Description: From battling Seminoles in Florida's swamps to storming through Old Mexico's fortified towns, Lewis Stevenson Craig served as an exemplar of the U.S. Army's burgeoning professional officer corps. An early officer to make the army a career, Craig was to die with his boots on, commanding the military escort of John Russell Bartlett's U.S.-Mexican Boundary Commission. Ironically, Craig was meant for a Virginia planter's life supported by a generous legacy from his father, but Craig's older brothers and a faithless guardian robbed him of his inheritance. For Craig, family love and concern had died with his short-lived older sister, Jane Craig Stanard, now famous as Edgar Allan Poe's Helen. As presented in this book, Craig's story is told, unspoiled by present-mindedness, through deep research into the original sources which include Virginia family papers and court files, U.S. military records, and Craig's own letters and journals, most from a heretofore untouched family archive.
