From: Confederate Military History Extended Edition.  Edited by Gen. 
Clement A. Evans of Georgia.  Wilmington, NC. Broadfoot Publishing 
Company, 1987; pages 290-294.

ADDITIONAL SKETCHES ILLUSTRATING THE SERVICES OF OFFICERS AND 
PRIVATES AND PATRIOTIC CITIZENS OF WESTERN VIRGINIA.

*COLONEL ROBERT WHITE*

Colonel Robert White, of Wheeling, W.Va., major-general
commanding the West Virginia division, United Confederate
Veterans, is a native of Romney, Hampshire county, a region
in which his family has been prominent for many generations.  
His great-great-grandfather, Robert White, a surgeon in the British 
navy, made his home of the valley of the Shenandoah at an early 
period in the settlement of Virginia.  His son, Alexander, was 
conspicuous as a patriot during the Revolutionary period, was a 
prominent member of the Virginia house of burgesses, was a member of 
the Virginia convention which adopted the Constitution of the United 
States, and sat in the First Congress. It was said of him that in 
whatever public body he participated "his ready information, 
eloquence and decision placed him in the front rank." Robert White, 
son of the latter, born near Winchester in 1759, in his seventeenth 
year went with Virginia troops as a private in the Revolutionary 
army, fought as a lieutenant at Monmouth, was distinguished as a 
partisan officer in 1778 until severely wounded and captured in New 
Jersey. His health was wrecked for several years, but still as a 
captain of cavalry he organized and trained a troop at Philadelphia, 
in 1779. He was subsequently distinguished as an attorney, and served 
as judge of the general court of Virginia from 1793 until stricken by 
the disease which caused his death, in 1831. John Baker White, son of 
judge White, born at Winchester in 1794, held the office of clerk of 
the circuit court of Hampshire county from his twenty-first year 
until he died, in 1862, in Richmond, Va., a refugee from his home. 
This gentleman was the father of Col. Robert White, whose service in 
the Confederate cause, and prominence in civil life, honorably 
supplement the record of his father. He was born at Romney, February 
7, 1833, and at the age of fourteen became an assistant in his 
father's office, where he saved the money necessary to prepare 
himself for the practice of law. After his graduation in 1854 at the 
school of Judge John W. Brockenbrough, in Lexington, he practiced law 
at Romney until the secession of the State.  Meanwhile, about 1857, 
he became the captain of the Frontier Rifles, a volunteer company in 
Hampshire county, with which he reported at Harper's Ferry in May, 
1861, bringing ninety-six men to reinforce the command of Col. T. J. 
Jackson. His company was assigned as Company I to the Thirteenth 
Virginia infantry, Col. A. P. Hill, brigade of Colonel Elzey, and was 
commanded by him in the Romney expedition and the first battle of 
Manassas. In the following winter he was assigned to duty, 
principally in the ordnance department, at Richmond and Greensboro, 
N. C., and soon after the reorganization in the spring of 1862, he, 
anxious to be in the field, was authorized to organize a battalion of 
cavalry in the Shenandoah and South Branch valleys, a duty he 
successfully performed. He was commissioned major of this battalion.  
February 11, 1863, he was authorized to raise a battalion inside the 
enemy's lines, which he successfully accomplished. From this grew the 
Twenty-third Virginia cavalry regiment, of which he was promoted 
lieutenant-colonel, and on April 29, 1864, colonel. He was 
distinguished as a daring and active cavalry officer, particularly in 
the campaigns in the Shenandoah valley and western Virginia, where, 
including the operations of Imboden's brigade, in 1864, he 
participated in fifty-six cavalry fights, including the battle of New 
Market, the Lynchburg campaign against Hunter, the expedition through 
Maryland against Washington, and the campaign against Sheridan. Among 
the engagements in which he took part, in addition to those already 
mentioned, were those at Leetown, Halltown, Martinsburg, Falling 
Waters, Piedmont, Dranesville, Lewinsville, Berryville, White Post, 
Snicker's Gap, Winchester (August, 1864), Fisher's Hill, Winchester 
(September, 1864), Stevenson's depot, Gordonsville, Charlestown, 
Drakesville, Rude's Hill, Woodstock, the Luray valley fight in which 
General Milligan was killed, the fight near Stevenson's in which 
General Ramseur fell, Salem, Liberty and New Bedford.  He was 
slightly wounded in the head at Gordonsville, 1864, again near New 
Market, and a third time at Lynchburg. In March, 1865, when his 
regiment was "out on horse furlough," Colonel White was ordered by 
General Early, who was at Staunton without an army, to gather as many 
cavalrymen as possible and go out to hold back Sheridan, not ten 
miles away, while an attempt could be made to save the government 
stores. He gathered twenty-eight men, and joined by General Lilly, 
the little band of dauntless spirits formed in skirmish line on 
Harman's hill, four miles north. Soon Sheridan's army appeared in 
full view from the hill, a splendid and glittering array. Presently a 
squadron was detached to ascend the hill, where the twenty-eight men 
stood erect outlined against the sky. At a prearranged signal from 
White the skirmishers gathered in the roadway and lay flat, giving 
the enemy as it reached them a sudden volley that staggered them and 
drove them back to the valley. At once the men resumed their 
positions as sentinels, giving the Federals the impression of a 
considerable force, and twice again they met in the road, with the 
same effect, the Federal reconnoissances. Thus they held the hill 
till night, and when they withdrew they found that Early had saved 
the stores. In May, 1865, he was paroled at Patterson's creek, 
Hampshire county, and he returned to civil life and the support of 
the family of his father, who had died at Richmond in 1862. He was a 
law partner for six years of John J. Jacob, who at the end of that 
period was elected governor of West Virginia.  Colonel White 
continued in the practice of law at Romney until 1877, becoming very 
prominent in this profession, and taking a leading part in public 
affairs, securing, with the assistance of other enterprising 
citizens, the location of the institution for the deaf, dumb and 
blind at Romney, and organizing and acting as president of the South 
Branch railroad company. In 1877 he was elected attorney-general of 
the State, by the remarkable majority of 17,000 votes, and upon 
assuming the duties of that office he made his home at Wheeling, then 
the State capital, where he has since resided.  In 1885 and 1891 he 
served in the West Virginia legislature, and held the chairmanship of 
the finance committee at each session. At the close of the last 
session the following testimonial was presented him by his fellow 
members:

"Hon. Robert White, Sir: Among the members of the legislature of West 
Virginia there is a general desire to express to you in some formal 
way their appreciation of the great zeal, ability and untiring 
industry that have marked your course in the legislature at this 
session. As chairman of the finance committee and one of the 
judiciary committees of the house, the duties incumbent upon you have 
been exceedingly important and exacting, both in committee room and 
on the floor of the house. In the performance of these duties you 
have been so zealous, industrious, painstaking and conservative as to 
attract the attention and win the respect and confidence of the 
entire legislature and to deserve the thanks and gratitude not only 
of your fellow members but of the people of the State at large. 
Permit us, therefore, to tender to you some expression of our 
appreciation of the benefits to the State derived from your earnest 
labors, and to say that we all feel that you have fully deserved not 
only our commendation, but a right to the gratitude and respect of 
your fellow citizens throughout the State of West Virginia."

Colonel White has also served two terms as solicitor for the city of 
Wheeling, was for many years a director of the State institute for 
the deaf, dumb and blind, was twice president of the Wheeling bar 
association, represented his State at the dedication of the 
Washington monument, and was a delegate to the arbitration convention 
at Washington in 1896. He is past commander, Knight Templars, and 
past grand master of the grand lodge, F. & A. M., of the State.       
He represented his presbytery at the centennial assembly of the 
Presbyterian church at Philadelphia. In the organization of the 
United Confederate Veterans he has been conspicuous as one of the 
trustees and member of the executive committee of the Southern 
memorial association, and in May, 1897, he was elected to the chief 
office of the order in West Virginia. On May 26, 1859, Colonel White 
was married to Ellen E. Vass, and they have one surviving child, 
Kate, wife of Charles M. Ferrell, of Richmond.


(Linda Fluharty)