author
b. 1841
A Civil War veteran turned cotton broker and manufacturing executive, this 19th-century New Englander led a life that moved from the battlefield to the business world. His story connects Boston, New Orleans, and Lowell, with a dramatic prison escape along the way.

by Charles Bean Amory, James Armstrong, Nelson H. DeLane
Born on July 30, 1841, in Manhattan, Charles Bean Amory was raised in a prominent family with ties to Massachusetts. He attended school in Jamaica Plain and entered business young, beginning work in a Boston counting room while still in his teens.
When the American Civil War began, he had already spent two years with the New England Guards and went on to serve in the 24th Massachusetts Volunteers. He was promoted through the ranks and was eventually breveted major for gallantry at Petersburg. Accounts on his family-history profile say he was imprisoned in Richmond but escaped and made his way back to Union forces.
After the war, he spent years in the cotton business in New Orleans before returning north. He later became treasurer of the Hamilton Manufacturing Company of Lowell, a role he held for many years, and remained a director after retiring in 1909. He died on October 18, 1919, in Milton, Massachusetts.