Biography

Full entries should be concise, give essential biographical details, and where possible offer an assessment (based on secondary material) of the subject's importance to the period. Dates of birth and death should be included if possible.

Anthony, Susan B.
Born 1820 to a Quaker family with a history of activism, Susan B. Anthony became a campaigner for women's rights and the abolition of slavery. She travelled across the country to try and gain suffrage for women and encouraged female labour. She was part of an anti-slavery family who met with others of the same mindset, and they were even joined by Frederick Douglass and William Lloyd Garrison. Anthony created the Women's National Loyal League in 1963 and The American Equal Rights Association in 1966 to campaign for equal rights for both women and slaves, and published The Revolution in 1968 to voice her views. She split from friend Frederick Douglass over the passage of the 15th amendment and later created the National Women's Suffrage Association in 1969.

Unfortunately she also fought against the consumption of alcohol.

Buffalo Bill
Buffalo Bill (Real name William Frederick Cody) was an American soldier and showman, born in the Iowa territory in 1846. As a youth, his father was killed for being anti-slavery and much of his childhood was spent taking harsh criticism for his family's beliefs. He undertook a contract to supply Kansas Pacific Railroad workers with buffalo meat, which is where he got his nickname. He was a soldier during the Civil War, as well as an army scout for the US Army, where he scouted Indians and buffalo to provide food for them. He received the Medal of Honour in 1972 for 'gallantry in action' but this was actually taken away from him as he was a civilian at the time. Made his stage debut in a Wild West show in 1972, and in 1973 created a new play 'Scouts of the Plains' with Wild Bill Hickock and Texas Jack Omohundro which toured for ten years. In 1893 the title was changed to "Buffalo Bill's Wild West and Congress of Rough Riders of the World" and showed an array of different groups of people such as the army and Native Americans parading on their horses in authentic dress. The show toured Europe and Bill became a celebrated figure around the world, bringing attention to the cultures of the West. Buffalo Bill also pushed for the rights of Native Americans as well as women. Cody treated Inidans with great respect and dignity, giving them an opportunity to leave the reservation and represent their culture when many were trying to destroy it. Wild West show posters frequently portrayed the Indian as "The American." He also advocated equal pay and voting rights for women. The women in his show received comparable pay for comparable work to the men in the show.

Catto, Octavius B.
Catto was an African American born in Charleston, S. Carolina in 1839. His father had been a slave before being ordained as a minister and taking his family to Philadelphia. He became a student at the Institutue for Coloured Youth, where he later became a teacher and gave speeches on the importance of equal rights. During the Civil War Catto, while still a young man, he was a staunch supporter of the Union, the Lincoln administration, the efforts of the Republican Party to improve civil rights for blacks and to assist in the war effort, and the struggle to end the scourge of slavery. He joined with Frederick Douglass and other prominent black leaders to form a Recruitment Committee to gather young black men to fight for their emancipation. As well as creating a company of volunteers to fight for the defense of Pennsylvania, who at first were not authorized to fight, but he persitantly gathered black troops and many later saw action. In November 1864, Catto was elected to be the corresponding secretary of the Pennsylvania Equal Rights League and fought fearlessly for the desegregation of Philadelphia’s mass transit system, Catto's fight became instrumental in the passing of a bill banning transit segregation in Pennsylvania. His achievements were recognised when Philadephia passed the 15th amendment, giving black men the vote, in October 1870. But this was not passes peacefully as the city's many Democrats and immigrants, mainly Irish, protested and rioted, leading to the Marines and stepping in to ensure peaceful voting. In this charged and intense period, Octavius Catto worked even harder to get out the Black vote, thus ensuring the enmity and hatred of the ward thugs and supporters of the Democratic Party. He was shot and killed on the day of the election, October 10th 1871, by Demoncratic members whilst he had been trying to ensure the safety of other black voters in the midst of riots. Many positive results came from Catto’s assassination. The power of the Democratic Party in Philadelphia and its resistance to equal civil rights was broken. William McMullen, his political machine, the street gangs, and the hose companies lost influence with the populace. The Republicans began to realize the importance of the black vote, and more patronage, city office appointments and jobs now flowed into the community. Generous donations were bestowed on black institutions, especially the churches and their ministries. Republican Political Clubs flourished in the black wards. black candidates were nominated and elected to certain city offices.

Cooke, Jay
Jay Cooke the “financier of the Civil War” was an important figure in the railroad business. Cooke had been important in the role of securing loans and finance for the union war effort, not only at the start of the war, but mostly importantly towards the end in 1865 when the north was struggling for finances. His work enabled the Union soldiers to be well supplied and paid in the closing months of the war effort. Before the war Cooke had played an important role in the reorganising of abandoned railways and canals in Pennsylvania returning them to operation. Then after the Civil War he became interested in the development of the North West, and in 1869/70 his company, Jay Cooke & Company, financed the construction of the Northern Pacific Railway. For 4 years the Northern Pacific securities sold briskly, but like many other railroad boom entrepreneurs Cooke over speculated, and his construction costs outran bond sales. In September 1873, Cooke defaulted on his bond, and his bank, the largest in the nation shut down and he was declared bankrupt. Within days of the collapse financial panic engulfed the credit system; banks and brokerage houses failed, the stock market temporarily closed and factories began to lay off workers. The period became known as the **Panic of 1873,** after which much of the railroad expansion collapsed and many industries which relied on the railroad system suffered disastrous results. Cooke’s shares in the northern pacific railroad were bought for pennies, but in 1880, became wealthy again because of an investment in a silver mine in Utah.

Douglass, Frederick
Frederick Douglass was born on February 14th, 1818, as a slave in Maryland. As a child he learnt to read and write from the white children in the village and from observing the writings of those he worked with. In 1838, Douglass successfully escaped from his position as a slave and travelled to Massachusetts, where he joined several organisations and societies, and regularly attended abolitionist meetings. Douglass soon began lecturing at meetings and writing anti-slavery documents. By the time of the Civil War Douglass had become one of the most famous black men in the country and he was revered for his oratory skills. During Reconstruction Douglass was appointed to several political positions, and campaigned persistently for Civil Rights, not only for black Americans, but for all, whether male, female, native American or immigrant. Douglass has become one of the most important figures in African-American history and gave inspiration for many other black reformers.

Fish, Hamilton
Born in 1803, son of less successful politician and soldier Nicholas Fish, Hamilton Fish began his career in the Whig Party, serving in the 28th Congress from New York's 6th District. Fish served as Governer of New York from 1848-1850, before being elected to the Senate where he served from 1851-1857, working as a member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. In the lead up to the Civil War, Fish was moderately anti-slavery, opposing both abolitionist and pro-slavery excesses. He actively supported Lincoln's campaign for President.

Fish served as Secretary of State under President Grant, and was extremely influential in America's foreign policy in the period. Fish fostered good relations with Great Britain through the negotiation of the Treaty of Washington ([|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Washington_(1871])) settling the Alabama Claims dispute, which had implicated Great Britain for supporting the Confederate army during the Civil War. Fish further strengthened America's foreign relations by overseeing the settlement og the Virginius Affair with Spain ([]) after Spain captured the American vessel and executed its incumbents, some of whom were American. It is widely agreed that Fish's handling of the affair was the chief reason for its peaceful conclusion. He died in 1893.

He was the second cousin four times removed of U.S. senator Prescott Bush, father of George W. Bush, and gradfather of George W. Bush Jnr.

**Forrest, N.B.**
Born in 1821, Nathan Bedford Forrest is widely regarded as the first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan. Forrest was a successful business man, owning several plantations and working as a slave trader in Memphis. His exploits made him one of the richest men in the South by the start of the Civil War. Forrest was a prominent cavalry commander in the Confederate Army.

Forrest was implicated in the Fort Pillow Massacre in April 1864. Confederate troops under Forrest's command killed nearly three hundred African-American soldiers in Federal colours. Many sources at the time indicate these soldiers were trying to surrender. Forrest's role in the battle remains subject to fierce debate.

After the conclusion of the war, it is speculated that Forrest became involved in the Ku Klux Klan. Despite Forrest not being present, he was named as the Grand Wizard at the Ku Klux Klan convention in Nashville 1867. Forrest publically denied his association with the Ku Klux Klan in the wake of its escalation of violence, calling for the group to disband, although he had originally admitted that he was sympathetic to their cause. He died in 1877.

The character Forrest Gump, was named after Nathan Bedford Forrest: much like Gump, Nathan Bedford is also said to have believed that life was like a box of chocolates, and that one was never going to know what one was going to get. This ancestral link proved pivotal in the portrayal of Gump, a character far-removed from the inherent prejudices of a post-Civil War society, to which his great, great (great?) grandfather was an historical protagonist. Sometimes, he just kept running, and running, and running, and running....... and rumour has it 'Enn-Bee', as he was known to his pals, had a girlfriend called Jenny. //[Is this the first alcohol-inflected edit?]// Quite possibly.

Godkin, E. L.
Was an American publicist, born in Ireland in 1831. He wrote as a War correspondent for the London Daily News and in 1856, as a Union sympathist, went to America to write on the Southern states of the Union. In 1865 he founded The Nation in New York, an independent weekly journal of political opinion that supported free trade, railed against political corruption and advocated liberal reforms. Godkin was a central force in the growth of the magazine's prestige as a vehicle for nineteenth-century American liberalism. Under Godkin the //Nation// became a shaper of American political thought whose influence far surpassed what might have been expected from its small circulation.

Grant, Ulysses S.
President 1869-1877. Union General (said to be Lincoln's favourite) during Civil War, and as a military hero, an obvious candidate for political office despite not being politically active before the conflict. Grant's politics tended towards the 'moderate' or 'conservative' wing of the Republican Party, but after the party's defeat in the 1867 elections, Radical delegates at the 1868 convention knew they could not go with one of their own.

Greeley, Horace
Born February 3rd 1811 in Amherst, New Hampshire. He was a particularly gifted child, going to school at 3. In 1819 his family was forced by debt to move to Vermont, from here he moved into journalism with his apprenticeship at the Northern Star which led to a move to New York in 1931 where he founded the New Yorker. In 1841 he founded the New York Tribune, acting as a vehicle for his egalitarian and idealist causes. He popularised communitarian ideas of Fourier and invested in the utopian community at Red Bank. Through the use of his papers he had channelled his Whig sympathies. During the 1850’s he supported moves to prevent the extension of slavery which he saw as morally deficient and economically regressive. He opposed the Mexican war and the Kansas-Nebraska Act, and his free-soil sentiments brought him into the Republican party. On the outset of the war he joined the radical antislavery faction of the Republican party. After the war his politics became particularly controversial and he joined the Congressional Radicals in supporting equality for freedmen. His paper the Tribune also advocated the impeachment of Andrew Johnson and also in 1867, the release of Confederate President Jefferson Davis from prison, as part of his policy to restore relations with the South. This represented his growing disaffection with the Grant administration because of its corruption, indifference to civil service reform and its continued enforcement of Reconstruction measures in the South. In 1872 he ran against Grant in the Presidential election for the anti-Grant Liberal Republicans and Democrats. Greeley was considered by the Liberals as a formidable candidate, however to many reformers a man who opposed; free trade, and specie currency, with a career of supporting prohibition and other efforts to use the state for their own purposes, it came as a stunning blow. Carl Schurz was convinced that his election as presidential candidate, had deprived the movement of “its higher moral character”, and asked him to withdraw. Greeley’s campaign was focussed in a new policy for the South, which united the Liberal coalition. Greeley believed that high taxes and corruption in the South had prevented the essential investment and migration needed from the North. He also believed that it was time for the freedmen to fend for themselves. In 1872 the campaign forced Greeley to increase his attacks on the reconstruction governments in the Tribune, arguing them regimes founded on ‘ignorance and degradation’. By May 1872 some Republicans grew concerned at the Greeley nomination and negotiated a deal with Democratic senators. Greeley’s speeches focused on the evils of Reconstruction and the need to restore local self-government. In the end the results of the election saw Grant carry every state north of the Mason-Dixon line, the Republican majority of over 55% of the vote nationally, saw the largest majority in any presidential election between 1836 and1892, encouraging Greeley to declare, “I was the worst beaten man that ever ran for high office.” Greeley died not long after the election on 29th November 1872.

Howard, Oliver Otis
During the war Howard was a Union General, known for the suffering the humiliating defeats at Chancellorsville and Gettysburg from which he recovered in the Western theatre. A moral crusader, after the war he was appointed head of the Freedman’s Bureau, it was in this position which he gained much contempt from Southerners and Northerners, mainly as a result of his unapologetic support of black suffrage and his constant attempts to distribute land to African Americans. Howard believed most freedmen must return to plantation labour, but under conditions which allowed them opportunity to work their way out of the wage earning class. In 1865, the Bureau controlled over 850,000 acres of abandoned land not enough to accommodate all freedmen, but enough to begin a substantial black yeomanry. July 1865, Howard issued Circular 13, and order instructing Bureaus to set aside 40-acre tracts for the freedmen, it was however blocked by Andrew Johnson, who had already begun to issue pardons to Confederates. In September 1865 the White House issued to Howard, Circular 15 ordered the restoration of land to all pardoned Confederates. Howard was even forced to inform some that they must give up the land, and either work for the owner or be evicted. Freedmen pleaded with Howard for the right to rent or purchase land, Howard vowed to help them and would raise the issue when Congress reconvened, but in 1866 the restoration of land resulted in the eviction of most of the 20,000 blacks settled on confiscated or abandoned lands across the south, by the army. Howard believed that the system of contract labour benefitted the freedmen more than the employer, and that contract labour was only a temporary expedient which would disappear once free labour came in.

James, Jesse
Jesse James was a famous outlaw from Missouri. Although Missouri remained loyal to the Union during the Civil War, it had a significant slave population and many had links with the South. The divided nature of the state led to a bitter guerilla warfare campaign from Confederate sympathisers. The James family saw itself as Southern, and Jesse's brother Frank fought for the Confederacy. Jesse joined the insurgency when he turned 16. After the war many guerillas such as the James brothers continued their campaign and became outlaws. The mythology that surrounds James was manufactured in the post-war era, by the pro-confederate press (especially John Edwards) who romanticised his actions. James himself was more politically self-conscious than other outlaws, and wrote letters to the Democratic press using pro-Confederate rhetoric to justify himself. The James-Younger Gang became infamous for a series of train and bank robberies, and were able to elude state authorities and the Pinkerton Detective Agency through their network of supporters in the state left over from the war. The gang was destroyed after an attempted bank robbery in Northfield, Minnesota, in 1876. Jesse and Frank moved to Tennessee, but Jesse was unable to adapt to a normal life and soon returned to crime. His new gang lacked the experience of the old one, and Jesse had become increasingly paranoid. Reconstruction was over, and what he had fought for politically had been achieved. He was murdered in 1882 by one of the few men he believed he could trust, Robert Ford. After his death he acquired the myth of the heroic 'Robin Hood' figure which many people still associate with him.

Andrew Johnson became the 17th American president after succeeding to the Presidency upon the assassination of Abraham Lincoln in 1865. He was also the first U.S. president to be impeached. As president, he took charge of Presidential Reconstruction (the 1st phase of Reconstruction), and his pacifying policies towards the South, his hurry to allow former Confederates back into the Union, and vetoing of civil rights bills embroiled him in controversy. Johnson was impeached on the second attempt in 1868 upon accusations of intentionally and unconstitutionally violating the Tenure of Office Act. Although Dunning historians of the twentieth century generally regarded Johnson as heroic in the face of Radical Republican corruption, and as a legitimate heir to Lincoln. Historians now tend to emphasise his racism, arrogance and dishonesty. Many look upon Johnson as the worst president the U.S. has ever seen.

Nast, Thomas
Born in 1840, Thomas Nast was a famous German-American caricaturist and editorial cartoonist in the 19th century, drawing for //Harper’s Weekly// from 1859 to 1860 and from 1862 until 1886. In general, his political cartoons supported American Indians, Chinese Americans and advocated the abolition of slavery. Nast also dealt with segregation in the South and the violence of the Ku Klux Klan. His cartoons had remarkable influence and were instrumental, for example, in the downfall of Boss Tweed and the election successes of Ulysses S. Grant. Empowering //Harper’s Weekly// with a degree of political importance, Nast’s drawings help to demonstrate the power of political cartoons whilst bring further light to the Reconstruction era.

Phillips, Wendell
Born on 29th November 1811, Wendell Phillips was an abolitionist and an advocate for Native Americans. He was born in Boston and graduated from Harvard University in 1833, and then went on to became a lawyer. He stopped practising law to dedicate all of his time to the abolitionist cause and joined the ‘American Anti Slavery Society. He became good friends with another leading abolitionist, William Lloyd Garrison. This friendship however was being challenged by 1865, with Garrison deciding that the 13th Amendment as the end of not just slavery, but anti slavery also. Phillips on the other hand believed that emancipation was just the start of a struggle for equal rights. These opposing views seem to be the first signs of serious dissension within the Radical Republicans. Immediately after emancipation had been proclaimed, Phillips was speaking put for Negro suffrage and economic equality. He wanted a South where freedmen and poor whites would achieve economic as well as political independence. He also campaigned for equal rights for Native Americans, arguing that the 14th Amendment should also grant citizenship to them. Phillips died 2nd February 1884.

Scott, Thomas
Was the President of the largest corporation in the nation, the Pennsylvania Railroad. It was his aggressive leadership which forged an economic empire which stretched across the continent including coal mines and oceangoing steamships. Pennsylvania had over 6000 miles, more than anywhere except for France and England. The railroad acted as a nationalising force establishing a vast national market, helping restore the economic infrastructure. Scott also devised the ‘Scott Plan,’ which became the basis for the Compromise of 1877, the plan entailed that largely Democratic Southern politicians would give votes in Congress and state legislatures for government subsidies for various infrastructure improvements including in particular for Scott’s own enterprise the Texas and Pacific Railway. The compromise which secured the Presidency for Rutherford B Hayes, Scott died in 1881.

Seward, William
Born in 1801, William Henry Seward served as US Secretary of State under Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson. An ardent supporter of American expansionism, Seward was committed to the development of an imperial strategy. His vision of empire marked a change in imperial outlook (hence Imperial Reconstruction). He argued that the federal government had to take greater responsibility, but above all emphasised the importance of technology and transportation. Seward’s most famous achievement is the purchase of Alaska from Russia for $7.2 million in 1867 that essentially enabled the extension of the US reach into Asia. Throughout 1867-8, Seward tried to use the Alaska triumph to set in motion a systematic expansionist policy. However, the strength of opposition ensured that this would never happen in Seward’s own life-time.

Sitting Bull was a Sioux chief, born in South Dakota. He was the principal chief of the Dakota Sioux who were driven from their plantation in the Black Hills. They refused to be transported to the Indian Territory and took up arms against whites and other Indian tribes. He is most notable in Native American history for his courage and role in the major victory at the Battle of Little Bighorn, fought in 1875 against Lieutenant Custer. After a harsh winter in 1881, Sitting Bull and his group surrendered themselves to the American army. Sitting Bull was held prisoner for two years and when he was released he joined the Buffalo Bill Wild West Show and toured around Europe. Sitting Bull remained a powerful force amongst his people and returned to the U.S to counsel tribal chiefs who sought his wisdom. Sitting Bull was shot in 1890 by police whilst he was being arrested. His son Crow Foot and other followers were also killed during this operation.

Stanton, Elizabeth Cady
Born on November 12th 1815, Elizabeth Cady Stanton was a leading feminist of the nineteenth century. She presented her ‘Declaration of Sentiments’ at the 1st women’s rights convention held in 1848 in Seneca Falls, New York. In it she stated that ‘The history of mankind is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations on the part of man towards woman, having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over her,’ and demanded that women ‘have immediate admission to all the rights and privileges that belong to them as citizens of the United States.’ This declaration has often been credited with initiating the first organised woman’s rights movements in America. She was an active abolitionist, and focussed not only on woman’s voting rights, but also on woman’s paternal, property, divorce and income rights. Like Susan B Anthony, she declined to support the 14th and 15th Amendments, as women were not mentioned at all and were not given voting rights. Stanton was good friends with Anthony, and together they founded the ‘National Woman’s Suffrage Association.’ Elizabeth married journalist, Henry Stanton, in 1840 and they had seven children. She died on the 26th October 1902.
 * Stevens,** Thaddeus

Stone, Lucy
Lucy Stone was born on the 13th August 1818 and was a feminist campaigner, who helped to form the ‘Women’s National Loyal League.’ This organisation fought for the emancipation and enfranchisement of African Americans. After the war she was involved with the ‘American Equal Rights Association,’ who’s main goal was to achieve equal voting rights for both genders and all races. There was a division between Stone’s other organisation the ‘American Woman Suffrage Association,’ and Anthony’s and Cady Stanton’s group the ‘National Woman Suffrage Association.’ Whilst Stone used old anti slavery methods of argument, Anthony and Cady Stanton focussed on passing a sixteenth amendment for woman’s suffrage. Stone did not like what she considered to be the unprincipled methods that they used, for example accepting help from Democrats, and preferred to rely on the Republican Party. However, by 1890 the two groups had resolved their differences and merged to form the ‘National American Woman Suffrage Association.’ Stone died on 19th October 1893. She had married Harry Blackwell in 1855, keeping her own name, and they had one daughter and a premature son who died.

Sumner, Charles
Born in 1811, Charles Sumner of Massachusetts was a Radical Republican in the US Senate during the Civil War and Reconstruction. Along with Thaddeus Stevens, he fought hard to provide equal civil and voting rights for the freedmen whilst made great efforts to prevent ex-Confederates from returning to power. Strongly opposed to the Reconstruction policy of Andrew Johnson, believing it to be far too generous to the South, Sumner would help bring the President to the brink of impeachment. In 1871 he parted ways with then president Ulysses S. Grant and his support for Horace Greeley’s Liberal Republican candidacy the following year would ensure his complete loss of power within the Republican party.

Trumbull, Lyman
Moderate Republican, chair of Senate Judiciary Committee in early Reconstruction era. Authored 13th Amendment. Proposes extension to Freedmen's Bureau in 1866 and Civil Rights bill same year (Johnson vetoes both). See Slap, //Doom of Reconstruction//, 77-8.

William M. Tweed was leader of Tammany Hall faction of New York's Democratic Party from 1858, and usually known as boss Tweed. He rose to power in the wake of the Draft Riots (1863), through a combination of ultra-patriotism (as apposed to Fernando Wood's Copperhead Democrat faction) and white supremacist beliefs. He was elected to the House of Representatives in 1853, and the New York State Senate in 1867. Tweed held together a coalition of business leaders and Irish immigrants, through patronage, low taxes and high public spending until allegations of widespread fraud were published in the New York Times in 1871. See Bernstein, 'The Volcano under the City', in Harold Holzer, State of the Union (Google Books) for overview of how the Riots brought Tweed to prominence. Tweed was arrested in 1871, and tried and convicted for stealing between 40 million and 200 million dollars. In 1875 he managed to escape and flee to Spain, but was recognized and eventually died in jail in 1878. .