This time our series turns its lens on Richard Clough Anderson of Hanover County, Virginia. Born in 1750, he was 25 when the Revolution began in 1775. On March 16, 1776, he became a captain in the Virginia Continental Line, and fought in the battles of White Plains, Trenton, Brandywine, Germantown, Monmouth, Savannah, Charleston and Yorktown. He also endured the hard winter at Valley Forge, making him a veritable walking talking history of the Revolution.
Anderson and his company fired the first shots at the Battle of Trenton, routing a 15 man Hessian outpost. A few days later, when Washington recrossed the Delaware and fighting began with the British army under Cornwallis at Assunpink Creek, Anderson was wounded in both thighs by a "yager ball" a bullet from the large bore rifles carried by Hessian jagers. A friend put him on a horsedrawn gun carriage and he followed the American army to Princeton. Beside him on the gun carriage lay another wounded Virginia officer, Lt. James Monroe. While recovering in a Philadelphia hospital, Anderson contracted smallpox but survived to accept an appointment as major in the First Virginia Line.
At the 1779 siege of Savannah, Anderson led a charge on an enemy redoubt and was badly wounded by a blow from a British officer's sword which knocked him off the parapet. Carried back to camp, he met the dying Casimir Pulaski, who gave Anderson his sword. It became a family treasure. Anderson was still convalescing in a Charleston hospital when the city surrendered to the British in 1780. After nine months of not very severe imprisonment, he was exchanged in February 1781 and became aide de camp to the Marquis de Lafayette. He played a key role in advising the Marquis in the complicated fighting against Cornwallis's invasion of Virginia. When Cornwallis retreated to Yorktown, and Washington arrived to begin the historic siege, he appointed Anderson adjutant general, with the temporary rank of colonel. After the British surrender, the rank was confirmed and Anderson was given command of the Third Virginia Line. He stayed in the army until 1783, departing after seven and a half years of service. A portrait of him at this time conveys his tough, defiant, savvy spirit.
In 1784, Anderson migrated to Kentucky, where he soon acquired a 500 acre plantation in Jefferson County. His mansion, which he called Soldiers Retreat, became famous for its hospitality. Andrew Jackson and Aaron Burr were among his celebrity guests. He accompanied Lafayette throughout Kentucky when the Marquis returned for his triumphant tour of the nation in 1824-5. Anderson married Elizabeth Clark, sister of George Rogers Clark, by whom he had five children. When she died, he married a cousin of John Marshall and produced another 12 children. Among his sons was Major Robert Anderson, who was in command of Fort Sumter when the Confederates opened fire on it. A later descendant, Larz Anderson, built the palatial mansion in Washington DC that serves as the national headquarters of the Society of the Cincinnati.