On this day in 1863, Confederate colonel Sul Ross assumed command of a brigade formed from the Third, Sixth, Ninth, and Twenty-seventh Texas Cavalry regiments, and the men in these units thereafter fought together as Ross's Brigade. Lawrence Sullivan Ross was born in Iowa in 1838; his family moved to Texas a year later. He realized his early ambition to become an Indian fighter like his father, Shapley Ross, when he served in campaigns with the Texas Rangers against the Comanches in 1858 and 1860; in the latter year he led the raid that resulted in the recapture of Cynthia Ann Parker. With the coming of the Civil War he joined the Confederate forces and rose to command the Sixth Texas Cavalry. He was promoted to the rank of general soon after taking command of Ross's Brigade. Under his able leadership, his brigade saw action in the Atlanta and Franklin-Nashville campaigns, although Ross was in Texas on furlough when his men surrendered at Jackson, Mississippi, in May 1865. After the war he served Texas as a state senator and then as governor from 1886 to 1891.