James Read Branch, Class of 1848

Branch, son of long-time R-MC trustee Thomas Branch and brother of Thomas Plummer Branch and William Addison Branch, enlisted as a captain on May 11, 1861 in the Lee Life Guard of the 4th Battalion VA Infantry, also known as Captain James R. Branch's Company of the 12th VA Infantry. On July 1, 1861 this company became Co. K of the 16th VA Infantry. Branch transferred as captain with his company to the VA Light Artillery at his request on March 18, 1862. He was promoted to Major on May 14, 1863 and to Lieutenant Colonel on August 25, 1863. In March of 1865, he was retired from duty and was assigned to the Invalid Corps, not having been with his command since April 1864 due to an injury (leg broken in three places) sustained in Plymouth, NC. On March 31, 1865, he was assigned to the Ordnance Department in Richmond. This order was revoked the following day on the eve of the evacuation and fall of the city.  He was paroled at Greensboro, NC on May 1, 1865.

Prior to the war, Branch had been a teacher in Lunenburg County and then a banker and merchant in Petersburg, VA with a family firm, Thomas Branch and Sons. After the war, he was in banking in Thomas Branch and Sons in Richmond, VA. He was killed in a suspension bridge collapse on the James River on July 2, 1869. He is buried in Richmond, VA in Hollywood Cemetery.

Benjamin James Hawthorne, student 1858-1861

Hawthorne enlisted as 2nd lieutenant in Co. G of the 38th VA Infantry on December 11, 1861. He was wounded in the left arm in the Battle of Gettysburg during Pickett's Charge. He was promoted to captain on November 15, 1863, although he had previously served as captain from March-June 1863 int he absence of his captain. He was detailed from late November 1864 to early January 1865 as an enrolling officer. He surrendered at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865.

Afte the war, he moved to Baton Rouge, LA and taught at Collegiate Institute. He went to West Tennessee College in 1869 and served as its president in 1872. In 1873, Hawthorne moved to Corvallis, OR to teach at Corvallis College at the request of the college's president, Benjamin Lee Arnold, also an R-MC alumnus and veteran of the 38th VA Infantry. Corvallis College later became Oregon State University. Hawthorne moved to the University of Oregon in Eugene, OR in 1884, where he founded the psychology department. During his years as a college professor he taught numerous subjects including Latin and Greek, agriculture, English literature, psychology, mathematics, and chemistry. He retired from the university in 1908 and became a lawyer, passing the bar in 1911 and practicing nearly until his death at age 90. He died on February 3, 1928 and is buried in Masonic Cemetery in Eugene, OR.

Gideon Hunt Macon, student early 1850s

Macon, whose grandfather was the younger brother of Nathaniel Macon, after whom the college was named, attended medical school at the University of Pennsylvania after leaving R-MC, graduating in 1854. He practiced medicine first in Warren County, NC and then in Halifax County, NC, where he was residing at the outbreak of the war. In 1861, he served as assistant surgeon for the 14th NC Infantry.  He assisted in the organization and outfitting of Co. A of this regiment, the Roanoke Minute Men, and signed documents as Lieutenant, Commissary, and Quartermaster of the company. Later biographies indicate he was surgeon for the 1st NC Regulars from February 2, 1862 through 1864, although on May 3, 1862 he requested to be exempted from service due to the need form his medical services at home in Halifax County.  By 1864, he also was serving as Justice of the Peace for Halifax County, NC.

Thomas Amis, Jr., student 1857-1858

Amis (variantly spelled Amiss), from Ouachita, AR enlisted as a private in Co. G of the 3rd AR Cavalry. No further information on him or his family, who had lived in Kentucky in 1850 and Arkansas in 1860, has yet been found.

Waddy Street, student 1838-1839

Street, a farmer in Lunenburg County, VA, enlisted as a private in Co. G of the 9th VA Cavalry on June 9, 1861. He was discharged for disability on June 26, 1861 in Ashland, VA, the postwar home of R-MC. According to his widow's pension application, he had contracted a fever which settled into one leg and disabled him for life.  The surgeon examining him in 1861 at the training camp in Ashland, however, indicates obesity as the cause, stating that "he is so corpulent as to find great difficulty in mounting and dismounting his horse."

After the war, Street returned to farming in Lunenburg County, VA. Street was a teacher in Lunenburg County, VA in the 1880 census. He died May 8, 1895 and is buried in Richmond, VA in Hollywood Cemetery.

Francis Duval Koonce, student 1854-1855

Koonce, who attended the University of North Carolina and studied law after leaving R-MC, was commissioned captain in "Koonce's State Guerrillas," which became Co. K of the 61st NC Infantry, on April 29, 1862. He was absent without leave through the fall of 1862 due to illness, and resigned on February 3, 1863.There is some indication that Koonce was a mail contractor for the CSA later in the war.

He practiced law in Onslow County, NC after the war. Koonce ran unsuccesfully for Congress in the 1880s. He died on April 10, 1911 and is buried in the Koonce Cemetery at Richlands in Onslow County, NC.

Giles Harris, Jr., student 1860-1863

Harris enlisted in the Lunenburg (VA) Light Artillery as a private in January 25, 1863. On January 28, 1865, he transferred to Co. E of the 3rd VA Cavalry.

Harris moved to Kentucky after the war where he initially farmed. In 1880, he was attending medical school in Louisville, KY. He graduated from the Transylvania University Medical Department in 1880 and practiced in Madison County, KY. He died August 10, 1913 and is buried in Richmond Cemetery in Richmond, KY.

Erasmus Kennon Harris, student 1852-1853

Harris attended the University of Virginia after leaving R-MC and was practicing law in Clarksville, VA at the beginning of the war. He enlisted as a private in Co. E of the 14th VA Infantry on May 12, 1861. He was hospitalized in Williamsburg, VA in December 1861 and was discharged for disability on February 13, 1861.  He was commissioned 2nd lieutenant of Co. I , 38th VA Infantry on April 29, 1862, a company he had joined in March 1862. He resigned from this company on June 28, 1862 due to ill health resulting from chronic diarrhea. He applied for a position with the CSA Treasury Department.

After the war, he returned to Mecklenburg County, VA and practiced law. He is believed to have died around 1875.

Fleming J. Hancock, student 1850-1851

Hancock was a physician in Spotsylvania County, VA at the beginning of the war. he enlisted as a surgoon on an unknown date, however, on November 28, 1861, he was"relieved from duty at the Main street Hospital and is assigned to the Ambulance train for the transportation of the sick from Manassas to this city," this city being Richmond, VA. On August 19,1862, serving, he was appointed Acting Assistant Surgeon at General Hospital Camp Winder in Richmond, VA.

After the war, he continued to practice medicien in Spotsylvania County, VA. He died July 8, 1898 and is buried in Hardyville, Middlesex County, VA in the cemetery at Clarksbury United Methodist Church.

Leonidas O. Rives, Class of 1854 (A.B.) and 1857 (A.M.)

Rives, a lawyer in Memphis, TN, enlisted as a sergeant in Co. A of the 4th TN Infantry on May 15, 1861. He was severely wounded at the Battle of Perryville, KY on October 8, 1862 and taken prisoner, and was absent through at least May 1864. He surrendered on May 4, 1865 at Citronelle, AL and was paroled at Grenada, MS on May 18, 1865.

Rives returned to practicing law in Memphis, TN after the war, where he is listed in city directories until 1874. His date of death is unknown, although John Hallum's 1895 book The Diary of an Old Lawyer states "he abandoned his profession and removed to his farm near Mason's depot, where he led the life of a morose recluse, ending it in suicide."

Richmond E. LLoyd, student 1859-1861

Lloyd enlisted as a private in the Wilmington Light Infantry, which became Co. G of the 18th NC Infantry, on August 2, 1861. He was received a serious wound at Fredericksburg, VA on December 13, 1862 and was hospitalized in Richmond before being furloughed in February 1863 to recover at home in North Carolina. He was promoted to 2nd lieutenant on January 1, 1863. He was still absent from his company through the summer of 1863 and does not appear to have returned before being discharged for disability on February 1, 1864.

Lloyd was a farmer in North Carolina after the war. He died on May 29, 1913 and is buried in Bladen County, NC in the cemetery at Carvers Creek United Methodist Church.

James Edward Leary, student 1857-1860

Leary enlisted on April 1, 1862 as a corporal in Co. G of the 32nd NC Infantry. His rank was reduced to private on July 15, 1862. He transferred to Co. F of the 4th NC Cavalry on January 9, 1863. He was ordnance sergeant from February 28, 1863 through August 31, 1863.

He is listed as a lawyer in a 1906 directory of the fraternity directory Delta Psi.

William Covington Wall, student 1856-1857

Wall attended the University of Virginia after leaving R-MC. He enlisted in Co. D of the 23 NC Infantry on May 30, 1861. He was promoted to 2nd lieutenant on November 7, 1861.  When he was defeated for reelection as lieutenant on May 10, 1862, and was discharged from the company. He enlisted in Co. C of the 59th NC Infantry on July 7, 1862.  He was appointed 2nd lieutenant of Co. F of the 23rd NC Infantry on May 22, 1863. In March and April 1864, he was serving extra duty as Assistant Surgeon. Wall was promoted to 1st lieutenant on May 6, 1864 and to captain on May 10, 1864. Wall surrendered and was paroled April 9, 1865 at Appomattox Court House, VA.

After the war, Wall completed medical school at Pennsylvania Medical College and then moved to DeSoto County, MS in 1867 where he practiced medicine and farmed. He died on July 2, 1910 and is buried in Hernando Memorial Park, in Hernando, DeSoto County, MS.

Jesse Powell HiIliard, student 1861-1862

Hilliard enlisted in Co. G of the 47th NC Infantry on May 20, 1862. He furnished a substitute and was discharged on or before August 1, 1862.

After the war, he farmed in Washington County, NC, where he was a county commissioner in 1890 and a Justice of the Peace in 1901. Hilliard died on June 1, 1902 and is buried in Plymouth, Washington County, NC in Garrett's Island Cemetery.

Richard Walker Griswold, student 1844-1845

Griswold was a farmer in Dinwiddie County, Va when he enlisted as a private on May 29, 1861 in Co. I of the 3rd VA Cavalry. He was hospitalized in Chimborazo Hospital in Richmond, Va in May 1862 for diarrhea. He was discharged September 9, 1862 to serve as a Justice of the Peace.

After the war, he returned to Dinwiddie County, VA and farmed. He is listed as a farmer and merchant in the 1880 census. He died in 1888 and is buried in the Abernathey Cemetery in Dinwiddie County, VA.

James Drury Proctor, Class of 1853 (A.B.) and 1856 (A.M.)

Proctor enlisted in Co. F of the 5th VA Cavalry, the Prince George Cavalry, on April 20, 1861 as a private. This later became Co. F of the 13th VA Cavalry. He was hospitalized at Episcopal Church Hospital in Williamsburg, Va on March 27, 1864 with chronic diarrhea. He is listed on the register of the South Carolina Hospital in Petersburg, VA dated April 1, 1864 as "At C Proctors on Washington St." Proctor returned to his company on August 1, 1864. The November-December 1864 company roll lists him as "Detailed as clerk for Court Martial."

After the war, he returned to Prince George County and farmed and worked in the railroad industry. In 1900, he was postmaster. Proctor died on August 3, 1900 and is buried in Petersburg, VA in Blandford Cemetery.

Robert L. Ragland, student 1846-1847

Ragland, a farmer in Halifax County, VA before the war, enlisted March 8, 1862 as 1st lieutenant of Captain Wright's Company (Co. C) of De Gournay's Battalion Heavy Artillery, the Halifax (VA) Artillery.  He resigned in June 1862 to join the quartermaster's department.

After the war, he returned to farming in Halifax County, VA. Ragland died on March 13, 1893 and is buried in Shady Grove Cemetery in Halifax County, VA.

Joseph W. Paup, student 1855-1856

Paup, a farmer in Hempstead County, AR in 1860, was commissioned as lieutenant in Co. B of the 4th AR Infantry on August 17, 1861. He resigned on September 16, 1861. In February 1863, he is listed as Adjutant and Inspector General to General James Fleming Fagan, commander of the 2nd Brigade, Hindman's Division. In July 1863, he is listed as Acting Brigade Inspector on the staff of General Fagan.

After the war, Paup was a merchant in Hempstead County, AR in the 1870 census. He died on January16, 1876.

Emmett Arrington Drewry, student 1855-1856

Drewry attended the Medical College of Virginia after leaving R-MC and graduated in 1860 from Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia. He was practicing medicine in Southampton County, VA when he enlisted as a private in Co. B of the 9th VA Infantry on September 20, 1861. He was commissioned 2nd lieutenant on May 8, 1862. From August -December 1862 he was enrolling conscripts, and was commanding the company in April 1863.  He resigned on August 25, 1863. He was appointed Assistant Surgeon in February 1864 with the rank to date back to August 4, 1863. He had been required to report for hospital duty on August 10, 1863, and starting on August 11, 1863, he served first in the Poplar Lawn hospital and then in the South Carolina hospital, both in Petersburg, VA. On October 11, 1864, he was relieved from duty in Petersburg, VA and sent to North Carolina, where he worked in hospitals in Salisbury, Greensboro, and Raleigh. He was captured while on duty at the hospital in Raleigh, NC on April 13, 1865 and paroled on May 11, 1865.

Drewry returned to Southampton County, VA and practiced medicine after the war. He died July 8, 1891 and is buried in the Drewry Family cemetery in Drewryville, in Southampton County, VA.

Benjamin C. Hartsook, student 1860-1861

Hartsook enlisted in Co. D of the 19th VA Infantry as a private on April 19, 1861. He was hospitalized for "debility" at Chimborazo in Richmond, VA from April 13- April 29, 1862. He furnished a substitute, Daniel Bonham, on August 7, 1862 and was discharged. The substitute died of disease at Chimborazo in 1863.

After the war, Hartsook went into the insurance business in Richmond, VA. He died on July 30, 1898 and is buried in Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond, VA.

Clifton A. Hamner, student 1859-1861

Hamner enlisted in the Charlotte (VA) Light Artillery on September 23, 1861. He was promoted to sergeant on April 1, 1862, to 2nd lieutenant on May 23, 1862 and to 1st lieutenant on December 31, 1864. He was paroled at Greensboro, NC on April 29, 1865.

After the war, he remained in North Carolina, where he was a salesman in High Point in 1880 and 1900. He is listed in the 1911 city directory in Asheville, NC as a traveling salesamn. He died on November 10, 1916 and is buried in Oakwood Cemetery in Iredell County, NC.

James M. Fitts, student 1862-1863

James Monroe Fitts. Jr. enlisted at the age of 16 in Co. F of the 12th Virginia Infantry as a private on April 18, 1861. He was discharged for being underage on May 17, 1862. He was then sent in 1862 to R-MC, his father James M. Fitt's alma mater (A.B. 1838, A.M. 1841). The college closed in February 1863 for the duration of the war, and on February 20, 1863, Fitts enlisted in Co. A of the 3rd VA Cavalry (the Boydton Cavalry) as a private. He is listed as AWOL in the summer of 1863 but his horse had been killed in action near Aldie, VA in June 1863, so he was likely procuring another mount. He had returned by September 1863. Fitts lost another horse in October, 1863 in battle at Raccoon's Ford, VA. He was hospitalized in Charlottesville, VA in December 1864 with impetigo, was in a hospital in Richmond in February, and listed as deserted on March 16, 1865.

He was a farmer in Mecklenburg County, VA in 1870. By 1880, he had returned to Warren County, NC where he was still farming. He died January 24, 1910 and is buried in Fairview Cemetery in Warrenton, NC.

James Waddy Davis, student 1861-1862

Davis attended the Medical College of Virginia after leaving R-MC, graduating in the spring 1864. On August 9, 1864, he was joined as Acting Assistant Surgeon. He was assigned to prison hospitals in Richmond, including the prison hospital at Belle Isle in Richmond, VA. In October, he was attached to the 46th VA Infantry On November 13, 1864, he was sent to the General Receiving Hospital in Gordonsville, VA for duty, where he remained until December 18, 1864. He was captured near Amelia Court House, VA on April 3, 1865 and sent to City Point, VA and then to Newport News, VA in late April. On April 28, 1865 he was sent to Old Capitol Prison in Washington, D.C., from which he was released on May 9, 1865 after taking the oath of allegiance.

After the war, he practiced medicine in Hanover County until 1874, when he moved to St. Charles County, MO, where he practiced medicine until 1877. He then became editor of the local newspaper Cosmos. He moved to Roanoke, VA in 1888 and became editor of the Roanoke Daily Times, and continued as a newspaper editor. He died in 1924.

Francis Withers Capers, student 1835-1836

Capers attended and graduated from the College of Charleston after leaving R-MC. He was a professor at The Citadel, Transylvania University, and then was appointed superintendent at The Citadel in 1853.  In September 1859, he became Superintendent of the new Georgia Military Academy in Marietta, GA.At the onset of the war, he was responsible for training GA troops. On November 11, 1861, he was appointed brigadier general, charged with guarding the coast. He returned to Georgia Military Academy a year later, but by 1863 was in charge of creating defensive works in Northern Georgia and was teaching military tactics and engineering. He commanded his cadets at the Battle of Atlanta and at other battles in Georgia.

The Georgia Military Institute had been destroyed in the war, so Capers opened his own school in 1865.  He went to the College of Charleston in 1869, where he was a professor of mathematics and civil engineering until 1889, also serving as president 1880-1882. He died January 12, 1891 and is buried in Charleston, SC in Bethel United Methodist Church Cemetery.

Abraham F. Cox, student 1853-1854

Cox was a physician in Westmoreland County, VA when he enlisted on May 25, 1861as a sergeant in Co. C of the 9th VA Cavalry. By November 1861, his rank is listed as private. He was taken prisoner on July3, 1863 at Gettysburg and sent to Fort McHenry, MD and then to the prison camp at Fort Delaware, DE.  He was paroled July 30, 1863, and returned to his company. Cox was shot in the left arm at Nance's Shop, VA on June 24, 1864, and hospitalized at Chimborazo in Richmond, VA.

After the war, Cox became a dentist  in Baltimore, MD and then in Alexandria, VA. He died September 16, 1902 and is buried in Saint Paul's Cemetery in Alexandria, VA.

Robert S. Jones, student 1858-1861

Jones, younger brother of Richard Watson Jones, John Randolph Jones, and William Mordecai Jones, enlisted as a private in Co. F of the 12th VA Infantry on June 6, 1861. He transferred to Co. I of the 12th VA Infantry, commanded by his older brother Richard, on May 1, 1862. He was wounded on June 1, 1862 at the Battle of Seven Pines, VA and hospitalized, then sent home to recover until the end of 1862. He was detailed in early 1863 to enroll conscripts, and was then detailed in May 1863 to the Provost Marshal in Weldon, NC. The letter of support from his brother and commanding office, Richard W. Jones, and the letter confirming disability for field service from the regiment's surgeon, James W. Claiborne, indicate Robert S. Jones was a sergeant at that time. He died of disease at home in Hicksford, Greensville County, VA (now part of Emporia, VA) on July 11, 1863.

John Randolph Jones, student 1853-1854

Jones received his M.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1858 and was practicing medicine in Greenville County at the start of the war. He enlisted as a private in Co. F of the 12th VA Infantry on June 6, 1861. He was promoted to corporal on August 20, 1861. On November 24, 1861, his rank was reduced to private at his request and he was detailed on hospital duty. During much of 1862, he was sick with chronic dysentery and was deemed unable to return to field service. He was discharged from the 12th VA Infantry and promoted to hospital steward on December 23, 1862.  He was appointed Assistant Surgeon on June 1, 1864, with the appointment retroactive to December 29, 1863. He was paroled in Albany, GA on May 16, 1865.

Dr. Jones returned to Hicksford, Greenville County, VA, now part of Emporia, VA, and farmed and practiced medicine. His widow's pension application states that he died of kidney disease on March 24, 1904. His obituary in the Journal of the American Medical Association lists the date of death as March 25, and his tombstone indicates the death date as March 27. He is buried in Emporia Cemetery in Emporia, VA.

William Mordecai Jones, Class of 1860

Jones, the younger brother of Richard Watson Jones, was teaching school when he enlisted on May 4, 1861 as a private in the Greensville Guard, which became Co. F of the 5th Battalion VA Infantry. He was discharged on May 16, 1862. An 1888 biographical sketch in Brock's Virginia and Virginians indicates he served in Petersburg, VA in the Quartermaster Department for the remainder of the war.

After the war, Jones taught from 1865-1871 at Wesleyan Female College. He then moved to Norfolk, Va and became a partner in the commission merchant firm of Jones, Lee, and Co. A prominent businessman, he also served as chairman of the Norfolk school board and was the treasurer for the board of the city water commissioners. He died April 15, 1908 and is buried in Elmwood Cemetery in Norfolk, VA.

Thomas Crawford Campbell, student 1856-1857

Campbell was working as an apothecary in Petersburg, VA in 1860. He enlisted as a private in Co. E of the 12th VA Infantry on March 22, 1862. He was detailed to the Medical Purveyor's Office in Wilmington, NC and spent the next 2 years acquiring medical supplies. In 1864 he was appointed hospital steward and served as apothecary after his regiment recalled him and he was given a certificate of disability due to rheumatism.

He was a grocery clerk in Petersburg, VA in 1870, and was working as a clerk at the time of his death. He died on October 31, 1895 and is buried in Petersburg, VA in Blandford Cemetery.

Richard Dabney Thackston, student 1859-1861

Thackston enlisted as a private on August 17, 1861 in Co. D of the 18th VA Infantry. In 1862, he transferred to Co. F of the 18th VA Infantry upon reenlistment. In June and August he is listed as sick and absent, and in October 1862 he was detailed to the hospital at Camp Lee in Richmond,VA, as a nurse, staying until at least February 1863.  By April, he was again back with his company.  He was taken prisoner at Gettysburg on July 3, 1863 and sent to the prison camp at Fort Delaware, DE, where he remained until he was exchanged on February 8, 1865 upon taking the oath of allegiance.

Oliver H. P. Terrell, student 1850-1851

Terrell, a farmer in Orange County at the beginning of the war, enlisted in the Albemarle (VA) Light Artillery as a private on July 15, 1861. He was discharged for disability due to rheumatism on July 29, 1861. A letter in support of his discharge indicates he was prone to "violent and frequent attacks of inflammatory rheumatism, brough on by the slightest exertion." In 1862, a Confederate field hospital was located on Terrell's farm. On August 1, 1863, he became a private in Co. D of the 20th VA Battalion Heavy Artillery, probably conscripted back into the service. He was detailed as a clerk to Major Selden from October 16, 1863 until at least April 1864, when he was detailed as an "agriculturalist," returning to his farm "Glencoe," near Grodonsville, VA. Numerous receipts for crops received by the Confederates from Terrell still exist. Terrell was considered AWOL after Dec. 19, 1864 when his detail was expired and on February 26, 1865, his captain requested that Terrell's detail be revoked and that Terrell return to the company. By late March of 1865, Terrell was again requesting to be examined for discharge due to disability.

Afte rthe war, he returned to farming in Orange County, VA, moving to Louisa County by 1900. He died on March 22, 1922 and is buried in the Terrell Family Cemetery off Route 732 in Orange, County, VA.