W . H . L . Wallace William Hervey Lamme Wallace ( July 8 , 1821 – April 10 , 1862 ) , more commonly known as W . H . L . Wallace , was a lawyer and a Union general in the American Civil War , considered by Ulysses S . Grant to be one of the Union ' s greatest generals . Early life and career . Wallace was born in Urbana , Ohio , the son of John Wallace and Mary Lamme Wallace . In 1836 , he was educated at Rock River Seminary in Mount Morris , Illinois . Although he planned to study law with Abraham Lincoln in Springfield , he joined Theophilus Lyle Dickey ' s practice in Ottawa , Illinois , instead . ( Dickey was a friend of Lincoln ' s and would eventually be a justice on the Illinois Supreme Court . ) In 1851 he married Dickey ' s daughter , Martha Ann . Wallace became licensed in law in 1846 and that same year he joined the 1st Illinois Infantry as a private . He rose to the rank second lieutenant and adjutant and participated in the Battle of Buena Vista along with a few other minor engagements . After this brief experience in the Mexican - American War he became district attorney in 1853 . Civil War service . At the start of the Civil War , Wallace volunteered as a private with the 11th Illinois , which was assembled in Springfield . He was then elected the unit ' s colonel . He rose up the ranks and commanded a brigade of Brig . Gen . John A . McClernand ' s division of Grant ' s Army of the Tennessee at the Battle of Fort Donelson in 1862 . During the battle much of McClernand ' s division had been driven back with heavy losses and Wallace ' s coolness under fire was especially noted . Brig . Gen . Lew Wallace described the colonel as looking like a " farmer coming from a hard day ' s plowing " . After this first time meeting upon the Fort Donelson battlefield , the two quickly learned each possessed the same surname and had commanded their respective states ' 11th regiments , prompting Lew Wallace to muse the coincidence must have caused " great profanity in the army post office " . For his service at Fort Donelson Colonel Wallace was appointed a brigadier general of volunteers . During the expedition to Savannah , Tennessee Maj . Gen . Charles Ferguson Smith injured his leg and was forced to turn over command of his division to General Wallace . At the Battle of Shiloh , Wallace was a new division commander , yet he managed to withstand six hours of assaults by the Confederates , directly next to the famous Hornet ' s Nest , or Sunken Road . When his division was finally surrounded , he ordered a withdrawal and many escaped , but he was mortally wounded and only later found barely alive on the battlefield by his troops . They carried him to his wife , who helped tend to him on the way back to General Grant ' s headquarters in the Cherry Mansion in Savannah , Tennessee . He died three days later in his wife ' s arms ; his last words were " We meet in heaven . " He is buried in LaSalle County , Illinois , in Ottawa . His war horse , Prince , is buried next to the General he carried into battle at Shiloh . He was the brother of future Brevet Brigadier General Martin R . M . Wallace . Wallace County , Kansas , was named in his honor in 1868 .