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.

[1] By 1845, he had acquired "Woodville", a Goochland County plantation, where he was a tobacco farmer and where he resided at the outbreak of the Civil War.

[2] By July, he was serving on the staff of Confederate Army Brigadier General Philip St. George Cocke.

[4] Harris planned Confederate defenses of Centreville, Virginia; Fort Pillow; Island Number Ten; Vicksburg, Mississippi; and Charleston, South Carolina.

[5] After traveling with Beauregard to Virginia, where he planned defenses at Petersburg in the summer of 1864, Harris returned to Charleston and the post of chief engineer of the Department of South Carolina.