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In the carefully written and full report of
General Magruder, he refers to the
Charles City Cavalry as follows:
‘The brave and devoted troopers of the
Charles City Cavalry were on this, as on all other occasions, distinguished for the promptness, intrepidity, and intelligence with which they discharged their important duties; and to their chivalric and enterprising lieutenant,
Hill Carter, Jr., I owe a public acknowledment of the great services he has rendered his country on every occasion which has presented itself.’
It may not be inappropriate to remark that this company, to which
General Magruder refers, lost the first man killed in battle in the war; for
Samuel W. Prvor had been killed in a skirmish below Bethel church, the
Confederate line, and was sleeping in his family burying ground in
Charles City county, before
Wyatt fell at Big Bethel in June, 1861.
It also lost about the last man killed in the war; for its gallant first lieutenant,
William H. Harwood, who had passed through every cavalry fight of his command, and been engaged in as many hand-to-hand encounters as any man in the service, fell pierced through by a cannon ball, in the desperate charge on
General Gregg's brigade, the day before the surrender at
Appomattox.
Benjamin H. Harrison was captain of this company at
Malvern Hill.
Magruder thus refers to him:
‘The noble, accomplished, and gallant
Harrison, commander of the
Charles City Troop, uniting his own exertions with mine, rallied regiment after regiment, and leading one of them to the front, fell, pierced with seven wounds, near the enemy's batteries.’
This worthy member of one of
Virginia's historic families, was a close kinsman of the
Benjamin Harrison of 1774, who, when the storms of revolution were gathering, stood at
Jefferson's right hand, as
Partrick Henry stood at his left, to make the voice of
Virginia heard in behalf of self-government.
He was a resident of that section of
Virginia from whose soil sprang three men who became
Presidents of the
United States.
He possessed in the highest degree all those heroic and lovable traits of character that endeared him to his men. One of them, closer to him than many, had the day before, while resting at Timberlake's Store, tried to dissuade him from rash exposure of his life.
But a noble and dauntless spirit impelled him, when it was not required nor expected of him, to lead