Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 3.djvu/847

Rh to Cold Harbor, and during the siege of Petersburg served partly near the Crater and partly on the Boydton plank road. Private Capps shared this honorable service from beginning to end, participating in all the battles of the company, and throughout discharged with faithfulness and intrepidity the duties assigned him. Charles R. Capps, son of the foregoing, born at Norfolk, March 4, 1871, after receiving an education in private schools and Roanoke college, entered upon his career as a railroad official in October, 1888, in the humble position of messenger boy in the local office of the Seaboard Air Line railroad. His devotion to duty and intelligence and integrity led to his rapid promotion, until in July, 1895, he became general freight agent of that extensive railroad system, a position in which he has proved himself thoroughly master of the situation. He is also interested in cotton manufacturing and has other important financial interests.

Colonel John B. Cary was born near Hampton, Va., October 18, 1819, of the ancient and well-known family of his name, which settled in the Tidewater portion of Virginia and was very prominent in that section until the beginning of the civil war. This event scattered them widely, and deprived them of home and fortune. Colonel Cary was educated at the old college of William and Mary, from which he graduated in 1839. He established, in Hampton, a school of high grade, which grew to be well known throughout the South as the Hampton military academy, whose cadets filled, throughout the war, positions of honor and service. The school was disbanded in May, 1861, and its principal was appointed major of Virginia volunteers on May 13, 1861, by the executive council of Virginia, composed of the governor, lieutenant-governor, president of the State convention. Gen. R. E. Lee and Com. M. F. Maury. He was assigned to the command of a battalion, consisting of two infantry companies, one cavalry, and one heavy artillery, then organizing at Hampton, 2 miles from Old Point, where Gen. B. F. Butler was in command of 10,000 volunteers, exclusive of the regular garrison. Two weeks thereafter General Butler landed 5,000 of his men at Newport News and Major Cary retired to Bethel, and thence by command of General (then colonel) Magruder, to Yorktown, with his battalion. This caused the evacuation of Hampton and in the following August this pretty little colonial town was burned to ashes by our own troops, Major Gary's fine academy buildings and residence, with all of their furniture and equipments, sharing the same sad fate. In June Major Cary was assigned to duty on Magruder's staff, where he served at the battle of Bethel, June 10th, the first engagement of the war, after which he was promoted for gallantry to be lieutenant-colonel of the Thirty-second Virginia. In the fall of 1861 he was put in charge of a battalion of Alabamians and Texans, and when they were transferred to the army of Northern Virginia he was again detailed by General Magruder to serve on his staff as inspector-general of the army of the Peninsula, during which time, at the siege of Yorktown, he had his horse shot under him. Just before McClellan's advance on Yorktown, at General Magruder's request, he was appointed assistant adjutant and inspector-general by the secretary of war, and as such served on his staff until after McClellan's retreat, being engaged actively in the fight at Savage's Station, where he