William Allin Archer, Class of 1862

Archer graduated with the final class before the college closed for the duration of the war in early 1863. He enlisted as a private in Co. A of the 3rd VA Cavalry, the Boydton Cavalry, the company many of his schoolmates had already joined. He was captured near Fredericksburg, VA  at the end of April, 1863 and sent first to Old Capital Prison in Washington, DC and then to Fort Delaware, DE. Archer was paroled in May, 1863. There is some  evidence that he was transferred to a Georgia unit in July, 1864, but this has not yet been verified.

After the war, he attended medical school at the University of Virginia, graduating in 1869. He was practicing medicine in Chesterfield County, VA in 1870 but later moved to Texas, where he practiced in Houston for many years. Archer died on July 6, 1922 and is buried in Houston's Glenwood Cemetery.

Thomas Walter Blake, Class of 1843

Blake, who became a lawyer in North Carolina in 1843, moved to Texas shortly thereafter. He served as state's attorney for the 1st District Court in northeast Texas for many years, but gave up law in 1857 to became a Methodist minister, serving several churches in Leon County, TX as a circuit rider. The census  indicates he owned 11 slaves in 1850, and by 1860 it was 17 slaves.

Blake enlisted in 1861 and was given command of the 17th Brigade Texas State Troops, serving as Brigadier General until his resignation in 1863, when he returned to preaching. He died on January 14, 1905 and is buried in Plantersville, TX in the Plantersville Cemetery. A second grave monument commemorating him was erected in the Texas State Cemetery in Austin, TX.

John Wesley Watts, student 1858-1861

 John Wesley Watts, known as Wesley, enlisted as a lieutenant in Co. F of the 25th Battalion VA Cavalry. Watts was mortally wounded at the the Battle of Brandy Station on June 9, 1863. He died on June 22, 1863 and is buried in the Watts cemetery on Route 600 near Preddy's Creek, Stony Point, Albemarle County, VA.

Lucius E. Barrow, student 1861-1862

Barrow enlisted in Captain Allen's Company, the Lunenburg Artillery, on August 30, 1862. He was furloughed in September 1863 due to General Debility caused by recurring fever. He was paroled at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865. His first name on some military records was improperly transcribed as "Lavewers E Barrow."

After the war, he returned to Nottoway County where he was a farmer in 1870. Sometime before 1907 he had moved to Cleburne, TX, when he appears as a business owner in city directories and where he was an abstracter of land titles in the 1910 census. Barrow died May 8, 1915 and is buried in Cleburne Memorial Cemetery.

Frazier Furr, student 1867-1868

Furr enlisted on November 6, 1862 as a sergeant in Co. A of the 17th Battalion VA Cavalry, which in February, 1863 became Co. K of the 11th VA Cavalry. He was paroled on May 6, 1865 in Winchester, VA, where his rank is listed as private.On his parole paper, he signs as "Frasier."

Furr attended R-MC in the final year in its Boydton location. He became a Methodist minister in the Baltimore Conference, serving primarily in the Shenandoah Valley and northern Virginia. Furr died on September 6, 1923 and is buried in Staunton, VA in Thornrose Cemetery.

Peter Fletcher Ford, Class of 1860 (A.M.)

Ford, known as Fletcher, enlisted as a corporal on May 29, 1861 in Co. F of the 20th VA Infantry, which later became Co. A of the 57th VA Infantry. On February 28, 1863, he was in temporary command of the company. He was promoted to 2nd lieutenant on July 30, 1862. Ford was killed on July 3, 1863 during the Battle of Gettysburg.

Edwin Gaston Moore, Class of 1857 (A.B.) and 1860 (A.M.)

Edwin Moore, older brother of Portius Aurelius Moore, was a Professor of Languages in Pitt County, N.C. in 1860. He enlisted in Co. A of the 24th NC Infantry as a private in Person County, NC on August 1, 1862. He was promoted to sergeant on May 1, 1863. Moore was wounded on April 18, 1864 during the Battle of Plymouth (NC) and was transferred on December 13, 1864 to the Veteran Reserve Corps.

He returned to Person County, NC after the war, where he was a teacher in 1870. By 1873, Moore had moved to Atlanta, GA, where he taught school. Moore died on July 15, 1904 and is buried in the Stephen Moore Cemetery in Person County, NC.

Moore's account of the Battle of Plymouth entitled  "Ransom's Brigade--Its Gallant Conduct in the Capture of Plymouth, North Carolina in April 1864" appeared in the Richmond Dispatch on February 25, 1901. It was reprinted after his death in the Southern Historical Society Papers, v. 36, 1908.

John Wesley Taylor, Class of 1860

Taylor was a teacher in Rockingham County, VA, at the beginning of the war. He enlisted as a private in Co. F of the 2nd Virginia Infantry on April 16, 1862. Taylor was reported as a deserter from his regiment on June 15, 1862 at Port Republic, Rockingham County, VA. He was arrested on March 8, 1863 and detailed to work in an iron foundry, where he remained at least through April 1864, when the records end.

After the war, he returned to teaching in Rockingham County, an occupation he was still practicing in 1910. He died on November 22, 1922 and is buried in Lacey Springs Cemetery in Rockingham County, VA.

Thomas Carter Johnson, Class of 1842 (A.B.), 1847 (A.M.) and President 1866-1868

Johnson, who had been a teacher, lawyer, and state legislator in Missouri prior to the war, served as a volunteer aid to General Sterling Price in 1862, during which time his rank is listed as lieutenant colonel. A letter from the Missouri governor to the CSA Secretary of War in early 1863 asks that Johnson be given a position in the Quartermaster or Paymaster departments. Johnson became a Special Agent in  the Quartermasters department, and he was given the charge in the summer of 1863 to establish and oversee a wagon manufacturing factory, the Government Transportation Works, in Columbus, GA. 

At the end of the war, Johnson relocated to Montgomery, AL where he practiced law until he was elected to the presidency of Randolph-Macon College in the fall of 1866, taking office in December 1866 and also serving as Professor of Moral Philosophy. Colonel Johnson, as he was known, resigned in the summer of 1868 preceding the college's move to Ashland, and was mortally injured in August 1868 on his journey home to his family in St. Louis, MO when he was crushed under a train car in Illinois, dying some hours later.

John T. Humphreys, Class of 1859

Humphreys was in Europe when the war began, studying the natural sciences in Oxford, Madrid, and Berlin, where he earned a Ph.D. at the University of Berlin prior to returning to the C.S.A. Humphreys enlisted as a private in Co. C of the 12th N.C. Infantry in March, 1864. He was wounded in the face during the Battle of Spotsylvania Courthouse on May 19, 1864, fracturing his some of his facial bones. He was discharged due to disability on February 14, 1865 as his wound left him "unable to eat camp rations." He was paroled on April 15, 1865 in Lynchburg, VA.

After the war, he was acknowledged as an expert in the study of lepidoptera (moths and butterflies) and also published geological studies of North Carolina. He died in 1882 due in part to the effects of his war wounds.