John Bull Smith Dimitry (December 27, 1835 – September 7, 1901) was an American author, professor, and Confederate soldier.

As the son of the author Alexander Dimitry, John was selected to write the Confederate Military History around the same period as Plessy v. Ferguson.

[1][2][3] John was born in Washington D.C. while his father worked as the principal clerk for the Southwest postal department.

The Dimitry family endured some hardships as people of color due to their positions in the local community.

[4][5][6] By the 1860s, John and other prominent members of the family participated in the American Civil War fighting for the Confederacy.

John spent his early life in Washington D.C. where his father was the principal clerk for the Southwest postal department.

John was educated in College Hill, Mississippi at Saint Charles Parish a school established by his father who was also the dean.

Around the same period, his father was the first person of color appointed superintendent of public education in the state of Louisiana from 1847 to 1854.

In 1853, John's first cousin George Pandely was running for a seat on the Board of Assistant Aldermen, the position was responsible for urban infrastructure in New Orleans including streets and sidewalks similar to a city councilman.

Pandelly resigned his elected position after seven months due to pressure from the mayor's office and his peers.

The case was dismissed Pandelly won but did not receive financial compensation, but the Pandely Affair inspired later generations to invent a new genealogy for themselves in which they claimed descent from a mythical, possibly invented Indian princess of the Alibamu tribe named Malanta Talla.

At the onset of the affair Alexander Dimitry’s school went from 50 students to 2 but five years later he became the first person of color to hold the position of U.S.

[13] Initially, John worked in the office of United States Attorney General Caleb Cushing and eventually became the secretary of legation to the U.S.

The couple moved to Colombia in 1874 where John was a professor of French and English at the Colegio Caldas Barranquilla.

By the year 1888 he translated Whose Famous Deeds Are Recorded in the Ancient Chronicles of François Rabelais from French and wrote Atahualpa's Curtain.

The incident sent shockwaves throughout the Creole community exposing the old families to the horrors of Jim Crow laws.

John also wrote the epitaphs on Henry Watkins Allen, Albert Sidney Johnston, Stonewall Jackson, Edgar Allan Poe, Charlotte Temple, Charles Sumner, Jefferson Davis, and the Confederate Flag.