George Armstong Custer

George Armstong Custer. . George Armstrong Custer was born on December 5, 1839 in New Rumley, Ohio. He was a graduate of West Point and the youngest general in the union army at the time of his promotion to brigadier general at age 23. General Custer was a nationally known cavalry officer in the Civil War long before the Battle of the Little Big Horn. , At the epic Battle of Gettysburg on July 3, 1863, it was General George Custer and his famous Michigan Cavalry Brigade, who though outnumbered, defeated the previously invincible Confederate general J.E.B. Stuart and his forces. This action was important in the Union army's victory at Gettysburg which was a turning point in the war. , Custer led his men in numerous cavalry battle charges during the war and had eleven horses shot dead beneath him. He was appointed to the command of the third cavalry division of the army of the Potomac and made a major general at age 25. He and his division were the main reason General Robert E. Lee surrendered his Confederate army of northern Virginia at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865. Custer and his men blocked the Confederate retreat route to Appomattox station and kept Lee and his army from trainloads of supplies. General Custer received the first Confederate flag of surrender at Appomattox. , The table that General Grant wrote the surrender terms on at Appomattox was purchased and given to Elizabeth Custer by General Sheridan. He wrote in a letter to her My dear madam, I respectfully present to you the small writing table on which the conditions for the surrender of the Confederate army of northern Virginia was written by Lt. General Grant and permit me to say madam that there is scarcely an individual who has contributed more to bring about this desirable result than your very gallant husband. She eventually donated the table to the Smithsonian Institute Museum. , George Custer died at the Battle of the Little Big Horn, Montana on June 25, 1876 and is buried at West Point, New York.