Let him command my troops until I come." He was stationed at Winchester, and was temporarily in charge of the Valley district. Soon afterward he was promoted brigadier-general, and in August returned to his former station on the Virginia & Tennessee railroad. Later he was transferred to General Longstreet's command in east Tennessee, until April, 1864, when he was ordered to report to General Breckinridge. In command of his brigade of veterans he took a conspicuous part in the defeat of Sigel at New Market, and served with honor in the Confederate lines at Cold Harbor. Returning toward the southwest for the defense of Lynchburg, he took part in the pursuit of Hunter down the valley and the expedition through Maryland to Washington. During the Shenandoah campaign he commanded a division comprising the infantry brigades of the old army of Western Virginia. After suffering severely during the valley battles of 1864, the division was badly cut up in the fight at Waynesboro, March 2, 1865. After the close of the war General Wharton lived at Radford.
Brigadier-General Williams Carter Wickham was the son of William Fanning Wickham and Anne Carter, and the great-grandson of Gen. Thomas Nelson, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence and the commander-in-chief of the Virginia Line in the Revolutionary army. He was born at Richmond, Va., September 21, 1820, moved with his parents to Hanover county in 1827; was educated at the university of Virginia, and admitted to the bar in 1842. He practiced in a country circuit for a few years, and then gave up the law for the life of a Virginia planter. On January 11, 1848, he married Lucy Penn Taylor, great-granddaughter of John Penn, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence from North Carolina. He was elected to the Virginia house of delegates in 1849; was presiding justice of the county court of Hanover county for many years. In 1858 he was commissioned captain of Virginia volunteer cavalry, and in 1859 was elected to the State senate from the district composed of Hanover and Henrico, as a Whig. In 1861, elected by the people of Henrico to the State convention as a Union man, he was bitterly opposed to the war and voted against the ordinance of secession, but immediately upon the secession of Virginia,
