Col. Frederic Gilbert Bauer was born on January 23, 1881 in Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts.

His grandfather, James G. Shute, enlisted with Co. K, 5th Massachusetts Infantry as a private on September 12, 1862 and mustered out of July 2, 1863. He was a Comrade of the Boston Post No. 200, Jamaica Plain.

On May 3, 1905, Fred became a charter member and the first Camp Commander of the Joseph Stedman Camp No. 51, Jamaica Plain. He was elected Massachusetts' Department Commander in 1939 and reelected in 1940. He was elected Senior Vice Commander-in-Chief at the 1950 National
Encampment. He was appointed National Counselor at the 1952 National Encampment. On September 12, 1954 Senior Vice Commander-in-Chief John W. Emery died and Fred was elected to fill the unexpired term.

He enlisted in the U.S. Calvary Reserves in 1903. During WWI, he was a Major in the Judge Advocate General's Office with the American Expeditionary Force in France. He was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel in 1918 and later advanced to the rank of Colonel. He accepted a regular Army commission in 1920 and returned to the reserves in 1923. He was decorated as a Commander of the Belgian Order of Leopold II. During WWII, he instructed Army students in international law at the Boston University Law School.

Fred graduated summa cum laude from Harvard College in 1900 and from the Harvard Law School in 1903 where he received his LLB degree, cum laude. He was a corporate and tax attorney. He was active as a civic leader in Weymouth, Massachusetts. After his retirement from the law firm of Fowler, Bauer, & Kenny of Boston in 1950 he moved to Ridgewood, New Jersey.

He was a National President of the Society of the Cincinnati, a President General of the Society of the War of 1812, a Department Judge Advocate of the Massachusetts Department Veterans of Foreign Wars, Founder and first Grand Master of the Maj. Gen. Henry Knox Masonic Lodge in Weymouth, Past Master of the Eliot Lodge of Masons in Jamaica Plain, and a member of the Sons of the American Revolution.

Fred married Mary F. Wilbur and they had two sons. After Mary died in 1943, he married Charlotte C. Aycrigg.

Brother Bauer died on April 13, 1964 in Ridgewood, New Jersey and he is buried at Woodbrook Cemetery in Woburn, Massachusetts.