Note Type
Historical NoteNote
Sarah Gilbert Alexander was born on January 26, 1826 on her parents' (Adam Alexander and Sarah Hill House Alexander) plantation, Fairfield, in Wilkes County, Georgia. She married Alexander Robert Lawton in 1845 and they had four children. Alexander Lawton graduated from the US Military Academy and Harvard Law School. At the outbreak of the Civil War, he joined the Confederacy as a colonel, before being commissioned a brigadier general by April 1861. He commanded his brigade during the Shenandoah Valley Campaign, the Second Battle of Bull Run, and the Battle of Antietam, where he was seriously wounded. In 1863, he became the Confederacy's quartermaster general, serving until the conclusion of the war. He worked as an attorney after the war, and in 1882, he was elected as president of the American Bar Association. In 1887, he was appointed Minister to Austria-Hungary, serving until 1889. He died in 1896. He is buried alongside Sarah , who died the following year, in Bonaventure Cemetery in Savannah.