Oliver Hardy wounded at the Battle of Antietam on September 17, 1862 and was a recruiting officer for Company K, 16th Georgia Regiment. The elder Oliver Hardy assisted his father in running the vestiges of the family cotton plantation following the Civil War. He then bought a share in a retail business and was elected full-time Tax Collector for Columbia County, Georgia. Hardy's mother Emily Norvell was the daughter of Thomas Benjamin Norvell and Mary Freeman, descended from Captain Hugh Norvell of Williamsburg, Virginia who arrived in Virginia before 1635. The elder Hardy and Norvell married March 12, 1890; it was her
Oliver Hardy often using new sketches and material that Laurel had written for them. In 1949, Hardy's friend John Wayne asked him to play a supporting role in "The Fighting Kentuckian". Hardy had previously worked with Wayne and John Ford in a charity production of the play "What Price Glory?" while Laurel began treatment for his diabetes a few years previously. He was initially hesitant, but he accepted the role at Laurel's insistence. Frank Capra invited him to play a cameo role in "Riding High" with Bing Crosby in 1950. During 1950–51, Laurel and Hardy made their final film "Atoll K" (also