David Hunter, 1807-1884

Hunter was born in Princeton, New Jersey. His maternal grandfather was Richard Stockton, a signer of the United States Declaration of Independence. He graduated from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in 1822, and was commissioned a second lieutenant in the 5th U.S. Infantry regiment.

From 1828 to 1831, he was stationed on the northwest frontier, at Fort Dearborn in Chicago, where he met and married Maria Kinzie. He was appointed captain of the 1st U.S. Dragoons in 1833 but resigned from the Army in July 1836 and moved to Illinois as a civilian. He rejoined the Army in 1841 as a paymaster and was promoted to major a year later.

In 1860, while stationed at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, Hunter began a correspondence with Abraham Lincoln, in which Hunter discussed his strong anti-slavery views. This correspondence lead to an invitation to ride on Lincoln's inaugural train from Springfield, Illinois to Washington, D.C., in February 1861.

After the firing on Fort Sumter, Hunter was promoted to colonel of the 3rd U.S. Cavalry, and soon after due to his connection to Lincoln he was appointed the fourth-ranking brigadier general of volunteers, commanding a brigade in the Department of Washington. He was wounded in the neck and cheek at the First Battle of Bull Run in July 1861. In August, he was promoted to major general of volunteers. He served under Maj. Gen. John C. Frémont, as a division commander in the Western Army and was appointed as commander of the Western Department on November 2, 1861, after Frémont was relieved of command.

Hunter was a strong advocate of arming blacks as soldiers for the Union cause. After the Battle of Fort Pulaski, he began enlisting black soldiers from the occupied districts of South Carolina and formed the first such Union Army regiment, the 1st South Carolina (African Descent). He was initially ordered to disband the regiment, but eventually got approval from Congress for his action. He caused a second furor by issuing an order emancipating the slaves in Georgia, South Carolina, and Florida:

The three States of Georgia, Florida and South Carolina, comprising the military department of the south, having deliberately declared themselves no longer under the protection of the United States of America, and having taken up arms against the said United States, it becomes a military necessity to declare them under martial law. This was accordingly done on the 25th day of April, 1862. Slavery and martial law in a free country are altogether incompatible; the persons in these three States — Georgia, Florida, and South Carolina— heretofore held as slaves, are therefore declared forever free.

Maj. Gen. David Hunter, Department of the South,
General Order No. 11, May 9, 1862

This order was quickly rescinded by Abraham Lincoln, concerned about the political effects that it would have in the border states by driving some slave holders to support the Confederacy. Lincoln's own Emancipation Proclamation was announced in five months later in September 1862, effective January 1, 1863. Nevertheless, the South was furious at Hunter's action and Confederate President Jefferson Davis issued orders to consider Hunter a "felon to be executed if captured."

Hunter served as the president of the court-martial of Maj. Gen. Fitz John Porter, later exonerated, and on the committee that investigated the loss of Harpers Ferry in the Maryland Campaign. He also served briefly as the Assistant Inspector General of the Department of the Gulf.

Hunter commanded of the Army of the Shenandoah and the Department of West Virginia in 1864, and was ordered by Ulysess Grant to employ scorched earth tactics similar to those later used during Sherman's March to the Sea; Hunter was to move through Staunton to Charlottesville and Lynchburg, "living off the country" and destroying the Virginia Central Railroad "beyond possibility of repair for weeks." After Hunter defeated Maj. Gen. William E. "Grumble" Jones at the Battle of Piedmont, he moved up the Valley (southward) to Lexington, where he burned Virginia Military Institute on June 11 and his troops freely looted civilian property of all kinds along the way. Lexington was particularly hard hit and Hunter's men plundered a number of private homes, the library of Washington College and burned the home of former Governor John Letcher.

Hunter's reign of terror in the Valley ended when he was defeated by Lt. Gen. Jubal A. Early at the Battle of Lynchburg. Grant brought in Maj. Gen. Philip Sheridan to lead the field troops, leaving Hunter with only administrative responsibilities. Hunter requested to be relieved and would serve in no more combat commands. In 1865 he was promoted to brevet major general in the regular army, a common honor for senior officers late in the war.

Hunter served in the honor guard at the funeral of Abraham Lincoln and accompanied his body back to Springfield. He was the president of the military commission trying the conspirators of Lincoln's assassination, from May 8 to July 15, 1865. He retired from the Army in July 1866. In 1873 he published "Report of the Military Services of Gen. David Hunter, U.S.A., during the War of the Rebellion."

Hunter died in Washington, D.C. in 1884.