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The War in Their Words: This Great Struggle

by Susannah J. Ural

A Confederate Surgeon kept his faith in his cause during the war’s last days. Dr. Francis Marion Robertson was a prominent figure in Charleston, S.C., when the Civil War began. A politically active Whig and friend of Henry Clay, Robertson was an early supporter of secession who would serve the Confederacy along with his five sons. Robertson had some military training—he attended the U.S. Military Academy at West Point from 1822 to 1826, though he did not graduate, and he led a militia company in the Second Seminole War.

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Rebel Pariah: General Roswell Ripley

by Robert K. Krick

General Roswell Ripley couldn’t get along with anyone.
Not even Robert E. Lee.
For nearly four years Roswell Sabine Ripley wore the wreath and three stars of a Confederate general officer, despite being an unmistakable Yankee by any definition. He hardly fit the image of the gallant Southern officer nobly defending the “Lost Cause,” even expressing distaste for Robert E. Lee, which put him in limited company among Confederate general officers. After the war, he earned an even more unusual credential: the only former Rebel general tapped by the Chinese to serve in the Far East.