Horace Porter
United States Army Medal of Honor recipient and Union Army general (1837-1921)
Horace C. Porter (April 15, 1837 – May 29, 1921) was an American soldier and diplomat who served as a lieutenant colonel, ordnance officer and staff officer in the Union Army during the American Civil War, personal secretary to General and President Ulysses S. Grant. He also was secretary to General William T. Sherman, vice president of the Pullman Palace Car Company and U.S. Ambassador to France from 1897 to 1905.
Early life
Porter was born in Huntingdon, Pennsylvania, on April 15, 1837, the son of David Rittenhouse Porter (1788–1867), an ironmaster who later served as Governor of Pennsylvania, and Josephine McDermott.
His paternal grandfather was Andrew Porter, the Revolutionary War officer and his paternal uncles included George Bryan Porter, the Territorial Governor of Michigan, and James Madison Porter, the Secretary of War. Among his first cousins was Andrew Porter, a Mexican–American War veteran and Union Army brigadier general. His aunt, Elizabeth Porter, was the grandmother of Mary Todd Lincoln.
Porter was educated at The Lawrenceville School in Lawrenceville, New Jersey (class of 1856) and Harvard University. He graduated from West Point July 1, 1860.
Career
Porter was commissioned a second lieutenant on April 22, 1861, and a first lieutenant on June 7, 1861. During the American Civil War, Porter served in the Union Army, reaching the grade of lieutenant colonel by the end of the war.
The public source identifies “Horace Porter” as united States Army Medal of Honor recipient and Union Army general (1837-1921). This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Horace, Porter and United.
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This entry incorporates text from “Horace Porter” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.