Henry Wilson: Difference between revisions

For other people named Henry Wilson, see Henry Wilson (disambiguation).

Henry Wilson
18th Vice President of the United States
In office March 4, 1873 – November 22, 1875
President	Ulysses Grant
Preceded by	Schuyler Colfax
Succeeded by	William A. Wheeler
Personal details
Born	200px February 16, 1812 Farmington, New Hampshire
Died	November 22, 1875, age 63 Washington, D.C.
Resting place	200px
Nationality	american
Political party	Republican
Spouse	Harriet Malvina Howe Wilson
Parent	200px

Henry Wilson (February 16, 1812–November 22, 1875) was a Senator from Massachusetts and the eighteenth Vice President of the United States. He was a leading Republican who devoted his enormous energies to the destruction of what he considered the Slave Power, that is the conspiracy of slave owners to seize control of the federal government and block the progress of liberty.

Wilson was born Jeremiah Jones Colbath in Farmington, New Hampshire. In 1833 he had his name legally changed by the legislature to Henry Wilson. He was adopted by a man with the last name Wilson when the Colbath family of twelve could not support itself. Henry Wilson moved to Natick, Massachusetts in 1833 and became a shoemaker. He attended several local academies, and also taught school in Natick, where he later engaged in the manufacture of shoes. He was a member of the state legislature between 1841 and 1852, and was owner and editor of the Boston Republican from 1848 to 1851.

Wilson was an unsuccessful candidate for election in 1852 to Congress. He was a delegate to the state constitutional convention in 1853 and was an unsuccessful candidate for Governor of Massachusetts in 1853. In 1855 he was elected to the United States Senate by a coalition of Free-Soilers, Americans, and Democrats to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of Edward Everett. He was reelected as a Republican in 1859, 1865 and 1871, and served from January 31, 1855, to March 3, 1873, when he resigned to become Vice President. He was Chairman of the Committee on Military Affairs and the Militia and the Committee on Military Affairs. In 1861 he raised and commanded the Twenty-second Regiment, Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry.

Wilson was elected Vice President of the United States on the Republican ticket with President Ulysses S. Grant and served from March 4, 1873, until his death in the United States Capitol Building at Washington, DC. He had suffered from paralysis from 1873-75. Among his works are: History of the Anti-Slavery Measures of the Thirty-seventh and Thirty-eighth Congresses, 1861-64 (1864); History of the Reconstruction Measures of the Thirty-ninth and Fortieth Congresses, 1865-68 (1868); and an exceedingly valuable publication, History of the Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in America, (three volumes, 1872-77). He was interred in Old Dell Park Cemetery, Natick.

Wilson was an ancestor of Lloyd Millard Bentsen, Jr., a Democratic U.S. Senator from Texas from 1971 to 1993 and the unsuccessful Democratic vice-presidential nominee in 1988.

Reference

• Henry Wilson, History of the Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in America, 2 vols. (Boston: J. R. Osgood and Co., 1873-77)

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