[2] By the mid-1940s he had arrived in Chicago and was playing on Maxwell Street and at house parties with Jimmy Rogers, Claude "Blue Smitty" Smith and John Henry Barbee.
[2] In 1958 Wrencher lost his left arm as a result of a car accident outside Memphis, Tennessee.
[2] By the early 1960s he had settled in Chicago, where he became a fixture on Maxwell Street Market, in particular playing from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Sundays.
During the 1960s he recorded for the Testament label backing Robert Nighthawk and as part of the Chicago String Band.
The resulting album, Maxwell Street Alley Blues, was described as "superlative in every regard" by Cub Koda, writing for AllMusic.