Brigadier General Frank Crawford Armstrong
Frank Crawford Armstrong was born on November 22, 1835 at Choctaw Agency, Indian Territory (now the virtually abandoned village of Scullyville) where his father, an officer in the U.S. Army, was stationed at the time. The latter died when Armstrong was a boy. His mother took as her second husband, General Persifor Frazer Smith, U.S.A., one of the heroes of the Mexican War, whom young Armstrong accompanied on a military expedition into New Mexico in 1854.

After graduation from Holy Cross Academy in Massachusetts, he was commissioned directly into the regular army the following year. He took part in the battle of First Manassas on the Union side, but resigned on August 13, 1861. His first Confederate service was on the staffs of Generals Mcintosh and Ben McCulloch; and he was a few feet away when the latter met his death at Pea Ridge (Elkhorn Tavern).

Subsequently elected colonel of the 3rd Louisiana Infantry, he was soon after given command of the cavalry in the forces under General Sterling Price. During the balance of the war Armstrong operated under the command of such leaders as Forrest, Wheeler, Stephen D. Lee, and Chalmers. His last battle was that of Selma, Alabama, when the remnant of Forrest's corps surrendered. He had meantime been promoted brigadier general to rank from January 20, 1863.

At the close of hostilities he entered the Overland Mail Service in Texas, was United States Indian Inspector from 1885 to 1889, and Assistant Commissioner of Indian Affairs from 1893 to 1895.

General Armstrong died at Bar Harbor, Maine, September 8, 1909, and is buried in Rock Creek Cemetery, Georgetown, District of Columbia.

Frank C Armstrong