Manley,  born July 29, 1887 in Pewee Valley, Kentucky, was the eldest of General Lawton's four surviving children,.  It's one of the reasons he doesn't have as big a part in the later Little Colonel stories as his sisters.  Basically, he just grew up too soon. 

In the Little Colonel stories, he is the model for "Ranald, the Little Captain."  Already in his name for the stories, we get an interesting historical connection.  One of  General Lawton's closest friends during the Indian Wars was General Ranald S. MacKenzie. This is one of the points that leads us to confirm that General Lawton's wife Mary (Mamie), "Mrs. Walton", had more than a little influence in naming the characters in the Little Colonel books.

In that fictionalized Little Colonel version, "The Little Captain" was noted to have participated in some valiant war incidents quite beyond what would normally be expected for a boy of his age at the time, including following his father into battle.  We wonder how many, if any, contemporary readers of the time would have been surprised that far from being fiction, this was actually true.  Manley was quite famous in his own right, having been portrayed in quite a number of magazine and newspaper articles of the time, and  sometimes having been referred to as the youngest officer in the army.

In real life, Manley was named after his uncle.  Manley was born on July 29,1887. His father and uncle Manley were very close.  In fact, General Lawton had talked about retiring in California in order to live close to his brother.  He even purchased, and lived for the briefest while, in a quite comfortable home in Redlands, California.  

Manley attended military academy as a young man, and later had two daughters. He lived much of his adult life in Washington, D.C., where he worked at the Capitol until fairly shortly before his death on Jan 11, 1960.

Views of Manley Lawton, "The Little Captain,"  'on duty' in the Philippines

On the pony he often rode following his father into battle

With his pet deer and Philippine servant