Search Results

Ashe, Thomas Samuel (19 July 1812–04 February 1887), jurist and congressman, was born at “the Hawfields,” Orange County, North Carolina, the home of his maternal grandfather, where his parents regularly spent the summer. He was the son of Pasquale Paoli Ashe, the owner of a plantation in coastal New Hanover County, North Carolina, and a coal mine in Alabama, and Elizabeth Jane Strudwick. His father lost his entire fortune about 1829 as surety for the debts of a friend....

Benjamin, Judah Philip (06 August 1811–06 May 1884), Confederate cabinet member, U.S. senator, and lawyer, was born at Christiansted, St. Croix, West Indies, the son of Philip Benjamin, a shopkeeper, and Rebecca de Mendes. St. Croix was under British rule at the time of Benjamin’s birth. He grew up in Charleston, South Carolina. Though his father’s circumstances were always modest, wealthy relatives and other benefactors helped him attend Yale (1825–1827), but he left as a junior under circumstances that remain unclear....

Campbell, Josiah Adams Patterson (02 March 1830–10 January 1917), jurist and a founding father of the Confederacy, was born in South Carolina (sources vary as to location), the son of Robert B. Campbell, a Princeton-educated Presbyterian minister, and Mary Patterson. A precocious child, he spent some time as a student at Davidson College in North Carolina before joining his parents at their new home in Madison County, Mississippi, in 1845. After reading law in the office of a local attorney for two years, he was admitted to the bar at the age of seventeen and began practicing in Kosciusko in Attala County. In 1850 he married Eugenia E. Nash; they had seven children....

Cobb, Thomas Reade Rootes (10 April 1823–13 December 1862), lawyer and Confederate congressman and military officer, was born in Jefferson County, Georgia, the son of John Addison Cobb, a planter, and Sarah Robinson Rootes. His older brother, Howell Cobb—congressman, governor, and secretary of the treasury under ...

Davis, George (01 March 1820–23 February 1896), lawyer, Confederate senator, and Confederate attorney general, was born in New Hanover (now Pender) County, North Carolina, the son of Thomas Frederick Davis, a prominent planter, and Sarah Isabella Eagles. He attended W. H. Harden’s school in Pittsboro, was tutored at home, and at fourteen entered the University of North Carolina, graduating in 1838 at the head of his class. After reading law with his brother in Wilmington, he was admitted to the bar at age twenty and licensed statewide a year later....

Gholson, Thomas Saunders (09 December 1808–12 December 1868), jurist and Confederate congressman, was born in Gholsonville, Brunswick County, Virginia, the son of Major William Gholson, a planter, and Mary Saunders. Gholson received his secondary education in Oxford, North Carolina, and then returned to his home state, where he graduated from the University of Virginia in 1827. He practiced law in Brunswick County until 1840, when he moved to Petersburg and formed a partnership with his older brother, James Hubbard Gholson. After his brother’s death in 1848, Gholson practiced with Judge James Alfred Jones of Mecklenburg County. By all accounts, Gholson was a skillful advocate and eloquent orator, and he made a name for himself by taking part in many notable cases, including the famous murder trial of William Dandridge Epes, in which Gholson was the prosecutor....

Holcombe, James Philemon (20 September 1820–22 August 1873), educator and Confederate official, was born in Powhatan County, Virginia, the son of William James Holcombe, a doctor, and Ann Eliza Clopton. After studying with a private tutor, James enrolled at Yale and later attended the University of Virginia but did not graduate from either school. After studies at the Staunton Law School, he began practicing law in Fincastle, Virginia. In 1844 he left Virginia to join a law firm in Cincinnati, Ohio. While in Cincinnati, he produced an extensive list of publications on legal matters, including ...

Maxwell, Augustus Emmet (21 September 1820–05 May 1903), jurist and legislator, was born in Elberton, Georgia, the son of Simeon Maxwell, a planter, and Elizabeth Fortson. When he was two years old, the family moved to Green County, Alabama. After attending country schools, in 1836 Maxwell began study at the University of Virginia; he left school briefly because of vision problems but he graduated from the university in 1841....

Orr, Jehu Amaziah (10 April 1828–09 March 1921), jurist and legislator, was born in Craytonville, South Carolina, the son of Christopher Orr, a merchant, and Martha McCann. In 1843 he moved with his parents to Chickasaw County, Mississippi, where his father, a slaveholder, had purchased land. Orr developed an interest in politics and the legal profession at an early age. Residing in Houston, the county seat, he read law under the guidance of Winfield Scott Featherston, a young lawyer and an aspiring Democratic politician. At the age of seventeen Orr went to the Democratic convention in Jackson to promote Featherston’s candidacy for a state office. Leaving home in 1846 to broaden his educational horizon, he studied in the liberal arts at Erskine College in South Carolina and in 1847 transferred to the College of New Jersey in Princeton. He received a bachelor of arts in 1849; he later returned to Princeton and received a master of arts in 1857. In June 1849 he was licensed to practice law and formed a partnership in Houston with Featherston, who then represented the district in Congress. Also the new owner and editor of a local newspaper, Orr actively supported his law partner’s successful bid for reelection in 1849. With the protection of slavery in the territories an issue in the campaign, Orr asserted that the federal judiciary, rather than the Whig “doctrine of congressional interference,” provided “the safest and surest protection” for the slaveholder ( ...

Pettus, John Jones (09 October 1813–26 January 1867), lawyer and Confederate governor, was born in Wilson County, Tennessee, the son of John Jones Pettus and Alice Taylor Winston, farmers. Pettus was raised in Limestone County, Alabama, after his father moved the family from Tennessee. Only nine when his father died, Pettus helped out with farm chores and was educated at home by his mother. He settled in Mississippi in 1835. After a brief stay in Sumter County, Alabama, where he studied law, he opened a law practice in Scooba, Kemper County, Mississippi, where in the early 1840s he married a cousin, Permelia Virginia Winston. They had at least three children. He became a successful planter and by 1850 owned 1,600 acres and 24 slaves....

Slidell, John (1793–29 July 1871), U.S. senator and Confederate diplomat, was born in New York City, the son of John Slidell, a merchant and banker, and Margery Mackenzie. Slidell grew up amid the affluence of New York’s thriving mercantile community. After graduating from Columbia College in 1810, he spent several years in Europe working for a New York mercantile firm. He returned to New York, passed the bar examination, and pursued a bachelor’s carefree existence that involved him in a duel with an outraged husband. Sobered by this scandal, he sought his future in New Orleans....

Staples, Waller Redd (24 February 1826–20 August 1897), Confederate congressman and post-Civil War jurist, Confederate congressman and post–Civil War jurist, was born at Stuart, Virginia, the son of Abram Staples, a member of the state legislature and clerk of court in Patrick County, and Mary Penn. He attended the University of North Carolina from 1842 to 1844 and the College of William and Mary for the next two years, graduating with honors in 1846. After law studies with Judge Norbonne Taliaferro in Franklin County, Virginia, he was admitted to the bar and began practice in 1848 as a junior associate of ...

Watson, John William Clark (27 February 1808–24 September 1890), lawyer and Confederate senator, was born in Albemarle County, Virginia, the son of John Watson and Elizabeth Finch, farmers. Little is known of Watson’s early life, but his local schooling prepared him for legal studies at the University of Virginia. A year after graduating with a law degree in 1830, he married Catherine Davis, the sister of one of his law professors. The couple soon moved to Abingdon in southwestern Virginia, where Watson practiced law from 1833 to 1845. He was an ardent Whig in his politics. In 1846 Watson moved to Holly Springs, Mississippi, to join in a law partnership with Jeremiah W. Clapp....

Wigfall, Louis Trezevant (21 April 1816–18 February 1874), U.S. and Confederate senator, was born Lewis Wigfall near Edgefield, South Carolina, the son of Levi Durand Wigfall and Eliza Thompson, planters. Both of Wigfall’s parents had died by his thirteenth year, when he was left to the care of a guardian. He received private tutoring, then attended Rice Creek Springs School, a military academy near Columbia, South Carolina. In 1834 he enrolled at the University of Virginia and, after almost challenging a fellow student to a duel over a misunderstanding at a school dance, decided to return to South Carolina. He completed his education at South Carolina College in 1837. He found oration in the school’s Euphradian Society more alluring than his regular classes, which he often skipped. A frequent visitor to off-campus taverns, Wigfall and several friends further defied the regimen of college life by spending three months in Florida in 1836 fighting in the Seminole Indian war. He rose to the rank of lieutenant, but years later he boldly called himself “colonel.”...

Yancey, William Lowndes (10 August 1814–27 July 1863), U.S. congressman, secessionist, and Confederate senator, was born at the shoals of the Ogeechee River, on the boundary between Warren and Hancock counties, Georgia, the son of Benjamin Cudworth Yancey, an attorney and South Carolina state legislator, and Caroline Bird. Benjamin Yancey died in 1817, and in 1821 Caroline married ...