Archibald H. Rowand Jr.: Teen Jessie Scout who volunteered for hazardous service for nearly the entire war and would receive the Medal of Honor for his actions.
Richard Blazer: Ohioan and leader of Blazer’s Independent Scouts, one of the first kill teams, and one of the first counterinsurgency units in the US Army, who hunted the South’s most dangerous men.
John Singleton Mosby: “The Gray Ghost,” the master spy who formed the greatest American guerrilla warfare unit in history.
Henry Harrison Young: A man born for war and leader of Sheridan’s Scouts.
Major General Philip Henry Sheridan: “Little Phil,” one of the Civil War’s most significant generals, whose Jessie Scouts led the North to victory.
James A. Campbell: “This country will never know how much it owes to [Jessie Scout] James A. Campbell.”
James White: The reluctant Jessie Scout and master escape artist.
Lewis Powell: Man of mystery, hulking Mosby’s Ranger turned Confederate Secret Service assassin and Lincoln assassination conspirator.
James E. Taylor: One of the most extraordinary embedded combat artists of his generation.
Harry Gilmor: The wily Marylander and partisan chief.
Asbe Montgomery: Sergeant and chronicler of Blazer’s Scouts.
James F. “Big Yankee” Ames: Traitor and deserter from the 5th New York Cavalry who became one of Mosby’s officers.
Charles Carpenter: The original Jessie Scout who would steal anything not nailed down.
Jack Sterry: Jessie Scout who gave his last full measure of devotion.
William Woodall: Confederate soldier who became a Jessie Scout after he killed the Southern officer who insulted his sister and then deserted; also a Medal of Honor recipient.
Dominick Fannin: Jessie Scout often in the thick of the action.
Joseph E. McCabe: Scout sergeant and Medal of Honor recipient.
Henry Pancake: Ohio grocer and Jessie Scout in Blazer’s Independent Scouts.
Thomas K. Coles: Blazer’s second in command.
Joseph Frith: Sergeant and Scout “ready for anything.”
Harrison Gray Otis: Initially joint commander of Blazer’s Scouts and future owner and publisher of the Los Angeles Times.
Adolphus “Dolly” Richards: Gentleman Ranger officer.
“Major” William Hibbs: Middle-aged local blacksmith who joined Mosby’s Rangers, expert scrounger responsible for logistics who had a nose for moonshine stills.
John W. Munson: Ranger and chronicler.
James Joseph Williamson: Ranger and chronicler.
William H. Chapman: Former artillery officer, commander of Company C, and eventually Mosby’s second in command.
Samuel Chapman: Fighting Ranger preacher.
Fountain “Fount” Beattie: Mosby’s best friend and one of his first Rangers.
Aaron Burton: Mosby’s enslaved manservant, friend, and trusted Ranger.
John Wilkes Booth: The assassin of the president.
George Nicholas Sanders: Secret Service agent always surrounded by money and beautiful women, and a proponent of the “theory of the dagger.”
Jacob Thompson: Former US and Confederate senator Jefferson Davis’ commissioner to Canada in command of the Confederate Secret Service in Canada.
Clement Claiborne Clay: Confederate commissioner to Canada.
Thomas Henry Hines: Member of John Hunt Morgan’s cavalry, a master escape artist, and architect of the Northwest Conspiracy.
John Breckinridge Castleman: Hines’ second in command and operative.
Frank Harney: Explosives expert with the Torpedo Bureau.
John Surratt: Secret Service agent, crucial mainspring within the Lincoln conspiracy, and escape artist extraordinaire.
Sarah Slater: “The French Woman,” one of the South’s couriers and spies trusted with the most important dispatches.
George Crook: Union major general instrumental to the development of Blazer’s Scouts.
William Woods Averell: Union cavalry officer known for his bold raids and use of Jessie Scouts.
Bradford Smith Hoskins: British soldier of fortune who served in multiple European conflicts and volunteered for Mosby’s Rangers.
Frank Stringfellow: Confederate Scout and spy who dressed as a woman to complete some of his missions.
Thomas Laws: African American hero of the Battle of Winchester.
Rebecca Wright: Schoolteacher who provided crucial information about the Third Battle of Winchester.
Lieutenant General John Brown Gordon: A natural at war and general whom the South turned to to alter the battlefield.
Lieutenant General Jubal Early: “Lee’s Bad Old Man,” who would wreak havoc in the Shenandoah Valley and threaten Washington, DC.
Tom Rosser: Confederate cavalry general.
John and Jessie Frémont: “The Pathfinder,” politician, and Union major general; the Jessie Scouts were founded by him and named in his wife Jessie’s honor, a woman renowned for her brilliance and charisma.
Lew Wallace: Major general, savior of Washington, DC, and later author of the novel Ben-Hur.
Clement Laird Vallandigham: Seditious Democratic congressman and leader of the Copperhead movement.
Nicholas Badger: Unscrupulous Union officer captured by Mosby.
Wash: Badger’s African American manservant who barely escaped with his life.
Charles Russell Lowell: The commander of the 2nd Massachusetts Cavalry Regiment, renowned Mosby hunters. Several companies of California men formed the California Battalion within the regiment. Famed author Herman Melville rode on one of the unit’s raids.
Ulric Dahlgren: Union officer and coleader of one of the most controversial raids of the war.
Ulysses S. Grant: Commanding general of the Union Army who later befriended Mosby.
Robert E. Lee: Commanding general of the Army of Northern Virginia.
Wild Bill Donovan: The director of the Office of Strategic Services and father of America’s modern special operations forces.
Abraham Lincoln: The sixteenth president of the United States.