Herman Haupt Herman Haupt ( March 26 , 1817 – December 14 , 1905 ) was an American civil engineer and railroad construction engineer and executive . As a Union Army General in the American Civil War , he revolutionized military transportation in the United States and was one of the unsung heroes of the war . Early life . Haupt , whose first name was sometimes spelled Hermann , was born in Philadelphia , Pennsylvania , on March 26 , 1817 , the son of Jacob and Anna Margaretta Wiall Haupt . Jacob , a merchant , died when Herman was 12 years old , leaving Anna to support three sons and two daughters . Herman worked part - time to pay his school tuition , then in 1831 was appointed to the United States Military Academy at the age of 14 by President Andrew Jackson . He graduated in 1835 and was commissioned a second lieutenant in the 3rd U . S . Infantry that July . But he resigned his commission on September 30 , 1835 , to accept an appointment under Henry R Campbell as Assistant Engineer engaged in the surveys of the Allentown road and of the Norristown & Valley Railroad , which opened in 1835 and 15 years later merged into the Chester Valley railroad . At 19 , he was appointed Assistant Engineer in the state service and located the line from Gettysburg to the Potomac across the South Mountain which is now a part of the Western Maryland . On August 30 , 1838 , in Gettysburg , Pennsylvania , he married Ann Cecelia Keller , with whom he would have seven sons and four daughters . In 1839 , he designed and patented a novel bridge construction technique known as the Haupt Truss . Two of his Haupt truss bridges still stand in Altoona and Ardmore , Pennsylvania , both from 1854 . From 1840 to 1847 , Haupt was a professor of mathematics and engineering at Pennsylvania College . He returned to the railroad business in 1847 , becoming a construction engineer on the Pennsylvania Railroad , and then general superintendent from 1849 to 1851 . He was the chief engineer of the Southern Railroad of Mississippi from 1851 to 1853 , and the chief engineer of the Pennsylvania Railroad until 1856 ; in the latter position he completed the Mountain Division with the Alleghany Tunnel , opening the line through to Pittsburgh . He was the chief engineer on the five - mile ( 8 km ) Hoosac Tunnel project through the Berkshires in Western Massachusetts from 1856 to 1861 . Civil War . In the spring of 1862 , a year after the start of the Civil War , the U . S . War Department organized a new bureau responsible for constructing and operating military railroads in the United States . On April 27 , Haupt was appointed chief of the bureau by Secretary of War Edwin M . Stanton , as a colonel and aide - de - camp to Maj . Gen . Irvin McDowell , then in command of the defenses of Washington , D . C . He repaired and fortified war - damaged railroad lines in the vicinity of Washington , arming and training railroad staff , and improved telegraph communications along the railroad lines . Among his most challenging assignments was restoring the Richmond , Fredericksburg and Potomac Railroad line , including the Potomac Creek Bridge , which he repaired in nine days . President Abraham Lincoln was impressed with Haupt ' s work there . In a visit on May 28 , 1862 , he observed : " That man Haupt has built a bridge four hundred feet long and one hundred feet high , across Potomac Creek , on which loaded trains are passing every hour , and upon my word , gentlemen , there is nothing in it but cornstalks and beanpoles . " Haupt was promoted to brigadier general of volunteers on September 5 , 1862 , but he officially refused the appointment , explaining that he would be happy to serve without official rank or pay , but he did not want to limit his freedom to work in private business ( and he privately bridled at the protocols and discipline of Army service ) . Offered promotion again in early autumn 1863 , he hinged his acceptance on three conditions : that a central Bureau of U . S . Military Railroads be established to inspect , direct , and receive reports concerning construction and operation of all military railroads ; difficulties with commanding generals be avoided through consultation and cooperation within their departments ; the chief of the bureau should be free to move wherever his personal presence was necessary or to attend to whatever public or private business requiring his attention . The War Department declined to accept such terms and Haupt ' s appointment was eventually rescinded on September 5 , 1863 , and he left the service on September 14 . During that year as a general , however , he made an enormous impact on the Union war effort . The Civil War was one of the first wars in which large - scale railroad transportation was used to move and supply armies rapidly over long distances . He assisted the Union Army of Virginia and Army of the Potomac in the Northern Virginia Campaign , the Maryland Campaign , and was particularly effective in supporting the Gettysburg Campaign , conducted in an area he knew well from his youth . His hastily organized trains kept the Union Army well supplied , and he organized the returning trains to carry thousands of Union wounded to hospitals . After the Battle of Gettysburg , Haupt boarded one of his trains and arrived at the White House on July 6 , 1863 , being the first to inform President Lincoln that General Robert E . Lee ' s defeated Confederate army was not being pursued vigorously by Union Major General George G . Meade . Postbellum . After his war service , Haupt returned to railroad , bridge , pipeline , and tunnel construction . He and his wife purchased a small resort hotel at Mountain Lake in Giles County , Virginia . He invented a drilling machine that won the highest prize of the Royal Polytechnic Society of Great Britain and was the first to prove the practicability of transporting oil in pipes . He was the general manager of Piedmont Air - Line Railway ( from Richmond , Virginia , to Atlanta , Georgia ) , 1872 to 1876 ; general manager of the Northern Pacific Railroad , 1881 to 1885 ; president of the Dakota and Great Southern Railroad , 1885 to 1886 . He was a wealthy man from his investments in railroads , mining , and Pennsylvania real estate , but he eventually lost most of his fortune , in part due to political complications involving the completion of the Hoosac Tunnel . Herman Haupt died of a heart attack at age 88 in Jersey City , New Jersey , stricken while traveling in a Pullman car named " Irma " on a journey from New York to Philadelphia . He is buried in West Laurel Hill Cemetery in Bala Cynwyd , Pennsylvania . His son Lewis M . Haupt was a noted civil engineer . In popular media . Haupt is featured prominently in the alternate history novel " " by Newt Gingrich and William R . Forstchen and the second novel of the trilogy , " Grant Comes East " .