Lawrence Berry Washington
While under the command of Captain Henry Clay Pate, Washington was present at the June 1856 Free-Stater attack known as Battle of Black Jack, where he sustained minor injuries.
[8][9] He advertised himself in the Spirit of Jefferson newspaper as an agent for landowners in the Virginia Military District in Ohio and offered his services for the legal defense and tax payments for those lands.
[8] By August 1845, he and his brother Benjamin Franklin Washington were engaged in a real estate venture, selling lots of 640 acres (2.6 km2) along the Kanawha River in Mason County.
Two and a half weeks later he was selected by a committee of prominent citizens in Charles Town on December 24, 1846, to serve in the company as a second lieutenant.
[12][13][14] Washington and his company departed Charles Town on January 4, 1847, and they reached the Brazos River in Texas by March 12.
[16][17][18] Of the sword carried by Washington, the Richmond Enquirer stated, "this precious relic will in itself be potent enough to rally every member of the Virginia regiment to the noblest and most generous deeds.
"[18] In July 1847, the Charlestown Free Press in Charles Town published a letter from Washington in which he praised then General Zachary Taylor as a potential Whig candidate for president.
"[19] While at Fort Monroe in Hampton, Virginia, after the company's return east, Washington drafted a letter dated May 7, 1848, to United States Secretary of War William L. Marcy offering to raise a company of troops to fight Mexican armed forces in Oregon or elsewhere on the condition that he be granted a captaincy.
[1] While in Virginia, Washington again applied for a military office in March 1855 under an expansion in the Regular Army after Congress added two new regiments to protect the large additional territory obtained from Mexico.
[28][29][30] On June 2, 1856, Washington and his company were attacked at their encampment near Baldwin City, Kansas by anti-slavery Free-Stater forces under the leadership of abolitionist John Brown.
