Despite that promising start, McRae faced some major difficulties in his run for governor. Throughout the campaign, he drew criticism for changing his position depending on which part of the state he was speaking in at the time. By abandoning the Democratic Party, McRae also alienated several members of his family, including his uncle who served as the chief justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court. The worst blow came when the powerful newspaper in his hometown of Fayetteville decided not to support his election because of an “honest difference” over some of McRae’s proposals.²

Although he eventually lost by a wide margin, McRae refused to give up his stance as a political maverick. He briefly reemerged as a Douglas Democrat before reversing course again in 1861 by supporting secession. His shifting positions made him a target for opposition editors across the state. “Mr. McRae was a Democrat, then a Distributionist, then a Consul, then a Douglas Democrat and is now a disunionist, having marked all the phases through which he has passed by a candidacy for something, without a solitary election we recollect of,” was how one major newspaper in Raleigh described him in early 1861.³

McRae’s last-minute conversion to support for secession, however, earned the backing of Governor Ellis, who selected McRae as the commander of one of the new regiments being raised by the state. The governor even requested assistance from President Davis in securing McRae’s commission. “Mr. McRae is competent, in every way, to this position and would make you a good officer if you choose to give him a commission in the Regular service, instead of the volunteer service to which I propose to appoint him, and his character and position here would materially aid in an Enlistment of recruits,” Ellis informed Davis.⁴

The governor eventually appointed McRae as colonel of the 5th North Carolina State Troops. The regiment included two companies from Gates County and two others from Rowan County. The other companies came from Caswell, Cumberland, Johnston, Craven, Bertie, and Wilson counties. The troops received their initial training at the camp of instruction in Halifax, North Carolina. During early July of 1861, the men from the 5th North Carolina moved on to the vicinity of Richmond, Virginia, where they joined the brigade commanded by Gen. James Longstreet.

Soon afterward, Colonel McRae’s troops moved north and were briefly engaged at the Battle of First Manassas on July 21. The men helped lead the way in pursuing the Federal troops toward the capital. While avoiding the worst fighting, the 5th North Carolina sustained a few casualties during the action there. The regiment transferred to Jubal Early’s command in the winter of 1861. During that time, the men engaged in picket duty outside Washington. In the early spring, the brigade was reassigned to the main Confederate army assembled to protect the capital at Richmond.⁵

In its first major action, McRae’s regiment suffered more than 250 casualties, including 87 men killed and mortally wounded, during the afternoon fighting at Williamsburg, Virginia, on May 5, 1862. The 5th North Carolina initially joined the rest of the brigade in an attack against some Federal troops under Brig. Gen. Winfield Scott Hancock, who had reoccupied an abandoned redoubt on the left of the North Carolinians. Several of the regiments, however, “failed to come up” due to the obstructions caused by the thick woods along their front. This left only McRae’s regiment and the 24th Virginia to carry out the assault against the Federals amid a driving rainstorm that had engulfed the area.⁶

The Tar Heel troops quickly moved forward through a section of heavy undergrowth before emerging into an open field. “We came out of the woods in full view of their redoubt about 3/4 of a mile distant,” Capt. Jacob Brookfield remarked in his diary. “As soon as we made our appearance the battery, which was several hundred yds nearer us, opened upon us. We wheeled and started straight for it—seeking no cover and asking nothing but a fair fight.” He noted that “shot and shell tore through our line but we kept on as the Yankees express it, ‘just as if there was no firing going on.’”⁷

After forcing the battery to pull back, the men pushed on toward the main enemy entrenchments. An officer from the regiment noted in a letter home that the artillery soon took up a new position alongside the redoubt and opened fire on their line with a barrage of shells, canister, and spherical case. At the same time, the Federal infantry was “dealing death at every volley” from behind the earthworks. He reported, however, that the men continued to march “straight forward over 800 yards right ‘through the valley of death’—our line as perfect and unbroken as if on parade.”⁸

The regiment eventually advanced within 50 yards of the Federal troops, who had taken cover in the fort. “Victory was in its grasp, the enemy had been driven to his entrenchment,” another soldier recalled. “One fresh regiment was all that was needed to go over the works, but none ever came; instead thereof an order to retreat.” The survivors were “too few in numbers” to continue the attack without support and soon withdrew to the protection of the woods on their left, leaving “a large majority of the officers and men dead and wounded on the field.”⁹

Less than one month later, the 5th North Carolina again suffered “a serious loss in officers and men” during the heavy fighting under Garland on the peninsula at Seven Pines. Stung by widespread criticism from his political opponents over the severe casualties his troops had sustained at Williamsburg and Seven Pines, McRae railed against his numerous foes, blaming them for the multitude of his troubles. “Although my pride has been cruelly mortified—my duty now forbids me to leave the command,” he informed his father at one point.¹⁰

McRae bristled even more when his Tar Heel regiment was retained in the brigade commanded by Garland of Virginia rather than transferred to one of the new brigades, which were formed soon after the fighting at Seven Pines and headed by North Carolina generals. McRae’s failure to gain a promotion to brigadier general made matters even worse. Despite these setbacks, McRae reluctantly swallowed his sizeable pride and remained on duty with his regiment outside the capital. “I refrained from resigning then, because of the impending conflicts around Richmond, yielding to the earnest solicitations of both Generals Hill and Garland,” was how he described it in a letter to the governor of North Carolina.¹¹

McRae continued at the head of the 5th North Carolina in the Seven Days’ Battles at Gaines’ Mill but was absent with his regiment on detached duty during the fighting at Malvern Hill. The low point for the colonel personally, however, came in the Maryland Campaign, when the brigade broke and fled from the field twice while under his temporary command—first at South Mountain and again at Sharpsburg. Many in the army placed the blame for this disastrous performance on his inability to manage the troops after Garland was mortally wounded. One of McRae’s most vehement critics was Col. Alfred Iverson of the 20th North Carolina.¹²

As the concerns about his capabilities grew, McRae threatened to resign due to “the injustices I have recd at the hands of the govt.” More than anything else, he blamed his many political enemies for blocking his promotion to brigadier general. He aimed his harshest comments at George Davis, one of the Confederate senators from North Carolina. “It is now ascertained that the Prest. did confer the promotion on me and I was defeated by No. Ca. politicians of whom Geo. Davis was conspicuous,” McRae explained in one of his letters home.¹³

The controversy was further fueled by some of his allies in the 5th North Carolina. One of them openly complained in a letter to a major Raleigh newspaper about the repeated lack of justice for McRae. The soldier noted that the primary cause for concern was “the total neglect of his claim to promotion, while others, in no particular his superior in merit, have been made Brigadier Generals.” He pointed to former Congressmen Thomas L. Clingman and Lawrence O’Bryan Branch as men who had been unjustly promoted ahead of McRae. He insisted that any reasonable person could “well understand how his sensitive spirit must feel goaded and chafed.”¹⁴

Despite those words of support, McRae was not universally liked even within his own regiment. His prickly personality and repeated attempts to gain a promotion for himself left at least some of his subordinates openly dissatisfied with his leadership. Worst of all was his frequent favoritism toward certain officers with regard to promotions. For many of his opponents, their opinions of him came closer to hatred than admiration. The regiment’s senior captain, Jacob Brookfield, described him as “a man whose passions and prejudices are paramount to his regard for truth or sense of justice.”¹⁵

McRae’s relations proved just as difficult with some of the men from the other regiments in the brigade. “Colonel MacRae was a man of commanding gifts, but of very strong prejudices, and the whole brigade knew of his prejudices against the Twelfth Regiment,” one veteran from the 12th North Carolina recalled. He noted that “the severity of discipline over his own regiment was universally known, and because the Twelfth was not willing to submit to such discipline in camp as he enforced on his own men, he always spoke of the Twelfth as a lot of ‘undisciplined gentlemen who thought themselves better than others.’”¹⁶

McRae’s actions also ruined the friendship with one of his own relatives in the brigade. Following South Mountain, his first cousin, Lt. Col. Thomas Ruffin Jr. from the 13th North Carolina, branded him a “bad, bad man” and as much a coward as the men who broke and ran during the battle. “My intercourse with him is purely official, much to my gratification, as I thought he was disposed to take me into his confidence & I feared would involve me in some [of] the miserable feuds which his presence seems every where to breed,” Ruffin wrote in a letter to his father.

The conflict between the two cousins finally reached the breaking point when McRae failed to acknowledge in his official report the gallant stand made by Ruffin’s regiment at South Mountain. Despite being surrounded, his men had escaped certain capture that day by charging directly into the enemy. According to Ruffin, “this is well known in the army, and fully admitted by all generous men; and yet because Col. McRae’s regiment, led by himself, ran before the shock came on them, he fails to make it known officially.”

The fallout from this dispute left Ruffin with no recourse other than open opposition to his cousin’s promotion to general. Ruffin made his feelings perfectly clear in a long letter home about a month after the battle. “We split after my having the courage to tell him, when asked by him, that I did not desire him to be our Brig General,” he reported to his father. “But, I need not tell you about him, as you know him far better than I do & have had a better opportunity to judge him.” By that point, any chance for reconciliation between the two relatives had completely vanished.

The cruelest blow for McRae occurred soon afterwards when Iverson was selected over him as the new brigadier general. That decision came as especially good news for Ruffin, who had twice failed to have his regiment transferred out of the brigade because of his strained relations with McRae. Ruffin could barely disguise his glee when he heard the first reports that his cousin would not be promoted. “I had the satisfaction of learning from Genl Lee, a few days before, that Col McRae would not continue in the command of us many more days,” Ruffin declared in a letter home.¹⁷

The news of Iverson’s elevation stunned and angered McRae, who defiantly stepped down from his command on November 13. “I have been obliged on two occasions to suffer the mortification of seeing the brigade pass from my command by the appointment and assignment of newly appointed officers to the command,” he complained in a letter to Confederate Adjt. Gen. Samuel Cooper. “In the last case that of Col. Iverson, the appointee is my junior in rank and from a state in no way connected with the regiments constituting the brigade.” McRae further declared that “it cannot fail to meet the expectations of all soldiers that this is a blow to my individual and state pride.”¹⁸

Addressing the troops of the 5th North Carolina a day later, McRae called upon them to uphold their reputation for valor and fidelity. “It is the pride of my life to have formed and trained the fifth regt. of North Carolina troops,” he proclaimed in his typical flamboyant style. McRae followed by outlining all they had accomplished up to that point in the fight for Southern independence. “When I am dead and my memory shall be forgotten, my children and their children will live in the light of history which your patriotism has enkindled,” he proudly remarked.¹⁹

McRae fired off his next round in a message to Governor Vance that explained his reasons for resigning. “But, severe as is the trespass upon the individual pride of North Carolina officers who have lately been obliged to submit to the promotion, in several instances, of citizens of other States, to the command of brigades exclusively North Carolinian,” penned the colonel, “the slur upon the State is broader, and demands the resentment of her sons in the only mode they can manifest it.” For the aggrieved colonel, there was but one proper response. “In the spirit of an earnest protest against this injustice, individually and to my state, I resign my commission,” he declared.²⁰

The letter arrived just as the 32-year-old Vance, who had assumed office on September 8, was struggling to find a workable balance between protecting state rights and the need for continued support of the broader war effort. His immense personal popularity among the major political segments in the state had propelled him to a stunning 33,000-vote victory over his opponent, William Johnston. As a former Whig congressman who came late to support for secession, the new governor was especially sympathetic to McRae’s claims that he had been badly mistreated by Confederate authorities in Richmond because of his moderate political views.

Within days of receiving the letter, Vance raised the issue of promotions in his first major speech before the General Assembly. He especially criticized the Richmond government for appointing several outsiders to high positions in North Carolina brigades. “It is mortifying to find entire brigades of North Carolina soldiers in the field commanded by strangers,” Vance openly complained to the lawmakers. The governor noted that “in many cases our own brave and war-worn colonels are made to give place to colonels from distant States, who are promoted to the command of North Carolina troops over their heads to vacant brigadierships.”

According to Vance, the situation had become so intolerable that many officers “have reported to me their intention to resign, alleging that the road to honorable promotion is almost closed to our citizens.” He further chastised Confederate officials for failing to recognize North Carolina’s contributions to the war effort. “We are willing that our soldiers should follow any general capable of leading them,” he added. “But we contend that as a matter of sheer justice our soldiers are entitled to their fair proportion of the honors won by their gallantry and endurance.”²¹

The governor turned over McRae’s letter of resignation for publication in the Fayetteville Observer, which was edited by one of Vance’s closest confidantes. Although the newspaper had opposed McRae politically, its editorial page supported his decision to resign. “It is not often that we have had such a sinking of the heart at any public event as that caused by the letter of Col. Duncan K. McRae, which we publish today,” editor William J. Hale declared. “Not that his loss or that of any other officer is fatal to our cause… but that his treatment exhibits a case of injustice to himself and to the state that is heart-sickening.”

Hale charged that the Richmond officials had repeatedly discriminated against former secession moderates when making their decisions about promotions. Describing him as a faithful and capable officer, the newspaper contrasted McRae’s treatment by Confederate authorities with that of former Congressman Lawrence Branch, who had been promoted to brigadier general early in the war. Hale argued that McRae had been punished for “the unpardonable sin” of being a Douglas Democrat, unlike Branch who had been pampered as “a Breckinridge man” and a secessionist.

The editorial laid most of the blame on President Davis’ vindictive nature. “There lies the secret of the different treatment of the two officers,” the editorial proclaimed. “Branch promoted before he ever smelt gunpowder—McRae always after the fight recommended for promotion by the great generals who commanded him and knew his worth and his services, and always rejected.” Hale described it as “another exhibition of that great defect in the President’s character which has marked his course since the beginning of the war—where old political differences exist, like the Bourbons, he ‘forgets nothing and learns nothing.’”²²

Another newspaper in the town of Greensboro echoed similar concerns about the lack of recognition for the state’s contributions to the war effort. The editor took pains to note that “the treatment of our officers… in regard to appointments and promotions, has been positively shameful.” He argued that the promotion of Alfred Iverson over Duncan McRae resulted from a much wider problem that needed to be addressed by the governor and the state legislature. “The idea of appointing officers from other States to command North Carolinians, when we have men among ourselves capable and worthy, is outrageous, and the practice is becoming intolerable,” he declared.²³

Following the governor’s lead, Senators William T. Dortch and George Davis, both of whom McRae had once blamed for blocking his promotion to general, also took up his cause in the Confederate capital. “I have for a long time been very indignant at the appointment of persons from other states to command Nor Ca Troops,” Senator Davis informed Vance. “But all our efforts so far have been unable to correct the evil.” He noted that the problem occurred because “our recommendations for high military appointments are ignored altogether, and attention is given to nothing but the recommendations of the Generals.”

The first step taken by the pair of senators was to stop Iverson’s nomination before it was submitted for confirmation in the Senate. “Mr. Dortch and myself some time ago addressed to the Secy of War a strong protest against Gen Iverson’s appointment being made as a North Carolina, appointment, inasmuch as he has never been a citizen of our state,” Davis remarked in a letter to the governor. “I regret to say that the Secy’s reply has been highly unsatisfactory, persisting in continuing the nomination as made.” Secretary of War James A. Seddon even argued in his reply that Iverson should be “regarded as an adopted citizen of North Carolina, who will do her certainly no dishonor.”²⁴

Behind the scenes, Dortch attempted to gather information that would help block the appointment once it reached the Senate floor. As part of this effort, he approached several of the top officers in the brigade. “A message was recd. yesterday by the officers of this Brigade from our Senator Mr. Dortch requesting that we state the grounds of our dissatisfaction with Brig. Genl. Iverson that he might use them in endeavoring to prevent his confirmation by the Senate,” the 23rd North Carolina’s Col. Daniel Christie reported in a letter to Governor Vance in late March.²⁵

Obtaining Christie’s support remained critical because he was so highly regarded in the brigade. Christie was born in 1833 and grew up in Virginia. Following a business failure in 1857, he moved to North Carolina and opened a military training institute in the town of Henderson. At the outbreak of the war, he was elected as major in what would become the 23rd North Carolina. The regiment included three companies from Granville County and two companies from Lincoln County. The other five companies entered military service from Anson, Montgomery, Richmond, Catawba, and Gaston counties.²⁶