He married Catherine Sarah Lee, daughter of Henry William and Eleanor Percy Lee who was a cousin of Robert Edward Lee. In 1876, he was appointed as president of the United States Board of Mississippi River Commissioners. He was also secretary and treasurer of the Mississippi Levee Board. In 1894, twenty thousand to forty thousand dollars mysteriously disappeared from the Mississippi Levee Board, of which Ferguson was both secretary and treasurer. Later that year, he suddenly left and moved to his hometown of Charleston where worked as a civil engineer. After staying in Charleston, Ferguson moved to Ecuador. It would be many years before he returned. At the outbreak of the Spanish–American War, he tried to join the war effort but he was turned down. On February 3, 1917, Ferguson died in Jackson, Mississippi, where he is buried at the Greenwood Cemetery along with other famous Confederate generals. Selected works Personal Memoirs of S. W. Ferguson (1900) See also List of Confederate States Army generals List of members of the United Confederate Veterans List of people from Charleston, South Carolina References Further reading Eicher, John H., and David J. Eicher, Civil War High Commands. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001. . Sifakis, Stewart. Who Was Who in the Civil War. New York: Facts On File, 1988. . External links Official Heyward and Ferguson Family Papers at the College of Charleston Heyward and Ferguson Family Papers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Samuel Wragg Ferguson Papers at the Louisiana State University General information 1834 births 1917 deaths 19th-century American engineers 19th-century American Episcopalians 19th-century American lawyers 19th-century American male writers 19th-century American non-fiction writers 19th-century United States Army personnel 20th-century American Episcopalians 20th-century American non-fiction writers 20th-century American male writers American civil engineers American expatriates in Ecuador American Freemasons American lawyers admitted to the practice of law by reading law American male non-fiction writers American memoirists American militia officers American people of English descent American people of Scottish descent American people of Welsh descent American slave owners Burials in Mississippi Cavalry commanders Confederate States Army brigadier generals Mississippi lawyers Military personnel from Charleston, South Carolina People from Greenville, Mississippi People of South Carolina in the American Civil War People of the Utah War Stateless people United States Army officers United States Military Academy alumni