Kit Carson
Carson was illiterate. He was embarrassed by not being able to read and write and so tried to hide it. He was impressed by gentlemen who could read and write, however. In 1856, he told his life story to an army officer, who wrote it down. Carson told the officer that he had left school at an early age: "I was a young boy in the school house when the cry came, Injuns! I jumped to my rifle and threw down my spelling book, and thar it lies."