Samuel P. Carter
Union cavalry leader Samuel P. Carter, a native of Elizabethton, was a naval veteran of the Mexican War and a professor at the Naval Academy before the Civil War. When the war began, Carter served as a general in the army, important especially for his 1862-63 cavalry raids in East Tennessee. Returning to his naval career after the war, he was appointed a rear admiral in 1882.
- The only person to have been both a general in the Army and a Navy Admiral.