Wentworth through Wight

WENTWORTH, John, 1815-1888, New Hampshire, lawyer, editor, newspaper publisher.  Congressman, 1843-1851, 1853-1855, 1865-1867.  Mayor of Chicago, Illinois, elected in 1857 and 1860.  Anti-slavery advocate.  Early co-founder of an anti-slavery political party that became the Republican Party.  (Appleton’s Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 436; Dictionary of American Biography, Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1936, Vol. 10, Pt. 1, p. 657)

WENTWORTH, John, journalist, born in Sandwich, New Hampshire, 5 March, 1815; died in Chicago, Illinois, 16 October, 1888, was a son of Paul Wentworth, and the grandson on his mother's side of Colonel Amos Cogswell, a Revolutionary officer. After graduation at Dartmouth in 1836, he settled in Illinois in 1836, attended the first meeting to consider the propriety of organizing the town of Chicago into a city, did much to procure its charter, and voted at its first city election in May, 1837. He studied law at Chicago, attended lectures at Harvard law-school, and was admitted to practice in Illinois in 1841. While studying law he conducted the Chicago “Democrat,” which he soon purchased and made the chief daily paper of the northwest and of which he was publisher, editor, and proprietor until 1861. Being elected to Congress as a Democrat, he served from 4 December, 1843, till 3 March, 1851, and again from 5 December, 1853, till 3 March, 1855. He introduced in that body the first bill favoring the establishment of the present national warehouse system, was instrumental in securing the grant of land to the state of Illinois out of which was constructed the present Illinois Central Railroad. He was one of the Democrats and Whigs in Congress that assembled at Crutchet's, at Washington, the morning after the repeal of the Missouri Compromise passed the house, and resolved to ignore all party lines and form an anti-slavery party. Out of this grew the present Republican Party, with which he afterward acted. He was elected mayor of Chicago in 1857 and again in 1860, and was the first Republican mayor elected in the United States after the formation of the party, and issued the first proclamation after Fort Sumter was fired upon, calling on his fellow-citizens to organize and send soldiers to the war. He introduced the first steam fire-engine, “Long John,” in Chicago in 1857, and later two others, the “Liberty” and “Economy.” Upon each occasion of his assumption of the mayor's office he found a large floating debt, and left money in the treasury for his successor. In 1861 he was a member of the convention to revise the constitution of Illinois, and he was a member of the board of education in 1861-'4 and in 1868-'72. He served again in Congress from 4 December, 1865, till 3 March, 1867, was a member of the committee of ways and means, and was an earnest advocate of the immediate resumption of specie payments. Mr. Wentworth had been a member of the Illinois State Board of Agriculture, and was the largest real estate owner in Cook County. He received the degree of LL. D. from Dartmouth, to which college he gave $10,000, and was elected president of its alumni in 1883. Owing to his extreme height he was called “Long John” Wentworth. In addition to lectures and writings upon the early history of Chicago, and historical contributions to periodicals, he was the author of “Genealogical, Bibliographical, and Biographical Account of the Descendants of Elder William Wentworth” (Boston, 1850), and “History of the Wentworth Family” (3 vols., 1878).  Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 436.


WENTZVILLE, MISSOURI, July 16, 1861. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 919.


WERDEN, Reed, naval officer, born in Delaware County, Pa,. 28 February, 1818; died in Newport, R. I., 13 July, 1886. He was appointed from Ohio a midshipman in the U.S. Navy, 9 January, 1834, became a passed midshipman, 16 July, 1840, was commissioned lieutenant, 27 February, 1847, and served in the sloop " Germantown " during the Mexican War in 1847-'8, in which he commanded a detachment of men from that ship in the expeditions against Tuspan and Tampico. When the Civil War began he was attached to the steam frigate "Minnesota," in which he participated in the attacks on the forts at Hatteras Inlet and operations in the sounds of North Carolina in Stringham's squadron. He commanded the steamers "Yankee" and "Stars and Stripes" on the North Atlantic Blockade in 1861-'2, and in the latter led the First Division in the capture of Roanoke Island. He was commissioned commander, 16 July, 1862, had charge of the steamer "Conemaugh," on the South Atlantic Blockade, in 1862-'3, was fleet-captain of the Eastern Gulf Blockading Squadron in 1864-'5, and commanded the steamer "Powhatan," in which he blockaded the Confederate ram "Stonewall" in the port of Havana, Cuba, until she was surrendered by the Spanish authorities. He was commissioned a captain, 25 July, 1866, promoted to commodore, 27 April, 1871, was made rear-admiral, 4 February, 1875, and commander-in-chief of the South Pacific Station in 1875-'6. He was then placed on the retired list at his own request. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, pp. 436-437.


WESSELLS, Henry Walton, soldier, born in Litchfield, Connecticut, 20 February, 1809. He was graduated at the U. S. Military Academy in 1833, assigned to the 2d U.S. Infantry, and was in the war with the Seminole Indians in 1837-'40, being promoted 1st lieutenant on 7 July, 1838. He served in the Mexican War, taking part in Scott's campaign, and was promoted captain, 16 February, 1847. At Contreras, Captain Wessells, though wounded, seized the regimental flag on the death of the color-sergeant, and led his men against the enemy. For gallant conduct there and at Churubusco he was brevetted major, and on his return from Mexico the state of Connecticut presented him with a jeweled sword "for distinguished services at Vera Cruz, Cerro Gordo, Contreras, and Churubusco." He served on the Pacific Coast in 1849-'54, and on the northwestern frontier in 1855-'61, being engaged in the Sioux Expedition of 1855. He was promoted major, 6 June, 1861, and from 22 August till 15 February, 1862, was colonel of the 8th Kansas Volunteers, being engaged on the Missouri border. In March, 1862, he was transferred to the Army of the Potomac, and on 25 April he was commissioned brigadier-general of volunteers. After serving in the Peninsular Campaign, being wounded at Fair Oaks, where he was brevetted lieutenant-colonel, and commanding the rear-guard from Haxall's to Harrison's landing. 2-3 July, 1862, he engaged in the defence of Suffolk, Virginia, from 20 Sept, till 9 December, and afterward took part in the operations in North Carolina. He was at Kinston and Goldsboro, and in the defence of New Berne, 21 December, 1862, till 1 May, 1863.  On 3 May he was placed in command of the sub-district of the Albemarle. On 17 April, 1864, the town of Plymouth, North Carolina, which General Wessells held with a garrison of 1,600 men, was attacked by General Robert F. Hoke with about 7,000 Confederates, assisted by the iron-clad ram "Albemarle." After a fight of four days, in which the enemy was driven back repeatedly, and one refusal to capitulate, General Wessells finally surrendered, with 1,600 troops, 25 cannon, and 2,000 small-arms, besides valuable stores. After the destruction of the "Albemarle" the town fell again into the hands of the National troops. After confinement at Richmond, Danville, Macon, and Charleston, where he was placed under the fire of the National batteries on Morris Island. General Wessells was exchanged on 3 August, and from 11 November, 1864, till 31 January. 1865, was commissary of prisoners. He was promoted lieutenant-colonel, 16 February, 1865, and received the brevet of colonel, 20 April, 1864, for "gallant and meritorious services during the rebel attack on Plymouth, North Carolina" and that of brigadier-general, U. S. Army, 13 March, 1865, for services during the war. General Wessells then served on the northwestern frontier till his retirement, 1 January, 1871, since which time he has resided in his native place. He has two sons in the army, one of whom, Henry Walton, a captain in the 3d U.S. Cavalry, has attained note as an Indian fighter. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, pp. 438-439.


WEST, Joseph Rodman, U. S. Senator, born in New Orleans, Louisiana, 19 September, 1822. He studied at the University of Pennsylvania, but was not graduated, served in the war with Mexico as a captain of volunteers, and emigrated in 1849 to California, where he engaged in commercial pursuits. At the opening of the Civil War he was proprietor of the San Francisco " Prices Current." He entered the army as lieutenant-colonel of the 1st California Infantry, saw service in New Mexico, and afterward in Arkansas and the southwest, was appointed brigadier-general of volunteers, 25 October, 1862, and became brevet major-general, 4 January, 1866, when he was mustered out of the service. After the war he settled for a short time in Texas, and then moved to New Orleans, where he served as chief deputy U. S. marshal and auditor of the customs, and afterward as administrator of improvements, till he was elected U. S. Senator from Louisiana as a Republican, serving from 4 March, 1871, till 3 March, 1877. Moving afterward to Washington, D. C, he engaged in business, and in 1882-'5 was a commissioner of the District of Columbia. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 440.


WEST, Nathaniel, clergyman, born in Ulster, Ireland, in September, 1794; died in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 2 September, 1804. He studied theology in Edinburgh, Scotland, was ordained in 1820, labored there for several years as a missionary, and was one of the founders of the first temperance society in that city. He came to this country in 1834, was installed as pastor of the Presbyterian Church at Meadville, Pennsylvania, 11 May, 1836, and after 1838 was pastor successively of churches in Monroe, Michigan, and Northeast, Pittsburg, McKeesport, and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania In 1853 he received the degree of D. D. from Jefferson College, Pennsylvania, and he was elected a corresponding member of numerous literary and scientific societies. At the opening of the Civil War he resigned his pastoral charge in Philadelphia, and in May, 1862, was appointed chaplain of the Satterlee U. S. General Hospital at West Philadelphia, one of the largest military hospitals in the country, where he served till his death. He published "The Ark of God the Safety of the Nation" (Pittsburg. 1850); "Popery the Prop of European Despotisms" (1852); "The Fugitive-Slave Law" (1852); "Babylon the Great " (1882); "Right and Left-Hand Blessings of God" (Philadelphia, 1852); "Complete Analysis of the Holy Bible, containing the Whole of the New and Old Testaments " (New York, 1853); "The Overturning of Tyrannical Governments," a sermon preached before Louis Kossuth when he was in the United States, which, by his order and at his expense. was translated and published in Magyar; "Lecture on the Causes of the Ruin of Republican Liberty in the Ancient Roman Republic" (Philadelphia, 1861); and " History of the U. S. Army General Hospital, West Philadelphia" (1863). Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 441.


WEST BRANCH, VIRGINIA, April 14, 1863. (See Suffolk, Siege of.)


WEST BRIDGE, ALABAMA, April 29, 1862. Federal Troops under Major-General O. M. Mitchell. An expedition against Bridgeport, consisting of two companies of cavalry, six regiments of infantry and 2 pieces of artillery, proceeded from Stevenson to the burned bridge within 4 miles of Bridgeport. After driving in the Confederate outposts and giving the enemy the impression that he would advance by the railroad, Mitchell made a flank movement, completely surprising the enemy, compelling him to abandon the Bridgeport road and take the Jasper route. The artillery was advanced to within 400 yards of the Confederate lines and the first fire drove them from the redoubt and breastwork across the main bridge. An attempt on the part of the enemy to fire the bridge was frustrated by a portion of the 2nd Ohio infantry. The casualties were not reported. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 919.


WESTBROOK'S, GEORGIA, October 2, 1864. (See Fairburn, same date.)


WEST LIBERTY, KENTUCKY, October 23, 1861. 2nd Ohio Infantry, Laughlin's Cavalry Company and a section of Konkle's Battery. Brigadier-General William Nelson reported that he ordered Colonel L. A. Harris with the above named troops to move from camp at McCormick's gap on West Liberty, while he (Nelson) moved up from another direction. Harris encountered a Confederate force of several hundred, but drove them easily and entered the town without further opposition. No casualties were reported. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 919.


WESTCOTT, James Diament, senator, born in Alexandria, Virginia, 10 May, 1802; died in Montreal, Canada, 12 January, 1880. He was the son of James D. Westcott (1775-1841), who was Secretary of State in New Jersey in 1830-'40, and his grandfather served in the Revolutionary war as captain of artillery. At an early age he moved with his father to New Jersey, where he received his education, studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1824, and practised until 1829. Afterward he was a clerk in the consular bureau of the state department in Washington, and in 1830-'4 was secretary of the territory of Florida, occasionally performing the duties of the governor. In 1832 he was a member of the territorial legislature, and in 1834-'6 was attorney-general for the middle district of Florida. He served again in the legislature, was a member of the convention for framing a state constitution in 1838 and 1839, and on the admission of Florida into the Union in 1845 was elected to the U. S. Senate as a Democrat, serving from 1 December, 1845, till 3 March, 1849. On the expiration of his term he moved to New York City, where he practised law until 1862, when he went to Canada and remained there until his death.—His son, James Diament, jurist, born in Tallahassee, Florida, 18 June, 1839, was educated in his native town, studied law, and was admitted to the bar. He entered the Confederate service at the beginning of the war, and attained the rank of major. In 1885 he became attorney-general of Florida, but resigned this post a year later, and was appointed a justice of the Supreme Court. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 442.


WESTCOTT, Thompson, editor, born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 5 June, 1820; died there, 8 May, 1888. He was educated at the English schools of the University of Pennsylvania, studied law, and was admitted to the bar in 1841. In 1840 he became law-reporter on the "Public Ledger," remaining there until 1851 and frequently acting in an editorial capacity for this journal and for the " Dollar Newspaper." When the "Sunday Despatch " was begun in 1848 he became its editor and served until 1884. In 1863-9 he was editor-in-chief of the "Inquirer," and he contributed to this journal until 1876. In 1884 he accepted an editorial appointment on the Philadelphia " Record," which he held for several months, after which he contributed to the " Public Ledger" and to other journals. Mr. Westcott was the author of a " Life of John Fitch, the Inventor of the Steamboat" (Philadelphia, 1857); "The Taxpayer's Guide" (1864); "Names of Persons who took the Oath of Allegiance to the State of Pennsylvania between the Years 1777 and 1789, with a History of the 'Test Laws' of Pennsylvania" (1865); "The Chronicles of the Great Rebellion against the United States of America," first published in the "Old Franklin Almanac" (1867): "Official Guide-Book of Philadelphia" (1870); "Centennial Portfolio" (1870); "Historic Mansions and Buildings of Philadelphia " (1877): and, with J. Thomas Scharf, a "History of Philadelphia, 1609-1884 " (3 vols., 1884); and contributed to the " Sunday Despatch " a " History of Philadelphia from the First Settlements on the Delaware to the Consolidation in 1854." Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 442.


WESTMINSTER, MARYLAND, June 29, 1863. Detachment of the 1st Delaware Cavalry. About 3:30 p. m. on the afternoon of the 29th, while the Union and Confederate armies were maneuvering for position before the battle of Gettysburg, Major N. B. Knight with two companies occupied Westminster and learned that the Confederates were advancing on the Washington road. An advance guard was sent out, but was immediately driven in and reported another force advancing from the other side of town. One company charged the enemy on the Washington road and drove them until the reserve came up, when the Federals were in turn driven back. Knight then ordered a retreat to Reisterstown, Company D protecting the rear. The Federal losses amounted to 67 all told; the Confederate casualties were not reported.  The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 919.


WESTON, Anne Warren, Weymouth, Massachusetts, abolitionist leader.  Co-founder, Officer, Counsellor, life member of the Boston Female Anti-Slavery Society (BFASS).  The BFASS “believing slavery to be the direct violation of the laws of God and productive of a vast amount of misery and crime, and convinced that its abolition can only be effected by an acknowledgement of the justice and necessity of immediate emancipation.”  Executive Committee, American Anti-Slavery society (AASS), 1843-1864.  Counsellor, Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, 1844-1860.  Helped organize anti-slavery fairs in Boston. (Dumond, 1961, p. 275; Mabee, 1970, p. 222; Rodriguez, 2007, p. 199; Yellin, 1994, pp. 40n, 41, 43n, 45, 56, 57n, 61-62, 64, 173, 176n, 253n, 258, 259, 289, 294; BFASS Annual Reports)


WESTON, Caroline, Boston, Massachusetts, abolitionist leader.  Co-founder, Boston Female Anti-Slavery Society (BFASS). Vice President, Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, 1843-1859.  Helped organize anti-slavery fairs in Boston.  Supported William Lloyd Garrison and immediate emancipation.  (Rodriguez, 2007, p. 199; Yellin, 1994, pp. 60, 62, 64n, 65, 172, 176, 253n, 256, 285, 294; BFASS Annual Reports)


WESTON, Deborah, Boston, Massachusetts, abolitionist leader.  Co-founder, Boston Female Anti-Slavery Society (BFASS).  Helped organize anti-slavery fairs in Boston.  Supported William Lloyd Garrison and immediate emancipation. (Yellin, 1994, pp. 40n, 43n, 62, 172, 173, 176, 257-259, 285, 294; BFASS Annual Reports)


WESTON, Sullivan Hardy, clergyman, born in Bristol, Maine, 7 October, 1816; died in New York City, 14 October, 1887. He was graduated at Wesleyan University in 1841, was ordained deacon in Trinity Church, New York City, in 1847, and priest in the same church in 1852. His ministerial life was passed in Trinity parish, of which he was an assistant minister, in special charge of St. John's chapel. He was elected bishop of Texas in 1852, but declined the office. He served as chaplain to the 7th New York Regiment, and accompanied that regiment to Washington, in 1861, at the opening of the Civil War, and again when the regiment volunteered in the summer of 1863. The degree of D. D. was conferred upon him by Columbia in 1861. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 443.


WESTON, KENTUCKY, September 14, 1864. Detachment of 48th Kentucky Infantry. A detail of 6 men under Sergt. Rogers was sent on the steamer Colossus from Smithland as a guard for 14 guerrilla prisoners. When the vessel neared Weston the guard was overpowered, the sergeant and a private being killed and 2 others wounded. After the prisoners gained control they ran the boat ashore and fled, taking all the arms with them. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 919.


WESTON, WEST VIRGINIA, August 31, 1862. Detachment of the 6th West Virginia Infantry. Brigadier-General A. G. Jenkins, of the Confederate army, in his report of an expedition into West Virginia and Ohio, says: "We reached Weston at daylight the next morning (August 31) and surrounded the place, but a dense fog suddenly arising, the enemy, of whom there were six companies, mostly escaped. We captured about a dozen prisoners." The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 919.


WESTOVER, VIRGINIA, July 4, 1862. Colonel Bradley T. Johnson of the Confederate army, says in a report: "On July 4 we occupied the woods' 1n front of Westover Church. There was some sharp skirmishing, but no loss." This is the only official mention of the affair. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 920.

WESTOVER, VIRGINIA, July 22, 1862. Captain Taylor, of the 4th Pennsylvania cavalry, was fired upon from ambush while visiting his pickets, and slightly wounded. The enemy was pursued but made his escape. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 920.


WEST PLAINS, MISSOURI, February 19, 1862. Detachments of 6th Missouri and 3d Iowa Cavalry. The command, led by Lieutenant-Colonel S. N. Wood, surrounded the town of West Plains, and then attacked. After a short skirmish the enemy surrendered, having lost 6 killed and 8 wounded. The remainder, 60 in number, were made prisoners. There were no Federal casualties. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 920.


WEST POINT, ARKANSAS, August 14, 1863. Detachment of 32nd Iowa Infantry. A side expedition of the Union army advancing upon Little Rock, moved up the Little Red river in boats, and when returning was fired upon at West Point by a portion of Shelby's brigade. The fighting was sharp for a time, but the Confederates were finally repulsed with a loss of 7 or 8 men wounded. The Federals had 6 wounded, 1 of them mortally. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 920.


WEST POINT, ARKANSAS, June 16, 1864. 9th Iowa Cavalry. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 920.


WEST POINT, ARKANSAS, July 28, 1864. Detachment of 11th Missouri Cavalry. A detachment of this regiment, consisting of 2 commissioned officers and 18 men, while waiting at a house for the main body, was attacked by about 60 Confederates clad in Federal uniform. After an exchange of shots the Confederates compelled the Union troops to retire, leaving 1 dead on the field. The enemy had 2 men killed.


WEST POINT, GEORGIA, April 16, 1865. (See Fort Tyler.)


WEST POINT, MISSISSIPPI, February 20-21, 1864. Cavalry of Military Division of the Mississippi. During the Meridian expedition Brigadier-General William Sooy Smith concentrated his cavalry at Prairie Station and moved on West Point. When the advance was within a mile of the town a Confederate brigade was encountered and after a short, sharp fight was driven back. By 3 p. m. the whole command was in front of West Point and careful reconnaissances were made of the Confederate strength and position. That night Smith determined to withdraw and at daylight next morning began a retrograde movement, Forrest following closely all day and skirmishing constantly with the rear-guard. The casualties for this single engagement were not reported. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 920.


WEST POINT, VIRGINIA, May 7, 1862. Franklin's Division, 1st Army Corps. The division left Yorktown early on the morning of the 6th and at 3 p. m. the advance reached Eltham's landing. Two hours later the artillery arrived and the command went into camp. During the night there was some picket firing, in which each side lost 1 man killed and 2 Confederates were captured. Early on the morning of the 7th reconnaissances were made in all directions and Newton's brigade was ordered into position to guard the road where it debouched from the wood. About 9 a. m. firing commenced on Newton's right. The pickets fell back slowly and in good order until reinforced by two regiments, when they again advanced. By 11 o'clock the enemy had come up in such force that Newton's skirmishers were compelled to fall back to the edge of the wood, pursued by the enemy. Hexamer's battery had been placed to cover the road, and as soon as the enemy appeared opened fire, driving him back to the shelter of the timber. Hexamer's and Upton's batteries then shelled the woods until the firing ceased, when Newton was reinforced by parts of Slocum's and Taylor's brigades and the action continued until about 3 p. m., when the enemy withdrew. Although this engagement is known as the battle of West Point, it was fought on the opposite side of the Pamunkey river between Eltham's landing and Barhamsville. The attack was made by the Confederates to protect their trains, which were in an exposed position at Barhamsville, and which they thought were in danger of an assault . The enemy's force consisted of part of G. W. Smith's division, the troops formerly commanded by Magruder, and Hill's and Longstreet's reserves. The Union loss was 48 killed, 110 wounded and 28 missing. The Confederate loss was not ascertained. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, pp. 920-921.


WESTPORT, MISSOURI, June 17, 1863. Detachment of 9th Kansas Cavalry. The detachment, under Captain Henry Flesher, was fired upon from the timber near Westport just about sunset by some 200 or 300 Confederates. In retiring Flesher was compelled to pass through a narrow lane and the enemy followed so closely that it was impossible to keep his men in order. They were finally rallied near some buildings, when they turned and repulsed the enemy. The Union troops lost 14 dead and at least 4 wounded, while the enemy had 1 man killed, who was buried by the Federals. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 921.


WESTPORT, MISSOURI, October 23, 1864. Army of the Border. After being compelled to retire from the crossing of the Big Blue river on the 22nd the Army of the Border fell back to Westport, the Confederates halting some miles south. Next morning the Union troops, after replenishing their ammunition, moved south and were deployed in line of battle 2 miles from the town, along the banks of Brush creek, a stream flowing east and skirted by heavy timber. The Confederates soon attacked in force and after a stubborn resistance the Union advance was obliged to fall back to the north side of the creek, while the enemy occupied the timber on the south side. When Major-General S. R. Curtis arrived he extended the Federal line farther to the right, using the militia on that wing, and after some delay the 9th Wisconsin battery was planted on an eminence commanding the Confederate position on the other side of the stream. Finding that the infantry line was able to hold the enemy in check at every point, Curtis ordered a cavalry charge down the main road and on a road leading to the Confederate right. At the same time the infantry pressed forward and the enemy was compelled to seek a new position on the open prairie. Curtis' men advanced so steadily that resistance was impossible, and by noon, when Pleasonton’s guns were brought into action on the left, the Confederate retreat had become almost a rout. At 2 p. m. Pleasonton joined Curtis and was sent in pursuit of the fleeing enemy. The casualties for this engagement were not definitely ascertained, but were not exceptionally heavy. The affair was the turning point of Price's Missouri expedition. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 921.


WEST'S CROSS ROADS, SOUTH CAROLINA, February 25, 1865. Foraging party of the 1st Brigade, 3d Division, 15th Army Corps. In the campaign of the Carolinas a foraging party, consisting of parts of the 48th, 63d and 93d Illinois infantry, was attacked near West's cross-roads by a Confederate detachment, some of whom wore the Federal uniform. In the skirmish 2 Union men were killed, 3 wounded and 5 captured, together with 2 wagons. A little later the same party attacked the pickets, but the attack was repulsed. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 921.


WEST UNION, WEST VIRGINIA, May 6, 1863. Detachments of 2nd and 11th West Virginia Infantry. About 6 p. m. the Confederate cavalry drove in the pickets on both the Weston and Clarksburg roads and came within 600 yards of the town, when a volley from the garrison sent them back. Fifteen of the outside pickets and 3 scouts were captured and paroled.


WET GLAIZE, MISSOURI, October 13, 1861. Detachment of 13th Illinois Infantry and Fremont Battalion Missouri Cavalry. The advance of a scouting party under Colonel John B. Wyman of the 13th Illinois met 500 men of Johnston's advance at Wet Glaize or Dutch Hollow. Major Clark Wright, commanding the Missouri cavalry, attacked the Confederates and dispersed them with the aid of the infantry, the Union casualties being 1 killed and 1 wounded, while the Confederates suffered to the extent of 16 killed and 30 wounded. This affair is also called Monday hollow. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 922.


WETHERILL, Samuel, inventor, born in Philadelphia. Pennsylvania, 27 May, 1821, is the son of John Price Wetherill, who was vice-president of the Academy of Natural Sciences in his native city in 1834-'53. In 1850 Samuel began to experiment with the newly discovered product of zinc ores, and to determine whether this could be substituted for white lead as a paint. His experiments led to his engagement with the New Jersey zinc Company in 1850-'2, and in the latter year he invented the "furnace process," which consists in reducing mixed coal and ore by the direct action of heat and a cold blast upon a furnace-lied having small holes, each producing the reducing flame. Subsequently he invented the tower process of separating the solid impurities, in which the velocity of the fan-attachment, which impels the products into the collecting bags, lifts the white zinc seventy feet into a tower, leaving the ashes at the base. This was afterward improved by Mr. Wetherill by causing the products thus treated to pass through a film of water. In March, 1853, with Charles J. Gilbert and several New York capitalists, he entered into a contract for forming the Pennsylvania and Lehigh Zinc Company, and he erected works under his patents, in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, to reduce the zinc ores in Lehigh County. These works went into operation on 13 October, 1853, when the first "zinc white" made in the United States was manufactured by Wetherill's process in combination with the bag process of collecting that was previously invented by Samuel T. Jones. The works were conducted by Gilbert and Wetherill in 1853-'7, and in that time delivered 4,725 tons of white oxide of zinc. In 1854-'9 he conducted a series of experiments for the manufacture of spelter, the first spelter from the Lehigh ores being made by him in 1854 by passing the vapor of oxide of zinc through a lied of incandescent coal in a muffle-furnace. Afterward he experimented with vertical retorts, which he patented, and his services were procured for the manufacture of metallic zinc at Bethlehem under the Pennsylvania and Lehigh Zinc Company. In 1857 he sent an ingot of his spelter to a firm of sheet-iron rollers, and they returned to him the first sheet of zinc that was rolled from metal extracted from Pennsylvania ores. At the beginning of the Civil War Mr. Wetherill recruited a squadron for the 11th Pennsylvania Cavalry, and entered service as captain on 19 August. 1861. He became major on 1 October, 1861, and was mustered out on 30 September, 1864. He was brevetted lieutenant-colonel, U. S. volunteers, on 13 March, 1865. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 445.


WETMORE, Lauren, New York, New York, abolitionist, American Anti-Slavery Society, Manager, 1851-1853.


WETMORE, Oliver, New York, abolitionist leader (Sorin, 1971)


WETUMPKA, ALABAMA, April 13, 1865. Detachment of 4th Kentucky Cavalry. The official report of Major-General J. H. Wilson, of his raid in Alabama and Georgia, says: "Major (John F.) Weston, of the 4U1 Kentucky, with a small detachment of his regiment made a rapid march toward Wetumpka, swam the Coosa and Tallapoosa rivers, and captured 5 steamboats and their cargoes, which were taken to Montgomery and destroyed." The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 922.


WEYER'S CAVE, VIRGINIA, September 27, 1864. (See Port Republic.)


WHALEY, Kellian V., Member of the U.S. House of Representatives, voted for Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, abolishing slavery (Congressional Globe)


WHALEY'S MILL, MISSOURI, September 13, 1862. (See Bragg' s Farm.)


WHARTON, Gabriel Caldwell, soldier, born in Springfield, Washington County, Kentucky, 13 June. 1839; died in Louisville, Kentucky, 22 February, 1887. He was the son of a farmer, and was educated at the public schools, the academy of his native town, and the law department of Louisville University. In 1860, at the age of twenty-one. he began the practice of law at Springfield with immediate success. The next year, at the opening of the Civil War, he enlisted in the 10th Kentucky Infantry in the U. S. volunteer army, and in November was commissioned major of that regiment. With the regiment, Major Wharton shared in the engagements and marches of the Army of the Cumberland, and in March, 1863, was promoted to be lieutenant-colonel. He commanded and bore a gallant part in the battles of Chickamauga and Missionary Ridge and the engagements of the Atlanta Campaign in 1864, until, at the expiration of his three years' service, he was mustered out. He then resumed his law-practice at Louisville, and in 1866 was appointed assistant U. S. Attorney for the District of Kentucky. On the appointment of Benjamin H. Bristow as Secretary of the Treasury, Colonel Wharton succeeded to the district attorney ship, holding that office for ten years. In 1880 he opened an office in Washington, and, after two years practice there, spent some time in Mexico in the interest of a railroad company. Returning, after a year's absence, he resided in New York City, where he soon had a lucrative practice. He was on a visit to Louisville when he died while alone in his room at a hotel. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 446.


WHARTON, Joseph, manufacturer, born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 3 March, 1826. His mother, Deborah Fisher (1795-1888). was an approved minister of the Society of Friends for seventy years, belonging to the branch that has been called Hicksite. She was active in charities and an interested friend to the Indians, defending their rights in Washington and visiting their reservations. After receiving a good education in his native city, the son entered a mercantile house, and afterward engaged in the manufacture of white lead and paints, bricks, copper-mining and spelter, became owner of iron-, glass-, and steel-works, and has been a director in manufacturing, railroad, and banking corporations. He was among the first to establish the manufacture of spelter, nickel, and cobalt in this country, and was the first to make magnetic needles of other substance than steel. He aided in establishing the Bethlehem iron Company, particularly its steel-forging plant for government work. Mr. Wharton owns the deposits of nickel ore in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, which he purchased in 1873, and established his works in Camden, New Jersey. He early experimented to produce nickel in a pure and malleable condition, so that it could be worked like iron, and was the first to attain practical success in this direction. He sent to the Centennial Exhibition of 1876, and to the Paris Exposition of 1878, samples of nickel ores, nickel-matte, metallic nickel in grains and cubes, cast and wrought nickel, cast cobalt, and electro-plating with nickel and cobalt, which illustrated the progress in the metallurgical development of this substance, and excited much admiration. Mr. Wharton aided in establishing Swarthmore College, of which he is president of the board of trustees, endowing its chair of history and political economy, and also founded the Wharton school of finance and economy in the University of Pennsylvania. He is a member of the Society of Friends. Mr. Wharton has published several pamphlets on the subject of protection to home industry. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, pp. 448-449.


WHEATON, Charles A., New York, abolitionist leader (Sorin, 1971)


WHEATON, Frank, soldier, born in Providence, Rhode Island, 8 May, 1813. He was educated in common schools, became a civil engineer and engaged in California and in the Mexican boundary surveys from 1850 till he was commissioned 1st lieutenant in the 1st U. S. Cavalry, 3 March, 1855. He served at Jefferson Barracks, Missouri., and in Kansas until 1850, and in the field against Cheyenne Indians till 1857, being in action near Fort Kearny, Nebraska. He was on the Utah Expedition till August, 1858, on duty with his regiment in the Indian Territory, and then on recruiting service till July, 1861, having been promoted captain in March. He received permission to accept the commission of lieutenant-colonel of the 2d Rhode Island Volunteers in July, 1861, became colonel in the same month, and took part in the battle of Bull Run, also serving in the principal engagements of the Army of the Potomac, including the Peninsula and Maryland Campaigns. He was appointed brigadier-general of volunteers in November, 1869, commanding a brigade during the operations of the same army in 1863-'4, and then a division of the 6th Corps, distinguishing himself in the operations in the Shenandoah Valley in 1864, and those that culminated in the surrender at Appomattox in 1865. He was brevetted major-general of volunteers for gallant and meritorious services at the Opequan, Fisher's Hill, and Middletown, Virginia, and received brevets in the regular army to the grade of major-general for the battles of the Wilderness, Cedar Creek, and Petersburg, respectively. He became lieutenant-colonel of the 39th U.S. Infantry, 28 July, 1866, was transferred to the 21st U.S. Infantry in March. 1869, and promoted colonel of the 2d U.S. Infantry; 15 December, 1874. Since the war General Wheaton has held commands in Dakota, Montana, and Nebraska. In July, 1866, he was presented with a sword by his native state for gallant services in the above-mentioned battles. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 450.


WHEATON, Josephus, clergyman, Holliston, Massachusetts, anti-slavery advocate. Gave memorable anti-slavery sermon.  (Dumond, 1961, pp. 147-149)


WHEEL. In the simple wheel and axle, the power is to the weight as the radius r of the axle is to the radius R of the wheel.

In a system of wheels and pinions, the power is to the weight as the product of the radii (or number of teeth) r  f r ff , &c., of the pinions is to the product of the radii (or number of teeth) ", &c., of the wheels:  (Scott, Military Dictionary, Van Nostrand, 1862, p. ).


WHEELER, Andrew Carpenter, journalist, born in New York, 4 July, 1835. He began his career in journalism as a reporter on the New York "Times," under Henry J. Raymond, but soon afterward went to the west. After several years he settled in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, as city editor of the "Sentinel." Soon after the opening of the Civil War he became a war-correspondent for several eastern and western papers. At the close of hostilities he returned to the east and served on the New York "Leader," and then on the " World." With the latter paper he has been connected ever since, excepting an interval of a few years. On the " World " he first adopted the pen-name " Nym Crinkle." He is best known as a dramatic and musical critic, in which capacity he has served on most of the New York papers. He has written "The Chronicles of Milwaukee " (Milwaukee, 1861), and " The Twins," a comedy, which was produced by Lester Wallack in 1862. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 452.


WHEELER, Ezra, Member of the U.S. House of Representatives, voted for Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, abolishing slavery (Congressional Globe)


WHEELER, Junius Brutus, soldier, born in Murfreesboro, North Carolina, 21 February, 1830; died in Lenoir, North Carolina, 15 July, 1886, was educated at the University of North Carolina, volunteered at the beginning of the Mexican War, and participated in every battle from Vera Cruz to the city of Mexico. He was promoted lieutenant in 1847. but resigned at the end of the war, entered the U. S. Military Academy, and was graduated in 1855. He was transferred to the Topographical Engineers in 1856, became 1st lieutenant on 1 July, 1860, was assistant professor of mathematics at the U. S. Military Academy in 1859-'61, and principal assistant professor there in 1861-'3. He became a captain in the Engineer Corps in March, 1863, chief engineer of the Department of the Susquehanna in June and September of that year, and chief engineer of the Army of the Arkansas from September, 1863, till May, 1864. He participated in engagements at Elkins Ferry, Prairie D'Ane, the occupation of Camden, and the battle of Jenkins Ferry, on the Saline River, 30 April, 1864, for which he was brevetted major, U. S. Army. In March, 1865, he was brevetted lieutenant-colonel and colonel for meritorious service during the Civil War. He was chief engineer of the Military Division of the Missouri in May and June, 1865, commanded the engineer depot at Jefferson Barracks, Missouri, in July and December of that year, was assistant engineer on the Mississippi levees in 1865-'6, and superintendent engineer of harbor improvements in 1866. He became major of engineers. U. S. Army, in 1866, and was then professor of mining and civil engineering at the U. S. Military Academy, which post he held till his retirement in 1885. He wrote a valuable series of military text-books that were adopted by the U. S. War Department, and published under the titles "Civil Engineering" (New York, 1877): "Art and Science of War, (1878); 'Elements of Field Fortifications" (1882); and "Military Engineering" (2 vols., 1884-'5). Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 453.


WHEELER, Joseph, soldier, born in Augusta, Georgia, 10 September, 1836. He was graduated at the U. S. Military Academy in 1859, and assigned to the dragoons. After a year's service at the cavalry school for practice at Carlisle, Pennsylvania, he received the full rank of 2d lieutenant, but on 22 April, 1861, resigned and entered the Confederate Army. He was made colonel of the 19th Alabama Infantry on 4 September, 1861, and served principally in the west. At Shiloh he commanded a brigade and covered the Confederate retreat from the field. In July, 1862, he was transferred to a cavalry command, and engaged in raiding western Tennessee. During the Kentucky Campaign of that year he had charge of General Braxton Bragg's cavalry, and fought at Green River and Perryville. He commanded the rear-guard of the Confederate Army when it retreated into Tennessee, and on 30 October, 1862. was promoted brigadier-general. At Murfreesboro he was in charge of the cavalry, and thereafter he was continuously active in contesting General William S. Rosecrans's advance, also attacking his flanks, raiding in the rear, and destroying his trains. On 19 January, 1863, he received his commission as major-general and opposed the National advance on Chattanooga. He commanded the cavalry at Chickamauga, and after the battle crossed Tennessee River and fell upon Rosecrans's line of communications, defeating the force that was sent against him and destroying over 1,200 wagons, with stores. On this raid he succeeded in damaging National property to the value of $3,000,000, but, after losing 600 men, was driven back to northern Alabama. Subsequently he took part in the siege of Knoxville and covered Bragg's retreat from Mission Ridge and Lookout Mountain. During the winter and spring he continually harassed the National troops, and, on the advance of General William T. Sherman's army toward Atlanta, he opposed every movement and fought almost daily, often with his men dismounted. During July 27-30 he fought the raiding force of Generals George Stoneman, General Kenner Garrard, and General Edward M. McCook, and captured many prisoners, including General Stoneman, and all the artillery and transportation. On 9 August, 1864, he was sent by General John B. Hood to capture the National supplies, burn bridges, and break up railways in the rear of General Sherman's army. Passing through northern Georgia, he went into eastern Tennessee as far as the Kentucky line, and thence through middle Tennessee back into northern Alabama. During this raid, which lasted one month, he was continuously engaged and ruined much property. He was unsuccessful in destroying Sherman's communications, and was finally driven back by the National cavalry. When the Confederate commander became convinced of the impossibility of arresting Sherman's advance, Wheeler was sent in front of the army to prevent the National troops from raiding and foraging. He then engaged in the defence of Savannah, and for his defence of Aiken received the thanks of the legislature of South Carolina. General Wheeler received his promotion to the rank of lieutenant-general on 38 February, 1865, and continued in charge of the cavalry under General Joseph E. Johnston until the surrender in April, 1865. The death of General James E. B. Stuart, on 11 May, 1864, made him senior cavalry general of the Confederate Armies. After the war, he studied law, which profession and the occupation of cotton-planting he followed until 1880, when he was elected to Congress as a Democrat, and took his seat on 5 December, 1881; but his place was successfully contested by William M. Lowe, and he was unseated, 3 June, 1882. He was re-elected to the same Congress on the death of Mr. Lowe, a few months later, and has served since 4 March, 1885. In January, 1888, he was appointed a regent of the Smithsonian Institution. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 453-454.


WHEELER, Nathaniel, inventor, born in Watertown, Connecticut, 7 September, 1820. He was educated in the public schools, began life as a carriage manufacturer, and continued in that business till about 1848. In 1850 he made the acquaintance of Allan B. Wilson, who was engaged in perfecting a sewing machine, but needed aid in patenting his invention and introducing it to the public. Wilson induced Mr. Wheeler to join in that enterprise, and in 1852 the machine was patented in the firm-name of Wheeler and Wilson. In 1853 the Wheeler and Wilson manufacturing Company was founded. Mr. Wheeler's knowledge of machinery and his ability as an organizer enabled him to expand the sewing-machine manufacture from the little factory that could make but one machine a day to an establishment that has facilities for producing 600 machines a day. Since 1850, as president of the Wheeler and Wilson sewing-machine Company, he has created a market for more than 1,200,000 sewing-machines. He has served six sessions in the Senate and House of the Connecticut Legislature, and has taken out patents for various inventions in sewing-machines, railway-cars, heating and ventilation of buildings, and wood finishing. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 454.


WHEELER, William Almon, statesman, born in Malone, Franklin County, New York, 30 June, 1819; died there, 4 June, 1887. He studied at the University of Vermont for two years, but was compelled by the death of his father to leave college without being graduated. He then began the study of law under Asa Hascall in Malone, New York, was admitted to the bar in 1845, and succeeded Mr. Hascall as U. S. District Attorney of Franklin County, which post he held till 1849. At that time his political sympathies were with the Whig Party, by which he was chosen to the assembly in 1849, but in the early part of the Fremont canvass in 1856 he supported the newly formed Republican Party, remaining in it until his death. An affection of the throat compelled him to abandon the practice of law in 1851, and from that year till 1866 he was connected with a bank in Malone. He became president of the Northern New York Railroad Company about the same time, and for twelve years was supervisory manager of the line from Rouse's Point to Ogdensburg, New York. He was a member and President pro tempore of the state senate in 1858-'9, and was chosen to Congress in 1860 as a Republican, but, after serving one term, returned to his railroad and banking interests. He was president of the New York Constitutional Convention in 1867, returned to Congress in 1869, and served continuously till 1877. During that time he was chairman of the committees on the Pacific Railroad Company and commerce, a member of those on appropriations and southern affairs, and was the first in either house to cover his back-pay into the treasury, after the passage of the back-salary act. He was also the author of the famous "compromise" in the adjustment of the political disturbances in Louisiana, by which William Pitt Kellogg was recognized as governor, and the state legislature became Republican in the Senate and Democratic in the house. In 1876 he was nominated for the vice-presidency by the Republican National Convention, and he took his seat as presiding officer of the Senate in March, 1877. On the expiration of his term in 1881 he returned to Malone, and did not again enter public life. Mr. Wheeler was a man of most excellent character and of great liberality. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 455.


WHEELOCK, Charles, soldier, born in Claremont, New Hampshire, 14 December, 1812; died in Washington, D. C, 21 January, 1865. He was educated in the common schools of New Hampshire and New York and became a farmer and provision-dealer in Oneida County, New York. Immediately after the fall of Fort Sumter he abandoned business and devoted his time to raising recruits, pledging himself to provide for their families. In the summer of 1861 he had thus given or pledged $5,000, about half of his possessions. Soon afterward he raised the 97th New York Regiment, of which he became colonel on 10 March, 1862, and subsequently he engaged actively in the war in the Army of the Potomac, being taken prisoner at the second battle of Bull Run, and serving, after his exchange, till his death from disease. On 19 August, 1864, he was brevetted brigadier-general of volunteers. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 455.


WHEELOCK, Julia Susan, hospital nurse, born in Avon, Ohio, 7 October, 1833. She was taken to Erie County, Pennsylvania, in 1837, and in 1855 went to Michigan, where she was educated in Kalamazoo College. In September. 1862, she was summoned from Ionia Michigan, where she was teaching, to the bedside of her brother, who had been wounded at the second battle of Bull Run, and after his death she continued to serve in hospitals till the end of the war. In 1865-'73 she held a clerkship in the U. S. Treasury Department, and on 28 May, 1873, she married Parter C. Freeman, with whom she has since resided in Middleville, Michigan, and Springfield, Missouri. Her journal was published as " The Boys in White: the Experience of a Hospital Agent in and around Washington " (New York, 1870). Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, pp.


WHELAN, Peter, clergyman, born in County Wexford, Ireland, in 1800; died in Savannah, Georgia, 5 February, 1871. He received a classical education in his native county, volunteered for missionary duty in the United States, finished his theological course in the diocesan seminary at Charleston, South Carolina, and was ordained by Bishop England in 1830. He was given charge of the eastern part of North Carolina, and in 1833 was transferred to Locust Grove church, a mission that embraced northeastern Georgia, where he remained until 1850. He administered the diocese of Savannah from 1859 till 1861, and as administrator took part in the eighth provincial council of Baltimore, where he was offered the vacant seat, but declined. During the Civil War he was general chaplain at all the stations in Georgia from Anderson to Tybee. In this capacity his devotion to the National prisoners was very marked, especially at Andersonville, where he shared with them all he possessed, even to his wearing-apparel. He was engaged in administering the sacraments to the sick at Fort Pulaski when it was taken, and was sent a prisoner to the north. He was confined in Fort Lafayette for some time, and, on his release, returned to Georgia. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 458.


WHILLISTON, John P.,  Massachusetts Abolition Society, Vice-President, 1841-42; 45-46


WHIPPING. Abolished, except for desertion. (Scott, Military Dictionary, Van Nostrand, 1862, p. 669).


WHIPPLE, Amiel Weeks, soldier, born in Greenwich, Massachusetts, in 1818; died in Washington, D. C., 7 May, 1863. He studied at Amherst, was graduated at the U. S. Military Academy in 1841, was engaged immediately afterward in the hydrographic survey of Patapsco River, and in 1842 in surveying the approaches to New Orleans and the harbor of Portsmouth, New Hampshire. In 1844 he was detailed as assistant astronomer upon the northeastern boundary survey, and in 1845 he was employed in determining the northern boundaries of New York, Vermont, and New Hampshire. In 1849 he was appointed assistant astronomer in the Mexican boundary commission, and in 1853 he had charge of the Pacific Railroad Survey along the 35th parallel. In 1856 he was appointed engineer for the southern light-house district and superintendent of the improvements of St. Clair Flats and St. Mary's River. At the opening of the Civil War he at once applied for service in the field, and was assigned as chief topographical engineer on the staff of General Irvin McDowell. In this capacity he was the author of the first maps of that part of Virginia that were issued during the war, and performed creditable service at the first battle of Fredericksburg. Upon the second advance of the army he was attached, as chief topographical engineer, to the staff of General George B. McClellan, but, being appointed brigadier-general of volunteers, was recalled in May, 1862, and assigned to the command of the defences of Washington south of Potomac River. His service here was so well performed that he received in orders the thanks of the president of the United States. His division was assigned in October, 1862, to the 9th Corps, and took part in the movement down the eastern base of the Blue Ridge, upon the skirts of Lee's retreating army. At Waterloo his division was attached to the 3d Army Corps, and he led it at the battle of Fredericksburg. At the battle of Chancellorsville it was much exposed, and suffered more, probably, in that engagement than any other division of the army. He was shot on Monday, 4 May, 1863, when the battle was practically at an end, and, living three days, was appointed major-general of volunteers for gallantry in action. He had received the brevets of lieutenant-colonel for the Manassas Campaign, colonel for Fredericksburg, brigadier-general for Chancellorsville, and major-general for services during the war—all in the regular army.—His son, Charles William, was graduated at the U. S. Military Academy in 1868, and is now chief ordnance officer of the Department of the Missouri, with the rank of captain. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, pp. 459-460.


WHIPPLE, John Adams, inventor, born in Grafton, Massachusetts, 10 September, 1822. While a boy he was an ardent student of chemistry, and on the introduction of the daguerreotype process into this country he was the first to manufacture the chemicals that were used in it. His health having become impaired through this work, he devoted his attention exclusively to photography, in connection with which he made many useful inventions and improvements. He prepared his plates and brought out his pictures by steam, invented crayon daguerreotypes, and crystalotypes, or daguerreotypes on glass, and, with the aid of the fifteen-inch equatorial telescope of the Harvard College observatory, under the direction of Professor William C. Bond, took a daguerreotype of the moon's surface, for which he was complimented by the Royal Academy of Arts and Sciences of London, and on 17 July, 1850, photographed Alpha Lyra, which is said to have been the first successful experiment in stellar photography. He received the prize medal at the World's Fair, London, and a silver medal at the Crystal Palace, New York. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 462.


WHIPPLE, Charles K., Boston, Massachusetts, abolitionist, American Anti-Slavery Society, Manager, 1836-1837, Executive Committee, 1840-1841.  Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, 1846-1860.


WHIPPLE, George, 1805-1876, Oberlin, Ohio, New York, abolitionist, clergyman, educator.  Secretary of the anti-slavery American Missionary Association (AMA).  American Anti-Slavery Society, Manager, 1839-1840.  American and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society, Executive Committee, 1844-1855, Treasurer, 1846-1855.  Teacher at Lane University.  Professor and principal, Oberlin College.  Met with President Lincoln at the White House regarding economic support for freed African Americans.  Worked in Freeman’s Bureau after the Civil War.  Agent of the American Anti-Slavery Society (AASS).  (Dumond, 1961, pp. 163, 165, 185; Mabee, 1970, pp. 153, 235, 403n25; Rodriguez, 2007, p. 166; Letters, American Missionary Association)


WHIPPLE, Prince, ? – 1797, African American, slave, soldier in Revolutionary War, abolitionist. (Gates, Henry Louis, Jr., & Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, eds. African American National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2013, Vol. 12, p. 10)


WHIPPLE, Squire, civil engineer, born in Worcester County, Massachusetts, 16 September, 1804; died in Albany, New York, 15 March, 1888. He earned sufficient money by teaching to educate himself at Hartwick Seminary and Fairfield Academy, and was graduated at Union College in 1830. Having acquired a fondness for mechanical pursuits as a boy in his father's cotton-factory, he now turned his attention to civil engineering, and was successively a rod-man and leveller on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. In 1840 he designed and built the first model of a scale for weighing canal-boats, and subsequently he built the first weigh-lock scale on the Erie Canal. He began his career as a bridge-builder in 1840 by designing and patenting an iron-bridge truss. During the next ten years he built several bridges on the Erie Canal and the New York and Erie Railroad. In 1852-'3 he built a wrought and cast-iron bridge over the Albany and Northern Railroad, and by his work acquired the title of the "father of iron bridges." He obtained a patent for his lift draw-bridge in 1872, and in 1873-4 built the first one over the Erie canal at Utica. Since that time the Whipple iron bridges have stood in the foremost rank. He possessed a fine cabinet of models, instruments, and apparatus, mostly made by himself, illustrating the different branches of physical and mechanical science. Mr. Whipple was elected an honorary member of the American Society of Civil engineers in 1868. He was the author of "The Way to Happiness" (Utica. 1847), and a "Treatise on Bridge-Building" (1847; enlarged ed., New York, 1873). Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 462.


WHIPPLE, William Denison, soldier, born in Nelson, Madison County, New York, 2 August, 1826. He was graduated at the U. S. Military Academy in 1851, and became 2d lieutenant in the 3d U.S. Infantry on 9 September of that year. After six years of uneventful service in New Mexico, he participated in the Gila Expedition against the Apaches in 1857, the Navajo Expedition of 1858. and the defence of Fort Defiance, N. M., in 1860. He became 1st lieutenant in December, 1856, and on the opening of the Civil War was on quartermaster's duty at Indianola, Texas. After the capture of the U. S. property he escaped through the enemy's lines, was commissioned captain and assistant adjutant-general, and in that capacity was present at the battle of Bull Run and at the headquarters of the Departments of Pennsylvania and Virginia, respectively, to June, 1862, when, becoming lieutenant-colonel and additional aide-de-camp, he was on duty in the Middle Department and 8th Army Corps, and as chief of staff to General Cadwallader. He was appointed brigadier-general of volunteers on 17 July, 1863, and assigned as chief of staff to General George H. Thomas, being present during the operations near Chattanooga, the siege of Atlanta, the battles of Missionary Ridge, Resaca, Kenesaw Mountain, and Nashville and at the headquarters of the Department of the Cumberland in 1853-'5. He received the brevets of brigadier and major-general in the regular army on 13 March, 1865, for gallant service in the Atlanta Campaign and battles before Nashville. Since the war General Whipple has been on duty as assistant adjutant-general at the headquarters of the principal military divisions, and in 1873-'81 as aide-de-camp to the general of the army. He was promoted colonel in the adjutant-general's department, 28 February, 1887. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 463.


WHIPPER, William J., 1804?-1876, free African American, abolitionist, reformer, activist, writer, advocate of non-violence, temperance activist.  Whipper was born in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.  Moved to Philadelphia in the 1820s, then to Columbia, Pennsylvania, where he became a successful businessman.  Using his wealth, he helped hundreds of fugitive slaves to escape to freedom in Canada.  (Dumond, 1961, p. 340; Mabee, 1970, pp. 36, 57, 58, 62, 64, 71, 92, 106, 134, 187, 193, 197, 203, 248, 276, 277, 293, 298, 305-307, 337, 342, 390n15; Rodriguez, 2007, p. 44; Gates, Henry Louis, Jr., & Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, eds. African American National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2013, Vol. 12, p. 6)


WHIPPY SWAMP, SOUTH CAROLINA, February 2, 1865. (See Barker's Mill.)


WHISTLER, ALABAMA, April 13, 1865. Detachment of 2nd Brigade, 3d Division, 13th Army Corps. Pursuant to orders the 2nd brigade under Colonel H. M. Day proceeded toward Whistler after it had marched through Mobile. Four companies of the 91st Illinois deployed as skirmishers suddenly came upon a body of Confederate cavalry near the railroad. The rest of the brigade was brought up and the enemy driven back to the Eight-mile creek bridge, which was about to be burned. Captain A. P. Stover with 20 men of the skirmish line charged across the bridge, followed by the rest of the brigade, and drove the enemy in confusion. Pursuit was made for a mile and a half. The loss was 3 wounded on the Federal side; 4 killed and 2 wounded of the Confederates. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 922.


WHISTLER, John, soldier, born in Ulster, Ireland, about 1756; died in St. Louis, Missouri, 3 September, 1829. He ran away from home when a boy, enlisted in the British Army, and served under General Burgoyne during the war of the Revolution. Upon his return to England he was honorably discharged, and soon afterward, forming an attachment for a daughter of Sir Edward Bishop, a friend of his father, he eloped with her, and, coming to this country, settled at Hagerstown, Sid. He shortly afterward entered the U. S. Army, served in the ranks, and was severely wounded in the disastrous campaign against the Indians in 1791. He was promoted captain, 1 July, 1797, and in the summer of 1803 was sent with his company of the 1st U.S. Infantry from Detroit to the head-waters of Lake Michigan, where, before the close of the year, he completed Fort Dearborn on the site of the city of Chicago. Having attained the brevet rank of major, he was appointed in 1815 military store-keeper at Newport, Kentucky, and afterward at Jefferson barracks, near St. Louis, where he remained till his death.—His son, William, soldier, born in Maryland in 1780; died in Cincinnati, Ohio, 4 December, 1863, was appointed a lieutenant of infantry, 8 June, 1801, and took part in the battle of Maguaga, Michigan, 9 August, 1812. He was promoted captain in December, 1812, major of the 2d U.S. Infantry, 28 April, 1826. lieutenant-colonel of the 7th U.S. Infantry, 21 July, 1834, and colonel of the 4th U.S. Infantry, 15 July. 1845. He retired from the service on 9 October, 1861. At his death he was the oldest army officer in the United States, with the exception of General Winfield Scott.—William's son, Joseph Nelson Garland, soldier, born in Green Bay, 19 October, 1822, was graduated at the U. S. Military Academy in 1846, and entered the army as 2d lieutenant of the 8th U.S. Infantry, but six months later was transferred to the 3d U.S. Infantry. He served in the war with Mexico, being engaged in the siege of Vera Cruz, the principal battles of the campaign that followed, and the capture of the city of Mexico. He was promoted 1st lieutenant in June, 1852, in 1861 was captured in Texas by the Confederates and paroled as a prisoner of war, and promoted captain in May, 1861. He was then on duty at the U. S. Military Academy as assistant instructor of infantry tactics till March, 1863. His services in the volunteer army date from May, 1863, when he was made colonel of the 2d New York Artillery. He served in the Richmond Campaign, participating in the battles of Spottsylvania, North Anna, Tolopotomy, Cold Harbor, and the assaults on Petersburg, where he was wounded during the siege. From July, 1864, till September, 1865, he commanded a brigade in the defences of Washington. In December, 1865, he was mustered out as brevet brigadier-general of volunteers. In September, 1866, he was transferred to the 31st U.S. Infantry, and in March, 1869, to the 22d U.S. Infantry. In February, 1874, he was promoted lieutenant-colonel of the 5th U.S. Infantry, and in May, 1883. he became colonel of the 15th U.S. Infantry. At the time of his retirement, 19 October, 1886, he was in command at Fort Buford, Dakota.— William's brother, George Washington, engineer, born in Fort Wayne, Indiana, 19 May, 1800; died in St. Petersburg, Russia, 7 April, 1849, was graduated at the U. S. Military Academy in 1819, appointed a 2d lieutenant in the corps of artillery, and was afterward, till 1821, employed on topographical duty and part of the time at Fort Columbus. From 2 November, 1821, till 30 April, 1822, he was assistant professor at the U. S. Military Academy, and he was employed in 1822-'6 in connection with the commission that was engaged in tracing the international boundary between Lake Superior and the Lake of the Woods. He was made 1st lieutenant in August, 1829, and was on topographical duty almost continually till 31 December, 1833, when he resigned from the army. With Jonathan Knight, William Gibbs McNeill, and Ross Winans, he examined the railroads of England on behalf of the directors of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, and afterward engaged in the construction of that road, the Boston and Albany, and other railroads. In 1834 Lieutenant Whistler became engineer to the proprietors of locks and canals at Lowell, and from 1834 till 1837 he gave much of his time to the reproduction, for the Boston and Albany Railroad, of a locomotive that was imported from the works of George and Robert Stephenson, at Newcastle, England. In 1837 he moved to Stonington, Connecticut, to take charge of the Stonington Railroad, and from 1840 till 1842 he was chief engineer of the Boston and Albany Railroad, with his headquarters at Springfield, Massachusetts In 1842 he went to Russia to act as engineer for the contemplated railroad to unite St. Petersburg and Moscow. Not only was the road to he built, but the iron for the track, the locomotives, cars, and everything appertaining to the road were to be manufactured under his supervision. In addition to the construction of railroads, he was also employed to build extensive dock-yards at St. Petersburg, and to improve the Russian harbors and rivers. In 1847, in recognition of his services, the Emperor Nicholas conferred upon Lieutenant Whistler the decoration of the Order of St. Anne. He is buried at Stonington, Connecticut, but a monument was erected to his memory in Greenwood cemetery by American engineers. — George Washington's son, George William, engineer, born in New London, Conn., in 1822; died in Brighton, England, 24 December, 1869, began the practice of his profession as a civil engineer under his father in 1840. He was connected with various railroads in this country, and was superintendent of the Erie, and New York and New Haven Railroads. In the winter of 1856 he went to Russia to take charge of the St. Petersburg and Moscow Railroad under the Winans contract, and he continued there, with the exception of a short interval, till the spring of 1869, when he resigned in consequence of impaired health. He was specially noted for his knowledge of railway machinery and for executive ability in the management of railways.—Another son, James Abbott McNeill, artist, born in Lowell. Massachusetts. in 1834, was educated at the U. S. Military Academy, studied for two years under Charles Gabriel Gleyre in Paris, and in 1863 settled in London. He holds peculiar theories on art, which have been the subject of much criticism. In many of his later works especially he has made interesting experiments in color, and he frequently succeeds in producing extraordinary results with few and subdued colors. There is at times, however, a sacrifice of form to color impressions in his " arrangements” and " nocturnes." His more important paintings are " White Girl" (1862); "Coast of Brittany." -'Last of Old Westminster," and " Westminster Bridge " (1863); "Princesse des Pays de la Porcelaine " (1865); "At the Piano" (1867)'; "Portrait of my Mother" (an "Arrangement in Gray and Black"), and portrait of Thomas Carlyle (1872); "Gold Girl." " Nocturne in Blue and Gold." and "Nocturne in Blue and Green" (1878); "Harmony in Gray and Green" (1881); "Nocturne in Blue and Silver," "Blue Girl," and "Entrance to Southampton Water" (1882); "Great Fire Wheel" (1883); "Harmony in Brown and Black " (1884); and " Arrangement in Black" (Lady Archibald Campbell) and "Arrangement in Gray and Green " (Miss Alexander), both exhibited at Munich in 18H8. His skill in etching has gained for him a position among etchers that is even higher than that which he holds as a painter. Among his works in this branch of art are a series of plates on London. Venice, and Brussels. He has published "Ten O'clock" (Boston. 1888). See an article by William C. Brownell,  Scribner’s Monthly" for August, 1879, and Frederick Wedmore's "Four Masters of Etching" (London. 1883). Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, pp. 463-464.


WHITAKER, Daniel Kimball, editor, born in Sharon, Connecticut, 13 April, 1801; died in New Orleans, Louisiana, 10 April, 1881. He was graduated at Harvard in 1820, studied law, and, moving to South Carolina, became the partner of John Lyde Wilson, of that state. He practised with success, but his taste was for literature, and he became the founder and editor of several periodicals that included the "Southern Literary Journal," " Whitaker's Magazine," and the " Southern Quarterly Review," which he founded in Charleston, South Carolina, in 1841, and conducted successfully until the Civil War. He moved to New Orleans in 1866, where he founded and edited for many years the " New Orleans Monthly Review." He was corresponding secretary of the New Orleans Academy of Sciences. Mr. Whitaker united with the Roman Catholic church in 1878.—His wife. Mary Scrimzeour, author, born in Beaufort District, South Carolina, 22 February, 1820, is the daughter of Reverend Samuel Furman, of South Carolina. She was educated in Edinburgh, contributed her first poems to the Scottish press under the auspices of Thomas Campbell, and was favorably reviewed by the critics of that city. She married in 1837 John Miller, a Scotch attorney, who died three months afterward. Mrs. Miller then returned to this country, and in 1849 married Mr. Whitaker. Her publications include many magazine articles, a collection of " Poems " (Philadelphia, 1850), and "Albert Hastings," a novel (1868). Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 465.


WHITAKER, Walter C., soldier, born in Shelby County, Kentucky, in August, 1823; died in Lyndon, Kentucky, 9 July, 1887. He received his education at Bethany College, West Virginia, under the presidency of Alexander Campbell, and had begun the study of law, when, at the opening of the war with Mexico, he entered the regiment of Kentucky volunteers as a lieutenant and served with gallantry. At the end of the war he resumed his legal studies, and soon afterward he opened an office at Shelbyville, Kentucky, devoting himself chiefly to criminal law, in which he won reputation. He also carried on a large farm, and took an active part in politics. He was a member of the state senate in 1861, when Kentucky was invaded by the Confederate Army, which, early in September, took possession of Columbus. He offered the resolution, which was almost unanimously adopted, "that the governor be requested to call out the military force of the state to expel and drive out the invaders." This resolution terminated the sham neutrality the state had undertaken to uphold. Soon afterward senator Whitaker entered the military service as colonel of the 6th Kentucky Infantry, which was mustered in early in September, and moved to meet General Simon B. Buckner's advance to Muldraugh's Hill. From that time till the close of the war his service was constant. He took an active part in the battle of Shiloh, in which his regiment lost 103 killed or wounded, and also in the battle of Stone River, and on 25 June, 1863, he was commissioned brigadier-general of volunteers. At Chickamauga, his brigade was in the reserve corps that marched upon the field at the critical moment and repelled the assault of the enemy on the National right. At the capture of Lookout Mountain, he was wounded, but he continued on the field. He was subsequently in all the engagements of the Atlanta Campaign and the battle of Nashville, and was promoted brevet major-general for gallant services. At the end of the war he returned to the practice of his profession at Louisville, and became connected with some of the most famous criminal trials in that region. He was a man of marked individuality of manner and character, and of an impetuous temper, which involved him in numerous personal difficulties, and led to his becoming for a time an inmate of an insane asylum. But in his later years he fully recovered his health, and had his share of legal practice. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 465.


WHITAKER, William, N. Salem, Massachusetts, Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, Vice-President, 1837-40.


WHITCOMB, James, Michigan, abolitionist, American Anti-Slavery Society, Manager, 1837-1839.


WHITCOMB, Rueben Jr., Howard, Massachusetts, Massachusetts Abolition Society, Vice-President, 1846.


WHITE, Albert Smith, senator, born in Blooming Grove, Orange County, New York, 24 October, 1803; died in Stockwell, Tippecanoe County, Indiana, 4 September, 1864. He was graduated at Union in 1822, in the class with William H. Seward. After studying law he was admitted to the bar in 1825, and soon afterward moved to Indiana. In March, 1829, he opened an office in Lafayette, where, and in the neighboring town of Stockwell, he resided until his death. During the session of 1828-'9 he reported the proceedings of the Indiana Legislature for an Indianapolis journal, the first work of the kind that had been done in the state. In 1830-'l he was assistant clerk of the Indiana House of Representatives, and from 1832 till 1835 he served as its clerk. In 1832 he was a candidate for Congress in opposition to Edward A. Hannegan, but was defeated. Four years later he was elected, serving from 4 September, 1837, till 3 March, 1839. The year before he had been an elector on the Whig ticket. In 1839 Mr. White was elected to the U. S. Senate as the successor of General John Tipton. There were three candidates, and he was not chosen until the 36th ballot. In the Senate he opposed the annexation of Texas, as well as every other measure that tended to extend the area of slavery. He was also active in securing grants of land to aid in the extension of the Wabash and Erie Canal. On the expiration of his senatorial term in 1845 he resumed the practice of law, but soon abandoned it to become actively engaged in the construction of railroads. He was president of the Indianapolis and Lafayette road from its organization until 1856, and for three years was also at the head of the Wabash and Western Railway. In 1860 Mr. White was elected to Congress as a Republican, and served from 4 July, 1861, till 3 March, 1863. He was made chairman of a select committee whose duty it was to consider the question of compensated emancipation, and reported a bill appropriating $180,000,000 to pay loyal owners for their slaves, and $20,000,000 to aid in the colonization of the freedmen. This measure was recommended and supported by Mr. Lincoln with all the influence of his office. In presenting the bill, Mr. White accompanied it with an elaborate report on slavery as a social and political problem. He contended that the white and black races should be separated, and the latter colonized in the equatorial regions of America. He also assured the south that if his proposition were not accepted, their slaves would ultimately be taken from them without compensation. Mr. White, at the close of his term, failed to secure a renomination, mainly on account of his action on this question. He was named by the president one of three commissioners to adjust the claims of citizens of Minnesota and Dakota, against the government for Indian depredations. On the death of Caleb B. Smith, 7 January, 1864, President Lincoln appointed Mr. White U. S. judge for the district of Indiana, but he lived to discharge the duties of the office only a few months. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, pp. 466-467.


WHITE, Alexander, lawyer, born in Franklin, Robertson County, Tennessee, 16 October, 1816. He was taken to Alabama when five years of age, and educated there and at the University of Tennessee, but he volunteered in the Creek and Seminole War in 1836, and therefore was not graduated. He subsequently studied law with his father, John White (1784-1842), who was one of the circuit and supreme court judges of Alabama. On his admission to the bar in 1838 he practised at first as the associate of his father, and afterward (1841-'55) as the partner of Lewis E. Parsons at Talladega. He was elected to Congress as a Union Whig after an exciting contest in a Democratic district, and served from 1 December, 1851, till 3 March, 1853. In 1856 he moved to Selina, and in 1860 he supported Bell and Everett for president and vice-president. He earnestly opposed secession, but decided to act with his state when that event became inevitable. At the close of the war he was a member of the convention to frame a new constitution for Alabama, and he was elected to the general assembly of the state in 1872. In the following year he was chosen to Congress as a Republican, and served from 1 December, 1873, till 4 March, 1875. In the latter year he was appointed an associate justice of the U. S. court for the Territory of Utah. After holding the office for a brief term he returned to Alabama, and in 1875 moved to Dallas, Texas, where he practices his profession. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 467.


WHITE, David Nye, journalist, born in Wareham, Massachusetts, 22 August, 1805; died in Sewickley, Pennsylvania, 1 April, 1888. He was descended from Peregrine White, and his father, Ebenezer, served through the Revolutionary War. He moved with his parents to Ohio soon after the war of 1812; was a Printer in Canton, Ohio, and Rochester, New York, in December, 1827, moved to Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, and in 1841 purchased the Pittsburg " Gazette," of which he was also editor. He was opposed to slavery, and, despairing of accomplishing anything to benefit the slaves through the existing political parties, he published a call in 1855 for a county convention to form a new party. The call had few signers, but, when the convention met, every district in the county was represented by a duly elected delegate. A ticket was nominated, and from this beginning, it is claimed, sprang the Republican Party. Mr. White was collector of internal revenue of the 23d district of Pennsylvania for four years, a member of the state house of representatives three years, and a delegate at large to the Constitutional Convention of 1873-'4. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 469.


WHITE, Edward Douglas, jurist, born in Lafourche Parish, Louisiana, 3 November, 1845, was educated at Mt. St. Mary's College, Emmitsburg, Maryland, and the Jesuit's College in New Orleans. During the Civil War he served in the Confederate Army. He then studied and practised law, was a state senator in 1874-'8 and judge of the Louisiana Supreme Court in 1878-'80, and on 29 May, 1888, was elected U. S. Senator for the term beginning on 4 March, 1889. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 469.


WHITE, Francis J., soldier, born in New York City in 1842; died in San Francisco, 29 August, 1875. He was the eldest son of James H. White, who was at one time judge of the Superior Court of New York. Francis received a good education, and early in life contributed articles to magazines. At the opening of the Civil War he joined the 10th New York Regiment, participated in the battle of Bull Run, and was subsequently on the peninsula with General Benjamin F. Butler. He then served under Fremont, and in October, 1861, at the head of his "prairie scouts," recaptured Lexington, Missouri. In the autumn of 1861 he was transferred to the Army of the Mississippi, and in the autumn of 1862 he followed Porter, the guerilla chief, for thirteen days and routed his band. At one period of the war he was provost-marshal and judge-advocate-general in central Missouri, and in the closing years of the contest he was governor of the eastern shore of Maryland. He was appointed brigadier-general of volunteers, 13 March, 1865, and was offered a captaincy in the regular army, which he declined. After serving a short time in Texas, he moved to St. Louis, studied law, was admitted to the bar, and elected to the legislature. He subsequently went to California, where he resided till his death, which was the result of disease contracted during the war. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 470.


WHITE, George Leonard, educator, born in Cadiz, Cattaraugus County, New York, 20 September, 1838. He was the son of a blacksmith, and while attending school assisted his father in the shop. When he was fourteen years old his father's health gave way, and the support of the family devolved upon him and his sisters. He conducted his father's business, but studied in leisure hours, moved to Chillicothe, Ohio, and began to teach. In 1862 he enlisted in the 73d Ohio Regiment, and fought at Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, Lookout Valley, and Lookout Mountain. At the close of the war he entered the employ of the Freedmen's Bureau, but in 1868 he resigned to give his entire time to the work of Fisk University. Mr. White had heard the simple Negro songs that came into being during the days of slavery, and he resolved to form a band of his best voices to sing these songs in the large cities of the north in aid of the university. His means were limited, but, embarking his all in the enterprise, he left Nashville with his jubilee singers on 6 October, 1871. By May, 1872, he had remitted to the college $20,000. The troupe was everywhere received with enthusiasm, and a second tour netted as much as the first. Early in 1874 they went to Europe, where a like reception met them. They sang before Queen Victoria and nearly every crowned head on the continent, and returned with a gain of $50,000. The total sum that was realized to the institution was $155,000. With the funds thus acquired twenty-five acres on a commanding eminence near Nashville have been purchased, and a fine building has been erected, which has been called Jubilee Hall. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 470.


WHITE, Harry, soldier, born in Indiana County, Pennsylvania, 12 January, 1834. He received a collegiate education, studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1855, and practised at Indiana, Pennsylvania, till the beginning of the Civil War, when he entered the National service as major of the 67th Pennsylvania Infantry. While in the army he was elected a state senator, serving in the winter of 1862-'3. He afterward returned to his command, was captured by the Confederate troops, and retained as a prisoner sixteen months, but escaped and reached the National lines near Atlanta in October, 1864. He returned to his command, served till the end of the war, was promoted to a colonelcy, and was brevetted brigadier-general of volunteers, 2 March, 1865. He was re-elected to the Senate of Pennsylvania in 1865, and served by successive elections till 1874, being speaker at the close of the term of 1871. In 1872 he was elected a delegate-at-large to the State Constitutional Convention, and he served in Congress from Pennsylvania in 1877-'81, having been chosen as a Republican. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 470.


WHITE, Edward Brickell, architect, born in Charleston, 29 January, 1806; died in New York City, 10 May, 1882. Entered the U.S. Military Academy in 1822, and was graduated four years later. He served in the army for ten years, resigning in 1836, and during that time was frequently detached for engineering duties. Settling in Charleston, he followed successfully his profession as an engineer, being engaged in the building of various railroads. He erected also numerous residences, built Trinity church in Charleston, and designed the monument to Colonel William Washington, at Eutaw Springs, and that to William G. Simms, in Charleston. He entered the Confederate Army, and served though out the war. In 1865 he moved to New York, where he remained until his death. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 473.


WHITE, Octavins Augustus, physician, born in Charleston, 8 February, 1826, was graduated at the College of South Carolina in 1846, and at South Carolina Medical College two years later. He began and continued the practice of medicine with success. until the opening of the Civil War, when he received the commission of surgeon in the Confederate Army. At the close of the war he moved to New York, where he has since resided. He is a member of the New York Academy of Medicine, and other medical societies. […]. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 473.


WHITE, Jacob C., Jr., 1837-1902, African American, educator, reformer, abolitionist, Free Produce advocate.  (Gates, Henry Louis, Jr., & Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, eds. African American National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2013, Vol. 12, p. 31)


WHITE, Jacob Clement, Sr., 1806-1872, African American, abolitionist, businessman, father of Jacob C. White, Jr. (Gates, Henry Louis, Jr., & Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, eds. African American National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2013, Vol. 12, p. 32)


WHITE, James, Essex County, New Jersey, abolitionist.  Manager, 1833-1840, and founding member of the American Anti-Slavery Society, December 1833. (Abolitionist, Vol. I, No. XII, December, 1833)


WHITE, Julius, soldier, born in Cazenovia. Madison County, New York, 29 September, 1816. He moved to Illinois in 1836, and has resided in that state and in Wisconsin, where he has engaged in commercial pursuits. In 1849 he was a member of the Wisconsin Legislature. He was made collector of customs at Chicago, Illinois, in the spring of 1861, but resigned that office on his appointment as colonel of the 37th Illinois Volunteers, then known as the Fremont Rifle Regiment. He commanded it during General John C. Fremont's Expedition to southwest Missouri in the autumn of 1861, and was afterward placed at the head of a brigade, accompanying General Samuel K. Curtis into Arkansas during the succeeding winter. He participated in the battle of Pea Ridge, and his appointment of brigadier-general of volunteers dated from that battle, 9 June, 1862. He was then assigned to the Department of the Shenandoah, and was subsequently ordered to report to General John E. Wool. He was at Martinsburg in September, 1862, and, when that town became untenable, retired to Harper's Ferry, where he volunteered to serve as second in command under his inferior officer, Colonel Dixon S. Miles, who was in charge of that post. When Harper's Ferry was surrendered, on 15 September, 1862, to General Ambrose P. Hill, he became a prisoner of war, but was released on parole. He was then placed under arrest by the U. S. government, and, at his own request, a court of inquiry was called, which found that he acted with capability and courage. He resigned in 1864, and on 13 March, 1863, was brevetted major-general of volunteers, He has since been in business in Illinois. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, pp. 473-474.


WHITE, Lydia, Society of Friends, Quaker, abolitionist.  Original founding member of the Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society in 1834. (Drake, 1950, p. 140; Rodriguez, 2007, p. 416; Yellin, 1994, pp. 69, 161, 163, 278-279)


WHITE, Richard Grant, author, born in New York City, 22 May, 1821; died there, 8 April, 1885. His ancestor, John White, came from England in 1636, and was a settler of Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Hartford, Connecticut, and his grandfather, Calvin (1763-1853), was rector of St. James's Parish in Derby, Connecticut, but afterward became a Roman Catholic, although he did not enter the priesthood of that church. He was a Tory and just escaped hanging by the mob because he "refused to shout 'Property and liberty!' Richard Grant's father, Richard Mansfield White, intended his son for the church, but after his graduation at the University of the City of New York in 1839 he studied medicine and afterward law, and was admitted to the bar in 1845. His literary tendencies drew him from law, and he soon became a contributor to the New York "Courier and Enquirer." where his musical, dramatic, and art criticisms attracted attention. From 1845 till 1859 he was connected with this journal, and he served as its editor in 1854-'9. He was a founder in 1846-'7 of " Yankee Doodle." and also a founder in 1860 of the " World," from which he withdrew in 1861. During the Civil War he wrote a series of letters to the London "Spectator," signed "A Yankee," which were of much service to the National cause. For nearly twenty years he was chief of the U. S. Revenue Marine Bureau in the district of New York, which post he resigned in 1878. He wrote for magazines, contributed articles to cyclopaedias, and edited the “Illustrated Record of the New York Exhibition of the Industry of all Nations" (1854), and "Poetry, Lyrical, Narrative, and Satirical of the Civil War" (1866). On the publication of John Payne Collier's folio manuscript emendations of Shakespeare (1852), Mr. White contributed a series of papers to “Putnam's Magazine," in which he denied the value of the emendations. The acumen and style of these articles elicited general admiration, and their subtle and vigorous criticism gave him a place among the most learned Shakespearian scholars. His publications are an " Appeal from the Sentence of the Bishop Onderdonk of New York" (New York. 1845): "Biographical and Critical Hand Book of Christian Art" (1853); "Shakespeare's Scholar" (1854); "The Works of William Shakespeare." an annotated edition (12 vols., Boston, 1857-'65): "Essay on the Authorship of the Three Parts of Henry the Sixth" (Cambridge, 1859); " National Hymns." an essay, with selections from the hymns written for a prize of $600 offered by a national committee, which was not awarded (New York, 1861); […]. His son, Stanford, architect, born in New York City, 9 November. 1853. was educated in his native city in public schools and under private tutors. He studied architecture under Charles D. Gambrill and Henry H. Richardson, and was chief assistant of that firm when they built Trinity church, Boston. During 1878-'80 he studied in Europe, and in 1881 he entered into partnership with Charles F. McKim and William R. Mead. Mr. White has made all of the designs for the architectural work of the statues by Augustus St. Gaudens, notably the pedestal of the Farragut monument in Madison Square. New York City (see illustration), and that of the Lincoln statue in Chicago. He has furnished many designs for book-covers, and those of the "Century" and " Scribner's Magazine" were by him. The University of the City of New York conferred on him the degree of A. M. in 1882. He is a member of the Tile Club, the American Institute of Architects, and other artistic and professional organizations. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, pp. 474-475.


WHITE, T. Joiner, New York, American Abolition Society (Radical Abolitionist, Vol. 1, No. 1, New York, August 1855)


WHITE, William, free African American, co-founded Free African Society in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 1787 (Rodriguez, 2007, p. 156)


WHITE HALL, NORTH CAROLINA, December 16, 1862. (See Goldsboro, Foster's Expedition to.)


White Hare, Missouri, June 15, 1864. Detachments of 6th and 7th Missouri State Militia Cavalry. Major William B. Mitchell with portions of the two regiments came upon the band of guerrillas that burned Melville the day before as they were auctioning off the goods taken from that place. A charge was immediately made, in which 7 bushwhackers were killed, a number wounded, and all the stolen goods recovered. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 922.


WHITE HOUSE, VIRGINIA, June 21, 1864. 1st and 2nd Cavalry Divisions, Army of the Potomac. As the cavalry corps, Major-General P. H. Sheridan commanding, was returning from the raid on the Virginia Central railroad, the whole command encamped on the evening of the 20th on the north bank of the Pamunkey river opposite the White House. The next morning the enemy was discovered holding the bluffs surrounding the White House, having made an attack on the force under General Abercrombie there the day previous. Sheridan sent over Gregg's division dismounted, and Torbert's mounted, and after a spirited skirmish the Confederates were driven back toward Tunstall's station. No casualties reported. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 922.


WHITEHOUSE, James Horton, designer, born in Handsworth, Staffordshire, England, 28 October, 1833. He was educated at King Edward's school, in Birmingham, and came to this country in his youth. He soon found employment as a designer and engraver in the house of Tiffany and Company, with whom he has since remained continuously. Many of the best-known art-pieces of silver-ware that have been produced in this country were designed by him, among them the Bryant vase, which was presented to the poet on his eightieth birthday, and is to be seen in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, also the silver casket presented to Bishop Horatio Potter on 25 November, 1879, the twenty-fifth anniversary of his consecration. The elaborate design of the latter was wrought by the repousse process, the golden enrichments are carved by hand, and the damaskeening was richer and costlier than any similar work ever produced in this country. The third seal of the United States, which is now in use in Washington, was designed by him. (See illustration.) The first seal was made under President Washington's immediate direction, while the second was a failure. Mr. Whitehouse has designed numerous national medals, as well as most of the U. S. corps badges that were made during the Civil War, also the beautiful memorial brasses in the tower of St. James's church, Lenox hill, New York City. He is a recognized authority on art, and is frequently consulted in the technicalities of art-work, the various applications of art, and on heraldry. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, pp. 479-480.


WHITELEY, Richard Henry, congressman, born in Ireland, 22 December, 1830. He was taken to Georgia in 1836, and engaged in the manufacturing business in early boyhood, but in 1860, having studied law, was admitted to the bar. He opposed secession, but served in the Confederate Army in 1861-'5. In 1867 he was chosen as a Republican to the State Constitutional Convention, and in the following year he was a Republican candidate for Congress and was appointed solicitor-general of the southwestern circuit. In February. 1870, he was elected U. S. Senator, but not admitted to a seat. Meanwhile he and his Democratic opponent had been contesting the Congressional election of 1868, and the seat was finally awarded to Mr. Whiteley in February, 1871, at the close of the session. He served from this time till 1875, and was a defeated candidate for the two following Congresses. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 480.


WHITELEY, Robert Henry Kirkwood, soldier, born near Cambridge, Maryland, 15 April, 1809. He was appointed from Delaware to the U. S. Military Academy, where he was graduated in 1830, and, being assigned to the 2d U.S. Artillery, served in various arsenals and garrisons, including that of Fort Moultrie, South Carolina, in 1832-'3, during the threatened nullification troubles. He was promoted 1st lieutenant, 28 December, 1835, brevetted captain. 19 July, 1836, for gallant conduct in the Florida War, and in 1838 was transferred to the ordnance. He was promoted captain in 1842, and commanded successively the arsenal at, Baton Rouge, Louisiana, that in St. Louis, Missouri, the New York Ordnance Depot, and the arsenal at San Antonio, Texas, till the last-named was seized by the state on its secession in 1861. During the Civil War he was in charge of the New York Arsenal till 1862, and then of Alleghany Arsenal, Pennsylvania, which latter post he held till his retirement from active service on 14 April, 1875. He became major, 3 August, 1861, lieutenant-colonel, 1 June, 1863, and colonel, 6 April, 1866, and on 13 March, 1865, was brevetted colonel and brigadier-general. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 480.


WHITELEY'S MILLS, ARKANSAS, April 5, 1864. Detachment of 2nd Arkansas Cavalry. A scouting party of 50 Federal cavalry attacked the camp of 250 guerrillas at Whiteley's mills on the headwaters of the Buffalo river. The Confederates had learned of the Federal approach and were in battle line. After 2 hours of hard fighting the Union command withdrew, having lost 1 killed, 1 wounded and 1 missing. The enemy's loss was not ascertained. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 922.


WHITEMARSH ISLAND GEORGIA, March 30-31, 1862. Detachment of 46th New York Infantry. Confederate reconnoitering parties on Whitemarsh and Wilmington islands attacked a Federal scout1ng party, killed 1, wounded 2 and captured 18. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 922.


WHITEMARSH ISLAND GEORGIA, April 1, 1862. Detachment of 8th Michigan Infantry and a Rhode Island Battery. Seven companies of the 8th Michigan, constituting an escort for Lieutenant J. H. Wilson, a topographical engineer making a reconnaissance of Whitemarsh island, were attacked between 4 and 5 p. m. by some 800 Confederates. The Federal advance line, stationed behind a hedge, delivered its fire and the bugles sounded the "charge." Some of the men mistook the signal and commenced falling back, the enemy meantime advancing rapidly. As soon as the Union troops could be rallied they checked the Confederate advance and the same positions were maintained by the participants for an hour or more, when the enemy made an attempt to turn the Union left . The company holding that position advanced and the rest of the line followed, driving the Confederates steadily before them for a half or threequarters of a mile. The Union loss was 10 killed and 35 wounded; the exact Confederate loss was not ascertained, but 2 dead and 1 mortally wounded were left in Federal hands. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, pp. 922-923.


WHITEMARSH ISLAND, GEORGIA, February 22, 1864. Confederate reports tell of an affair on Whitemarsh island, where Federal forces attempted to fain a foothold but were repulsed with a loss of several killed and wounded and 4 captured. The Confederate casualties amounted to 1 killed, 1 wounded and 11 captured or missing. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 923.


WHITE OAK BAYOU, MISSISSIPPI, July 24, 1862. (See Coldwater, same date.)


WHITE OAK CREEK, ARKANSAS, April 14, 1864. (See Camden, Arkansas, Expedition to.)


WHITE OAK CREEK, ARKANSAS, September 29, 1864. Detachment of Cavalry Division, 7th Army Corps. During a cavalry expedition from Fort Smith, under Major Thomas Derry, there was heavy skirmishing from Clarksville to White Oak creek, where bivouac was made. During the posting of vedettes the enemy showed himself in some force and was with difficulty driven away. One of the vedettes was killed at his post during the night. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 923.


WHITE OAK CREEK, NORTH CAROLINA, January 19, 1863. Detachments of 3d New York Cavalry and 51st Massachusetts Infantry. During a reconnaissance from New Berne to Pollocksville the detachments of the two regiments reached Young's cross-roads about noon and found that the bridge across the White Oak a mile below had been destroyed. As the Federals approached the stream the enemy opened fire from a barricade on the opposite bank. A howitzer was brought to bear against the barricade, which soon silenced the enemy's fire and caused him to retreat from his position. No casualties were reported. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 923.


WHITE OAK RIDGE, MISSOURI, August 18, 1862. 2nd Illinois Cavalry. White Oak Road, Virginia, March 31, 1865. Two skirmishes occurred on this date on the White Oak road, in the first of which the Union troops were driven back and in the second the Confederates were defeated. (See Five Forks for detailed account.) The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 923.

WHITE OAK RUN, VIRGINIA, April 29-May 2, 1863. (See Fitzhugh's Crossing.)


WHITE OAK SPRINGS, KENTUCKY, August 17, 1864. U. S. Troops of District of Indiana. This affair was an incident of an expedition from Mount Vernon, Ind., under Bvt. Major-General Alvin P. Hovey. The Confederate recruiting camp at White Oak Springs was attacked, a few prisoners were taken and the remainder of the force was scattered. No casualties -were reported. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 923.


WHITE OAK SWAMP, VIRGINIA, June 28-30, 1862. The operations about White Oak swamp were part of the Seven Days' battles, and a full account of them is given under that title. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 923.


WHITE OAK SWAMP, Virginia, June 13, 1864. 3d Cavalry Division and 3d Division, 5th Corps, Army of the Potomac. In the march from the Rapidan to the James the cavalry division, commanded by Brigadier-General J. H. Wilson, crossed the Chickahominy river on the night of the 12th and was followed by the 5th corps, Major-General Warren commanding. Wilson drove the enemy before him across the White Oak bridge and engaged him there until relieved by Crawford's division of the 5th corps, when the cavalry moved toward New Market cross-roads. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, pp. 923-924.


WHITE OAK SWAMP BRIDGE, VIRGINIA, August 5, 1862. Detachments of 5th U. S. and 3d Pennsylvania Cavalry. Colonel William W. Averell, commanding a cavalry brigade in a movement to reoccupy Malvern hill, reports that his advance dashed upon some 30 or 40 Confederates stationed at White Oak swamp bridge. The enemy was dispersed and pursued, and 3 were reported killed, although the Confederate report says there were but 3 wounded. Twenty-two prisoners were captured. No casualties were sustained by Averell. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 924.


WHITE POINT, SOUTH CAROLINA, April 29, 1862. (See Pineberry Battery, same date.)

WHITE POINT, SOUTH CAROLINA, July 3, 1864. Troops of District of Florida. As an incident of a demonstration against Charleston Brigadier-General William Birney's command was disembarked on the 2nd about a mile from White Point on the Dawho river. In the advance next morning a small Confederate force was driven to a point where it was impracticable to cross a stream, on the opposite side of which was a small fort. Later in the day Birney withdrew. The Federal casualties were 6 wounded. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 924.


WHITE POND, SOUTH CAROLINA, February 8, 1865. (See Williston.)


WHITE POST, VIRGINIA, June 13, 1863. 1st New York Cavalry. The only official mention of this action is in a despatch from General R. H. Milroy, which states that "A small detachment of the 1st New York encountered a body of rebel cavalry at White Post. * * * Two of the 1st New York wounded and 1 missing. One rebel killed and some wounded." The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 924.


WHITE POST, VIRGINIA, August 11, 1864. 2nd Brigade, 1st Cavalry Division, Shenandoah Valley Campaign. On this date, during the cavalry operations in the Shenandoah valley, Colonel Cesnola, with the 4th New York, was sent on a reconnaissance toward Newtown. Near the crossing of the Newtown and White Post and the Front Royal roads he found the enemy in considerable force, strongly posted behind stone walls, and so reported to Brigadier-General Devin, commanding the brigade. The entire brigade was then brought up, the 6th New York and 17th Pennsylvania were deployed on the left and the 9th New York was sent about a mile to the right, where it was ordered to charge the enemy's flank. Owing to the nature of the ground the movement could not be executed with success and the regiment was forced to retire. Devin then brought a section of Heaton's battery into position and opened fire on the Confederate front with artillery. At the same time the two regiments on the left were dismounted and charged the enemy's right flank, driving him from his cover. Pursuit was kept up for about a mile, when the Confederates gained a strong position and opened fire with a battery of 3-inch guns. All of Heaton's battery was now brought into action, and after a few shots were fired the Confederates again vacated their position and retired precipitately toward Newtown. No report of casualties. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 924.

WHITE RIVER, ARKANSAS, January 13-19, 1863. Gorman's Expedition. Immediately after the fall of Arkansas Post on January 11, Brigadier-General Willis A. Gorman, commanding the Department of Eastern Arkansas, undertook an expedition up White river, to break up Confederate detachments stationed at various places along that stream. A force of 1,200 or 1,500 cavalry was sent across the country from Helena to Clarendon, while Gorman embarked about 10,000 infantry on transports and the gunboats Cincinnati, St. Louis, Rose and Romeo and started for White river. St. Charles was reached late on the 13th. Here a large amount of forage, corn, etc., was captured, with a few prisoners, but the main body of the garrison had evacuated before Gorman's arrival. Leaving the Cincinnati, a regiment of infantry, two companies of cavalry and a 6-gun battery to hold St. Charles, Gorman pushed on up the river, hoping to overtake the Confederate steamer carrying the artillery taken from that place. In the meantime the cavalry sent from Helena had occupied Clarendon without serious opposition, and when Gorman reached that point he started the cavalry in pursuit of the train that had gone overland toward Little Rock, but the heavy rains had overflowed the low grounds and the pursuit had to be given up. Devall's Bluff, with 25 prisoners, two 8-inch Columbiads, 90 new Enfield rifles, and some stores, was captured on the 17th. A force of infantry was seen to scatter in the woods as the boats approached the town, and was pursued for 7 miles on the Little Rock road, but only a few stragglers were taken. Colonel W. T. Spicely, with the gunboats Romeo and Rose and the 24th Ind. infantry, was sent on up the river to Des Arc, arriving there at 4 p. m. and capturing the entire garrison of 70 men, several thousand bushels of corn, 70 stands of arms and 200 rounds of 6-pounder ammunition. The post office and telegraph office were seized arid a large number of letters, some of them important, fell into Federal hands. Further operations had to be abandoned on account of the high water, and the expedition returned to Helena. The railroad track at Devall's Bluff was torn up for some distance, 2 railroad bridges and the depot burned and several cars broken to pieces. Not a man was lost during the expedition. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 924-925.


WHITE RIVER, ARKANSAS, March 22, 1863. Soldiers and Citizens from Fayetteville. Some 35 men sent out from Fayetteville to help the beef contractor in getting in his stock were attacked by about 200 Confederates near the head of White river. The Federals lost 3 soldiers and 1 citizen killed, 1 citizen wounded and 7 soldiers and 8 citizens captured. The Confederates were said to have lost their leader killed in the attack. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 925.


WHITE RIVER, ARKANSAS, March 25, 1864. Detachment of 2nd Arkansas Cavalry. A scouting party of 30 men under Captain Albert A. Irwin came upon a band of Confederates 40 strong near White river. The enemy were feeding and resting, but they were at once charged, 4 of them being killed, 1 wounded and 2 captured. No casualties on the Union side. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 925.


WHITE RIVER, ARKANSAS, September 14, 1864. (See Rodgers' Crossing.)


WHITE RIVER, ARKANSAS, October 22, 1864. S3d U. S. Colored Infantry. While this regiment was proceeding down the White liver on a transport it was fired upon when opposite St. Charles. Three men were killed and 17 were wounded. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 925.


WHITE RIVER, MISSOURI, August 4, 1862. Detachment of Missouri State Militia Cavalry. Captain Milton Burch, in command of 100 men, came upon a camp of Confederates on the White river near Forsyth. In the charge the enemy was routed, leaving 4 dead on the field, while the only loss sustained by the Federals was 2 wounded. Twenty-three horses, 2 mules, 30 stands of arms, 75 saddles and bridles, commissary stores, etc., were captured. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 925.


WHITE RIVER, MISSOURI, April 17, 1863. Detachment of 7th Missouri Cavalry. A squad of 20 men reconnoitering on White river was attacked by a greatly superior force of the enemy. In the running fight which the Federals were compelled to make in their retreat they lost 1 man killed and 8 missing. One of the Confederates was known to have been killed. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 925.


WHITE RIVER STATION, ARKANSAS, June 22, 1864. Detachment of 12th Iowa Infantry. The garrison of 50 men of the 12th la. was attacked on the morning of the 22nd by some 300 Confederates. After a sharp fight the enemy was repulsed with a loss to the garrison of 1 killed and 4 wounded. The Federal reports estimate the Confederate losses at 30 killed and wounded. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, pp. 925-926.

WHITE'S FARM, KENTUCKY, August 30, 1862. (See Richmond.)


WHITE'S FORD, VIRGINIA, September. 21, 1863. Cavalry of the Army of the Potomac. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 926.


WHITESIDE, FLORIDA, July 27, 1864. 35 U. S. Colored Infantry. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 926.


WHITE SPRINGS, ARKANSAS, January 2, 1863. The report of General J. O. Shelby of Marmaduke's expedition into Missouri tells of a skirmish at White Springs in which the Federal participants were defeated, losing 20 killed, 20 wounded and several captured. Union reports do not mention the affair. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 926.


WHITE'S RANCH, TEXAS, May 13, 1865, (See Brownsville, same date.)


WHITE'S TAVERN, VIRGINIA, August 16, 1864. (See Deep Bottom, August 13-20.)


WHITE STONE HILL, DAKOTA, September 3-5, 1863. Northwestern Expedition. These two affairs were incidents of an expedition against the Indians in Dakota. The action on the 3d was the bloodier, the soldiers coming upon the Indian encampment and charging into it. On the 5th a scouting party came upon a band of Indians in the tall grass, and killed the larger part of them, the Indian loss being over 150. The troops had 17 enlisted men killed and 36 officers and men wounded. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 926.


WHITE SULPHUR SPRINGS, WEST VIRGINIA, August 26-27, 1863. (See Rocky Gap, same date.)

WHITE WATER, MISSOURI, April 27, 1863. 2nd Division, Army of the Frontier. After the Confederates under General Marmaduke had been driven from Jackson, the division, commanded by Brigadier-General William Vandever, pressed on in pursuit. Three miles from the bridge over the White Water river the 3d la. cavalry, which formed Vandever's advance, commenced skirmishing with Marmaduke's rear-guard and soon developed a force of some 6,000 or 7,000. At this juncture the main body of the division came up and the engagement became general, the Confederates gradually falling back to the river, where they succeeded in crossing and destroying the bridge behind them, thus checking pursuit. The Union loss in this action was 1 killed, 4 wounded and 17 missing. The enemy's casualties were not reported. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 926.


WHITFIELD, James Monroe, 1822-1871, African American, abolitionist, orator, poet, supported African American emigration and Black nationalism. (Gates, Henry Louis, Jr., & Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, eds. African American National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2013, Vol. 12, p. 53)


WHITING. To make whiting for accoutrements, it is necessary to boil many handfuls of bran enveloped in linen. Dissolve afterwards pipe-clay in this water. Whiten with it when cold. When the buff leather is greasy and does not receive the whiting, scrape it, and apply to it a solution of pipe-clay and Spanish whiting. Another receipt, calculated for one hundred men, is the following: Pipe-clay, 3 lbs.; Spanish whiting, 8 ounces; white lead, 4 ounces; glue, 1- ounces; starch, 6 oz.; white soap, 5 oz. Put the pipe-clay and Spanish whiting in about five gallons of water; wash them and leave them to soak for six hours; 2d, throw out the first water, and replace it by 5 gallons of pure water; add the White lead, glue, and white soap. Cook them together, taking care to stir constantly the composition. At the moment that the foam shows itself on the surface, with, draw the vessel from the fire without suffering the composition to boil; put then the starch in the whiting, and mix all well together. (Scott, Military Dictionary, Van Nostrand, 1862, p. 669).


WHITING, Daniel Powers, soldier, born in Troy, New York. 31 July, 1808. He was graduated at the U. S. Military Academy in 1832, and assigned to the 7th U.S. Infantry, with which he served in various garrisons, becoming 1st lieutenant, 8 June, 1836, and captain, 18 April, 1845. During the Mexican War he was engaged at Fort Brown, Monterey, Vera Cruz, and Cerro Gordo, where he was brevetted major. After serving against the Seminoles, on the frontier, and in the Utah Expedition in 1859, he attained full rank on 20 December, 1860. He was in command of Fort Garland, Colonel, in 1861-'2. became lieutenant-colonel, 15 February, 1862, served on a board of examination at Annapolis, Maryland, in 1862-'3, and on 4 November, 1863, was retired "for disability, resulting from long and faithful service, and from sickness and exposure in the line of duty." He has published “The Army Portfolio," a series of lithographed views illustrating the Mexican War (Washington, 1849). It was intended to continue the series, but Colonel Whiting's sketches were lost on a steamboat that sank in the Mississippi River. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 482.


WHITING, William, Concord, Massachusetts, abolitionist, Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, Vice-President, 1853-60-.


WHITING, William B., naval officer, born in Troy, New York, 13 November, 1813; died in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, 16 December, 1883. He was appointed a midshipman in the U.S. Navy, 2 February, 1829, and cruised on the Pacific Station in 1831-'4, principally engaged on surveys. He became a passed midshipman. 4 June, 1836, served on coast-survey duty in 1837-'43. in the frigate "Macedonian," on the coast of Africa, on surveying duty in 1843-'5, and at the naval observatory at Washington in 1845-50. during which he drew plans of the defences of Vera Cruz preliminary to the expedition of the navy and General Winfield Scott's army. He was again on the coast survey in 1851—'2, and cruised in the sloop" Vandalia," 1852-6, measuring the coasts of China and Japan. He was placed on the reserved list by the notorious retiring board of 1855 because his entire service had been in surveying duty rather than the military duties of the naval profession. He was then attached to the U. S. Naval Observatory at Washington until 1871, where he rendered valuable services in astronomical work. In recognition of his scientific attainments, he was promoted to commander and captain in 1867, and to commodore in 1871. After this last promotion he was relieved from active duty. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 483.


WHITING, William Danforth, naval officer, born in Boston, Massachusetts, 27 May, 1823. He entered the U.S. Navy as a midshipman. 1 March, 1841, and served in the sloop " Levant " in 1846-'7, at the capture of Monterey, California, when the American flag was first hoisted on that shore, 7 July, 1846. He attended the naval academy in 1847-'8, was graduated, and-became a passed midshipman, 10 August, 1847. He was promoted to master, 1 May, 1855, and to lieutenant, 14 September, 1855, and was attached to the steam frigate "Niagara" when the first Atlantic cable was laid in 1857. He was executive of the sloop "Vandalia" at the capture of Port Royal in 1861, and commanded the steamer "Wyandotte " on the South Atlantic Blockade and in the Potomac Flotilla. Lieutenant Whiting was promoted to lieutenant-commander, 16 July, 1862, and in the gun-boat "Ottawa" participated in the attacks on the defences of Charleston, engaged Battery Gregg and Fort Wagner, and assisted in the capture of the lower end of Morris Island in 1863-'4. In 1864-'5 he commanded the " Savannah," in the Eastern Gulf Station. He was commissioned a commander, 25 July, 1866, had the steamer " Tioga" on the coast of Maine and in the Gulf, was at the New York Navy-yard in I867-'9 and 1871—'2, and commanded the sloop "Saratoga" and the monitor "Miantonomoh" in the North Atlantic Squadron in 1869-'70. He was promoted to captain, 19 August, 1872. and commanded the steam sloop "Worcester," flag-ship of the North Atlantic Squadron, in 1871-'5. In the first year of that cruise he took out contributions of food and clothing from the American people for the relief of the French sufferers in the Franco-Prussian War. Owing to the want of means to transport these contributions to the needed districts in the east of France, the stores were taken to Liverpool and London, where a favorable market realized a much larger sum of money than that which was expended for the purchase of these stores in this country. The American relief committee in France also urged that the money was more needed than contributions in any other shape. He was present at New Orleans during the political excitement owing to the overthrow of the Packard government, and won the confidence of the citizens by wise measures, contributing to allay the excitement. On 11 June, 1878, he was appointed chief of Bureau of Navigation and office of detail, with the rank of commodore. Failing health and almost total blindness resulting from exposure incidental to the service compelled him to be relieved from this duty, 12 October, 1881, from which date he was placed on the retired list, with the rank of commodore, by special act of Congress. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 483-484.


WHITING, William Henry Chase, soldier, born in Mississippi about 1825; died on Governor's Island, New York Harbor, 10 March. 1865. His father, Levi, a native of Massachusetts, was an officer of the regular army from 1812 until his death in 1852, when he was lieutenant-colonel of the 1st artillery. The son was graduated at the U. S. Military Academy in 1845 at the head of the class in which were Charles P. Stone, Fitz-John Porter, and Gordon Granger. He was assigned to the Engineer Corps, and engaged in the construction of forts and internal improvements in the west and south, becoming a captain, 13 December, 1858. He resigned on 20 February, 1861, entered the Confederate service, and in June and July of that year was chief engineer, with the rank of major, of the Army of the Shenandoah, under General Joseph E. Johnston. He was promoted brigadier-general on 27 August, 1861, and commanded the brigade whose timely arrival won the battle of Bull Run for the Confederates. He took part in the battle of West Point, Virginia. 7 May, 1862, was made a major-general in 1863, and built Fort Fisher, N. C., of which he took command in the autumn of 1864. He defended the fort during the unsuccessful attack by General Benjamin F. Butler, and the successful one by General Alfred Terry (q. v.), and on its capture was severely wounded and taken prisoner. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 484.


WHITMAN, Walt, 1819-1892, poet, essayist, journalist. Wrote antislavery poetry.  Supported the Wilmot Proviso and was opposed to the inclusion of slavery in the new territories.  His poetry presented his views on the equality of the races.  Supported the abolition of slavery, but did not necessarily support the tactics of the abolitionist movement.  In 1856, he wrote to the people of the South, in an unpublished work, “You are either to abolish slavery, or it will abolish you.” (Hughes, Meltzer, & Lincoln, 1968; Appleton’s Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, pp. 485-486; Dictionary of American Biography, Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1936, Vol. 10, Pt. 2, p. 143)

WHITMAN, Walt, or Walter, poet, born in West Hills, Long Island, New York, 31 May, 1819. He was educated in the public schools of Brooklyn and New York City, and learned printing, working at that trade in summer and teaching in winter. Subsequently he also acquired skill as a carpenter. For brief periods he edited newspapers in New Orleans and in Huntington, Long Island. In 1847-'8 he made long pedestrian tours through the United States, generally following the courses of the great western rivers, and also extended his journey through Canada. His chief work, “Leaves of Grass” (New York, 1855), is a series of poems dealing with moral, social, and political problems, and more especially with the interests involved in 19th century American life and progress. In it he made a new and abrupt departure as to form, casting his thoughts in a mould the style of which is something between rhythmical prose and verse, altogether discarding rhythm and regular metre, but uttering musical thoughts in an unconventional way which is entirely his own. Expecting the opposition and abuse with which his volume was assailed, he speaks of it as a sortie on common literary use and wont, on both spirit and form, adding that a century may elapse before its triumph or failure can be assured. For thirty years Whitman has been correcting and adding to this work, and he says that he looks upon “Leaves of Grass” “now finished to the end of its opportunities and powers, as my definitive carte visite to the coming generations of the New World, if I may assume to say so.” In the war Whitman's brother was wounded on the battle-field, which led to the poet's at once hastening to join him in the camp, where he afterward remained as a volunteer army nurse at Washington and in Virginia in 1862-'5. His experiences during this service are vividly recorded in “Drum-Taps” (1865) and “Memoranda during the War” (1867). His fatigue and night-watching in 1864 brought on a serious illness, from which he has never entirely recovered. In 1870 he published a volume of prose essays called “Democratic Vistas,” a new edition of which has been issued by Walter Scott (London, 1888), with a preface written by Whitman in April of the same year. In this volume he explains that he uses the word “Democrat” in its widest sense as synonymous with the American form of government. From 1865 till 1874 Whitman held a government clerkship in Washington. In February, 1873, the lingering effects of his nursing fatigues and illness during the war culminated in a severe paralytic attack. He left Washington for Camden, New Jersey, and was recovering when in May of the same year his mother died somewhat suddenly in his presence. This shock caused a relapse. He abandoned Washington and has continued to reside at Camden. Mr. Whitman has been called “the good gray poet.” His admirers, especially in England, have been extravagant in their praise of his works, comparing him with the best of the classic writers, and in this country Ralph Waldo Emerson said on the appearance of “Leaves of Grass”: “I find it the most extraordinary piece of wit and wisdom that America has yet contributed . . . . I find incomparable things incomparably said.” On the other hand, the peculiar form of his writings prevents their popularity, and their substance has been widely regarded as of no value. “Leaves of Grass” has even been condemned for indecency on account of its outspokenness, and when a complete edition of the work was published (Boston, 1881) the Massachusetts authorities objected to its sale in that state on the ground of immorality. Besides the works already mentioned, Whitman has published “Passage to India” (1870); “After All, not to Create Only” (1871); “As Strong as a Bird on Pinions Free” (1872); “Two Rivulets,” including “Democratic Vistas” and “Passage to India” (1873); “Specimen Days and Collect” (1883); “November Boughs” (1885); and “Sands at Seventy” (1888). A selection of his poems, by William M. Rossetti, was published (London, 1868). Besides the complete edition of “Leaves of Grass” that has been mentioned, another, edited by Professor Edward Dowden, has since been issued (Glasgow, Scotland). A popular selection, with introduction by Ernest Rhys, was published by Walter Scott (London, 1886). See “The Good Gray Poet, a Vindication,” by William D. O’Connor (New York, 1866), and “Notes on Walt Whitman as Poet and Person,” by John Burroughs (1866). Appleton’s Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI. pp. 485-486.


WHITMORE'S MILL, ARKANSAS, April 30, 1864. (See Camden, Arkansas, Expedition to.)


WHITNEY, Anne, sculptor, born in Watertown. Massachusetts, 2 September, 1821. She was educated by private tutors, and early manifested a love for poetry and sculpture, the latter becoming gradually an absorbing pursuit. Her poetical writings were collected in a volume entitled "Poems" (New York, 1859). In the same year she opened a studio in her native place, and subsequently making several visits to Europe, studied there four years, producing two of her best works during that time. On her return in 1873 she established a studio in Boston, where she has since remained. She has executed portraits and ideal works in groups, busts, medallions, and statues, including a statue of Samuel Adams, of which two copies, one in bronze and one in marble, are respectively in the capitol at Washington and in Boston (1863); "Roma" (1865); "Africa," a colossal recumbent figure of a woman, illustrating the Civil War in the United States (1873); a statue of Harriet Martineau, belonging to Wellesley College (1883); and the fountain of "Leif Erikson " (1886). The last was unveiled in Boston, 29 October, 1887. and the statue above the fountain represents the Norse-Icelandic discoverer of America as a man of physical beauty and vigor, in the costume of the ancient Scandinavian warrior. (See the accompanying illustration.) Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 487.


WHITNEY, Asa, manufacturer, born in Townsend, Massachusetts, 1 December 1791; died in Philadelphia, 4 June, 1874. His opportunities for education were meagre, and, after spending several years in his father's blacksmith-shop, he went in 1812 to New Hampshire, and soon became so capable as a machinist that his employer sent him to Brownsville, New York, to superintend the erection of machinery in a cotton-factory. Here he remained till 1830, carrying on a business in machine and forge-works, when he was appointed assistant superintendent of the Mohawk and Hudson Railroad, and became superintendent the following year. Resigning this post in 1839, he was elected canal commissioner of New York State, and for two years superintended the enlargement and management of the Erie Canal and its branches. In 1842 he moved to Philadelphia and entered into the manufacture of locomotives with Matthew W. Baldwin, but withdrew from the partnership in two years. Soon afterward he became president of the Morris Canal Company, for which he applied special machinery to a series of inclined planes worked by steam, by which means its boats could pass elevations. He took out patents on 22 May, 1847, for the corrugated plate car-wheel, and the curved corrugated plate wheel, and began their manufacture with his son George as partner. On 25 April, 1848, he patented his process for annealing car-wheels. It consisted in placing the wheels, soon after they were cast, in a heated furnace, where they were subjected to a further gradual increase of temperature, and were then slowly cooled for three days. The discovery of this process of annealing, as applied to chilled east-iron wheels, marked an era in the history of railroads. It enabled them with safety to increase both loads and speed. Previous to this discovery it was impossible to cast wheels with solid hubs, and therefore impossible to secure them rigidly to the axle. Now the whole wheel was easily cast in one piece, and capable of being forced securely upon the axle at a pressure of forty tons. Over ten million car-wheels are now in use in this country, and this principle of annealing is applied in some form to every wheel that is made of chilled cast-iron. On 19 March, 1850, he patented the tapered and ribbed corrugated wheel. For many years he made from 50,000 to 75,000 car-wheels per annum. The business is still carried on by the firm of A. Whitney and Sons. In 1860 Mr. Whitney was made president of the Reading Railroad, but he resigned in a year from failing health, after contributing largely to the success of the road. He gave liberally during his life, and among other public bequests he gave $50,000 to found a professorship of dynamical engineering in the University of Pennsylvania, 112,500 to the Franklin institute, and $20,000 to the Old Men's Home in Philadelphia. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 487-488.


WHITNEY, Asa, merchant, born in 1797; died in Washington, D. C., in August, 1872. He was in mercantile business in New York City. He recognized the necessity of a railroad to the Pacific, was the first to suggest its feasibility, and from 1846 till 1850 urged it upon congress, the legislatures of several states, and the public, by personal influence and his writings. He was Annually instrumental in securing appropriations in 1853 for the first surveys of the northern, southern, and middle routes, and lived to see communication opened from sea to sea in 1869. He was the author of "A Project for a Railroad to the Pacific " (New York, 1849), and " A Plan for a Direct Communication between the Great Centres of Populations of Europe and Asia " (London, 1851). Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 488.


WHITNEY, Eli, inventor, born in Westborough, Massachusetts, 8 December, 1765; died in New Haven, Connecticut, 8 January, 1825. During the Revolutionary war he was engaged in making nails by hand. Subsequently, by his industry as an artisan and by teaching, he was able to defray his expenses at Yale, where he was graduated in 1792. In the same year he went to Georgia under an engagement as a private tutor, but, on arriving there, found that the place had been filled. He then accepted the invitation of the widow of General Nathanael Greene to make her place at Mulberry Grove, on Savannah River, his home while he studied law. Several articles that he had devised for Mrs. Greene's convenience gave her great faith in his inventive powers, and when some of her visitors regretted that there could be no profit in the cultivation of the green seed-cotton, which was considered the best variety, owing to the great difficulty of separating it from the seed, she advised them to apply to Whitney "who," she said, "could make anything." A pound of green seed-cotton was all that a Negro woman could at that period clean in a day. Mr. Whitney up to that time had seen neither the raw cotton nor the cotton seed, but he at once procured some cotton from which the seeds had not been removed, although with trouble, as it was not the season of the year for the cultivation of the plant, and began to work out his idea of the cotton-gin. He was occupied for some months in constructing his machine, during which he met with great difficulty, being compelled to draw the necessary iron-wire himself, as he could obtain none in Savannah, and to manufacture his own iron tools. Near the end of 1792 he succeeded in making a gin of which the principle and mechanism arc both exceedingly simple. Its main features are a cylinder four feet long and five inches in diameter, upon which is set a series of circular saws half an inch apart and projecting two inches above the surface of the revolving cylinder. A mass of cotton in the seed, separated from the cylinder by a steel grating, is brought into contact with the numerous teeth on the cylinder. These teeth catch the cotton while playing between the bars, which allow the lint, but not the seed, to pass. Beneath the saws is a set of stiff brushes on another cylinder revolving in the opposite direction, which brush off from the saw-teeth the lint that these have just pulled from the seed. There is also a revolving fan for producing a current of air to throw the light and downy lint that is thus liberated to a convenient distance from the revolving saws and brushes. Such are the essential principles of the cotton-gin as invented by Whitney and as it is still used; but in various details and workmanship it has been the subject of many improvements, the object of which has been to pick the cotton more perfectly from the seed, to prevent the teeth from cutting the staple, and to give greater regularity to the operation of the machine. By its use the planter was able to clean for market, by the labor of one man, one thousand pounds of cotton in place of five or six by hand. Mrs. Greene and Phineas Miller were the only persons that were permitted to see the machine, but rumors of it had gone through the state, and before it was quite finished the Wilding in which it was placed was broken into at night and the machine was carried off. Before he could complete his model and obtain a patent, a number of machines based on his invention had been made surreptitiously and were in operation. In May, 1793, he formed a partnership with Mr. Miller, who had some property, and went to Connecticut to manufacture the machines; but he became involved in continual trouble by the infringement of his patent. In Georgia it was boldly asserted that he was not the inventor, but that something like it had been produced in Switzerland, and it was claimed that the substitution of teeth cut in an iron plate for wire prevented an infringement on his invention. He had sixty lawsuits pending before he secured a verdict in his favor. In South Carolina the legislature granted him $50,000, which was finally paid after vexatious delays and lawsuits. North Carolina allowed him a percentage for the use of each saw for five years, and collected and paid it over to the patentees in good faith, and Tennessee promised to do the same thing, but afterward rescinded her contract. For years—amid accumulated misfortunes, lawsuits wrongfully decided against him, the destruction of his manufactory by fire, the industrious circulation of the report that his machine injured the fibre of the cotton, the refusal of congress, on account of the opposition of southern members, to allow the patent to be renewed, and the death of his partner—Mr. Whitney struggled on until he was convinced that he should never receive a just compensation for his invention. In 1791 the amount of cotton that was exported amounted to only 189,500 pounds, while in 1803, owing to the use of his gin, it had risen to more than 41,000,000 pounds. Despairing of gaining a competence, he turned his attention in 1798 to the manufacture of fire-arms near New Haven, from which he eventually gained a fortune. He was the first manufacturer of fire-arms to effect the division of labor to the extent of making it the duty of each workman to perform by machinery but one or two operations on a single part of the gun, and thus made interchangeable the parts of the thousands of arms in process of manufacture at the same time. His first contract was with the U. S. government for 10,000 stand of muskets to be finished in about two years. For the execution of this order he took two years for preparation and eight more for completion. He gave bonds for $30,000, and was to receive $13.40 for each musket, or $134,000 in all. Immediately he began to build an armory at the foot of East Rock, two miles from New Haven, in the present village of Whitneyville, where, through the successive administrations from that of John Adams, repeated contracts for the supply of arms were made and fulfilled to the entire approbation of the government. The construction of his armory, and even of the commonest tools, which were devised by him for the prosecution of the business in a manner peculiar to himself, evinced the fertility of his genius and the precision of his mind. The buildings became the model upon which the national armories were afterward arranged, and many of his improvements were transferred to other establishments and have become common property. His advance in the manufacture of arms laid this country under permanent obligations by augmenting the means of national defence. Several of his inventions have been applied to other manufactures of iron and steel and added to his reputation. He established a fund of $500 at Yale, the interest of which is expended in the purchase of books on mechanical and physical science. In 1817 he married a daughter of Judge Pierpont Edwards. Robert Fulton said that "Arkwright, Watt, and Whitney were the three men that did most for mankind of any of their contemporaries," and Macaulay said: "What Peter the Great did to make Russia dominant. Eli Whitney's invention of the cotton-gin has more than equalled in its relation to the power and progress of the United States." See "Memoir of Eli Whitney," by Denison Olmsted (New Haven, 1846). Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 488-489.


WHITNEY, Josiah Dwight, geologist, born in Northampton, Massachusetts, 23 November, 1819. He was graduated at Yale in 1839, and then spent six months in the chemical laboratory of Dr. Robert Hare in Philadelphia. In 1840 he joined the survey of New Hampshire as assistant geologist under Charles T. Jackson, and remained connected with that work until May, 1842, when he went abroad. For five years he travelled on the continent of Europe, and pursued chemical, geological, and mineralogical studies. On his return to this country in 1847 he engaged in the geological exploration of the Lake Superior region, and with John W. Foster was in the same year appointed by the U. S. government to assist Charles T. Jackson in making a geological survey of that district. Two years later the completion of the survey was intrusted to Foster and Whitney, who published "Synopsis of the Explorations of the Geological Corps in the Lake Superior Land District in the Northern Peninsula" (Washington, 1849), and "Report on the Geology and Topography of a Portion of the Lake Superior Land District in the State of Michigan" (part i., Copper Lands, 1850; part ii.. The Iron Region, 1851). On the completion of this work he travelled for two years through the states east of the Mississippi for the purpose of collecting information with regard to the mining and mineral interests in this country. His results were issued as " The Metallic Wealth of the United States described and compared with that of other Countries" (Philadelphia, 1854). In 1855 he was appointed state chemist and professor in the Iowa state University, and was associated with James Hall in the geological survey of that state, issuing "Reports on the Geological Survey of Iowa" (2 vols., Albany, 1858-'9). During 1858-'60 Professor Whitney was engaged on a geological survey of the lend region of the upper Missouri in connection with the official surveys of Wisconsin and Illinois, publishing, with James Hull, a "Report on the Geological Survey of the State of Wisconsin" (Albany, 1862). He was appointed state geologist of California in 1860, and engaged in conducting a topographical, geological, and natural history survey of that state until 1874. when the work was discontinued by act of legislature. Besides various pamphlets and annual reports on the subject, he issued six volumes under the title of "Geological Survey of California" (Cambridge, 1804-'70). In 1865 he was appointed professor of geology in Harvard, which chair he still retains, with charge of its school of mining and practical geology. The degree of LL. D. was conferred on him by Yale in 1870. Professor Whitney was one of the original members of the National academy of sciences named by act of Congress in 1863, but he has since withdrawn from that body. He is also a member of other scientific bodies, both at home and abroad. In addition to contributing to the "American Journal of Science," the "North American Review," and similar periodicals, he has translated Berzelius's " Use of the Blowpipe " (Boston, 1845), and is the author of "The Yosemite Guide-Book (San Francisco, 1869). Professor Whitney has made a specialty of collecting a library of geological and geographical books. Mount Whitney, the highest mountain in the United States, was named in his honor. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, pp. 489-490.


WHITNEY'S RANCH, CALIFORNIA, July 28, 1862. Detachment 2nd California Infantry. Three soldiers had been left at this ranch because unable to continue with the troop. On the 28th the ranch was attacked by Indians and the owner, 1 soldier and an employee on the ranch were killed. The Indians were frightened away by the approach of a detail of the 2nd California sent from Fort Anderson. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 926.


WHITTIER, John Greenleaf, 1807-1892, Haverhill, Massachusetts, poet, journalist, newspaper publisher and editor, Society of Friends, Quaker, radical abolitionist.  Wrote antislavery poetry.  Publisher and editor of the Pennsylvania Freeman.  Founding member, Manager, and Secretary of the American Anti-Slavery Society.  Member of the Executive Committee, American and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society.  Leader and active with the Liberty Party.  Member, Free Soil Party. 

(Blue, 2005, pp. 5, 37-64; Drake, 1950, pp. 113, 127, 137, 140-142, 158-159, 176, 181, 195; Dumond, 1961, pp. 167, 245, 286, 301; Filler, 1960, pp. 56, 66, 90, 105, 134, 148, 151, 194; Mabee, 1970, pp. 2, 4, 9, 11-13, 18, 21-22, 25-26, 29-30, 35-36, 48, 51, 65, 194, 211, 309, 326, 329, 359, 368, 373, 378; Pease, 1965, pp. 65, 102-104, 123-128; Rodriguez, 2007, pp. 161, 433, 641, 723; Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, pp. 493-494; Dictionary of American Biography, Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1936, Vol. 10, Pt. 2, p. 173; American National Biography, Oxford University Press, New York, 2002, Vol. 23, p. 350; The National Cyclopaedia of American Biography, Vol. I. New York: James T. White, 1892, p. 407)

WHITTIER, John Greenleaf, poet, born in Haverhill, Massachusetts, 17 Dec., 1807. His parents were members of the Society of Friends, and to the principles and practices of this sect he always remained faithful, conforming even to its peculiarities of speech and garb in a community where such observance, by being singular, must often have been trying to a temperament so shy and sensitive as his. His first American ancestor came to Massachusetts in 1638, and the conversion to Quakerism took place in the second generation of the family, after the settlement of the Bay Colony, at a time when that sect was sternly persecuted. There may therefore be something of heredity in the unswerving constancy of Whittier to unpopular opinions. At the date of his birth Haverhill was still a farming village, one of the prettiest among the many pretty hamlets which then gave a peaceful charm to the rural scenery of Massachusetts. Born on a farm, Whittier's first occupations were those of a farmer's boy, driving the kine to and from pasture, riding to mill, fetching in wood for the undying kitchen-fire, and helping in the lighter labors of haying and harvest. He was thus early brought into that intimate communion with Mother Earth and with Nature which comes not by mere observation, and which gives such a peculiar charm of picturesque truth to so many of his poems. How much he thus learned and to how good profit he put it are visible in many of his poems, but especially in his “Snow-Bound,” which, in addition to its other merits, has now also a historical value as a vivid picture of modes of life even then obsolescent and now almost as far away as those pictured by Homer. And not only will the scenery of New England, both outward and domestic, live in his verse, but it is worth remark that the nobler qualities of the Puritans have nowhere found such adequate literary expression since Milton as in this member of a sect which they did their utmost to suppress. Almost alone among American poets, he has revived the legends of his neighborhood in verse, and his “Floyd Ireson” is among the best of modern ballads, surpassed by none save Scott, if even by him. His schooling in other respects must have been scanty enough, since his only opportunity during boyhood would be the nearest district school (taught commonly by a college student younger than some of his rustic pupils), where he got such training in the simpler rudiments of knowledge as was possible under the conditions then existing. And this training, as usually in the country, was limited to the winter months, when farm-work was necessarily suspended. He has recorded his indebtedness during boyhood to Dr. Elms Weld, of Haverhill, who gave him the freedom of his library.

A farm-hand taught him shoemaking, the common occupation during winter in the fishing and farming villages along the coast, and by this means he earned enough to warrant his attending Haverhill Academy during six months of 1827. He was now sufficiently learned, according to the simpler notions of those days, to be himself a teacher, and taught in the district school of West Amesbury during the following winter. This supplied the means for another six months at the academy. In Whittier's case, as in that of so many other New Englanders, nothing is more characteristic or more touching than the persistent resolve to get the best education within their reach at whatever sacrifice.

The literary impulse in him must have been strong, for a while yet in his nineteenth year he contributed anonymous verse to the poet's corner of the “Free Press,” a journal edited by W. L. Garrison in Newburyport, and enjoyed the furtive bliss of print. Garrison saw signs of promise in these immature experiments, sought out the author, and gave him the precious encouragement of praise and sympathy. This led to a lasting friendship, and, with the traditions of his sect, may have had some influence in preparing Whittier to enlist in the anti-slavery crusade which began with the establishment of the “Liberator” in 1831, and afterward caught so much of its inspiration from his fervid lyrics. The ambition to become a poet was awakened in him appropriately enough by a copy of Robert Burns's poems, which fell into his hands in his fourteenth year.

His father dying, he carried on the farm for the next five years, and in 1835 was sent to the general court from Haverhill. During all these years he had been an industrious writer, seeking an outlet in all directions and contributing poems to John Neal's “Yankee” and to the “New England Magazine,” where the “Autocrat” began his admirable discourses. In 1829 he undertook the editorship of the “American Manufacturer” in Boston, and in 1830 succeeded George D. Prentice as editor of the “Haverhill Gazette” during the first six months of the year, and then of the “New England Weekly Review” in Hartford, Connecticut This office he resigned in 1832 on account of failing health and returned home. In 1836 he became secretary of the American anti-slavery society, and afterward moved to Philadelphia, where for a year (1838-'9) he edited the “Pennsylvania Freeman.” This he did with such sincerity that its printing-office was sacked and burned by a mob. At that time it required the courage of passionate conviction to maintain principles the noisier profession of which was to become profitable a few years later. Delicate as his organization was, Whittier faced many a brutal mob with unflinching composure. He was never a mere fanatic, but always quick to recognize and celebrate high qualities even in an adversary, as many of his poems show. He refused to follow Garrison in the renunciation of political action as one means of reform. In 1840 he took up his abode in Amesbury, a quiet village near his birthplace, and there (with the exception of six months spent at Lowell as editor of the “Middlesex Standard”), in the simple dignity of a frugal independence, the fruit of his own literary labors, he has lived ever since, and happily still lives, known and loved wherever our tongue is spoken. From 1847 to 1859 he contributed editorially to the “National Era,” an anti-slavery newspaper published at Washington, in which '”Uncle Tom's Cabin” was first printed.

In his seclusion Whittier was never idle, nor did he neglect his duties as a citizen while confirming his quality as a poet. Whenever occasion offered, some burning lyric of his flew across the country, like the fiery cross, to warn and rally. Never mingling in active politics (unless filling the office of presidential elector may be called so), he probably did more than anybody in preparing the material out of which the Republican party was made. When the civil war was impending he would have evaded it if possible by any concession short of surrender, as his “Word for the Hour” (January, 1861) shows. While the war continued he wrote little with direct reference to it, and never anything that showed any bitterness toward the authors of it. After it was over he would have made the terms of settlement liberal and conciliatory. He was too wise and too humane to stir the still living embers of passion and resentment for any political end however dear to him.

Of all American poets, with the single exception of Longfellow, Whittier has been the most popular, and in his case more than in that of any other the popularity has been warmed through with affection. This has been due in part to the nobly simple character of the man, transparent through his verse, in part to the fact that his poetry, concerning itself chiefly with the obvious aspects of life and speculation, has kept close to the highest levels of the average thought and sentiment. His themes have been mainly chosen from his own time and country—from his own neighborhood even—he deals with simple motives and with experiences common to all, and accordingly his scenery (whether of the outward or the inward eye) is domestically welcome to all his countrymen. He is never complex in thought or obscure in expression, and if sometimes his diction might gain in quality by a more deliberate choice, yet the pellucid simplicity of his phrase and the instant aptness of his epithet as often secure a more winning felicity through his frankness of confidence in the vernacular. His provincialisms of word or accent have an endearing property to the native ear, though even that will consent to a few of his more licentious rhymes. One feels that it is a neighbor who is speaking. Nor should the genial piety of his habitual thought and the faith that seeks no securer foothold than the Rock of Ages, on which the fathers stood so firmly, be overlooked among the qualities that give him a privilege of familiar entrance to a multitude of hearts and minds which would be barred against many higher, though not more genuine, forms of poetry. His religion has the sincerity of Cowper's without those insane terrors that made its very sincerity a torture. There are many points of spiritual likeness between the English and the American poet, especially in their unmetaphysicized love of outward natures, their austerity tempered with playful humor, and in that humanity of tone which establishes a tie of affectionate companionship between them and their readers. Whittier has done as much for the scenery of New England as Scott for that of Scotland. Many of his poems (such, for example, as “Telling the Bees”), in which description and sentiment mutually inspire each other, are as fine as any in the language.

Whittier, as many of his poems show, and as, indeed, would be inevitable, has had his moments of doubt and distrust, but never of despair. He has encountered everywhere the moral of his inscription on a sun-dial, convinced that “there's light above me by the shade below.” He, like others, has found it hard to reconcile the creed held by inheritance with the subtle logic of more modern modes of thought. As he himself has said:

“He reconciled as best he could

Old faith and fancies new.”

But his days have been “bound each to each with natural piety”; he has clung fast to what has been the wholesome and instructive kernel of all creeds; he has found consolation in the ever-recurring miracles, whether of soul or sense, that daily confront us, and in the expression of his own delight and wonder and gratitude for them has conveyed that solace to the minds and hearts of all his readers. One quality above all others in Whittier—his innate and unstudied Americanism—has rendered him alike acceptable to his countrymen and to his kindred beyond the sea. His first volume was “Legends of New England,” in prose and verse (Hartford, 1831), which has been followed by “Moll Pitcher” (1832); “Mogg Megone” (Boston, 1836); “Ballads” (1838); “Lays of My Home, and other Poems” (1843); “Miscellaneous Poems” (1844); the first English edition of his poetry, entitled “Ballads, and other Poems,” with an introduction by Elizur Wright (London, 1844); “The Stranger in Lowell” (1845); “Supernaturalism in New England” (New York and London, 1847); “Leaves from Margaret Smith's Journal” (Boston, 1849); “Voices of Freedom” (Philadelphia, 1849); a larger English collection of his “Poetical Works” (London, 1850); “Old Portraits and Modern Sketches” (Boston, 1850); “Songs of Labor, and other Poems,” and “The Chapel of the Hermits, and other Poems” (1853); “A Sabbath Scene: a Sketch of Slavery in Verse” (1853); “Literary Recreations and Miscellanies” (1854); “The Panorama, and other Poems” (1856); “Complete Poetical Works” (2 vols., 1857); “Home Ballads and Poems” (1860); “Snow-Bound” (1862); a new edition of his “Complete Poetical Works” (1863); “In War Time, and other Poems” (1863); “National Lyrics” (1865); a collection of his “Prose Works” (2 vols., 1866); “The Tent on the Beach” (1867); “Among the Hills” (1868); an illustrated edition of his “Complete Poetical Works” (1868); one corresponding in typography with the “Prose Works” (1869); a volume of his “Ballads of New England” contains sixty illustrations by various artists (1869); “Miriam, and other Poems” (1870); “The Pennsylvania Pilgrim, and other Poems”  (1872); “Hazel Blossoms” (1874); “Mabel Martin” (1875); a new collected edition of his “Poetical Works” comprising poems that he had written till the date of publication (1875); “Centennial Hymn” (1876); “The Vision of Echard, and other Poems” (1878); “The King's Missive, and other Poems” (1881); “Bay of Seven Islands, and other Poems” (1883); “Poems of Nature” (1885); and “St. Gregory's Guest, and Recent Poems” (1886). A final edition of his poetical and prose works has been supervised by himself, and includes his sister's poems (7 vols., 1888-'9). See a “Biography,” by Francis H. Underwood (Boston, 1875; new ed., 1883), and “John G. Whittier: his Life, Genius, and Writings,” by W. Sloane Kennedy (1882). Appleton’s Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI. pp. 493-494.


WHITTIER, Elizabeth Hussey, born near Haverhill, Massachusetts, 7 December, 1815; died in Amesbury, 3 September, 1864, although not a literary aspirant, was the author of poems marked by tenderness, grace, and rhythmic felicity. Several of them were included by her brother in his volume entitled " Hazel Blossoms." Like him, she was a member of the Society of Friends, and an ardent advocate of liberty. The engraving represents Whittier's home. Oak Knoll, in Danvers, Massachusetts [Sister of John Greenleaf Whittier]. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 494.


WHITTLESEY, Charles, geologist, born in Southington, Connecticut, 4 October, 1808, died in Cleveland, Ohio, 18 October, 1886, was graduated at the U. S. Military Academy in 1831, and assigned to the 5th U.S. Infantry. In 1832 he was stationed at Fort Howard, Wisconsin, and, after serving in the Black Hawk War, he resigned on 30 September of the same year. After studying law he followed that profession in Cleveland and in 1836-'7 he was editorially connected with the Cleveland "Herald." In 1837 he was appointed assistant geologist of Ohio, under William W. Mather, and given charge of the topographical and mathematical parts of that survey, which disclosed the rich coal and iron deposits of eastern Ohio that are the foundation of its manufacturing industries. At this time he carefully examined and measured several of the works of the mound-builders, and his plans and notes of twenty of these remains were embodied in Davis and Squire’s "American Monuments of the Mississippi Valley " (Washington, 1848). From 1847 till 1851 he was engaged by the U. S. government in making a mineralogical and geological survey of the region about Lake Superior and the upper Mississippi. Subsequently he was professionally engaged as a mining engineer in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota, and in 1858 became associated in the geological work of the survey of Wisconsin. In February, 1861, he was enrolled in a company that tendered its services to General Winfield Scott to escort the president-elect, Abraham Lincoln, to Washington. He was made assistant quartermaster-general on the staff of the governor of Ohio on 17 April, 1861, and during the western Virginia Campaign acted as chief engineer of the Ohio troops. At the expiration of his three-months service he was appointed, on 15 August. 1861, colonel of the 20th Ohio Infantry, and detailed as chief engineer of the Department of Ohio, with charge of planning and constructing the defences of Cincinnati. He was present at Fort Donelson, where he led his regiment, and after the surrender was sent to the north in charge of over 10,000 prisoners. At the battle of Shiloh he commanded the 3d Brigade of General Lewis Wallace's division, but failing health compelled his retirement from active service, and he resigned on 19 April, 1862. He then resumed the geological exploration in the Lake Superior and upper Mississippi basin, and continued his literary labors. In 1867 he was active in the founding of the Western Reserve and Northern Ohio Historical Society, of which he was president until his death. His bibliography included about 200 titles, and, in addition to his reports for the geological surveys, he published in the “Smithsonian Contributions" "Descriptions of Ancient Works in Ohio" (Washington, 1851); "On Fluctuations of Level in the North American Lakes " (1800); "Ancient Mining on the Shores of Lake Superior" (1863); and "On the Fresh-Water Glacial Drift in the Northwestern States " (1866). He is also the author of " Life of John Fitch." in Sparks's "American Biography" (Boston, 1845); and "Early History of Cleveland and Vicinity" (Cleveland." 1867). Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, pp. 496.


WHITTLESAY, Elisha, 1783-1863, Canfield, Ohio, lawyer, U.S. Congressman, American Colonization Society (ACS), Vice-President, 1836-41.  (Appleton’s Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, pp. 495-496; Staudenraus, P. J. The African Colonization Movement, 1816-1865. New York: Columbia University Press, 1961)

WHITTLESAY, Elisha, lawyer, born in Washington, Connecticut, 19 October, 1783; died in Washington, D.C., 7 January, 1863. He was brought up on a farm, received an academical education, studied law, and on his admission to the bar began practice in Canfield, Ohio, in 1806. He served as an aide-de-camp during the war of 1812-'15, was for sixteen years prosecuting attorney of his district, a member of the Ohio state House of Representatives in 1820-'1, and served in Congress from Ohio by successive elections from 1 December, 1823, till 9 July, 1838, when he resigned. He was one of the founders of the Whig party, was appointed by President Harrison in 1841 auditor of the post-office department, and by President Taylor in 1849 first comptroller of the treasury, from which post he was removed by President Buchanan in 1857, but he was reappointed by President Lincoln in 1861, and held office till his death. In 1845 he was appointed general agent and director of the Washington national monument association, and contributed greatly to the success of that enterprise.  Appleton’s Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI. pp. 495-496.


WHITTLESEY, Joseph H., soldier, born in New York in 1821; died in Seattle, W. T., 2 August. 1886. He was graduated at the U. S. Military Academy in 1844, and assigned to the 2d U. S. Dragoons, becoming 1st lieutenant, 18 October, 1847. He served in the military occupation of Texas and in the war with Mexico, and was brevetted 1st lieutenant for gallantry at Buena Vista in 1847. Until the opening of the Civil War he was on duty in New Mexico and Oregon. As major of the 5th U. S. Cavalry he served with the Army of the Potomac till May, 1862. During the remainder of the war Major Whittlesey was employed in organizing volunteer cavalry. He was retired from active service on account of disability resulting from exposure in the line of duty. He was employed on light duty until February, 1867, when he was ordered to inspect the educational institutions of the United States, for the purpose of devising a system of military instruction for colleges and universities with relation to a scheme for future National defence. He was professor of military science at Cornell in 1868-'70, and treasurer of the Soldiers' Home. Washington, D. C, till 1881. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 496.


WICHELL, John, Illinois, abolitionist, American Anti-Slavery Society, Vice-President, 1851-1857.


WICKERSHAM, James Pyle, educator, born in Chester County, Pennsylvania. 5 March, 1825. He is of the fifth generation in direct descent from Thomas Wickersham, who in 1701 settled on a 1,000-acre tract of land in Chester County that had been deeded by William Penn in 1682 to his father-in-law, Anthony Killingbeck. The Wickersham family came from the parish of Bolney, County of Sussex, England. James received a good education in the public schools and at Unionville Academy, near his birthplace. When he was sixteen years old he was teacher in a public school, and in 1845 he became principal of the Marietta (Pennsylvania) Academy. He was the first county superintendent of Lancaster County in 1854, and in 1855 he opened the normal school at Millersville, Pennsylvania, which in 1859 became the first state normal school in Pennsylvania. In 1866 he was appointed state superintendent of public instruction, and held that post for nearly fifteen years. He assisted in the organization of the Lancaster County Educational Association, and became its second president in 1863. He helped to organize the Pennsylvania state teachers' association, was its fourth president in 1855, assisted at the organization of the National educational association, and was its seventh president in 1865. He was twice elected president of the National Department of School Superintendents. In 1863 he raised a regiment of soldiers for three months' service, and commanded it during the Gettysburg Campaign. Lafayette gave him the degree of LL. D. in 1871. In 1882 he was appointed U. S. minister to Denmark. He has written on educational subjects for magazines and newspapers. For ten years (1871-'81) he was editor of the "Pennsylvania School Journal." His School Economy" (Philadelphia. 1864) and " Methods of Instruction " (1805) have been translated into the Spanish, French, and Japanese languages. His most elaborate work is the " History of Education in Pennsylvania" (1886). Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 497.


WICKHAM, Williams Carter, soldier, born in Richmond, Virginia, 21 September, 1820; died there, 23 July, 1888, was educated at the University of Virginia, adopted the profession of law, served in the state senate, and was an active member of the " old-line " Whig party. At the beginning of the Civil War he entered the Confederate Army as captain, and became colonel of the 4th Virginia Regiment, rising to the rank of brigadier-general. He served in most of the important battles of the Army of Northern Virginia, and was wounded three times, severely at Williamsburg. In 1864 he was a member of the Confederate Congress. After the war he joined the Republican Party, attaching himself to the conservative branch of that body. He was an admirer and advocate of General Grant, supported him for the presidency, and exerted a pacific influence in the reconstruction of the state. From the first he opposed the adjustment of the state debt as proposed by the followers of William Mahone, and engaged in many controversies with that senator. He was chosen to the state senate in 1882-'3, and in the next election he was returned without opposition. At the time of his death he was a vice-president, general manager, and receiver of the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 498.


WICKLIFFE, Charles A., politician, born in Bardstown. Kentucky, 8 June, 1788, died in Howard County, Maryland, 31 October, 1869. He was educated at the Bardstown grammar-school, studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1809, and began practice in Bardstown. He soon achieved distinction as a lawyer. He was aide to General Samuel Caldwell at the battle of the Thames, 5 October, 1813, was a member of the state house of representatives in 1814-'23, and sat in Congress from Kentucky in 1823-33, having been chosen as a Henry Clay Democrat. He was then elected again to the state legislature, and was its speaker in 1834. In 1836 he was elected lieutenant-governor of his native state, and in 1839 he became acting governor. In 1841, he was appointed postmaster-general by President Tyler, holding the post till March, 1845, and in the latter year he was sent by President Polk on a secret mission to Texas in the interests of annexation. He was a member of the state constitutional convention of 1845, a member of the Peace Congress in February, 1861, served again in Congress in 1861-'3, having been chosen as a Union Whig, and was a delegate to the Chicago National Democratic Convention in 1864. Mr. Wickliffe was wealthy, and his aristocratic bearing and contempt for the poorer classes won him the name of " the Duke." Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 498.


WICKS, L. D., New York, American Abolition Society (Radical Abolitionist, Vol. 1, No. 1, New York, August 1855)


WIDOWS AND ORPHANS. (See PENSION.)


WIGFALL, Louis Trezevant, senator, born in Edgefield district. S. C. 21 April, 1816; died in Galveston, Texas, 18 February, 1874. He was educated at the College of South Carolina, but left before graduation to go, as a lieutenant of volunteers, to Florida, where he took part in the operations against the Indians. He subsequently studied law at the University of Virginia, was admitted to the bar, and moved to Marshall, Texas, where he practised his profession. He served in the lower branch of the Texas legislature in 1849-'50, and was a member of the state senate in 1857-'8, and again in 1859-'60. During the latter session he was chosen U. S. Senator, and took his seat, 4 January, 1860. In that body he was among the ablest and most uncompromising defenders of the slave power. As he did not take his seat at the called session of the 32d Congress, he was expelled on 11 July, 1861. In the meantime he had been present at the bombardment of Fort Sumter, as a member of General Pierre G. T. Beauregard's staff. On the afternoon of the second day, 13 April, being on Morris Island, and noticing that the fire from the fort had ceased and that the flag had been shot away, Colonel Wigfall, with the approval of General James Simons, in command of the forces on the island, embarked in a skiff, and set out across the bay. On reaching Fort Sumter, he made his way through an open port-hole inside the fortification, where he met Major Robert Anderson, and demanded the unconditional surrender of the fort, on the ground that the work was no longer tenable and that further resistance would be madness. After some parley, Major Anderson consented to have a white flag hoisted, and the surrender was an accomplished fact. Wigfall subsequently became colonel of the 2d Infantry in the provisional Confederate Army, and was promoted brigadier-general, 21 October, 1861. He commanded a brigade composed of three Texas regiments and one of Georgia troops until 20 February, 1862, when he resigned. Besides his military service, he also represented Texas in the provisional Confederate Congress from February, 1861, till February, 1862. He was also senator in the Confederate Congress from February, 1862, until the end of the war. He then went to England, where he resided for several years. In 1873 he settled in Baltimore. He died while visiting Texas on a lecturing tour. General Wigfall was a forcible speaker, being remarkable for his impassioned style, and an ardent partisan, and took part in several duels. Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, p. 499.


WIGGENTON'S MILLS, VIRGINIA, February 6, 1863. Detachment of 17th Pennsylvania Cavalry. The picket post at Wiggenton's mills, consisting of 17 men of the 17th Pennsylvania, was attacked by 35 Confederates. Only 5 of the Federals escaped, 2 being killed, 1 wounded and 10 captured, together with 15 horses. The Union Army, 1908, Vol. 6, p. 926.


WIGHT, Peter Bonnett, architect, born in New York City, 1 August, 1838. He was graduated at the College of the City of New York in 1855, and, after studying architecture for eighteen months, went to Chicago in 1858 to practice that profession, but returned the following year to his native city. Between 1862 and 1868 he built the New York Academy of Design (see vignette), the Yale School of the Fine Arts, and the Brooklyn Mercantile Library, now known as the Brooklyn Library. In 1862 he planned the first army hospital that was built by the government during the Civil War. In 1864 he erected the building of the Union square branch in New York City of the Sanitary Fair, and managed it until its close. Immediately after the Chicago fire in 1871 he moved to that city, and between 1872 and 1870 was chiefly engaged in the erection of commercial buildings to the value of nearly $2,000,000. Among the latter was the American Express building, in executing which he was associated with Henry H. Richardson. In 1878 he retired partially from the more active pursuit of his profession, and practised mainly as a consulting architect, devoting his time to constructive, engineering, and sanitary matters connected with building. In 1880 he organized the Wight Fire-Proofing Company for the construction of fire-proof buildings, of which he is still the general manager and principal stockholder. In 1868 he invented the first improvement in the construction of fire-proof buildings. In 1874 he took out a patent for his method of rendering iron columns fire-proof, and he has since been granted three others for the same purpose. Other patents of his are for the construction of fire-proof ceilings in buildings in which wooden joists are used for floor construction; for making iron floor-beams fire proof when flat, hollow, tile floor arches are used; for devices for automatically closing gates to swing-bridges; and for making terra-cotta coping for brick walls. Mr. Wight, besides frequently contributing articles on subjects connected with his specialty to various periodicals, has published a monograph on the "National Academy of Design Building," with photographic illustrations (New York, 1865), and " One Phase in the Revival of the Fine Arts in America" (Chicago, 1886). Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. VI, pp. 501-502.