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History and Government—Congressional Biographies—TennesseeBROWNLOW, William Gannaway
(1805—1877)
Senate Years of Service:
1869-1875
Party:
Republican
BROWNLOW, William Gannaway, (uncle of Walter Preston Brownlow), a Senator from Tennessee; born near Wytheville, Wythe County, Va., August 29, 1805; attended the common schools; entered the Methodist ministry in 1826; moved to Elizabethton, Tenn., in 1828 and continued his ministerial duties; published and edited a newspaper called the Whig at Elizabethton in 1839; moved the paper to Jonesboro, Tenn., in 1840 and to Knoxville, Tenn., in 1849, and from his caustic and trenchant editorials became widely known as ‘the fighting parson’; unsuccessful candidate for election in 1842 to Congress; appointed by President Millard Fillmore in 1850 a member of the Tennessee River Commission for the Improvement of Navigation; delegate to the constitutional convention which reorganized the State government of Tennessee in 1864; elected Governor in 1865 and again in 1867; elected as a Republican to the United States Senate and served from March 4, 1869, to March 3, 1875; was not a candidate for reelection; chairman, Committee on Revolutionary Claims (Forty-third Congress); returned to journalism in Knoxville, Tenn., until his death there on April 29, 1877; interment in the Old Grey Cemetery.
Bibliography
Dictionary of American Biography
; Ash, Stephen V., ed. Secessionists and Other Scoundrels: Selections from Parson Brownlow’s Book
. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1999; Coulter, E. Merton. William G. Brownlow: Fighting Parson of the Southern Highlands
. 1937. Reprint. Knoxville: University of Tennessee
Alexander, Thomas B. “Strange Bedfellows: The Interlocking Careers of T.A.R. Nelson, Andrew Johnson and W.G. (Parson) Brownlow.” East Tennessee Historical Society’s Publications
51 (1979): 54-77.
Ash, Stephen V., ed. Secessionists and Other Scoundrels: Selections from Parson Brownlow’s Book
. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1999.
Brownlow, William G. Brownlow, the Patriot and Martyr, Showing His Faith, and Works, as Reported by Himself
. Philadelphia: R. Weir, 1862.
___. Ought American Slavery to Be Perpetuated? A Debate Between W.G. Brownlow and A. Pryne Held in Philadelphia, September, 1858.
1858. Reprint. Miami: Mnemosyne, 1969.
___. A Political Register, Setting Forth the Principles of the Whig and Locofoco Parties in the United States, with the Life and Public Services of Henry Clay
. 1844. Reprint. Spartanburg, SC: Reprint Co., 1974.
___. Portrait and Biography of Parson Brownlow, the Tennessee Patriot. Together with his last editorial in the Knoxville Whig; Also, his recent speeches, rehearsing his experience with secession, and his prison life.
Indianapolis: Asher & Co., Publishers, 1862.
___. Sketches of the Rise, Progress, and Decline of Secession
. 1862. Reprint, with new introduction by Thomas Alexander. New York: Da Capo Press, 1968.
Conklin, Forrest. “Parson Brownlow Joins the Sons of Temperance.” Tennessee Historical Quarterly
39 (Summer 1980): 178-94; (Fall 1980): 292-309.
___, ed. “ ‘Parson’ Brownlow on the Impeachment of Judge Humphreys and Other Matters in Washington, D.C.—June, 1862.” East Tennessee Historical Society’s Publications
56 and 57 (1984 and 1985): 120-31.
Conklin, Forrest, and John W. Wittig. “Religious Warfare in the Southern Highlands: Brownlow versus Ross.” Journal of East Tennessee History
63 (1991): 33-50.
Coulter, E. Merton. William G. Brownlow: Fighting Parson of the Southern Highlands
. 1937. Reprint, with introduction by James W. Patton. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1971.
Humphrey, Stephen F. “The Man Brownlow from a Newspaper Man’s Point of View.” East Tennessee Historical Society’s Publications
43 (1971): 59-70.
Humphrey, Steve. ”That D....d Brownlow”: Being a Saucy and Malicious Description of William Gannaway Brownlow
. Boone, NC: Appalachian Consortium Press, 1978.
Kelly, James C. “William Gannaway Brownlow.” Tennessee Historical Quarterly
43 (Spring 1984): 25-43; (Summer 1984): 155-72.
McKellar, Kenneth. “Parson Brownlow,” in Tennessee Senators as seen by one of their Successors
. Kingsport, Tenn.: Southern Publishers, Inc., 1942, 330-351.
Miscamble, William G. “Andrew Johnson and the Election of William G. (‘Parson’) Brownlow as Governor of Tennessee.” Tennessee Historical Quarterly
37 (Fall 1978): 308-20.
Patton, James Welch. “The Senatorial Career of William G. Brownlow.” Tennessee Historical Magazine
, 2d ser., 1 (April 1931): 153-64.
___. Unionism and Reconstruction in Tennessee, 1860-1869
. Gloucester, Mass.: P. Smith, 1966 (c1934).
Source: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, 1771-Present
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