Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 3.djvu/1272

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1192
CONFEDERATE MILITARY HISTORY.

campaign shared the fighting of his division from May 5th until it was almost entirely destroyed on the morning of May 12th at the "bloody angle," on the field of Spottsylvania. Escaping this disaster he fought under Gordon at Cold Harbor, marched with Early to the relief of Lynchburg, and after the latter campaign, having so lost his voice that he could not serve efficiently in command, he was detailed as enrolling officer in Botetourt county. He was there on duty at the end of hostilities in Virginia, when Lee surrendered at Appomattox on April 9th.

Richard H. Strattan, the great-grandson of an artillery officer of the Revolutionary war, and a veteran of Fitz Lee's cavalry, was born at Staunton, Va., February 13, 1844. At the beginning of hostilities in 1861, he was but a little past seventeen years of age and had received a good education at Lexington and Charlottesville, and was employed in a drug store at the latter place. In the latter part of 1861 he began service in the Confederate field hospital, and in February, 1862, having reached his eighteenth birthday, he enlisted as a private in Company I of the Fifth Virginia cavalry, beginning a career of faithful and gallant service which continued until he was paroled at Appomattox. This was Colonel Rosser's old regiment, and was attached to Robertson's and later to Fitzhugh Lee's brigade of Stuart's cavalry. He participated in many battles and skirmishes, prominent among which were the famous engagements at Frayser's Farm, Second Manassas, Sharpsburg, Brandy Station, the Wilderness, Five Forks and Farmville. On June 17, 1863, at Aldie, Va., he was captured by the enemy, and was subsequently confined about two months in the Old Capitol prison at Washington before he was exchanged. After the close of the war he returned to Albemarle county and farmed for one season, then making his residence at Gordonsville, where he has since resided. He soon embarked in the drug business, and is now one of the leading business men of the town. He has taken an active part in the work of organization of the survivors of the glorious army of Northern Virginia, and was one of the prime movers in the formation of William S. Grymes camp, No. 724, U. C. V., and No. 35, Virginia, at Gordonsville, of which he serves as adjutant. In 1869 he was married to Miss M. E. Atkins, of Gordonsville, and they have seven children living.

Major Charles S. Stringfellow, of Richmond, prominent in the professional and social life of the city, was born in Clarke county, Va., in 1837. His family has long been seated in the State, he being a member of the fifth generation in Virginia. The great-great-grandfather came to the State from England; his son served in the Indian wars as a colonial soldier and his son Robert was a prosperous farmer of Culpeper county; and the son of the latter, Horace Stringfellow, was a well-known practitioner of law in Madison county, until about the age of thirty-two years, when he took orders in the Episcopal church and served as a rector until his death in 1885, at the age of eighty-six years. Charles S. Stringfellow, son of the latter, was reared at Washington, D. C., to the age of ten years, and subsequently at Petersburg, and other points at which his father was stationed in Virginia. In 1855 he was graduated at William and Mary college, and then after teaching school for two years he began preparation for a career in the profession of law. He studied at the university of Virginia, and em-