(1822-89) Graduated in the celebrated West Point class of 1846. During the Mexican War he served as a lieutenant of dragoons and was captured and held prisoner for eight days while making a reconnaissance near Buena Vista. After the Mexican War he took part in a number of Indian campaigns out west. At the start of the Civil War he was in command at Fort Smith, Arkansas. Many of his officers defected to the Confederacy; however Sturgis refused to surrender and managed to march his troops with much of the government property to Fort Leavenworth. Taking part...  

(1802-86) Graduated in the West Point class of 1822. Hunter was invited by President Elect Abraham Lincoln to travel with him on the inaugural train to Washington in Feb. 1861. Selected for high command by Lincoln himself, Hunter became the 4th highest ranking officer in the volunteer army. His field service included the 1st battle of Bull Run where he was wounded, the battle of Secessionville, S.C., and the battle of Piedmont. He was also known for his 1862 order to abolish slavery in the Department of the South; an order that was instantly repudiated by...  

(1829-92) Graduated from the University of Pennsylvania's Medical School in 1850. The following year he accepted an appointment as assistant surgeon in the U.S. Army and served at various points on the western frontier until 1860. He was then stationed at Fort Moultrie in Charleston Harbor and later Fort Sumter, where he had command of a battery during the bombardment which signaled the start of the Civil War. Soon after, he vacated his staff commission by becoming major of the newly authorized 13th U.S. Infantry. During the Shenandoah Valley campaign of...  

(1818-1885) Graduated from the West Point class of 1838. From 1841 to 1845 he taught tactics at the U. S. Military Academy and many of the students he taught went on to become Confederate generals who haunted him on the battlefields of the Civil War. He was awarded the rank of brevet captain for gallantry at the battle of Buena Vista during the Mexican War. He was appointed brigadier general May 14, 1861. By July, political pressure demanded an advance by his half trained army on the Rebels under the command of General P.G.T. Beauregard at Manassas...  

(1815-1872) Graduated in the West Point class of 1835, and won a brevet in the Mexican War. He fought in the 1862 Virginia Peninsular campaign and the Seven Days battles being very severely wounded at Glendale. He recovered in time to see action at 2nd Bull Run, South Mountain, Antietam, Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville. Elevated to command of the Army of the Potomac, he defeated General Robert E. Lee at Gettysburg and went on to fight in all of their battles culminating in the surrender at Appomattox Court House.

Wet plate, albumen carte de...  

(1816-90) Graduated from the Norwich Academy in Vermont. He served in the Mexican War as captain of a company of the 1st Indiana Volunteers. At the outbreak of the Civil War he was appointed colonel of the 9th Indiana Infantry. After taking part in McClellan's West Virginia campaign, he was promoted to brigadier general of volunteers on Sept. 3, 1861, and major general to rank from Nov. 29, 1862. He commanded the Cheat Mountain district for a time and then was engaged in the Shenandoah Valley campaign of 1862. He later commanded an "Independent...