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Thomas Benton Gatch

officer in the U.S. confederate army in the American Civil War

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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJul 24, 2026
Entity authorityQ19879958
Source-derived summary

Thomas Benton Gatch (May 21, 1841 − December 25, 1933) was an officer in the Confederate Army during the American Civil War and politician and businessman afterwards.

Biography

He was born in Baltimore County, Maryland, on May 21, 1841. His parents were Nicholas Gatch and Anna Maria Gatch (née Merryman). He graduated from the Norfolk Military Academy in Virginia in 1859, and began studying medicine at Columbia College in Washington D.C. that fall, but the Civil War changed his plans, and he joined the Confederate Army in May 1861 as a private in Turner Ashby's regiment. He was promoted to first sergeant by the Battle of Gettysburg, where he was a courier for General Robert E. Lee. At Gettysburg he was made a captain, and later in the battle was taken prisoner. He remained at the prison camp at Fort Delaware for the rest of the war.

He participated in both the first and second Battles of Bull Run, and the battles of Cedar Mountain, Fredericksburg, Antietam, Morton's Ford, New Market, and in Stonewall Jackson's Valley campaigns. He was wounded multiple times. He joined the Maryland National Guard after the war and was promoted to the rank of major in 1868.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Thomas Benton Gatch” as officer in the U.S. confederate army in the American Civil War. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Thomas, Benton and Gatch.

Editorial reviewA strong contextual entry point for chronology, institutions and public events when official records are distinguished from later interpretation. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1841, 1933, 1859, 1861—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1841-05-21. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Thomas, Benton and Gatch providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Thomas Benton Gatch”, the useful work is to connect “officer in the U.S. confederate army in the American Civil War” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

Chronology, provenance and viewpoint should be read together before a broad social or political interpretation is accepted. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 24, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q19879958. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1841, 1933, 1859 and 1861.

Critical limits

Official terminology may obscure informal participation, dissent or communities documented only indirectly. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.

Best used for
  • Event chronology
  • Institutional context
  • Locating named record creators
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Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.

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  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Thomas Benton Gatch”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Thomas Benton Gatch primary sources, Thomas Benton Gatch archive and Thomas research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Thomas Benton Gatch” 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.