site logo
[no picture yet]

[no picture yet]

Confederate (CSV)

Private

James Diggs Wilder

(1840 - 1910)

Home State: South Carolina

Education: Emory College

Branch of Service: Artillery

Unit: Palmetto (SC) Light Artillery

Before Sharpsburg

Age 21, he enrolled as First Lieutenant, Company D, 2nd South Carolina Infantry on 8 April 1861 at Sumter, SC. He mustered out on 13 May 1862, then enlisted as a Private in Captain Garden's Palmetto Light Artillery on 2 July in Columbia, SC.

On the Campaign

He was wounded in 2 places by pieces of shell at Sharpsburg on 17 September 1862.

The rest of the War

He was with the battery through most of the war. He was admitted to a hospital in Richmond in August 1864 for syphilis and returned to duty on 20 January 1865, but was given a 21 day furlough on 15 February 1865, with no later military record.

After the War

He was partner in the McCallum & Wilder gallery and photographic studio in Sumter from 1866-68, with a new partner as Wilder & Wheeler there from 1869-70, then on his own as a well respected photographer to 1878. He was listed as an "artist" in 1880 and lived in Concord, Sumter County, SC. He was a teacher and School Commissioner and was elected Sumter County Auditor in 1896. He retained that position to at least April 1910.

References & notes

His service from his Compiled Service Records, online from fold3, with details from his bio sketch in the History.1 Personal details from family genealogists, Harvey S. Teal's Partners with the Sun: South Carolina Photographers, 1840-1940 (2001), and the US Census of 1880-1910. His gravesite is on Findagrave.

He married Sarah Moore Roach (1840-1922) in 1869 and they had 5 sons, all of whom survived him.

More on the Web

The South Caroliniana Library at the University of South Carolina (USC) has one of his photographs: Carte-de-visite of little girl in striped socks sitting on chair (1870s) [finding aid]. At least 4 other photographs of his are in various collections at USC, via WorldCat.

Birth

03/15/1840; Sumter District, SC

Death

10/18/1910; Sumter County, SC; burial in Sumter Cemetery, Sumter, SC

Notes

1   Evans, Clement Anselm, editor, Confederate Military History, 12 Volumes, Atlanta: The Confederate Publishing Company, 1899, Vol. 5, pp. 916-917  [AotW citation 26250]