William Booth Taliaferro (/ˈtɒlɪvər/ TOL-iv-ər; December 28, 1822 – February 27, 1898) was a United States Army officer, a lawyer, legislator, Confederate general in the American Civil War, and Grand Master of Masons in Virginia.

He was the son of Frances Amanda Todd (Booth) and Warner Throckmorton Taliaferro,[1] and the nephew of James A. Seddon, who would become Secretary of War for the Confederate States of America under Jefferson Davis.

[2][3] He also entered public life, winning election as a member of the Virginia House of Delegates.

He fought several engagements in 1861 and by the end of the year had ascended to brigade command, where he led Confederate forces at the Battle of Greenbrier River, in what is now West Virginia.

Taliaferro spent the next few months recuperating and resumed division command just before the Battle of Fredericksburg in December, where he did not see any significant action.

He served again in the state legislature and as a judge and sat on the board of the College of William and Mary and the Virginia Military Institute.

He died at his home, "Dunham Massie", aged 75, and is buried in Ware Church Cemetery, Gloucester County, Virginia.

’56, a World War II veteran and the first African American student enrolled at the institution.