Eugene B . Beaumont Eugene Beauharnais Beaumont ( August 2 , 1837 – July 17 , 1916 ) was a Union Army officer in the American Civil War and a recipient of the United States military ' s highest decoration , the Medal of Honor , for his actions at an engagement on the Harpeth River in Tennessee and at the Battle of Selma . After the Civil War he served in the Indian Wars of the western United States . Early life . Beaumont was born in Luzerne County , Pennsylvania , the son of U . S . Representative Andrew Beaumont . He was appointed to the United States Military Academy from the city of Wilkes Barre in 1856 and graduated on May 6 , 1861 . Ranking 32nd out of his class of 45 cadets , Beaumont was assigned as a second lieutenant to the 1st Cavalry Regiment . Soon after entering the Army he married Margaret Rutter , his childhood sweetheart . Civil War service . He trained soldiers in Washington , D . C . , until June 1861 , when he was appointed aide - de - camp to General Ambrose Burnside . With Burnside , he participated in the First Battle of Bull Run . In September he became aide - de - camp to General John Sedgwick and served with him in the Peninsula Campaign of early 1862 until falling ill with typhoid fever . After recuperating , he returned to duty in August 1862 and again worked as an aide - de - camp , this time to General - in - Chief of the Union Army , Henry Wager Halleck . Beaumont requested to be sent back to the field , and in May 1863 he rejoined General Sedgwick as a captain . He served with Sedgwick for just over a year and took part in a series of battles , including Gettysburg , Rappahannock Station , Raccoon Ford , Mine Run , and the Wilderness . By December 17 , 1864 , he was a major serving as the Assistant Adjutant General of the Army of the Mississippi ' s Cavalry Corps . On that day , at the Harpeth River in Tennessee , he took command of the 4th Cavalry Regiment and led a successful mission to capture a Confederate artillery battery . At the Battle of Selma , Alabama , four months later , on April 2 , 1865 , he led the regiment in an assault on Confederate fortifications . For these actions , he was awarded the Medal of Honor several decades after the end of the war , on March 30 , 1898 . Medal of Honor citation . Beaumont ' s official Medal of Honor citation reads : Obtained permission from the corps commander to advance upon the enemy ' s position with the 4th U . S . Cavalry , of which he was a lieutenant ; led an attack upon a battery , dispersed the enemy , and captured the guns . At Selma , Ala . , charged , at the head of his regiment , into the second and last line of the enemy ' s works . Indian Wars service . After the Civil War , Beaumont served with the 4th Cavalry throughout the western United States . One of his first assignments was as commander of the District of Lampasas , Texas , in 1869 and 1870 . During the Red River War , he fought with Colonel Ranald S . Mackenzie in the Battle of Palo Duro Canyon , where he led the 4th Cavalry ' s leading battalion . He spent four years as a cavalry instructor at West Point , from 1875 to 1879 , before being promoted to major and returning west . He commanded Fort Reno , in the Indian Territory , for a year , then participated in a campaign against the Ute tribe while stationed at Fort Garland , Colorado . He commanded Fort Riley , Kansas , in 1881 , Fort Bowie , New Mexico Territory ( present - day Arizona ) , beginning in 1884 , and Fort Huachuca in 1888 . Beaumont ' s wife Margaret died in 1879 and he remarried , to Maria Orton , in 1883 . His oldest daughter from his first marriage , Natalie Sedgewick Beaumont , married George Alexander Forsyth , a fellow 4th Cavalry officer who was only three or four months his junior . He retired on May 6 , 1892 , as a lieutenant colonel . Beaumont died at age 78 in Harveys Lake , Pennsylvania . He was buried at Hollenback Cemetery in his hometown of Wilkes - Barre .