Charles Francis Adams, Jr.

He was the son of the US Minister to England and grandson of President John Quincy Adams. He graduated from Harvard in 1856 and was admitted to the bar in 1858. He was commissioned First Lieutenant of Company H, First Massachusetts Cavalry on 28 December 1861.

He was probably Regimental Adjutant in Maryland, his appointment dated to 1 September 1862.

He was promoted to Captain 1 December 1862, and mustered out of the 1st Cavalry on 1 September 1864 to accept appointment as the Lieutenant Colonel of the 5th Massachusetts Cavalry (to date from 4 September) and was promoted to Colonel in March 1865. He resigned from Volunteer service in August 1865. He was cited by Brevet to Brigadier General of Volunteers for "distinguished gallantry and efficiency at the battles of Secessionville, SC, South Mountain and Antietam, MD, and for meritorious service during the War."

He became something of a railroad regulation and management expert and was President of the Union Pacific Railroad from 1884 to 1890. He was also an historian, noted particularly for his balanced view of the Civil War.

Source: Heitman, Francis Historical Register and Dictionary of the United States Army 1789-1903, Washington, US Government Printing Office, 1903; and
Appleton's Cyclopedia of American Biography, edited by James Grant Wilson and John Fiske. Six volumes, New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1887-1889. His picture from a photograph of some officers of the First Massachusetts Cavalry in August 1864, now at the Library of Congress.

5/27/1835; Boston, MA

03/20/1915; burial in Mount Wollaston Cemetery, Quincy, Norfolk County,