Charles Francis Roe

Every now and then the life story of an eminent soldier who has passed from the scene reminds one of the varied character of American military history. General Charles F. Roe will be chiefly remembered as a national guardsman; especially as organizer and commander of New York’s well-known cavalry Troop A until in 1898, at the time of the Spanish War, he was appointed Major-general commanding the New York National Guard. That Roe was himself a born cavalryman, even those who did not know him might have judged as they watched on the Central Park bridle-path, only a few years ago, the erect figure and firm seat of the seventy-year-old rider on his powerful horse. Only the jingling sabre and the military spurs, in place of the black frock-coat and the silk hat, were needed to suggest that this must be one of Custer’s men. That was in fact precisely what he had been. Missing the Civil War by a very few years—he graduated from West Point in 1868—General Roe was serving as lieutenant in Gibbon’s troop in 1876, when it made the famous ride to the relief of Major Reno after Custer and his command had been massacred by the Indians.

Alexander Dana Noyes
1923 Century Association Yearbook