Edward Porter Alexander

Edward Porter Alexander (May 26, 1835 – April 28, 1910) was an American military engineer, railroad executive, planter, and author. He served first as an officer in the United States Army and later, during the American Civil War (1861–1865), in the Confederate Army, rising to the rank of brigadier general.
Alexander was the officer in charge of the massive artillery bombardment preceding Pickett's Charge, on the third day of the Battle of Gettysburg, and is also noted for his early use of signals and observation balloons during combat. After the Civil War, he taught mathematics at the University of South Carolina in Columbia, spent time in Nicaragua, and wrote extensive memoirs and analyses of the war, which have received much praise for their insight and objectivity. His Military Memoirs of a Confederate were published in 1907. An extensive personal account of his military training and his participation in the Civil War was rediscovered long after his death and published in 1989 as Fighting for the Confederacy.
At the First Battle of Bull Run, Alexander made history by being the first to use signal flags to transmit a message during combat over a long distance. Stationed atop "Signal Hill" in Manassas, Alexander saw Union troop movements and signaled to the brigade under Col. Nathan "Shanks" Evans, "Look out for your left, your position is turned".[9] Upon receiving a similar message, Beauregard and Gen. Joseph E. Johnston sent timely reinforcements that turned the tide of battle in the Confederates' favor.[8]
In his later writings, Alexander accused Lee of making fundamental errors at Gettysburg, as the Union position on high ground was too strong for an attack to be advisable, and Lee had ordered the assault on the center, which entailed Confederates advancing for three quarters of a mile while under fire and then being enfiladed as they closed with the Union line. Writing in 1901 Alexander said "Never, never, never did Gen. Lee himself bollox [sic] a fight as he did this."[14]
Since the end of the Civil War, stories of the Confederate gold and its vast wealth have been told and retold. One of these stories involves Alexander. He helped organize search parties in Lincoln and Wilkes Counties. Alexander and bank officials soon located some of the gold through Alexander's neighbors in Wilkes County and persuaded them that the money belonged to wives and children of Confederate veterans. With Alexander's help, bank officials eventually recovered some $111,000 of the stolen money. Former Confederate cabinet official Robert Toombs also turned over $5,000 that, intentionally or accidentally, had been thrown into his yard in Washington.[16]
After the surrender, Alexander briefly considered joining the Imperial Brazilian Army.[17] Finding that he no longer desired the Georgia plantation life of his youth, he taught mathematics at the University of South Carolina in Columbia, and then served in executive positions with the Charlotte, Columbia, and Augusta Railroad (executive superintendent), the Savannah and Memphis Railroad (president), the Louisville and Nashville Railroad (president),[2] and in the late 1880s the Central Rail Road and Banking Company of Georgia until 1891. During his employment at the Savannah and Memphis Railroad, the decision was made to route the railroad through Youngsville, Alabama. Youngsville was later renamed Alexander City in his honor.
Unlike such Confederate officers as Jubal Early and William Pendleton, Alexander eschewed the bitter Lost Cause theories of why the South was doomed to fail, given the overwhelming superiority of the North. He was willing to express in writing his criticisms of prominent Confederate officers, including General Lee himself. Many historians regard Alexander's memoirs as among the most objective and sharpest sources produced by a Civil War combatant
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Porter_Alexander