Alexander H. Mitchell (November 13, 1840–March 7, 1913) was a United States military officer who fought with the Union Army during the American Civil War as captain of Company A of the 105th Pennsylvania Infantry. Wounded multiple times in combat during the war, he was awarded the Kearny Cross for his distinguished service in the Battle of Chancellorsville, Virginia in May 1863, and was then also awarded his nation’s highest award for valor, the U.S. Medal of Honor for his capture of a Confederate flag in hand-to-hand combat with the color-bearer of the 18th North Carolina Infantry during the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House on May 12, 1864. The older brother of Pennsylvania State Senator James George Mitchell (1847–1919), Alexander H. Mitchell worked for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, serving as a messenger for the Pennsylvania Department of Internal Affairs from 1889 until his death in 1913. Formative years Born in Perrysville, Pennsylvania on November 13, 1840, Alexander H. Mitchell was a son of Thomas Sharp Mitchell Sr. (1813–1883), a Jefferson County merchant who was a native of Elderton, Pennsylvania, and Hunterdon County native Sarah E. (Blose) Mitchell. He was raised in Allegheny County and educated in the public schools of his community with his siblings: Nancy (1831–1884), Andrew (1833–1863), Sarah Ann (1834–1894), Thomas Sharp Jr. (1838–1898), Rebecca A. (1842–1910), Martha J. (1844–1923), James George (1847–1919), Malinda (1849–1910), Laura (1852–1909), and Alice R. (1855–1932). Known to family and friends as “Alex”, Mitchell resided in Jefferson County at the dawn of America’s Civil War. Civil War On April 18, 1861, at the age of 20, Alex Mitchell became one of Pennsylvania’s earliest responders to President Abraham Lincoln’s call for volunteers to help defend Washington, D.C. following the fall of Fort Sumter, on April 13 to Confederate States Army troops. After enrolling for Civil War military service that day (April 18) at Brookville, Pennsylvania, he then officially mustered in for duty at Harrisburg on April 24 as a private with Company K of the 8th Pennsylvania Infantry. Initially stationed at Camp Slifer, near Chambersburg, Mitchell and his regiment were attached to the 3rd Brigade, 1st Division before being moved, on June 7, to Greencastle and then south to the Washington, D.C. area, where they were assigned to guard duties along the Potomac River near Williamsport. Stationed near Martinsburg in July, the 8th Pennsylvania periodically engaged Confederate troops in small skirmishes, and then participated