436 Southern Historical Society Papers.
Maryland had no reason to suppose that her sons had degenerated from the days of Otho Williams, John Eager Howard, and William Smallwood, when the Mexican war brought out such men as Ring- gold, the first organizer of horse artillery; Ridgely, his dashing successor; and Charley May, the hero of the cavalry charge upon the Mexican battery.
Coming down to the Civil War, the President on the Union side was a Southern-born man, his successor was born in North Carolina, and the commanding General, who first organized his troops, was a Virginian. His great War Secretary, the Carnot of that day, was born in Edgecombe county, North Carolina, though he would never admit it.
The Union Generals who struck us the heaviest blows, next to those of Grant and Sherman, were from our own soil. From West Point there came forth forty-five graduates of Southern birth, who became Federal Generals. I have their names, from George H. Thomas and George Sykes to David Hunter and John Pope, with the States of their nativity, viz : George H. Thomas, Va.; George Sykes, Del.; E. O. C. Ord, Md.; R. C. Buchanan, Md.; E. R. S. Canby, Ky. ; Jesse L. Reno, Va. ; John Newton, Va.; R. W. John- son, Ky.; J. J. Reynolds, Ky. ; J. M. Brannan, D. C.; John Buford, Ky.; Thomas J. Wood, Ky.; John W. Davidson, Va.; John C. Tid- ball, Va. ; Alvan C. Gillenn, Tenn. ; William R. Terrill, Va. ; A. T.
A. Torbert, Del.; Samuel L. Carroll, D. C. ; N. B. Buford, Ky.; Alfred Pleasanton, D. C.; O. M. Mitchell, Ky.; George W. Getty, D. C. ; William Hayes, Va.; A. B. Dyer, Va. ; John J. Abercrombie, Tenn.; Robert Anderson, Ky. ; Robert Williams, Va.; Henry E. Maynadier, Va.; Kenner Garrard, Ky. ; H. C. Bankhead, Md.; H. C. Gibson, Md.; John C. McFerran, Ky.; B. S. Alexander, Ky.; E.
B. Alexander, Ky.; Washington Seawell, Va.; P. S. Cook, Va.; G. R. Paul, Mo.; W. H. Emory, Md.; R. H. K. Whitely, Md.; W. H. French, Md.; H. D. Wallen, Mo.; J. L. Donaldson, Md.; Fred T. Dent, Mo.; David Hunter, Va. ; John Pope, Ky. Most of these were good officers, and some of them were superb. I could name six or eight of them who did the very best they could for their native land by going on the Federal side. In addition to these forty-five West Point Southerners in the Federal army, some of the high offi- cers of that army were born in the South, but not educated at West Point; Joseph R. Hawley (now Senator from Connecticut), John C. Fremont, the three Cnttendens, Frank Blair, &c.
If we come to the United States Navy, we find abundant proof of
