The Rev. Nathaniel Crawford, Jr., J 1972 - MMI’s first African American cadet and graduate

Two images of Cadet Sergeant First Class Nathaniel (Nate) Crawford, Jr., J 1972


Marion Military Institute’s first African American cadet and graduate was Nathaniel Crawford, Jr., of Tarpon Springs, Florida. Nate entered the Institute in 1970 as a first year college student, and he graduated with the A.A. degree in the Class of 1972.

At MMI, Crawford held rank as a Sergeant First Class in “A” Company, and he played varsity baseball (pitcher) and basketball (a top player) both his college years. He was a member of the Monogram and Athletic Clubs, he made the Commandant’s List his second year, and he received the Excellence in Citizenship award in 1971-1972.

Nate as a student in John Moore’s class.

Nate was an outstanding player on the college basketball team.

He pitched for the college baseball team.

Nate at bat.

The team captains with Alabama Coach Paul “Bear” Bryant who was the guest speaker at the MMI Sports Banquet in 1972.

Nate Crawford completed the Master of Divinity (M.Div.) degree at the Interdenominational Theological Center (ITC) in Atlanta, Georgia, and then took the degree of Master of Social Work (M.S.W.) from the Atlanta School of Social Work, Clark Atlanta University.

The Rev. Crawford served as a career Air Force Chaplain, rising to the rank of Colonel. COL Crawford retired two years ago as Chaplain of the 375 Airlift Wing at Scott Air Force Base in Illinois. He and his family settled on Florida’s West Coast. COL Crawford is married and the father of three grown children.

His son, Isaac A. Crawford, graduated from MMI with the A.A. degree in 1999.

Isaac A. Crawford, J 1999

James Thomas Murfee (1833-1912) – Part Two

COL James T. Murfee at MMI in 1892. (MMI Archives)



In 1871, COL James T. Murfee was appointed president of Howard College in Marion, a position which he held until Howard moved to Birmingham. From 1887 until his death in 1912, COL Murfee helped to transform Marion Military Institute into one of the premier educational institutions in the South. He also involved himself with the fortunes of Howard College, Judson College, Marion Female Seminary, and the Siloam Baptist Church in Marion. COL Murfee was instrumental in bringing Booker T. Washington to Alabama and Tuskegee Institute, a fact publicly acknowledged by Washington when he spoke to a large gathering in Marion in 1913.

The memorial for Booker T. Washington at Tuskegee Institute, now Tuskegee University, in Alabama. (MMI Archives)



At one time or another, James Thomas Murfee was offered – but, declined – the presidencies of the University of Alabama, and what became Auburn University and the University of Montevallo.

President Benjamin Harrison appointed COL Murfee to the Board of Visitors at the United States Military Academy at West Point. In 1906, Murfee received one of the first annuities established by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching in recognition of his extraordinary contribution to American education.

COL Murfee was elected in 1997 to the Alabama Men’s Hall of Fame at Samford University in Birmingham. (Image by Bill Mathews)



James Thomas Murfee died in Miami, FL, on April 23, 1912, and is buried with his wife, Laura Owen (died 1920), in the Marion cemetery. (MMI Archives)



COL Murfee was succeeded as president of MMI by his son, Hopson Owen Murfee (1905-1918). Two other Murfees, Walter Lee Murfee (1918-1944) and James Thomas Murfee, II (1944-1953), would serve as the third and fourth presidents of MMI.

The MMI faculty from The Assembly (yearbook) for 1901. (MMI Archives)



Finally, a side bar: As a distinguished graduate of the Virginia Military Institute, Class of 1853, James Murfee was consulted in 1856 by VMI authorities concerning the possible removal of his former professor, Thomas Jonathan (“Stonewall”) Jackson, from teaching in the VMI classroom! Apparently, Jackson’s teaching skills and subject knowledge were lacking. While Murfee supported his former teacher as a man of honor, honesty, integrity, and strong religious conviction (and a heroic Mexican War veteran), he had to confess that he had learned little in Jackson’s class. (VMI Archives)

James Thomas Murfee (1833-1912) – Part One

Two images of the painting of COL James T. Murfee in the Samford University Library in Birmingham, AL. (Images by Samford University and Bill Mathews)





James Thomas Murfee (1833-1912) of Southampton County, Virginia, became the founder and first president of Marion Military Institute in 1887. Then president of Howard College (1871-1887) in Marion, COL Murfee and some trustees elected to stay in Marion and create Marion Military Institute following the decision to move Howard College to the new boom-town of Birmingham.

Col Murfee, who had begun the military program at Howard in 1871, graduated from the Virginia Military Institute, Lexington, in 1853 in civil engineering. As a cadet, he served as the First Captain (the highest ranking cadet) and graduated first in his class without a single demerit.

This is not Cadet First Captain J. T. Murfee, VMI Class of 1853, but rather the first captain in the Class of 1856. However, the image illustrates the dress uniform that Murfee would have worn. Note the Corps of Engineers emblem on the shako, similar to that worn at West Point during the period. (VMI Archives)



J. T. Murfee’s top standing in the VMI Class of 1853. (VMI Archives)



Entering the teaching profession, Murfee taught in Pennsylvania and Virginia before joining the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa as a mathematics professor. With the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861, the University was militarized and the all-male student body became the Alabama Corps of Cadets (ACC). Murfee was originally second in command, but rose to become commandant of the ACC when his predecessor joined the Confederate forces. J. T. Murfee, himself, rose to the rank of lieutenant-colonel in the 41st Alabama Infantry.

The Round House at the University of Alabama (which still stands next to the Gorgas Library) was the only structure specifically built for military purposes, c. 1860-1861. It served as the cadet guard house and, ironically, was one of only four buildings to survive the destruction of the University in 1865. Its architecture is similar to that of the Virginia Military Institute. (Hoole Special Collections Library, University of Alabama)



As commandant, Murfee commanded the Alabama Corps of Cadets when Croxton’s raiders burned the University of Alabama on April 4, 1865. Alarmed that Union cavalry were in Tuscaloosa, the cadets were assembled and rushed through Tuscaloosa to defend the bridge at River Hill over the Black Warrior River. In a brief encounter with Union skirmishers near the bridge, two cadets and a tactical officer, State Captain John H. Murfee - COL Murfee’s brother - were wounded (Murfee, in the foot; three of the raiders were killed). Learning that their cannon had already been captured and that the cadets were badly outnumbered by a heavily armed opponent with artillery, the decision was made to retreat. While the enemy destroyed the University, the Alabama Corps of Cadets retreated along the Huntsville Road to Hurricane Creek where they barricaded the bridge and dug in along the opposite bank prepared to make a stand should the Union raiders follow them. The attack never came, however. COL Murfee then marched the Alabama Corps of Cadets down to Marion where they were disbanded, the war being essentially over.

After the Civil War, James T. Murfee worked as an architect in Tuscaloosa. As such, he was hired to help rebuild the University of Alabama. The first major structure built, what became Woods Hall, was designed by Murfee and was patterned after the barracks at his alma mater, the Virginia Military Institute. The building was to form part of a proposed quadrangle (modeled after VMI) which was never built. The Alabama Corps of Cadets continued as the mainstay of the student body during Reconstruction and beyond.

Woods Hall, built in 1868, was the principal University building until 1886, when two other buildings were constructed. (Hoole Special Collections Library, University of Alabama)



Note: Part Two will begin with James T. Murfee’s appointment as president of Howard College in Marion in 1871.

H. O. Murfee and Albert Einstein

Elsa and Albert Einstein in Europe.



A young Hopson Owen Murfee, c. 1905.



Beginning in 1931 and continuing through 1939, Hopson Owen Murfee, in retirement from his home in Prattville, Alabama, pursued a running correspondence with Dr. Albert Einstein, world-renowned physicist and formulator of the theory of relativity. COL Murfee, a scientist himself, was the second president of Marion Military Institute (1905-1918) and the son of our founder and first president, COL James T. Murfee (1887-1905). H. O. Murfee’s letters were sent first to the University of Berlin in Germany, then to the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, and finally to Princeton University in Princeton, New Jersey, where Einstein spent the bulk of his years in America.

Initially, H. O. Murfee wanted Dr. Einstein to write an article for his proposed book, Thought and Style: Science and Culture. When Einstein politely declined the offer, Murfee asked if he could reprint Einstein’s Introduction to Newton’s Optics in his work. This request Einstein granted, as he granted at least one more reprint later.

Here is Dr. Einstein’s letter (in German) to H. O. Murfee on August 8, 1931, granting Murfee permission to reprint his Introduction to Newton’s Optics.



And here is Murfee’s letter of thanks, dated August 24, 1931.



H. O. Murfee’s main focus, however, was toward convincing Dr. Einstein to visit Alabama and Marion Institute and to tour other exceptional educational institutions in the state including the University of Alabama, Alabama Polytechnic Institute (now Auburn University), and Tuskegee Institute. Retired and something of an invalid, H.O. Murfee wanted Dr. and Mrs. (Elsa) Einstein to visit he and his wife, Queenie (Mary McQueen Smith), in their “country home” on a 10,000-acre plantation near Prattville, Alabama.

Here is Elsa Einstein’s response (in English) to Murfee’s continued invitations to visit Alabama, dated February 7, 1933.



Dr. Einstein’s response throughout the years of Murfee’s correspondence (1931-1939) was one of polite refusal to come to Alabama. H. O. Murfee mounted an all-out campaign to persuade Einstein to come to the state in 1935; letters – prompted by Murfee - were sent to Dr. Einstein from the governor of Alabama, the presidents of Alabama, Auburn, and Tuskegee, the Jewish Rabbi in Montgomery, and from various other Alabama notables, all to no avail. (Murfee mounted similar campaigns to get other notables to visit Alabama; he succeeded at one point in getting Eleanor Roosevelt to have lunch in his Prattville home while traveling to give a speech in Montgomery in 1939).

Here is the invitation of Governor Bibb Graves of Alabama for the Einsteins to visit Alabama and the Murfees, dated December 23, 1935.



It appears that Dr. Albert Einstein never visited Alabama. To add to the “myth and fable” category of Marion Military Institute lore, a tale of a special “Einstein Science Curriculum” at MMI appears to have been just that, a tale. I have found nothing to date regarding same.

Here is a recent humorous billboard about Dr. Albert Einstein from the folks at The Foundation for a Better Life.



By the way, H. O. Murfee worked on compiling Thought and Style: Science and Culture for many years but it was never completed for publication.

Myth and Fable at MMI

Since I began working at MMI last June, I’ve heard a number of tales from members of the MMI Family regarding the prowess of the Howard College Corps of Cadets during the Civil War. These stories range from the cadets fighting as a unit in the Battle of Selma in 1865, to participating in at least three pitched battles in Virginia! One MMI faculty member even mentioned an image in the Archives of the Howard College cadets lined up in front of The Chapel ready to march off to battle. I have not located that image to date, but I think it was probably this image from the 1870s or 1880s (Samford University Special Collection):



This earliest known image of the Marion campus of Howard College is post-Civil War and appears to show students in civilian dress (Samford University Special Collection).



(Both images are from 160 Years of Samford University: For God, For Learning, Forever (Arcadia, 2001) by Sean Flynt.)

Based on what I have read to date, I have found little to substantiate any of the above claims! It appears that Howard College, MMI’s predecessor, remained open during part of the war, at least, but that the college was non-military (if not Confederate in spirit!). Yes, the Confederate Breckinridge Military Hospital utilized the campus in 1863-1865, and Federal troops entered the town of Marion in 1865. However, there is no mention of the Howard College Cadet Corps participating in any of this; perhaps, because they were non-existent!

James F. Sulzby’s two-volume Toward a History of Samford University (Samford University Press, 1986) makes no mention of Howard College students (Samford’s former name) fighting as a cadet unit in any engagements.

That Howard College alumni did fight bravely as members of various volunteer Confederate units is a given. Simply put, nearly every able-bodied male (including many boys) served in the Confederate forces. Even one of Marion’s Confederate generals, BG George D. Johnston, was a Howard College graduate.

With the outbreak of hostilities in 1861, Howard College students joined the Marion Rifles, Marion Light Infantry, and several other volunteer Confederate units. The president of Howard College, Dr. Henry Talbird, formed his own company, the Independent Company, which consisted mainly of “Howard students and boys from the vicinity.” Captain Talbird’s company was absorbed into the regular Confederate forces and they did fight bravely in the Virginia theatre of operations.

In the 1950s a cadet delivered an address in The Chapel on the history of MMI.:

“His [Union General James H. Wilson] next stop was the Confederate arsenal at Selma. His success was not immediate, for he was opposed by the cadets of Howard College, which is now Marion Institute. The cadets stood as long as possible in one of the bloodiest battles of the war, then retreated to Marion, the birth place of the Confederate flag. After the battle the wounded of both sides were brought in by trains and horse-drawn carts to the hastily prepared hospital in South Barracks. Approximately eighty Confederates and twenty Yankees died, and they are buried in the Episcopal cemetery in Marion. Many of the tombstones are marked unknown, and they stand in silent tribute to those soldiers of the Blue and Grey Armies that left their homes never to return again.”

This report, however erroneous, enjoyed some distribution, at least (I have several copies in the Archives). Unfortunately, future writers of MMI history picked up on this report and went with it so that today the truth is shrouded in myth and fable.

Some of the confusion about Howard College during the Civil War may stem from other Southern educational institutions which did fight as units at various points during the war. The Citadel (South Carolina Military Academy) and Virginia Military Institute leap to mind. So does the University of Alabama Corps of Cadets (their commandant, COL James T. Murfee, became the founder and first president of Marion Military Institute). Other schools include Georgia Military Institute and the (West) Florida Military and Collegiate Institute, among others.

The John Ford-John Wayne movie, The Horse Soldiers (1959), depicts the cadets of Jefferson Military Academy harrassing Union cavalry. While JMA actually existed in Washington, Mississippi, near Natchez (it was called Jefferson College during the war, was very similar to Howard College, and was essentially closed), the cadet scenes for the movie were fabricated as a tribute to Virginia Military Institute and their charge at the Battle of New Market, VA, on May 15, 1864.

“Youth’s Hour of Glory” by Tom Lovell (New Market):



The site of Jefferson Military Academy today is Historic Jefferson College (1811-1964), a Mississippi state historical landmark.



Hopefully, this short piece will shed some light on the subject and will help to dash some of the myth and fable surrounding MMI.

Finally, someone told me once in Virginia that they knew exactly who had shot Confederate General Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson; that the shooter was a relative of theirs, and that the shooting was in revenge for one of Jackson’s misdeeds! Here we go again!

From the Photograph Album of Donald A. Warner, Jr., MMI Class of 1942

(Captain, Co. A, 22nd Infantry, 4th Division, World War II)

PART THREE:

I am delighted to report that Captain Don Warner, Jr., ’42, is alive and well and living in South Texas! He turns 88 on May 23rd. Warner is spry and is as sharp as a tack, mentally. He sends his best to the MMI Family!

With Don’s permission, I offer the following photographs and documents from his photograph album and his alumni file here at MMI:

MMI: Company “C,” the Colors, and Band Company, 1941.



Our hero, Cadet Captain Donald A. Warner, Jr. ’42.



OK, sports fans, here is MMI night football in 1940 (note the helmets!).



Citation for the Bronze Star award (Heroic).



Citation for the First Oak Leaf Cluster to the Bronze Star.



Citation for the Silver Star award.



Citation for the Oak Leaf Cluster to the Silver Star.



Note Warner’s statement to COL J. T. Murfee re: his military training at MMI (April 13, 1948).



Don Warner’s MMI Alumni Questionnaire dated April 13, 1948 (note his military decorations).



Don Warner as a Second Lieutenant of Infantry.

From the Photograph Album of Donald A. Warner, Jr., MMI Class of 1942

(Captain, Co. A, 22nd Infantry, 4th Division, World War II)

PART TWO:

Apparently, I’ve stumbled upon a real American hero of World War II – not just in the usual sense as a member of our Greatest Generation – but a true warrior who even the top brass crowed about as a “magnificent young officer.” Novelist Ernest Hemingway and journalist Ernie Pyle – who attached themselves to the 22nd Infantry for five months during tough combat – apparently agreed. In addition to the Silver and Bronze stars, among other decorations, it appears that Captain Warner was nominated for two Distinguished Service Crosses (second only to the Medal of Honor) and two British Distinguished Service Orders (second only to the Victoria Cross), but that the paperwork was lost going through channels!

From Major General C. T. “Buck” Lanham, former commander of the 22nd Infantry:

December 28, 1946, to Don Warner: “…God knows there are few men in this country who more richly deserve whatever comes their way than you. I can certainly say flatly that in my opinion there was no officer in the 22nd who transcended you in gallantry. Few things have chagrinned me more than the word that you came out of this war with only one Silver Star and that very late. God only knows what ever became of the citations I personally put in for you; lost at Division I suppose.” Lanham goes on to say that a thorough search was made for those citations, among others to members of the unit, but that they were never found. There were not even copies at regimental headquarters.

“In any event all of us have the two proudest honors – we fought with the 22nd and we were combat infantrymen. All else is tinsel.”

January 6, 1956, Landham to Don Warner:

Major General Lanham mentions that his wife ran into some people in Washington, D.C., who knew Don Warner, and that he told them about the 22nd Foot: “However, if I know you, and I think I do, I am damn well sure that you told these good people everything in the world about our colleagues in the 22nd and not one damn thing about the fabulous exploits of a magnificent young officer named Don Warner. When I next see these people, and I shall before too long, they shall certainly have a fill-in on your astonishing, indeed breath-taking, performance in World War II. To this day, whenever Ernest Hemingway and I foregather and discuss the old Double Deucer, your name repeatedly stars the conversation. You and our wonderful gang were the guys who put stars on my shoulders…”

At this point, I do not know if Donald A. Warner is still alive. I suspect that he is not. A check with the Alumni Office here was unsuccessful. He appears to be one of our “lost” alumni. From the letters, I learned that Captain Warner’s wife, Ann (Hutchins?), died in the late 1960s in Mercedes, Texas. Don Warner may have been a rancher as one letter is addressed to him at Ranch ‘O Hills in Mercedes. Mercedes is a small town on the Mexican border along the Rio Grande. It is not far from Harlingen, Texas, home of the Marine Military Academy and the former home of the Confederate Air Force!

In the May 1, 1968, newsletter of the 22nd Infantry Association, Don Warner mentions the death of his wife, Ann, and then states that his son, Don A. Warner III, is a pre-med student at the University of Texas, and that his daughter, Martha Ann, is a “14 year old red head.”

When and from whom MMI received Warner’s photograph album is not recorded. As I find out more, I will pass that information along (there will be a part three!). For now, please enjoy some more photographs from Don Warner’s album:

Don Warner and Ann Hutchins (she was also known as “Higgins”).



The Battalion with The Chapel in the background.



The joys of Summer School at MMI, 1939.



Flight training at the Selma airport.



Don and Ann (3rd and 4th from left) at a MMI dance.



The same group of friends with Don and Ann.



Don with classmates and a future president of MMI, Thomas H. Barfield.



A rough pair.



A letter from the Chief of Staff of the U. S. Army highlighting the exploits of the 22nd Infantry in World War II.