Description

Front: Edmund Ruffin, January 5, 1794, Jun 17, 1865, Agriculturalist, Writer, Patriot. Edmund was born sickly into a Virginia farm family and surprised everyone by surviving childhood. He was tutored privately, and finished a term at William & Mary College when his father passed away leaving him a property that was run down. Intent on making his property profitable he seriously studied every aspect of agriculture that was known at the time. He discovered and promote the addition of soil amenities to replenish

Back: depleted soil. So successful were his methods that by 1840 he became Virginia’s and the South’s leading agricultural spokesman. Editing the Farmer’s Register and presiding over the Virginia Agricultural Society he was well known and respected. His tradition was one of fierce independence and when Virginia first refused to secede he moved to South Carolina to join the Palmetto Guards and was given the honor of fire the first shot on Fort Sumter from a battery emplacement. Too old for military service, he served as a citizen whenever he could be useful in the environs of Richmond. After the Appomattox surrender he became so distraught that at age 71 he took his own life rather than live under a despotism.