Albert Gallatin Jenkins was born in 1830 and was educated at Marshall Academy, Jefferson College, and Harvard Law School. He practiced law and served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1857 to 1861. When the Civil War began, he was elected captain of the Border Rangers, a unit of 101 militiamen from Cabell and Mason counties, which entered Confederate service in May 1861. During the first year of the war, the Border Rangers took part in several skirmishes, raids, and battles. Early in 1862, Jenkins was elected to the first Confederate Congress and served until August, when he was promoted to brigadier general and returned to the field. He then launched his raid through Western Virginia, and on September 4 he and his men crossed the Ohio River and planted the first Confederate banner in Ohio. Early in 1863, Jenkins and his men returned to the Kanawha Valley and fought most notably at Hurricane Bridge and Point Pleasant. In June, he was recalled to the Shenandoah Valley to join Gen. Robert E. Lee’s forces for the Gettysburg Campaign. During the second day of the Battle of Gettysburg, Jenkins was wounded and did not rejoin his unit until late fall. He returned to the Department of West Virginia and continued raiding. In 1864, he was named the Department’s cavalry commander. At the Battle of Cloyd’s Mountain in Virginia on May 9, Jenkins was wounded and captured, and he died of his wounds on May 21. He is buried in the Confederate plot in Spring Hill Cemetery in Huntington. In 1825, Capt. William Jenkins purchased 4,395 acres in northern Cabell County and completed his house ten years later. The plantation relied on dozens of slaves to work fields of grain and corn. In 1861, Union troops camped there and seized corn and horses.