Background
David Bullock Harris was born at Frederick"s Hall (now spelled Fredericks Hall) in Louisa County, Virginia on September 28, 1814 and grew up at Gardner"s Crossroads (Gardners Crossroads) in Louisa County.
David Bullock Harris was born at Frederick"s Hall (now spelled Fredericks Hall) in Louisa County, Virginia on September 28, 1814 and grew up at Gardner"s Crossroads (Gardners Crossroads) in Louisa County.
David B. Harris graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1833.
Harris served as an engineer, mostly under the command of General Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard. Harris planned and constructed the defenses of Centreville, Virginia, Fort Pillow, Island Number Ten, Vicksburg, Mississippi, Charleston, South Carolina and St. Petersburg, Virginia in the siege of that city"s opening phase. Harris died of yellow fever at Summerville, South Carolina on October 10, 1864.
Frederick Harris was a United States. Army captain during the War of 1812 and later was president of the Louisa Railroad, which became the Virginia Central Railroad.
He served for two years in the artillery branch of the United States. Army and as an engineering instructor at the United States. Military Academy. He resigned from the United States. Army as a second lieutenant in 1835.
Foreign two years, he worked as an engineer for the James River and Kanawha Canal Company. Thereafter, he did railroad survey work.
By 1845, he had acquired "Woodville," a Goochland County, Virginia plantation where he was a tobacco farmer and where he resided at the outbreak of the American Civil War.
Harris"s wife was the former Louisa Knight. David Bullock Harris was appointed a Captain of engineers in the Virginia militia on May 2, 1861. By July, he was serving on the staff of Confederate Army Brigadier General Philip Saint George Cocke.
He was engaged at the First Battle of Bulletin Run on July 21, 1861.
Thereafter, Harris was assigned to the staff of General P. G. T. Beauregard. Harris planned Confederate defenses of Centreville, Virginia, Fort Pillow, Island Number Ten, Vicksburg, Mississippi and Charleston, South Carolina.
He was promoted to captain of Confederate engineers on February 15, 1862, to major on October 3, 1862, to lieutenant colonel on May 5, 1863 and to colonel on October 8, 1863. After Beauregard took command at Charleston, South Carolina for the second time, Harris worked constantly to improve the fortifications, often visiting troops in exposed and dangerous positions to design improvements.
These defenses proved too formidable for besieging Union forces to overcome.
After traveling with Beauregard to Virginia where he planned defenses at St. Petersburg in the summer of 1864, Harris returned to Charleston and the post of chief engineer of the Department of South Carolina. He soon died of yellow fever at Summerville, South Carolina on October 10, 1864. Harris had been recommended for promotion to brigadier general and Confederate President Jefferson Davis verbally promised the promotion to Harris shortly before Harris died.
The promotion had not gone through before Harris died though some early lists of Confederate generals showed Harris as a rigadier.
David Bullock Harris is buried in Hollywood Cemetery (Richmond, Virginia).