUCIUS BELLINGER NORTHROP.
BY MARIE FLOYD NORTHROP.
Lucius Bellinger Northrop, who was Commissary General of the Confederacy, was born at Charleston, South Carolina, Sep- tember 8th, 1811, and graduated at West Point, N. Y., in 1829, in the class with Jefferson Davis, President of the Southern Confederacy. They served together in the West against the In- dians. He was in the Seminole War in Florida, where he was severely wounded, and then retired on half pay. He then stud- ied medicine in Philadelphia and on his return to Charleston practiced occasionally for charity only. When South Carolina seceded he resigned his commission as Captain in the United States Army and became Commissary General of the Confed- eracy.
A few months before the fall of Richmond he went to North Carolina and engaged in farming near Egypt in that State. In July, 1865, he was arrested by the National authorities and confined in Richmond in what was known as "Castle Thunder" until the following November, when he was released on his pa- role that he was not to leave the State of Virginia without noti- fying the Federal Government. In 1867 he bought a farm near Charlottesville, Virginia, upon which he resided until sometime after he was paralyzed, February 4th, 1890. He died in the Soldiers' Home, Pikesville, Maryland, February 9th, 1894.
He was six feet tall, straight as an arrow, erect as a column and a very Cincinnatus. He hated publicity in any form.
With regard to his life during the years that he resided near Charlottesville, there is but little to tell. He lived a very re- tired life. With the exception of a trip to Charleston, South Carolina, he was never out of the State after settling upon the farm near Charlottesville, until he went to Maryland, where he died as previously stated. After coming to Charlottesville his most intimate friends were Professors Holmes, Smith and Page and others of the older professors of the University, all of whom, except Professor Smith, are long since dead.
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BRIGADIER-GENERAL ARMISTEAD LINDSAY LONG.
BY WM. F. LONG.
General Armistead Lindsay Long (1825-1891) was a son of Colonel Armistead Lindsay Long, of Amherst County, Virginia. He graduated at the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1850. From 1850 to 1861 he was an officer in the United States Army. When the war broke out he resigned his commission and offered his services to the Confederacy. He served as Major from 1861 to 1862, as Military Secretary to General Lee from 1862 to 1863, and as Brigadier General from 1863 to the close of the war.
Shortly after the close of the war General Long received the following testimonial from General Lee:
"General A. L. Long entered the Confederate service in 1861, and served continuously till the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia, 9th April, 1865. His conduct during that time was marked by zeal and gallantry. A graduate of the Military Academy at West Point, in addition to a military edu- cation, he has had long experience in the military service.
He was with me as Chief of Artillery in the winter of 1861-62 in the Southern Department, and became a member of my staff when appointed to the command of the Army of Northern Vir- ginia. He was promoted Brigadier-General in 1863, and made Chief of Artillery of the Second Army Corps, Army of North- ern Virginia, which position he held till the surrender of the army, 9th April, 1865."
R. E. Lee, "General."
After the war General Long became blind, and to overcome the inactivity to which loss of sight subjected him, he sought occupation in writing a life of his beloved General, and in 1886 published his "Memoirs of Robert E. Lee."
General Long married Mary Heron Summer, daughter of Major General E. V. and Hannah Foster Summer. There were three children of this marriage: E. V. S. Long, a civil engineer, who died of typhoid fever when only twenty-four years old; Virnie, wife of Col. Robert Alexander Brown, U.
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CoL. R. T. W. DUKE IN 1880
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S. A .; and Eugene McLean Long, Civil Engineer, of New York City.
General Long is buried in Maplewood Cemetery in Char- lottesville, Virginia. On the granite monument over his grave, these words are inscribed: "Thine eyes shall see the King in his beauty."
COLONELS. COLONEL RICHARD THOMAS WALKER DUKE.
BY HIS SON, W. R. DUKE.
Richard Thomas Walker Duke, the son of Richard Duke and Maria Barckley Walker, his wife, was born June 6th, 1822, at Mill Brook, locally known as the Burnt Mills, in Albemarle County, Virginia.
He attended private schools, among his teachers being the late Judge William J. Robertson, his life long friend.
He was appointed State cadet to the V. M. I. in 1842, and graduated second in his class in 1845. He taught school in Richmond, also in Lewisburg, Virginia, now West Virginia.
On the death of his father in 1849, he moved to Morea and studied law, graduating in 1850. Again he taught school and at the same time practiced law in Charlottesville. He was elected Commonwealth's Attorney in 1858.
After the John Brown raid he organized the Albemarle Rifles, Company B, Nineteenth Virginia Regiment, and was elected Captain. He went to Harper's Ferry on April 17th, 1861, and was at First Manassas. In the summer of 1862 he was elected Colonel of the Forty-sixth Virginia Infantry. He resigned during the spring of 1864, came home, and was ap- pointed Lieutenant-Colonel of the Second Battalion of Re- serves, and served in the trenches and at guarding prisoners in Richmond. He was captured, together with his command, at Sailors Creek, April 6th, 1865.
He was in Washington the night President Lincoln was as- sassinated.
He remained a prisoner at Johnson's Island until July, 1865. Upon his release he returned home and resumed the practice of
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law. He was removed from the office of Commonwealth's At- torney by military authority. He was elected to congress in 1870 and served until 1873.
He was one of the charter members of the John Bowie Strange Camp, Confederate Veterans, its first Second Lieuten- ant Commander, and afterwards Commander.
During this period he continued to practice law and was elected to the legislature in 1881, serving one term. ·
He died at Sunny Side, July 2nd, 1898, and was buried in Maplewood Cemetery.
COLONEL ANDREW JACKSON GRIGSBY.
BY ISABELLE H. Goss.
Colonel Andrew Jackson Grigsby was born in Rockbridge County, Virginia November 2nd, 1819. When war with Mex- ico was declared, he was residing in Missouri, and enlisted in Colonel Doniphan's well known regiment which distinguished itself in that war. In the spring of 1861 he was living in Giles County, Virginia, and at once entered the service of his State, becoming successively Major, Lieutenant-Colonel, and Colonel of the Twenty-seventh Virginia Regiment-one of the five regiments of the noted "Stonewall" Brigade. He served with this brigade through the campaigns of 1861 and 1862, becom- ing its commander after Colonel W. H. S. Baylor was killed at "Second Manassas."
At the battle of Sharpsburg, after the retirement of General J. R. Jones-injured by concussion from the bursting of a shell -and the death of General W. E. Starke, who was killed early in the action, he became commander of Jackson's old division, and led it with conspicuous ability and gallantry. Indeed, the gallantry of Colonel Grigsby was conspicuous on every field on which the "Stonewall" Brigade was engaged, so that his regi- ment acquired the sobriquet of "The Bloody Twenty-seventh." At the battle of Port Republic his sword belt was shot away, and he was wounded in a later engagement.
In the fall of 1863, after the promotion of General E. F. Pax- ton, former Major of his regiment and at that time Adjutant
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General of Jackson's Corps, to the command of the "Stonewall" Brigade, Colonel Grigsby resigned. He was then in feeble health and unable to render further active service.
He retired to the home of his relatives, the Goss family in Albemarle County, where he afterwards resided. On Decem- ber 18th, 1895, he was taken with pneumonia, and died Decem- ber 23rd, in the seventy-seventh year of his age. He was laid to rest on Christmas morning in the burying ground of the Goss family, near Stony Point.
COLONEL JOHN BOWIE MAGRUDER.
FROM A SKETCH BY COL. WM. HENRY STEWART OF PORTSMOUTH, VA.
John Bowie Magruder, eldest son of Benjamin Henry Ma- gruder and Maria Louisa Minor, was born in Scottsville, Albe- marle County, Virginia, November 24th, 1839. His parents moved to "Glenmore," in the same county, when he was five years old. He was educated at John Bowie Strange Military Academy and the University of Virginia, receiving the degree of Master of Arts at the latter in 1860. Planning to study law later, he was teaching at Smith's Academy in Culpeper when the Civil War began. He graduated in thirty days in military tac- tics at the Virginia Military Institute. He organized the "Ri- vanna Guards," and was commissioned its Captain in July, 1861.
This Company (H) was first assigned to the Thirty-second Virginia Infantry, and that fall to the Fifty-seventh Virginia In- fantry, commanded by Colonel Kean and then later by Armi- stead.
Magruder first served south of James River; then north, par- ticipating in the Seven Days Battle around Richmond, and los- ing at Malvern Hill half his company. He was made Lieuten- ant Colonel for gallantry in 1862. He was in the battle of Fredericksburg and was made Colonel, January 12th, 1863, of the Fifty-seventh Virginia Infantry, Armistead's Brigade, Pick- ett's Division, Longstreet's Corps. In April, 1863, he was with Longstreet in the siege of Suffolk. He distinguished himself with an independent command near Edenton, N. C., where with 1,300 men he defeated 5,500 Federals in two battles, for which
-
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he was highly complimented by General Longstreet. He fell mortally wounded in Pickett's charge at Gettysburg July 3rd, 1863, within twenty steps of the enemy's cannon, shouting to his men as he fell, "They are ours." He refused to be carried back and ordered his men to "go on and do their duty." When in retreat they offered to take him back he told them, "Save yourselves as I am hopelessly wounded." He died a prisoner in Gettysburg July 5th, 1863. He was a member of the Epsilon Alpha Fraternity and a frater sent his remains and personal effects in a metallic coffin to "Glenmore," where he lies buried. Had he survived Gettysburg he would have been a Brigadier General before attaining the age of twenty-four years.
Prior to Gettysburg many of his command criticized his in- tricate maneuvres in charging over and around obstacles as a needless sacrifice of energy ; but in Pickett's Charge a dwelling, outbuilding, and garden in the way were passed without delay, impairing alignment, or sheltering skulkers.
Magruder was small in stature but muscular, finely educated, of splendid character and executive ability, superb courage and soldierly qualities, a fine disciplinarian but thoughtful of the comfort of his men to whom he was courteous and kind. His soldierly conduct, bearing, and qualities won the admiration and praise of both superiors and subordinates. He died a Chris- tian patriot.
LIEUTENANT-COLONEL JOHN WILLIAM MALLET.
BY MILTON W. HUMPHREYS.
John William Mallet was born in Dublin, Ireland, October 7th, 1832, and died at the University of Virginia, November 7th, 1912. His father was Robert Mallet, F. R. S., and his mother Cordelia Watson. After thorough preliminary training, he studied alternately at Trinity College, Dublin, and at Göttingen, receiving the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at the latter Uni- versity in 1852, and A. B. at Dublin in 1853.
In 1853 he came to America on business for his father with- out any intention of remaining in this country, but was induced to give temporary instruction in German and French at Am-
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herst College, Massachusetts, and in 1854 he was made Pro- fessor of Analytical Chemistry in that institution. Before the session ended he was appointed chemist to the Geological Sur- vey of Alabama, and at once was induced to act as temporary Professor of Chemistry in the State University at Tuscaloosa, and afterwards became regular professor.
In the fall of 1861 he joined as a private a cavalry company that was being organized at Tuscaloosa, but before this com- pany was mustered in he accepted a position as aide-de-camp on the staff of general Rodes, and was commissioned as first lieutenant on the 16th of November of that year. Rodes' bri- gade spent the winter at Manassas and in the spring repaired to the peninsula and served in the campaign up to and including the battle of Seven Pines. On the day of this battle he re- signed from Rodes' staff, having been commissioned as Captain of Artillery May 21st, 1862, with orders to take general charge under Colonel (afterwards General) Gorgas of the production of ammunition for all arms. Being sent on a tour of inspection of all the various arsenals and ordnance depots with instruc- tions to confer with the various officers as to distribution of the work, the avoidance of orders prductive of confusion, etc., and to collect all needful facts, he made a report to the Chief of Ordnance. This report, with its recommendations, led to the erection of a great central ordnance laboratory at Macon, Geor- gia, which, however, was not put into full operation before the war ended. Dr. Mallet, as Superintendent of Laboratories, was required every month to visit the principal ordnance establish- ments, the headquarters of the principal armies, and each im- portant fortified port, for conference with other ordnance offi- cers. He had to make tests of ordnance products and perform experiments with a view to finding substitutes for materials that had become exhausted or could not be obtained. During the siege of Charleston in 1863, when visiting that place, he re- ceived a slight wound. To give a detailed account of his labors in this field would require much space.
Dr. Mallet was made Major June 28th, 1863, and Lieutenant- Colonel of Artillery February 29th, 1864.
General Wilson advanced on Macon at the very end of the
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war, and an engagement was in progress when a joint telegram from Sherman and Johnston, addressed to Federal and Confed- erate commanders, ordered an immediate cessation of hostili- ties. Mallet was paroled with others in like situation.
Dr. Mallet was engaged now in practical scientific work for three years in addition to being Professor of Chemistry in the Medical Department of the University of Louisiana. In 1868 he was called to the University of Virginia, where, as Pro- fessor of Chemistry, he remained until his death in 1912, with the exception of two sessions ; one (1883-4) spent at the Uni- versity of Texas as Professor of Chemistry and Physics, be- sides being Chairman of the Faculty; and the other (1884-5) as Professor of Chemistry in the Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia.
Dr. Mallet's ability as an analytical chemist caused him very often to figure as an expert witness in cases of poisoning, and to be employed for the analysis of ores, water, and, in short, everything an analysis of which was desired.
He was a Fellow of the Royal Society (F. R. S.), London, and a fellow or member of a score of other scientific societies on both continents, and belonged to a considerable number of other organizations.
· He did not write any books, but his articles in scientific pub- lications number about a hundred, not to mention many that appeared in popular periodicals:
His fame brought him many honors. Honorary degrees (M. D., LL. D., etc.,) were showered upon him, and he was often appointed to discharge special temporary duties, such as serv- ing as judge in exhibitions, delivering lectures at other institu- tions, etc.
He was extraordinarily versatile, and not only kept abreast of progress in the sciences, but maintained remarkable knowl- edge of the ancient languages, and in almost every department of human knowledge his accuracy was amazing.
His general characteristics are excellently stated in the action of the faculty of the University of Virginia on the occasion of his death: "Great as have been his world-wide acknowledged intellectual achievements in science, these seem to fade into in-
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significance when compared with the impress of character which he has stamped upon the generation of men who have sat at his feet in this University. He was the soul of honor, truth and courage ; he hated sham, deceit and charlatanism in all their forms, and, regardless of consequences, never permitted himself to swerve a hairbreadth from what he recognized to be a prin- ciple."
He married, first, Mary E., daughter of Judge John J. Or- mond, of Alabama, in 1857. She passed away in 1886, and in 1888 he married Mrs. Josephine Burthe, of Louisiana, who survives him.
He retired from active teaching in 1908 and was made Pro- fessor Emeritus. An attack of influenza subsequently impaired his health, and on the seventh of November, 1912, he passed away after a brief acute illness.
He never became naturalized as an American citizen, a fact possibly due to his having embraced the Confederate cause, and later (after 1877) to his desire to remain a Fellow of the Royal Society, a distinction limited to British subjects.
Dr. Mallet was a member of the Protestant Episcopal Church, and a man of the purest moral character, whose example could have only an ennobling effect upon all who came in contact with him.
COLONEL JOHN S. MOSBY.
1
BY R. T. W. DUKE, JR.
John S. Mosby, one of the greatest partisan leaders of mod- ern times, was born at the home of his grandfather, James Mc- Laurine, in Powhatan County, Virginia. When he was a child his father purchased a farm near Charlottesville in Albemarle County, and upon this farm Colonel Mosby was raised. He was educated at private schools and at the early age of sixteen entered the University of Virginia. Here he showed quite an aptitude for languages, graduating in Greek. An unfortunate altercation with a man named Turpin, in which Colonel Mosby shot him, led to his conviction of unlawful shooting and a fine. and imprisonment. Had the law at that time allowed Mosby to
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testify, there would have been very little doubt of his acquittal. The fine was remitted and he was pardoned by the Governor. The Attorney for the Commonwealth, Judge Wm. J. Robert- son, although he prosecuted young Mosby with unusual vigor, took great interest in him, visited him frequently while in jail, and lent him law books. So well did he use his time, that on leaving his prison he received a license to practice law, and in 1855 moved to Bristol, Virginia, where he opened a law office and soon began a very successful practice.
At the outbreak of the War between the States Colonel Mosby promptly volunteered in a cavalry company and was later in Colonel (afterwards General) J. E. B. Stuart's regiment, and was in the First Battle of Manassas and subsequently was with Stuart in his famous ride around Mcclellan. For valuable services in that ride he was recommended for a captaincy by Stuart. In January, 1863, he organized his celebrated battalion, which became one of the most valuable arms of the service. He was commissioned Captain and recommended by General Lee to the President for a major's commission.
The deeds of Mosby and his magnificent regiment are too many and too full of incident to allow more than a reference. Suffice it to say that they threw dismay and anxiety into the campaigns of. the Federal troops in Virginia, and in the lan- guage of Sheridan, Mosby's men were the most redoubtable partisans he ever met. History has immortalized them.
He was promoted from time to time and his battalion grew into a regiment of the most daring, fearless and splendid sol- diers the world has ever seen. Their gallant commander led them into battle, was wounded time and again, and when the war closed he was a colonel, having been desperately wounded late in 1864 and commissioned as Colonel January 6th, 1865. He surrendered his command on April 21st, 1865. He was not paroled until February 6th, 1866, and was subjected to much petty annoyance by the Federal authorities.
He resumed the practice of law in Warrenton, Virginia, and was appointed consul to Hong Kong by President Hayes, serving in that position until 1885, when he became attorney for the Southern Pacific Railroad and remained in the service of that
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Company, living in California, for some sixteen years. Re- turning to Virginia he divded his time between his old home, Warrenton, and Washington, dying in the latter city on May 30th, 1916.
Colonel Mosby was a superb soldier, a stainless gentleman, loved to idolatry by his men, and dying he left behind him a memory of which any man might be proud. To know him was to love and admire him, and one of the most precious posses- sions of the writer of this brief sketch is a letter written but a short time before his death, in which the Colonel said, speaking of a visit to Albemarle: "I am a rich man-the reception I re- ceived in dear old Albemarle, where I was raised, was proof to me that I possess some things that gold cannot buy." And he had that which nothing can buy-fame-love-immortality.
COLONEL WM. ELISHA PETERS, A. M., LL. D. BY PROF. F. H. SMITH.
He was born in Bedford County, Virginia, August 18th, 1829. He died at the University of Virginia, March 22nd, 1906. He was educated at the New London Academy ; graduated at Emory and Henry College; studied at the University of Virginia, and for two years at the University of Berlin. He was Professor of Latin and Greek at Emory and Henry from 1852, resigning to enter the Confederate service, as private, in 1861. He was quickly promoted, finally becoming Colonel of the Twenty-first Regiment of Cavalry. He surrendered at Appomattox in 1865. He was elected Professor of Latin at the University of Virginia in 1866, resigning his chair in 1902.
Of his merit as a Latinist, a colleague does not presume to speak ; but he impressed us as one who passed by grammars and drew his inspiration from the immediate well of Latin unde- filed. He studied not Kuehner, but Cicero. His value as pro- fessor extended far beyond his classes. Many a bright fellow, giving way for a time, was put again on the right path by his timely and kindly counsel; how many, eternity only will show.
Especially attentive was he to the sons of old friends. These had always a welcome to his office for advice and to his dwell-
448800
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ing for hospitality. He was a noble man, just suited to his place. When the occasion arises, Virginia seems always to have the fitting person.
I may give two characteristic pictures from his life:
When General Early invaded Pennsylvania and drew near to Chambersburg, he sent a written order, through General Bradey Johnson, to Colonel Peters, to march his regiment into the city and burn it. Colonel Peters refused, saying that he had enlisted to fight men, not women and children. He was ar- rested, deprived of his sword, and exposed to court martial and death. His wise and gallant general found a way to save a no- ble officer and yet carry out General Early's order. He passed the order to another colonel, who had no scruples in the mat- ter. Chambersburg was burned, as Virginia towns had been. After the war a great newspaper of Philadelphia offered Col- onel Peters a large sum to give his own account.of the matter. He promptly declined the offer, because he did not wish for praise of the act from the North.
Colonel Peters had that mark of a genuine teacher, in giving supreme eminence to his own chair, in the scheme of education. A witty colleague reports a walk he took with Colonel Peters on a moonlight night. After a long silence,which any one else would have broken by some reference to the sky, the Colonel exclaimed with a deep sigh, "Ah! I fear much those boys will miss that delicate use of the subjunctive." If the joke was not true, it was well invented.
COLONEL JOHN BOWIE STRANGE.
BY R. T. W. DUKE, JR.
Colonel John Bowie Strange was born in the year 1823 in Fluvanna County, Virginia. He entered the Virginia Military Institute in 1842 and was one of the first graduates of that in- stitution.
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