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History and Government—Congressional Biographies—GeorgiaHerschel Vespasian JOHNSON
(1812-1880)
Senate Years of Service:
1848-1849Party: DemocratJOHNSON, Herschel
Vespasian, a Senator from Georgia; born near Farmer’s
Bridge, Burke County, Ga., September 18, 1812; attended private
schools and Monaghan Academy near Warrenton; graduated from the
University of Georgia at Athens in 1834; studied law; admitted to
the bar in 1834 and commenced practice; moved to a plantation,
“Sandy Grove,” in Jefferson County in 1839 and
practiced law in Louisville; unsuccessful Democratic candidate in
1843 for election to fill a vacancy in the Twenty-eighth Congress;
presidential elector on the Democratic ticket 1844; moved to
Milledgeville, Ga., in 1844 and continued the practice of law;
unsuccessful candidate for nomination as Governor in 1847;
appointed as a Democrat to the United States Senate to fill the
vacancy caused by the resignation of Walter T. Colquitt and served
from February 4, 1848, to March 3, 1849; was not a candidate for
election to fill this vacancy; chairman, Committee on the District
of Columbia (Thirtieth Congress); judge of the superior court of
the Ocmulgee circuit 1849-1853; presidential elector on the
Democratic ticket 1852; Governor of Georgia 1853-1857; returned to
his plantation near Louisville, Jefferson County, in 1857;
unsuccessful candidate for Vice President of the United States on
the Douglas Democratic ticket in 1860; delegate to the State
secession convention at Milledgeville in 1861; a Senator from
Georgia in the Second Confederate Congress 1862-1865; president of
the State constitutional convention in 1865; presented credentials
in 1866 as a Senator-elect to the United States Senate but was not
permitted to qualify; resumed the practice of law in Louisville;
appointed judge of the middle circuit of Georgia in 1873 and served
until his death on his plantation near Louisville, Ga., August 16,
1880; interment in the Old Louisville Cemetery.
Bibliography
American National Biography; Dictionary of American
Biography; Flippin, Percy. Herschel V. Johnson of Georgia,
State Rights Unionist. Richmond: Press of Deitz Printing Co.,
1931; Greeman, Elizabeth D. “Stephen A. Douglas and Herschel
V. Johnson: Examples of National Men in the Sectional Crisis of
1860.” Ph.D. dissertation, Duke University, 1974.
Source: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, 1771-Present
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