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| Thomas H. Williams, medical director of the first Confederate army in Virginia Dr. Williams was one of the regular army surgeons whose convictions led him to join the Southern cause. As medical director of the army in Utah under General Albert Sydney Johnston in 1859, he made an enviable record. In April, 1861, he resigned from the United States army, and on June 21st proceeded to Richmond. The following day he offered his services to President Davis, and was appointed surgeon in the Confederate States army. June 24th he was ordered to report to General Beauregard as medical director of the (Confederate) Army of the Potomac. He continued to hold this same position after General Joseph E. Johnston took command of the army. When General Johnston was wounded at the battle of Seven Pines, General Lee succeeded to the command. His medical director ranked Dr. Williams in the old army and therefore relieved him. Dr. Williams was afterward appointed medical director and inspector of hospitals in Virginia, and made his headquarters in Danville. He established nearly all the large hospitals in Virginia except at Richmond and Petersburg, and after a few months he was transferred to Richmond and put in charge of the ‘Medical Purveyors' Department,’ in which position he remained active till the end of the war. |
