Samuel Gibbs French Samuel Gibbs French ( November 22 , 1818 – April 20 , 1910 ) was an officer in the U . S . Army , wealthy plantation owner , author , and a major general in the Confederate army during the American Civil War . He commanded a division in the Army of Tennessee in the Western Theater . Biography . Samuel G . French was born in Mullica Hill , New Jersey . His larger family lived in both Gloucester and Salem Counties . He graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1843 . His classmates included future Civil War generals Ulysses S . Grant , William B . Franklin , Roswell Ripley , and Franklin Gardner . French was brevetted as a second lieutenant in the 3rd U . S . Artillery and assigned to garrison duty . During his military service in the Mexican - American War , he was wounded at the Battles of Monterrey and Buena Vista . He was awarded a congressional award and a sword from the State of New Jersey . He rose to the rank of Captain , but resigned his commission in May 1856 to become a planter in Mississippi . When the Civil War began , French sided with the South . On February 12 , 1861 , French was appointed chief of ordnance of the state of Mississippi ; and on October 23 , 1861 , he was appointed a brigadier general in the provisional army of the Confederate States of America . French became a major general on August 31 , 1862 . General French commanded a brigade and subsequently a division under Gen . Daniel Harvey Hill at Petersburg , Virginia . He led a demonstration against Harrison ' s Landing on July 4 , 1862 and one against Suffolk , Virginia on September 22 , 1862 . ( Fort French at Suffolk was nanmed for him . ) In 1863 , French led a division under LTG James Longstreet in the Siege of Suffolk . French ' s division intervened in the Battle of Suffolk ( Hill ' s Point ) , with its commander waiting for the federals who had seized Fort French to withdraw from their exposed position . French was transferred to the West . French commanded a division at Jackson , Mississippi during Gen Joseph E . Johnston ’ s effort to relieve the Siege of Vicksburg . Later he served under LTG Leonidas Polk in Mississippi . French served in Polk ’ s corps , later under LTG Alexander P . Stewart , in the Atlanta Campaign of the Army of Tennessee , which was led by Johnston and then by Gen John Bell Hood . On October 5 , 1864 , after the fall of Atlanta , Hood sent French with his division to break the line of communication of Sherman ' s army by capturing Allatoona Pass . The pass was held by a federal garrison under Gen . John M . Corse , who defended it in the Battle of Allatoona . When federal reinforcements arrived , General French withdrew his division to New Hope Church and rejoined the Army of Tennessee . French served in the Franklin - Nashville Campaign . Illness forced him to return home in December 1864 ; but he returned to service in 1865 , commanding forces in Mobile , Alabama to the end of the war . After the war , he returned to his work as a southern planter , and later authored the book " Two Wars " about his war experiences . French had married Mary Fontaine Abercrombie on 12 January 1865 . Mary Fontaine Abercrombie died on 16 May 1900 at Atlanta , Georgia . They had two sons and a daughter . Gen French died in Pensacola , Florida in 1910 . Gen French was buried in Florida but a memorial to him was constructed in the Laurel Hill Cemetery in Philadelphia , Pennsylvania . There is also a bust and marker of French in the National Military Park in Vicksburg , Mississippi . External links . History of Salem County by Joseph S . Sickler , pub 1937 pp - 243 , 276 - 277