Robert Brown Potter (July 16, 1829 – February 19, 1887) was an American lawyer and a Union Army general in the American Civil War.
Early life
Potter was born in Schenectady, New York on July 16, 1829. He was the third son of Alonzo Potter, the bishop of the Episcopal Church of Pennsylvania, and Sarah Maria (née Nott) Potter. His mother was the only daughter of Eliphalet Nott, President of Union College. After the death of his mother in 1839, his father remarried in 1840 to his mother's cousin, Sarah Benedict, with whom his mother had placed the children in the event of her death. Sarah also predeceased Bishop Potter, and three months before his death in 1865, he remarried to Frances Seton, who lived in Flushing until she died in 1909.
Career
Potter served as an attorney in New York City prior to the outbreak of the Civil War. The wound was only "slight", however, and Potter continued in command of the 51st NY regiment through the rest of the fall and winter of 1862; notably at the Battle of Fredericksburg.
Potter was promoted to the rank of brigadier general on March 13, 1863. He led the 2nd Division, IX Corps, in the siege of Vicksburg. He next commanded IX Corps in the Knoxville Campaign. After serving on recruiting duty in New York state, he was assigned in 1864 to command of the 2nd Division of IX Corps under Burnside. Potter led the division in the Overland Campaign and at the siege of Petersburg. He was wounded in the final assault on Petersburg on April 2, 1865, Potter's third wound of the war.
Upon his recovery, he was given command of the Rhode Island and Connecticut district of the Department of the East. On his wedding day was given his commission as full major general of volunteers.
He was honorably mustered out of the volunteer service, January 15, 1866.
Later career
After he retired from the military, he served for three years as receiver of the Atlantic and Great Western Railroad. He moved to England in 1869, but returned to Rhode Island in 1873, where he died in 1887.
Potter died in Newport, Rhode Island on February 19, 1887. He was buried at Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx, New York City.