Background
WHITING, William Henry Chase was born on March 22, 1824 in Biloxi, Mississippi, United States, United States. Son of Levi and Mary A. Whiting.
WHITING, William Henry Chase was born on March 22, 1824 in Biloxi, Mississippi, United States, United States. Son of Levi and Mary A. Whiting.
Graduate Georgetown College, Washington, District of Columbia 1840. Graduated from the United States Military Academy, 1845.
He graduated from Boston High School in Massachusetts, was first in his class at Georgetown College, D.C., in 1840, and graduated first in a class of forty-one at the U. S. Military Academy in 1845, with the highest grade average of any cadet up to that time. He was a Catholic. He had one son by his marriage to Kate D. Walker. From 1845 to 1856, he supervised river and harbor fortifications with the Army Corps of Engineers in California, Florida, Georgia, and North Carolina.
He was promoted to first lieutenant in 1853 and to captain in 1858. From 1856 to 1861, he worked on improvements of the Savannah River. Whiting resigned his commission on February 20, 1860, to enter the service of the Confederate Army.
He entered as a major of engineers in the defense of Charleston and was General Joseph E. Johnston’s chief of engineers at the battles of First Manassas and Seven Pines. He was promoted to brigadier general on August 28, 1861. He assisted Thomas J. Jackson in the Valley campaign of 1862, where he commanded Hamilton P. Bee’s Brigade and provided successful strategy for the campaign against McClellan.
After the Seven Days, Whiting was transferred to North Carolina, where he made Fort Fisher at the mouth of the Cape Fear River the strongest in the Confederacy. He was promoted to major general on February 28, 1863, but his military career came to a standstill when, following an exceptionally bad showing at Port Walthall Junction during the fighting around Petersburg in the summer of 1864, he was accused of being drunken. He was transferred to a command in North Carolina.
During his defense of Fort Fisher in January 1865, he was mortally wounded and captured during hand-to-hand combat.
"Peculiar institution" of slavery was not only expedient but also ordained by God and upheld in Holy Scripture.
Stands for preserving slavery, states' rights, and political liberty for whites. Every individual state is sovereign, even to the point of secession.
Married Kate Doctorate. Walker.