# Henry B. Walthall

Henry Brazeale Walthall (March 16, 1878 – June 17, 1936) was an American stage and film actor. He appeared as the Little Colonel in D. W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation (1915).

## Early life

Henry B. Walthall was born March 16, 1878$^{:1437}$ on a cotton plantation owned by his father in Shelby County, Alabama. His father Junius Leigh Walthall had been a captain in the Confederate States Army. His sister, Anna Mae Walthall (1894–1950) had a film career in the 1920s.
In 1898, during the Spanish–American War, he enlisted in the First Alabama Regiment. He contracted malaria while in camp in Jacksonville, Florida, and the war ended before he had recovered. He served 11 months, and when his regiment was discharged he returned home. Then, with $100, he left for New York to make his career on the stage. He played small parts with the Murray Hill Theater stock company. Later he became affiliated with the American Theater stock company and soon afterward joined the Providence, Rhode Island, stock company.

## Career

In New York in 1901, Walthall won a role in Under Southern Skies by Charlotte Blair Parker. He performed in the play for three years, in New York and on tour. With the company of Henry Miller he gained recognition on Broadway in plays, including Pippa Passes, The Only Way and William Vaughn Moody's The Great Divide (1906–08). His fellow cast member James Kirkwood introduced Walthall to D. W. Griffith, and at the conclusion of that engagement, Walthall joined the Biograph Company.
His career in films began in 1909 at Biograph Studios in New York with a leading role in the film A Convict's Sacrifice. This film also featured James Kirkwood, and was directed by D.W. Griffith, a director that played a huge part in Walthall's rise to stardom. As the industry grew in size and popularity, Griffith emerged as a director, and Walthall found himself a mainstay of the Griffith company, frequently working with Griffith regulars such as Owen Moore, Lionel Barrymore, Harry Carey, Lillian and Dorothy Gish, Blanche Sweet, Mae Marsh, Bobby Harron and Jack and Mary Pickford. He followed Griffith's departure from New York's Biograph to California's Reliance-Majestic Studios in 1913. After a few months with Reliance, he joined Pathé for a short period.
He decided to go into the producing business and formed The Union Feature Film Company, the first to be devoted entirely to full-length films. The venture was not successful, however, and he again became associated with Griffith's company.
Given the relatively short length of films in the early years, Walthall frequently found himself cast in dozens of films each year. He gained national attention in 1915 for his role as Colonel Ben Cameron in Griffith's highly influential and controversial epic The Birth of a Nation. Walthall's portrayal of a Confederate veteran rounding up the Ku Klux Klan won him large-scale fame, and Walthall emerged as a leading actor in the years leading up to the 1920s.
Walthall continued working in films through the 1920s, appearing in The Plastic Age with Gilbert Roland and Clara Bow. He portrayed Roger Chillingworth in Victor Sjöström's 1926 adaptation of The Scarlet Letter with Lillian Gish, a role he reprised in the 1934 film adaptation of the novel.
Walthall continued his career into the 1930s. After his performance in director John Ford's 1934 film Judge Priest starring Will Rogers, he enjoyed a golden period of his career. He portrayed Dr. Manette in A Tale of Two Cities (1935), starring Ronald Colman. In 1936, he appeared as Marcel in The Devil-Doll and as Captain Buchanan in the American Civil War drama Hearts in Bondage. He was gravely ill during his final film, China Clipper.
Frank Capra wanted Walthall to portray the High Lama in his 1937 film Lost Horizon. "Frail and failing, he died before we could test him," Capra wrote.$^{:196}$
Walthall has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame located at 6201 Hollywood Boulevard.

## Personal life

Lillian Gish described Walthall as "a slight man, about five feet six, fine-boned, with the face of a poet and a dreamer."$^{:135}$ She recalled his patience while Griffith grappled with technical problems filming the epilogue of Home, Sweet Home (1914), a scene in which Gish, as an angel, lifts Walthall's character out of hell. "There was a long discussion while Walthall and I, encased in leather harness, hung on the guide wires. Wally, a true southern gentleman, didn't raise his voice, didn't complain; he simply fainted and hung there limply."$^{:113}$
Walthall was married twice. His marriage to actress Isabel Fenton (1904–1918) ended in divorce. His second marriage to Irish actress Mary Charleson lasted from 1918 until his death in 1936.
Exhausted from months of uninterrupted film work, Walthall collapsed on the Warner Bros. set after completing his scenes in the film China Clipper, in which he portrayed an airplane inventor. He entered the Pasteur Sanitarium at Monrovia, California, and died of an intestinal illness three weeks later on June 17, 1936.

## Filmography

| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
| 1908 | Rescued from an Eagle's Nest | Woodsman | Short$^{:1437}$ |
| 1909 | A Convict's Sacrifice | The Convict's Friend | Short$^{:1437}$ |
| 1909 | The Mended Lute | Indian | Short |
| 1909 | Pranks | Sunbather | Short$^{:1437}$ |
| 1909 | The Sealed Room | The Minstrel | Short$^{:1437}$ |
| 1909 | In Old Kentucky | Robert, the Confederate Son | Short$^{:1437}$ |
| 1909 | The Hessian Renegades | | Short |
| 1909 | A Corner in Wheat | The wheat king's assistant | Short$^{:1437}$ |
| 1909 | Fools of Fate | | Short |
| 1909 | A Trap for Santa Claus | Arthur | Short |
| 1909 | In Little Italy | Victor | Short |
| 1909 | The Day After | Party Guest | Short |
| 1909 | Choosing a Husband | Harry | Short$^{:1437}$ Lost film |
| 1909 | Getting Even | Miner | Short |
| 1910 | The Honor of His Family | George Pickett Jr. | Short$^{:1437}$ Lost film |
| 1910 | In Old California | Perdita's Son | Short$^{:1437}$ Lost film |
| 1910 | The Two Brothers | Pedro | Short Lost film |
| 1910 | The Kid | Walter Holden | Short Lost film |
| 1910 | The Gold Seekers | The Prospector | Short$^{:1437}$ Lost film |
| 1910 | Ramona | Alessandro | Short |
| 1910 | In the Border States | Confederate Corporal | Short, Uncredited |
| 1910 | The House with Closed Shutters | The Confederate Soldier | Short |
| 1910 | The Sorrows of the Unfaithful | Bill | Short$^{:1437}$ |
| 1910 | A Summer Idyl | Albert | Short$^{:1437}$ Lost film |
| 1910 | The Oath and the Man | Henri Prevost | Short$^{:1437}$ |
| 1910 | Rose O'Salem-Town | The Trapper | Short |
| 1910 | The Armorer's Daughter | | Short$^{:1437}$ Lost film |
| 1911 | A Little Child | The Burglar | Short$^{:1437}$ Lost film |
| 1912 | The Miser's Daughter | The Miser's Daughter's Sweetheart | Short$^{:1437}$ Lost film |
| 1912 | Home Folks | | Short$^{:1437}$ |
| 1912 | The Inner Circle | | Short |
| 1912 | A Change of Spirit | First Gentleman Thief | Short Lost film |
| 1912 | Two Daughters of Eve | The Father | Short |
| 1912 | Friends | Dandy Jack | Short$^{:1437}$ |
| 1912 | So Near, Yet So Far | | Short |
| 1912 | A Feud in the Kentucky Hills | Psalm Singer | Short |
| 1912 | In the Aisles of the Wild | Jim Watson | Short Lost film |
| 1912 | The One She Loved | The Husband | Short |
| 1912 | The Painted Lady | At Ice Cream Festival | Short, Uncredited |
| 1912 | My Baby | The Husband | Short |
| 1912 | The Informer | The false Brother | Short |
| 1912 | Brutality | In Play | Short |
| 1912 | My Hero | Indian Charlie | Short Lost film |
| 1912 | The Burglar's Dilemma | Householder's Weakling Brother | Short |
| 1912 | The God Within | The Woodsman | Short |
| 1913 | Three Friends | Ned Billings - the Husband | Short Lost film |
| 1913 | Oil and Water | The Idealist | Short$^{:1437}$ |
| 1913 | Love in an Apartment Hotel | The Young Woman's Fiancé | Short Lost film |
| 1913 | Broken Ways | The Road Agent | Short$^{:1437}$ |
| 1913 | The Sheriff's Baby | First Bandit | Short Lost film |
| 1913 | The Perfidy of Mary | Poet | Short |
| 1913 | The Lady and the Mouse | The 1st Rival | Short |
| 1913 | If We Only Knew | The Father | Short Lost film |
| 1913 | The Wanderer | The Wanderer | Short |
| 1913 | The Tenderfoot's Money | The Prospector | Short Lost film |
| 1913 | The Stolen Loaf | The Poor Man | Short Lost film |
| 1913 | The House of Darkness | Minor Role | Short |
| 1913 | Red Hicks Defies the World | In Crowd | Short Lost film |
| 1913 | Death's Marathon | The Husband | Short$^{:1437}$ |
| 1913 | The Switch Tower | The Switchman | Short |
| 1913 | The Mothering Heart | Club Patron | Short, Uncredited |
| 1913 | The Mistake | Jack, the Friend, a Prospector | Short Lost film |
| 1913 | A Gambler's Honor | Beth's Brother | Short Lost film |
| 1913 | During the Round-Up | The Stranger | Short Lost film |
| 1913 | The Mirror | The Station Agent | Short Lost film |
| 1913 | The Vengeance of Galora | | Short$^{:1437}$ Lost film |
| 1913 | Two Men of the Desert | First Partner | Short$^{:1437}$ Lost film |
| 1913 | A Woman in the Ultimate | Member of the Badger Gang | Short Lost film |
| 1913 | The Wedding Gown | | $^{:1437}$ |
| 1913 | The Battle at Elderbush Gulch | Indian Chief's Son | Short$^{:1437}$ |
| 1913 | The Little Tease | The Valley Man | |
| 1914 | Classmates | Duncan Irving | Short |
| 1914 | The Green-Eyed Devil | | Short Lost film |
| 1914 | The Gangsters of New York$^{:1437}$ | Porky Dugan | Short Lost film |
| 1914 | Judith of Bethulia | Holofernes | |
| 1914 | Strongheart | Soangataha / Strongheart | Short,$^{:1437}$ Lost film |
| 1914 | The Floor Above | Stephen Pryde | Short Lost film |
| 1914 | Ashes of the Past | | Lost film$^{:1437}$ |
| 1914 | Home, Sweet Home | John Howard Payne | $^{:1437}$ |
| 1914 | The Mountain Rat | Douglas Williams | Short Lost film$^{:1437}$ |
| 1914 | Lord Chumley | Lord Chumley | Short |
| 1914 | Man's Enemy | | Short |
| 1914 | The Avenging Conscience | The Nephew | |
| 1914 | The Odalisque | Joe, in love with May | Short Lost film$^{:1437}$ |
| 1915 | The Birth of a Nation | Col. Benjamin Cameron | |
| 1915 | Beulah | Dr. Guy Hartwell | Lost film |
| 1915 | Ghosts | Captain Arling / Oswald | $^{:1437}$ |
| 1915 | The Raven | Edgar Allan Poe | |
| 1915 | The Woman Hater | | Lost film$^{:1437}$ |
| 1916 | The Misleading Lady | Jack Craigen | Lost film |
| 1916 | The Strange Case of Mary Page | Phil Langdon, Attorney | Serial Lost film |
| 1916 | The Birth of a Man | | Lost film |
| 1916 | The Sting of Victory | David Whiting/Walker Whiting | Lost film |
| 1916 | The Pillars of Society | Karsten Bernick | Lost film$^{:1437}$ |
| 1916 | The Truant Soul | Dr. John Lancaster / Dr. Lawson | Lost film |
| 1917 | Little Shoes | David Noel | Lost film |
| 1917 | Burning the Candle | James Maxwell | Lost film |
| 1917 | The Saint's Adventure | Rev. Paul Manson | Lost film |
| 1917 | National Association's All-Star Picture | | Lost film |
| 1918 | His Robe of Honor | Julian Randolph | Lost film |
| 1918 | Humdrum Brown | Hector "Humdrum" Brown | |
| 1918 | With Hoops of Steel | Emerson Mead | Lost film |
| 1918 | The Great Love | Sir Roger Brighton | Lost film |
| 1918 | And a Still Small Voice | Clay Randolph | Lost film |
| 1919 | The Long Lane's Turning | Harry Sevier | |
| 1919 | The False Faces | Michael Lanyard, "The Lone Wolf" | |
| 1919 | Modern Husbands | Stephen Duane | Lost film |
| 1919 | The Boomerang | George Gray | |
| 1919 | The Long Arm of Mannister | George Mannister | Lost film |
| 1920 | The Confession | Father Bartlett | |
| 1920 | Parted Curtains | Joe Jenkins | Lost film |
| 1920 | A Splendid Hazard | Karl Breitman | Lost film |
| 1921 | Flower of the North | Philip Whittemore | |
| 1922 | The Ableminded Lady | Breezy Bright | Lost film |
| 1922 | One Clear Call | Henry Garnett | |
| 1922 | The Kickback | Aaron Price | Lost film |
| 1922 | The Long Chance | Harley P. Hennage | Lost film |
| 1922 | The Marriage Chance | Dr. Paul Graydon | Lost film |
| 1923 | The Face on the Bar-Room Floor | Robert Stevens | Lost film |
| 1923 | Gimme | John McGimsey | Lost film |
| 1923 | The Unknown Purple | Peter Marchmont / Victor Cromport | Lost film |
| 1923 | Boy of Mine | William Latimer | Lost film |
| 1924 | The Woman on the Jury | Prosecuting Attorney | Lost film |
| 1924 | Single Wives | Franklin Dexter | |
| 1924 | The Bowery Bishop | Norman Strong | Lost film |
| 1925 | The Golden Bed | Colonel Peake | |
| 1925 | On the Threshold | Andrew Masters | |
| 1925 | The Girl Who Wouldn't Work | William Hale | |
| 1925 | Kit Carson Over the Great Divide | Dr. Samuel Webb | |
| 1925 | Kentucky Pride | Mr. Beaumont | |
| 1925 | Dollar Down | Alec Craig | |
| 1925 | Simon the Jester | Brandt | Lost film |
| 1925 | The Plastic Age | Henry Carver | |
| 1926 | Three Faces East | George Bennett | |
| 1926 | The Barrier | Gale Gaylord | Lost film |
| 1926 | The Unknown Soldier | Mr. Phillips | |
| 1926 | The Road to Mandalay | Father James | |
| 1926 | The Scarlet Letter | Roger Chillingworth | |
| 1926 | Everybody's Acting | Thorpe | Lost film |
| 1927 | Fighting Love | Filipo Navarro | |
| 1927 | The Enchanted Island | Tim Sanborn | Lost film |
| 1927 | Wings | Mr. Armstrong | |
| 1927 | The Rose of Kildare | Bob Avery | Lost film |
| 1927 | Love Me and the World Is Mine | Van Denbosch | |
| 1927 | A Light in the Window | Johann Graff | Lost film |
| 1927 | London After Midnight | Sir James Hamlin | Lost film |
| 1928 | Retribution | Henry / Tommy Mooney | Short, Vitaphone Varieties 2418 |
| 1928 | Freedom of the Press | John Ballard | Lost film |
| 1929 | The Jazz Age | Mr. Maxwell | |
| 1929 | Stark Mad | Captain Rhodes | Lost film |
| 1929 | Speakeasy | Fuzzy | Lost film |
| 1929 | The Bridge of San Luis Rey | Father Juniper | |
| 1929 | From Headquarters | Buffalo Bill Ryan | Lost film |
| 1929 | River of Romance | Gen. Jeff Rumford | |
| 1929 | Black Magic | Dr. Bradbroke | Lost film |
| 1929 | Street Corner | | Short |
| 1929 | In Old California | Don Pedro DeLeón | $^{:1437}$ |
| 1929 | The Phantom in the House | Boyd Milburn | |
| 1929 | The Trespasser | Fuller | |
| 1930 | Blaze o' Glory | Burke | Lost film |
| 1930 | Temple Tower | Blackton | |
| 1930 | Abraham Lincoln | Colonel Marshall | |
| 1930 | The Love Trader | Captain Adams | |
| 1930 | Tol'able David | Amos Hatburn | |
| 1931 | Is There Justice? | District Attorney John Raymond | Lost film |
| 1931 | Anybody's Blonde | Mr. Evans | |
| 1932 | Police Court | Nat Barry | |
| 1932 | Hotel Continental | Winthrop | |
| 1932 | Strange Interlude | Professor Leeds | |
| 1932 | Alias Mary Smith | Atwell | |
| 1932 | Chandu the Magician | Robert Regent | |
| 1932 | Ride Him, Cowboy | John Gaunt | |
| 1932 | Klondike | Mark Armstrong | |
| 1932 | The Cabin in the Cotton | Eph Clinton | |
| 1932 | Me and My Gal | Sarge | |
| 1932 | Central Park | Eby | |
| 1932 | Self Defense | Dr. Borden | |
| 1933 | 42nd Street | The Actor | Uncredited |
| 1933 | The Whispering Shadow | J.D. Bradley - Company President | Serial$^{:1437}$ |
| 1933 | The Flaming Signal | Rev. James | |
| 1933 | Somewhere in Sonora | Bob Leadly | |
| 1933 | Hold Your Man | Clergyman in Alternate Version | Uncredited |
| 1933 | Laughing at Life | Presidente Valenzuela | |
| 1933 | Headline Shooter | Judge Beacon | Uncredited |
| 1933 | Her Forgotten Past | Mr. Maynard | |
| 1933 | The Wolf Dog | Jim Courtney | Serial |
| 1933 | The Sin of Nora Moran | Father Ryan | |
| 1934 | Dark Hazard | Schultz | Uncredited |
| 1934 | Beggars in Ermine | Marchant the Blind Man | |
| 1934 | Men in White | Dr. McCabe | |
| 1934 | Viva Villa! | Francisco I. Madero | |
| 1934 | City Park | Colonel Henry Randolph Ransome | |
| 1934 | The Murder in the Museum | Bernard Latham Wayne, alias Professor Mysto | |
| 1934 | Judge Priest | Rev. Ashby Brand | |
| 1934 | The Scarlet Letter | Roger Chillingworth | |
| 1934 | The Lemon Drop Kid | Jonas Deering | $^{:1437}$ |
| 1934 | A Girl of the Limberlost | Dr. Ammon | |
| 1934 | Love Time | Duke Johann von Hatzfeld | |
| 1934 | Bachelor of Arts | Professor Barth | |
| 1935 | Helldorado | Abner Meadows | $^{:1437}$ |
| 1935 | Dante's Inferno | Pop McWade | |
| 1935 | A Tale of Two Cities | Dr. Manette | |
| 1936 | The Garden Murder Case | Dr. Garden | $^{:1437}$ |
| 1936 | The Mine with the Iron Door | David Burton | |
| 1936 | Hearts in Bondage | Captain Buchanan | |
| 1936 | The Last Outlaw | Under Sheriff Calvin Yates | Screening on Broadway when Walthall died |
| 1936 | The Devil-Doll | Marcel | |
| 1936 | China Clipper | Dad Brunn | Walthall collapsed on the set after completing his scenes and died three weeks later (final film role) |