marker. Civil War Bratton joined the Confederacy in the Civil War. On April 13, 1861, he volunteered to be an assistant surgeon for the Fifth Regiment, South Carolina Infantry Volunteers under Colonel Jenkins. He was then placed in charge of the Fourth Division of the Winder Hospital in Richmond, Virginia, where he served three years and was promoted to the rank of surgeon. He requested lighter duty and was transferred to the 20th Regiment of Virginia surgeons under General Braxton Bragg at Milledgeville, Georgia. After Union General William T. Sherman marched his army through Georgia, the hospital was dismantled and Bratton was furloughed and returned to Yorkville. On April 28 and 29 of 1865, Confederate President Jefferson Davis was fleeing Union forces and came through Yorkville, and Bratton hosted Davis and two of his aides. Post-Civil War After the war and the emancipation of the slaves, Bratton's plantation saw lean times. Many of his former slaves left, and Bratton worked the fields in 1866. In 1868, he sent away former slave "Bob and his family" on account of his radical politics. His farm was still not profitable in 1867 through 1869, while Bratton attempted to resume medical practice. In 1870 he had in part recovered and incorporated the Columbia Oil Company. During this time, Bratton became active in anti-Reconstruction activities and became a leader in the York County Ku Klux Klan. Ku Klux Klan In February 1871, local black preacher Elias Hill met with local Ku Klux Klan leaders to negotiate the safety of blacks in the community. These negotiations were not successful, and around February 12, eight black men were killed by 500 to 700 whites in black gowns with masks, and was followed by nightly Klan raids for months. An important black leader in York County of that time was a former Union soldier and local militia leader named James Rainey, also known as Jim Williams. Williams was a former slave of Bratton's brother, John S. Bratton, and his wife, Harriet J. Rainey. At that time, black militias like this were known as Union Leagues. On February 11, 1871, Jim Williams, along with June Moore (nephew of Elias Hill) and a group of blacks met with a group of whites led by Bratton at a crossroads near Clay Hill to seek to deescalate tensions. Williams suggested that he would be willing to relinquish his militia weapons, and Black