Anson Mills was born on a farm in Boone County, Indiana. At age 16 he left home to attend school at the Charlottesville Academy in New York. He was dubbed there the “Russian Ambassador from the Woolly West” because of the full, dark mustache he cultivated even in his late teens, as well as his rural accent. At age 21 – a little older than most cadets – Mills enrolled in the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, where he studied for two years. In 1857 he resigned because of his low marks in mathematics. The disappointment, he later said, “was one of the keenest of his life, for he had always fostered the ambition to become an officer in the Army.”

Too ashamed to return home, Mills set out for Texas, eventually reaching El Paso (a town then called Franklin, but renamed El Paso at the suggestion of Mills during his years there), where he was joined by two of his brothers. Despite his difficulties, he had learned enough math to win contracts surveying land and assisting with several engineering projects at El Paso, including construction of “the most imposing structure in El Paso for forty years,” the offices of the Butterfield Overland Mail Company. He also worked as a tutor in private families, then qualified for a position as a civilian surveyor with the military, surveying several Texas fort sites for the government.

In February 1861 an election was held to determine whether Texas would secede from the Union. The vote in El Paso County was 985 in favor of secession, with 2 lone votes in opposition – the votes of Anson Mills and one of his brothers. Mills left El Paso for Washington, D.C. to join the U.S. Army.

He must have been popular with his classmates during his two years at West Point, because it wasn’t long before Army officials received this petition:

West Point, N.Y.
April 30, 1861

Lorenzo Thomas,
Adjutant-General,
Washington, D.C.

Sir:

We, the undersigned, members of the First Class at the United States Military Academy, respectfully recommend to your favorable consideration the claims of Mr. Anson Mills, an applicant for a commission as second lieutenant in the United States army.

Mr. Mills was formerly a member, for nearly two years, of the class preceding ours, when he resigned.

During that time his habits and character conformed to the strictest military propriety and discipline, and we feel assured that he would be an honor to the service and that its interests would be promoted by his appointment.

Respectfully submitted,

[signed by 38 members of the 1861 graduating class]

Two weeks later, Mills won his commission as first, rather than second lieutenant, of the 18th Infantry, United States Army.

Over the next four war years, Mills was never absent, either on leave or due to sickness, for a single day. He fought with his unit in the siege of Corinth; the battles of Perrysville, Kentucky; Murfreesboro, Tennessee; Hoover’s Gap, Tennessee; Chickamauga, Georgia; the siege of Chattanooga, Tennessee; on Missionary Ridge, Tennessee, Tunnel Hill, Georgia, and at Buzzard’s Roost, Georgia. He participated in the Atlanta campaign; fought at Resaca, Dallas, New Hope Church, Kenesaw Mountain, Neal Dow Station, Peach Tree Creek, Utoy Creek, and Jonesboro (all in Georgia), and at Nashville, Tennessee. His regiment, the 18th Infantry, reportedly lost more men in battle than any other regiment in the regular army, and his company (H, 1st battalion) lost more than any other company in that regiment. Yet Mills received only one slight wound, at Peach Tree Creek, on 20 July 1864.

He was given a well-earned leave after the war, then rejoined his regiment in October 1867, after its transfer to Fort Bridger, Utah (now Wyoming). He was there for only a few months, but this is what he recalled in his memoirs of his time there:

At the expiration of my leave, I was ordered to the command of Fort Bridger, Utah, where my company had arrived in my absence.

The volunteers, under General P. Edward Connor, were being relieved. The posts and the territory were both in a chaotic condition, the soldiers harassing the Mormons and encouraging the Gentiles in unlawful persecutions. …

I was prejudiced against the Mormons, but found they were the best people in the country, and the only ones who would fill contracts fairly. The Gentiles practiced every device to beat the government, but the word of a Mormon was his bond.

With Major Lewis, commanding Fort Douglas at Salt Lake, I called upon Brigham Young. He looked like General Grant, and was an earnest and, I believe, a sincere and conscientious man. He said he was glad to meet a regular officer, because the regular army always treated them well, but that the volunteers under Connor had been demoralizing to those of the Mormon faith. Discussing my prejudice against his people, about which he asked and I answered frankly, he said: “You have doubtless heard we are disloyal to the Union.” Pointing to the flag flying over his Tabernacle, he said it had waved every day since the war began. Upon his invitation I attended his Church and heard him preach the next Sunday.

I visited the Tabernacle in company with his son-in-law and saw open on the pulpit the inspired volumes from which they preached: the Old Testament, the New Testament, and the Book of Mormon. He presented a copy of the latter to me, inscribed with his name, which I still have.

My experiences changed my mind regarding the Mormon people. I believe their Church the equal of any in the inculcation of those qualities which make the Mormons law-abiding, industrious, economical, and faithful to all their agreements.

[Anson Mills, My Story (Washington: The Author, 1921), 103-105]

Mills continued with the Army for a few more years, participating in actions against the Plains Indian tribes, and serving at posts as widely scattered as Fort Walla Walla, Washington, the Presidio at San Francisco, and Fort Reno, Oklahoma. He left the service in 1893 with the rank of brigadier general, retiring to El Paso, where he resumed his engineering career and was soon appointed as U.S. commissioner on the international boundary commission negotiating with Mexico. One of his most noteworthy achievements was a plan to settle the boundary issue once and for all by the enormous engineering task of eliminating the “bancos” in the Rio Grande. This river, which had traditionally marked the boundary between the two countries, was a constantly shifting course of U-bends, or “bancos” – whenever the river changed its meandering course, the property and citizenship along its banks shifted from one country to another, an obviously untenable situation. Mills devised plans for engineers to cut a permanent course for the river through the necks of all those “bancos,” thus permanently fixing the border.

In 1921 he completed and published his memoirs for private circulation among his friends. He died on 5 November 1924, and was buried at Arlington National Cemetery.