Theodore Winthrop (1828 - 1861)

Theodore Winthrop (September 22, 1828 – June 10, 1861) was a writer, lawyer, and world traveller. He was one of the first Union officers killed in the American Civil War. Winthrop was born in New Haven, Connecticut. He was descended through his father from Governor John Winthrop and through his mother from Jonathan Edwards. An 1848 graduate of Yale University, he travelled for a year in Great Britain and Europe and then through the United States. After contributing to periodicals, short sketches, and stories, which attracted little attention, Winthrop enlisted in the 7th Regiment, New York State Militia, an early volunteer unit of the Federal Army that answered President Abraham Lincoln's call for troops in 1861. He wrote a popular essay about the experience titled "Our March to Washington." He was appointed Major and soon became an aide-de-camp to Maj. Gen. Benjamin Butler, commander of the Department of Virginia headquartered at Fort Monroe.