Samuel Chapman Armstrong (January 30, 1839 – May 11, 1893) was an American soldier and general during the American Civil War who later became an educator, particularly of non-whites. The son of missionaries in Hawaii, he rose through the Union Army during the American Civil War to become a general, leading units of African American soldiers. He became best known as an educator, founding and becoming the first principal of the normal school for African-American and later Native American pupils in Virginia which later became Hampton University. He also founded the university's museum, the Hampton University Museum, which is the oldest African-American museum in the country, and the oldest museum in Virginia. Early and family life The third son of Christian missionary Richard Armstrong (1805–1860), Armstrong was born in Wailuku, Maui, Kingdom of Hawaiʻi, the sixth of ten children (eight of which survived to adulthood). His mother, Clarissa Chapman Armstrong, grew up in a Congregational family in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. His father was a Presbyterian minister sent by the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, founded by several Williams College graduates associated with various Protestant denominations. His parents were among the first missionaries to what was then known as the Sandwich Islands. Arriving in 1832, they established several Christian congregations on various Hawai'ian islands. In 1840, following the death of experienced missionary Rev. Armstrong, he became the second shepherd of Kawaiahaʻo Church in Honolulu on the main island of Oʻahu when Samuel was an infant. Many chiefs and their families attended the historic church (which received its current name in 1853 under Rev. Armstrong). Rev. Armstrong also served on the kingdom's privy council and became the Minister of Education and later Superintendent of Public Instruction. He established schools throughout the kingdom, and emphasized learning a manual trade in addition to farming. He graduated students proficient in blacksmithing, carpentry or barrel-making in addition to reading, writing and arithmetic. Like many children of missionaries and tribal leaders, Samuel attended Punahou School and associated Oahu College in Honolulu for his elementary education. There is a bronze plaque at Punahou commemorating him as a "Son of Punahou". After finishing Punahou he became his father's secretary. After his father suffered a horseback accident and died in 1860, Samuel Armstrong, aged 21, followed his father's wishes and sailed from Hawaiʻi for the mainland United States to begin his own studies at Williams College in Massachusetts. He