Thomas Hart Ruffin (September 9, 1820 – October 17, 1863) was a Congressional Representative from North Carolina; born in Louisburg, North Carolina, September 9, 1820; attended the common schools; graduated from the University of North Carolina Law School, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, 1841; lawyer, private practice; circuit attorney of the seventh judicial district of the state of Missouri 1844–1848; elected as a Democrat to the Thirty-third and to the three succeeding Congresses (March 4, 1853 – March 3, 1861); delegate to the Confederate Provisional Congress at Richmond, Va., in July 1861; during the American Civil War served in the Confederate Army as colonel of the 1st North Carolina Cavalry Regiment, Confederate States of America; mortally wounded in action on October 14, 1863, at Auburn, Virginia; and died as a prisoner of war on October 17, 1863, in Grace Church Hospital, Alexandria, Virginia; interment in the private cemetery on the Ruffin homestead, near Louisburg, N.C.

Ruffin owned a large plantation with 51 slaves.^[1]