Nathaniel Beverly Tucker was the half-brother of John Randolph of Roanoke and the son of St. George Tucker. Born in Chesterfield County, he became a lawyer, a judge and a professor of law at William and Mary College. Although he was never able to attain economically and socially this high planter type of social status, he taught the necessity of an aristocracy. He expounded the doctrine of secession, defended slavery in spite of his father's energetic campaign against slavery and disliked practically everything outside of Virginia. In 1836, he wrote "The Partisan Leader" under the assumed name of Edward William Sidney. Since he strongly disliked Martin Van Buren, he wrote this book in direct opposition to Van Buren. He placed the time of the story as 1856 and then proceeded to describe the happenings of a "dictatorship" which had been established by Van Buren and the eventual secession of the Southern states from the Union with a civil war as the result. Peculiarly enough, this book was reprinted in 1861 as a propaganda technique by both the North and the South: the North used it as an illustration that the theory of secession had been planned and discussed for years in the South and the South used it as an illustration that the theory of secession had been justified and accepted for years. Two major literary works of Tucker are "A Discourse on the Importance of the Study of Political Science" and "The Principles of Pleading." Francis Walker Gilmer, a native of Albemarle County and a brilliant student at William and Mary where he prepared himself for a law career, wrote an anonymous volume entitled "Sketches of American Orators." His "Sketches, Essays and Translations" were published posthumously. William Alexander Caruthers was a medical doctor who enjoyed writing. His most well-known book is "The Knights of the Horse-Shoe; a Traditional Tale of the Cocked Hat Gentry in the Old Dominion." He also wrote "The Kentuckian in New-York, or the Adventures of Three Southerners," "The Cavaliers of Virginia, or the Recluse of Jamestown" and "An Historical Romance of the Old Dominion."