Robert Francis Catterson

Robert Francis Catterson was born March 22, 1835, on a farm near Beech Grove, Marion County, Indiana. He was educated at Adrian College in Michigan and Cincinnati Medical College. He gave up his newly established medical practice in Rockville, Indiana to enter the Union Army when the Civil War broke out. During his service in the Civil War, Catterson held every rank from sergeant to brigadier except major. On April 23, 1861, he was mustered into Company A of the 14th Indiana Infantry. He was quickly promoted to first sergeant in June, second lieutenant in July, first lieutenant the following March, and captain in May 1862. He served in western Virginia and saw action at Kernstown, in the Shenandoah Valley campaign of 1862, and Antietam. On October 18, 1862, Catterson was appointed lieutenant colonel of the 97th Indiana and colonel the following month. He served at Memphis, took part in the siege of Vicksburg, the Tullahoma campaign, the battle of Chattanooga, the Atlanta campaign, and the “March to the Sea.” He commanded a brigade of C. R. Wood’s division of Logan’s XV Army Corps during the march north from Savannah, which resulted in the surrender of Joseph E. Johnston in North Carolina. He was promoted to brigadier general of volunteers to rank from May 31, 1865, and was mustered out of the service on January 15, 1866. Robert Francis Catterson would never return to the practice of medicine. He failed in cotton speculation and became commander of the Arkansas Negro militia under Governor Powell Clayton to fight against the Ku Klux Klan. From 1872 to 1874, he served as mayor of Little Rock, Arkansas. He moved to Minnesota where he was an unsuccessful farmer and farm implement merchant. He suffered a stroke and died in the Veterans’ Hospital in San Antonio, Texas on March 30, 1914. Catterson was buried in the National Cemetery there.

---