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J. Walker
(1835 - 1902)
Home State: South Carolina
Command Billet: Brigade Commander
Branch of Service: Infantry
Unit: Jenkins' Brigade
see his Battle Report
Before Sharpsburg
A few months before the outbreak of the civil war the Spartan Rifles was organized at Spartanburg, composed as it was of the very best material which could be brought together in that town and surrounding country. To the command of this gallant company, numbering at first nearly one hundred men, Joseph Walker was elected Captain.The Spartan Rifles became Company K of the 5th South Carolina Infantry and Walker commanded this company for a year, which was the term for which the company had enlisted. On 15 April 1862, on the reorganization of all South Carolina troops, in Virginia, he was elected Lieutenant Colonel of the new Palmetto Regiment of Sharpshooters. He was promoted to Colonel on 23 July.
On the Campaign
He commanded Jenkins' Brigade in Maryland as senior Colonel present, Brigadier General Micah Jenkins having been wounded at 2nd Manassas in August.
The rest of the War
Except for brief furloughs late in 1863 and 1864 to attend the State Legislature, he was with his regiment to the surrender with General Lee at Appomattox, VA on 9 April 1862.
After the War
He returned to Spartanburg and was a merchant until 1875, in the cotton and fertilizer trade until 1889, then helped reorganize the Merchants and Farmers Bank, and served as president. For ten years or more after the war he was the mayor of the city of Spartanburg. In 1900 he was listed as a "capitalist" and was living with his daughter Alice and her husband in Spartanburg.
More on the Web
His service from his Compiled Service Records,1 online from fold3. Personal details from family genealogists, the US Census of 1880-1900, and a bio sketch in J.B.O. Landrum's History of Spartanburg County (1900), source also of the quote above. His gravesite is on Findagrave. His photograph from an excellent ambrotype in the Liljenquist Family Collection in the Library of Congress; thanks to Alphonso Laporte for the pointer to it.
Birth
05/18/1835; Fairforest, SC
Death
01/27/1902; Spartanburg, SC; burial in Oakwood Cemetery, Spartanburg, SC
1 US War Department, Compiled Service Records of Confederate Soldiers, Record Group No. 109 (War Department Collection of Confederate Records), Washington DC: US National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), 1903-1927 [AotW citation 30402]