Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 3.djvu/630

584 and soon afterward delivered to his friends. General Lee wrote that "the loss sustained by the cavalry in the fall of General Chambliss will be felt throughout the army, in which, by his courage, energy and skill, he had won for himself an honorable name."

Brigadier-General Robert Hall Chilton, of Virginia, was born about 1816, and entered the military academy at West Point in 1833, where he was graduated in 1837, and promoted second lieutenant of the First dragoons. He served on frontier duty at Fort Leavenworth, Kan.; in the Osage country, among the Choctaws, in the Indian Territory, and at various other frontier posts, until 1844, when he was sent into Texas, on the expedition to the Falls of the Brazos. Meanwhile he had been promoted first lieutenant, and during the Mexican war he received promotion to captain, and brevet major for gallant and meritorious conduct in the battle of Buena Vista. Subsequently he returned to frontier duty, from which he was transferred in 1854 to the pay department at Washington, with the rank of major. He served in this capacity at New York, Detroit and San Antonio, Tex., until the spring of 1861, when he resigned and entered the Confederate service as lieutenant-colonel in the adjutant-general's department, soon being promoted colonel. When General Lee took command of the army of Northern Virginia, he applied to Gen. Samuel Cooper for a suitable officer for chief of staff, and Colonel Chilton was at once assigned to that important position. General Lee had served with him in Mexico and Texas, and later in the progress of the war took occasion to write General Chilton that he had always been zealous and active in the discharge of his official duties, and never known to be actuated by any other motive than the interests of the service. With promotion to the rank of brigadier-general, and appointment to the position of inspector-general of tho army of Northern Virginia, October 28, 1862, Chilton served in the conspicuous position of chief of staff through all the campaigns and battles of the army of Northern Virginia, from June 1, 1862, until April 1, 1864, when he resigned. After the close of hostilities he made his home at Columbus, Ga., where he became interested in manufacturing and resided until his death, in 1879. 