John S . Mason John Sanford Mason ( August 21 , 1824 – November 29 , 1897 ) was a career officer in the United States Army who served as a general in the Union Army during the American Civil War . Early life and career . John S . Mason was born in Steubenville , Ohio , in the late summer of 1824 . His father was a prominent physician who had been a military surgeon during the War of 1812 . He was educated in the local schools began his college studies at Kenyon College in Gambier . In the winter of 1842 , he transferred to Washington College in Pennsylvania . However , he withdrew when he received an appointment to the United States Military Academy in West Point , New York , on July 1 , 1843 . He graduated 9th of 38 cadets in the Class of 1847 and was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the 3rd U . S . Artillery . Among his classmates were future Civil War generals A . P . Hill , Henry Heth , John Gibbon , and Ambrose Burnside . With the Mexican War raging , he was assigned to garrison duty at Tampico , Mexico , where he contracted yellow fever . After spending time in Cincinnati , Ohio , recovering , he returned to Mexico to Puebla as a commissary officer . He survived a second severe bout with yellow fever in New Orleans at the end of the war . He later served in a variety of posts , including Fort Adams in Newport , Rhode Island , Fort Yuma , several garrisons in California , and finally at Fort Vancouver in the Washington Territory . He was a quartermaster from June 1854 until June 1858 , and was promoted to first lieutenant in September 1860 . Civil War . Lieutenant Mason was still at Fort Vancouver when news arrived in April 1861 of the outbreak of the Civil War and the bombardment of Fort Sumter in Charleston , South Carolina . After the departure of Edward O . C . Ord , Mason assumed the role of post commander at Fort Vancouver on May 7 , 1861 and remained in that position until June 11 , when relieved following the arrival of Capt . Henry K . Black of the 9th U . S . Infantry . . Later in May , he was promoted to a captaincy in the 11th U . S . Infantry . In October of that year , he was appointed as the colonel of the three - years ' 4th Ohio Infantry . He joined 4th OVI in western Virginia , where they served during the fall and winter under command of Maj . Gen . James Shields . In 1862 , Mason ' s regiment participated in the Peninsula Campaign of Maj . Gen . George B . McClellan , where they guarded Harrison ' s Landing . He was involved in the Maryland Campaign and the Battle of Antietam . Late in the year , he commanded a brigade in Maj . Gen . John Sedgwick ' s II Corps ' " Right Grand Division " and fought at the Battle of Fredericksburg . He was cited for gallantry in both of those actions and brevetted . On November 29 , 1862 , he was promoted to the rank of brigadier general of U . S . Volunteers . His health , never robust following the two yellow fever bouts , again failed him and Mason asked for and received administrative duty . In April 1863 , Mason was assigned to muster and recruit duty , first in Ohio ( where he also commanded Camp Thomas for more than a year ) , and for the last two years of the war in California as an Adjutant General , and finally in the new state of Nevada . He was promoted to Major of the 17th U . S . Infantry in the Regular Army in 1864 . Mason was responsible for John Hunt Morgan and his raiders imprisoned in Columbus , OH at the time that seven escaped . From March 7 , 1865 - July 21 , 1865 he was commander of the District of Arizona under the Department of the Pacific . In the omnibus promotions at the end of the Civil War in 1865 , he was brevetted through the Regular Army grades to that of brigadier general . Postbellum career . Mason remained in the U . S . Army following the war ( reverting to his Regular Army rank of major and transferring to the 35th U . S . Infantry in September 1866 as commander of the new District of Arizona ) . He subsequently performed garrison duty in a number of outposts on Western frontier in the 1870s and the 1880s . He was transferred to the 15th U . S . Infantry in March 1869 . He was promoted to lieutenant colonel of the 4th U . S . Infantry in 1873 and to colonel of the 9th U . S . Infantry in 1883 . His stations included the states and territories of Texas , New Mexico , Wyoming , Washington , D . C . , Ohio , and Arizona . Mason was a cousin of President James A . Garfield ’ s wife Lucretia and during the Garfield administration was Deputy Governor of the Soldiers Home at Washington . He was married twice , first to Anna Worrell Judkins and then to Cornelia ( Keller ) Wilson . Mason was active in veterans affairs , particularly in the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States . He retired in 1888 as the colonel of the 9th U . S . Infantry at Fort Whipple , Arizona , and took up residence in Washington , D . C . , where he died at home on November 29 , 1897 , from general paralysis brought about from a stroke . He was buried with full military honors in Section 1 , Grave 541 , of Arlington National Cemetery . One of his sons , Captain John S . Mason , Jr . , perished at the army post at the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation from exposure in the line of duty , and is also buried at Arlington National Cemetery . Another son , Charles , also served in the Army .