Early life and career
Waller T. Patton was born in Fredericksburg, Virginia, into a well-known family. He was named for the Governor of Virginia, Littleton Waller Tazewell. His father, John Mercer Patton, a member of the Council of State, served as Acting Governor in March 1841. An ancestor, Hugh Mercer, served as a general during the American Revolution. His brother was Confederate colonel George S. Patton Sr.
Patton graduated from the Virginia Military Institute in 1855, placing 2nd in a class of 16. While still a student, he became a member of the faculty, serving as acting assistant professor of Latin from 1852 until 1854. Patton also served as lieutenant in the cadet corps and for a time, as assistant professor of languages and assistant. Following his graduation, Patton was hired as an instructor of tactics, and as assistant professor of mathematics and assistant instructor of tactics. He studied law and passed the bar exam, then established a profitable law practice in Culpeper, Virginia. He commanded a local militia unit, the Culpeper Minutemen.
Civil War
With the outbreak of the Civil War and Virginia's subsequent secession, Patton enlisted in the Confederate Army in the spring of 1861 and was elected to serve as a major in the 7th Virginia Infantry. He was promoted to lieutenant colonel on April 27, 1862. Patton took command of the regiment in June 1862 following the promotion of the previous colonel, James L. Kemper, to the command of the brigade. He was badly wounded at Second Manassas on August 30, 1862, and spent the remainder of the year back home in Fredericksburg recuperating. Patton was elected to the Virginia Senate in 1863, but chose instead to return to his regiment.
His regiment served in North Carolina in the spring of 1863, then Patton led it northward during the Gettysburg Campaign into Pennsylvania. On July 3, the 7th Virginia was in Pickett's Division, and as part of Kemper's Brigade, formed the right of the Confederate line during Pickett's Charge. Colonel Patton was mortally wounded while leading his men towards the Union positions on Cemetery Ridge. Part of his jaw had been ripped away by an artillery shell fragment. He died in a makeshift hospital at Pennsylvania College several weeks later. His first cousin, Lewis B. Williams, Jr, commanded another Virginia regiment in Pickett's Division and was also mortally wounded.
An older brother, George Smith Patton, was killed at the Third Battle of Winchester during the Valley Campaigns of 1864. Both George and Waller Patton are buried in the Stonewall Cemetery, a part of Mt. Hebron Cemetery, Winchester, Virginia. Four other brothers were officers in the Confederate States Army: Col. John Mercer Patton, Col. Isaac Patton, Lt. James F. Patton, and Lt. Hugh Mercer Patton.
Waller Patton was a great-uncle of American World War II General, George S. Patton.
Pickett's Charge, also known as the Pickett–Pettigrew–Trimble Charge, was an infantry assault ordered by Confederate General Robert E. Lee against Major General George G. Meade's Union positions on the last day of the Battle of Gettysburg in Pennsylvania during the Civil War. Confederate troops made a frontal assault toward the center of Union lines, ultimately being repulsed with heavy casualties. Suffering from a lack of preparation and problems from the onset, the attack was a costly mistake that decisively ended Lee's invasion of the north and forced a retreat back to Virginia.
James Johnston Pettigrew was an American author, lawyer, and soldier. He served in the army of the Confederate States of America, fighting in the 1862 Peninsula Campaign and played a prominent role in the Battle of Gettysburg. Despite starting the Gettysburg Campaign commanding a brigade, Pettigrew took over command of his division after the division's original commander, Henry Heth, was wounded. In this role, Pettigrew was one of three division commanders in the disastrous assault known as Pickett's Charge on the final day of Gettysburg. He was wounded, in the right hand, during the Pickett-Pettigrew Charge on July 3, 1863 and was later mortally wounded during the Union Confederate rearguard action while the Confederates retreated to Virginia near Falling Waters, Virginia on July 14, dying several days thereafter on July 17, 1863.
The Stonewall Brigade of the Confederate Army during the American Civil War, was a famous combat unit in United States military history. It was trained and first led by General Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson, a professor from Virginia Military Institute (VMI). His severe training program and ascetic standards of military discipline turned enthusiastic but raw recruits into an effective military organization, which distinguished itself from the First Battle of Bull Run in 1861 to Spotsylvania Court House in 1864. Its legacy lives on in the 116th Infantry Brigade, which bears the unofficial nickname "Stonewall Brigade," and in several living history reenactment groups.
Richard Brooke Garnett was a career United States Army officer and a Confederate general in the American Civil War. He was court-martialed by Stonewall Jackson for his actions in command of the Stonewall Brigade at the First Battle of Kernstown, and killed during Pickett's Charge at the Battle of Gettysburg.
James Lawson Kemper was a lawyer, a Confederate general in the American Civil War, and the 37th Governor of Virginia. He was the youngest brigade commander and only non-professional general officer in the division that led Pickett's Charge, during which he was severely wounded.
Cadmus Marcellus Wilcox was a career United States Army officer who served in the Mexican–American War and also was a Confederate general during the American Civil War.
John Mercer Brockenbrough was a farmer and a Confederate colonel in the American Civil War.
The Philadelphia Brigade was a Union Army brigade that served in the American Civil War. It was raised primarily in the city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, with the exception of the 106th regiment which contained men from Lycoming and Bradford counties.
James Dearing was a Confederate States Army officer during the American Civil War who served in the artillery and cavalry. Dearing entered West Point in 1858 and resigned on April 22, 1861, when Virginia seceded from the Union. Dearing was mortally wounded at the Battle of High Bridge during the Appomattox Campaign of 1865, making him one of the last officers to die in the war. Despite serving as a commander of a cavalry brigade and using the grade of brigadier general after he was nominated to that grade by Confederate President Jefferson Davis, Dearing did not officially achieve the grade of brigadier general because the Confederate Senate did not approve his nomination. His actual permanent grade was colonel.
The 2nd Vermont Brigade was an infantry brigade in the Union Army of the Potomac during the American Civil War.
John Mercer Patton was a nineteenth-century politician and lawyer from Virginia. Patton served in the United States House of Representatives representing two different Virginia Districts and was the acting governor of Virginia for twelve days in 1841.
Micah Jenkins, was a Confederate general in the American Civil War, mortally wounded by friendly fire at the Battle of the Wilderness.
George H. Smith was a Confederate Civil War veteran and prominent Los Angeles lawyer, judge and politician.
Edward Tiffin Harrison Warren was a military colonel who commanded a Virginia infantry regiment in the Army of Northern Virginia during the American Civil War. He was killed in the Battle of the Wilderness on May 5, 1864.
The 7th Virginia Infantry Regiment was an infantry regiment raised in Virginia for service in the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War. It fought mostly with the Army of Northern Virginia.
The 4th North Carolina Infantry Regiment was a Confederate States Army regiment during the American Civil War, active from 1861 until the war's end in April 1865. Ordered to Virginia, the unit served in General Winfield S. Featherston’s, George B. Anderson’s, Stephen D. Ramseur’s, and William R. Cox’s Brigade. Its field officers were Colonels George B. Anderson, Bryan Grimes, Edwin A. Osborne, and James H. Wood; Lieutenant Colonels David M. Carter and John A. Young; and Majors Edward S. Marsh and Absalom K. Simonton. It was nicknamed "The Bloody Fourth" after the high rate of casualties at the Battle of Seven Pines.
Colonel George Patton Sr. was a Confederate colonel during the American Civil War. He was the grandfather of World War II general George S. Patton. George Patton was also the great-grandfather of Major General George Patton IV, who died in 2004.
Lewis B. Williams Jr. was a Confederate Colonel during the American Civil War. He was killed during Pickett's Charge during the third day of the Battle of Gettysburg.
Stonewall Confederate Cemetery is a subsection of Mount Hebron Cemetery in Winchester, Virginia, established in 1866 for 2,575 Confederate soldiers who died in battle or in the hospitals in and around the Winchester area. A monument over the mass grave of more than 800 unknown Confederate soldiers is at the center of the cemetery, and there is a section for each state member of the Confederacy. The plots are thus organized according to the home states of the fallen soldiers within. There are state monuments in most of the sections.
Edward Claxton Edmonds was an American military teacher and colonel in the Confederate Army during American Civil War. He commanded the 38th Virginia Infantry and was killed near Gettysburg when he led the regiment on the offensive during Pickett's Charge.
Confederate States of America 
Confederate States Army 
Lieutenant Colonel