Robert Anderson CLASS OF 1825 Kentucky-born of a prominent Virginia family and sympathetic to the institution of slavery, Anderson nonetheless honored his oath to United States. Commissioned in the artillery after West Point, he served in the Seminole and Mexican Wars. In 1860, now a major, Anderson received a delicate assignment; commanding the federal forts in Charleston Harbor. Conciliatory in his dealing with city authorities, he still refused to surrender Fort Sumter until Confederate bombardment reduced the fort to ruins. Anderson’s defiance of secessionist demands and his insistence on marching out with colors flying made him one of the first Union heroes of the Civil War. Forced by ill health to retire in 1863, he briefly returned to service in 1865 to raise the U.S. flag over recaptured Fort Sumter. NEXT Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard Alfred Mordecai 1804–1887 Class of 1823 George Henry Thomas 1816–1870 Class of 1840 John Clifford Pemberton 1814–1881 Class of 1837 Robert Anderson 1805–1871 Class of 1825 Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard 1815–1893 Class of 1838
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