Alfred Terry Alfred Howe Terry ( November 10 , 1827 – December 16 , 1890 ) was a Union general in the American Civil War and the military commander of the Dakota Territory from 1866 to 1869 and again from 1872 to 1886 . Early life and career . Although born in Hartford , Connecticut , Alfred Terry ' s family quickly moved to New Haven , where he spent most of his childhood . Terry graduated from the Hopkins School in New Haven in 1838 . After attending Yale Law School in 1848 , Terry became a lawyer and was appointed clerk of the Superior Court of New Haven County . Civil War . South Carolina . When the Civil War started , Terry raised the 2nd Connecticut Infantry Regiment , and was appointed as their colonel . The regiment fought at First Bull Run , after which Terry and his regiment were transferred to South Carolina . On September 13 , 1861 , at New Haven , Connecticut , Col . Terry organized an elite and special regiment , 7th Regiment Connecticut Volunteer Infantry , a three - year regiment , naming Joseph Roswell Hawley , who assisted in raising the regiment , as lieutenant colonel . He was appointed brigadier general of volunteers in April 1862 and placed in command of the Morris Island Division of the X Corps . Terry was heavily involved in the siege operations against Charleston during 1863 and Morris Island , South Carolina . Troops under Terry ' s direct command were engaged at a skirmish at Grimball ' s Landing and later succeeded in capturing Fort Wagner in September 1863 , but the following year the entire X Corps was sent north to Benjamin Butler ' s Army of the James in Virginia . Virginia . Terry ' s Morris Island Division was redesignated the 1st Division , X Corps , and fought at the Battle of Proctor ' s Creek and in the Bermuda Hundred Campaign around Richmond . Once the Siege of Petersburg began , Terry continued to fight in the battles north of the James River , notably at the Battle of New Market Heights . Upon the death of X Corps commander David B . Birney in October , Terry briefly assumed command of the corps before it was dissolved . His leadership was never in question , but he had not achieved the same battlefield glory that many of his counterparts had won by this time in the war . Fort Fisher and North Carolina . Terry ' s greatest achievement of the war came when he was placed in command of the Fort Fisher Expeditionary Corps . Benjamin Butler had previously failed in an expedition against Fort Fisher at the end of 1864 . Terry had gained the confidence of General Ulysses S . Grant and was now in command of the ground forces in a second expedition against the fort . Unlike Butler , Terry worked well with the Navy under the command of David D . Porter . On January 13 , 1865 , Terry sent a division of United States Colored Troops to hold off Confederate forces under Braxton Bragg to the north of Fort Fisher . He sent his other division under Adelbert Ames against the northern part of the fort . After hand - to - hand fighting , the Union troops took control of the fort . For his part in the Battle of Fort Fisher , Terry was promoted to major general of volunteers and brigadier general in the regular army . Reinforcements arrived in February and John M . Schofield arrived to take overall command of the campaign against Wilmington , North Carolina . After the fall of Wilmington , the Fort Fisher Expeditionary Corps was renamed the X Corps , with Terry remaining in command , and participated in the final stages of the Carolinas Campaign . He is generally considered one of the most capable generals with no previous military training to emerge from the war . Postbellum activities . After the war , Terry remained in the military . He helped to negotiate the Treaty of Fort Laramie ( 1868 ) , which ended Red Cloud ' s campaign against American troops in the region . Terry became a strong opponent of the Ku Klux Klan after being assigned as the last military governor of the Third Military District , based in Atlanta , where he served beginning on December 22 , 1869 . Terry was the commander of the U . S . Army column marching westward into the Montana Territory during what is now popularly known as the Centennial Campaign in 1876 – 77 . Two other columns marched toward the same objective area ( George Crook ' s from the south and John Gibbon ' s from the west ) . A column of troops under his command arrived shortly after the Battle of Little Big Horn and discovered the bodies of Custer ' s men . In October 1877 , he went to Canada to negotiate with Sitting Bull . He was still in command in Montana during the Nez Perce War and sent reinforcements to intercept Chief Joseph . In 1878 , Terry joined Maj . Gen . John Schofield on a presidential board asked to reexamine the conviction by court - martial of Fitz John Porter . The board found that Porter had been unfairly convicted of cowardice and disobedience . In 1886 , Terry was promoted to major general and was given command of the Division of the Missouri , headquartered in Chicago . He died four years later in New Haven , Connecticut , where he is buried in Grove Street Cemetery . Media portrayals . In 1967 , Terry was portrayed by Robert F . Simon ( 1908 – 1992 ) on the ABC television series " Custer " . In the series Terry often clashed with the brash Custer , played by Wayne Maunder . In 1991 , Terry was portrayed by Terry O ' Quinn in the television film " Son of the Morning Star " .