Robert Wickliffe Cooper (October 19, 1831 – June 8, 1867) was a United States Army officer and cavalry commander of the American Civil War. He rarely used his real first name and thus appears in most documents as Wickliffe Cooper. Early life Robert Wickliffe Cooper was born in Lexington, Kentucky on October 19, 1831. Wickliffe Cooper attended Dickinson College in Pennsylvania for two years; He was in the class of 1851. Military career Cooper enlisted in the army as a private at Louisville, Kentucky in 1861 at the outbreak of the Civil War. He was made a Sergeant on November 15, 1861 and was commissioned as second lieutenant in the 20th Kentucky Infantry on January 24, 1862. From February to July 1862 he was the Acting aide-de-camp (ADC) and Acting Assistant Adjutant general (AAG) for the 22nd Brigade of the 4th Division in the Army of the Ohio. At the Battle of Corinth he said to have "exhibited bravery even to rashness" in an official report by Colonel Thomas D. Sedgewick. In a report that Sedgewick made earlier the same month, he said of Cooper: "Asst. Adjt. Gen. Wickliffe Cooper, as on all occasions before, exhibited the greatest bravery. The coolness and precision with which he made the several reconnaissances ordered by me amid the greatest danger merit the highest praise." In July 1862 he was made the ADC to Maj. General William Nelson. At the Battle of Richmond (August 1862), he was singled out for honors by a Union Army general. He was taken prisoner and paroled on August 30, 1862 in Richmond, Kentucky, as part of a prisoner exchange. Cooper was recommissioned as lieutenant-colonel of the 4th Kentucky Cavalry on March 26, 1863 and became its colonel in April; following the resignation of Col. Bayles. On June 4, 1863, Cooper was injured when a horse fell on him in Franklin, Tennessee. He commanded the regiment at the Battle of Chickamauga in September 1864. Cooper returned to Lexington, Kentucky in 1864 for sick leave. Then Cooper led local forces against John Hunt Morgan's raiders. He refused Morgan's demands for the surrender of Lexington on June 9, 1864 and repulsed his troops. In April 1865 he commanded the post of Montgomery, Alabama and in May and July 1865 the post of Albany, Georgia. He was honorably mustered out on August 21, 1865 at Macon, Georgia. He received battle honors for