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Image courtesy Library of Congress
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AUSTIN, Richard Wilson, a Representative from Tennessee; born in Decatur, Morgan County,
Ala., August 26, 1857; attended the common schools, Loudon High School, and the
University of Tennessee at Knoxville in 1873; studied law; was admitted to the
bar in 1878 and commenced practice in Knoxville, Tenn.; clerk in the Post
Office Department at Washington, D.C., 1879-1881; Assistant Doorkeeper of the
House of Representatives in the Forty-seventh Congress 1881-1883; special agent
of the War Department 1883-1885; engaged in newspaper work in Knoxville, Tenn.,
in 1885; returned to Decatur, Ala., and continued the practice of law; private
secretary to Congressman Leonidas C. Houk from Tennessee in 1888; served as
city attorney of Decatur, Ala.; unsuccessful Republican candidate for election
in 1890 to the Fifty-second Congress; delegate to the Republican National
Convention at Minneapolis in 1892; returned to Knoxville, Tenn., in 1893 and
edited the Knoxville Republican; United States marshal for the eastern district
of Tennessee 1897-1906; appointed United States consul at Glasgow, Scotland,
and served from July 1906 to November 1907, when he resigned; elected as a
Republican to the Sixty-first and to the four succeeding Congresses (March 4,
1909-March 3, 1919); unsuccessful candidate for renomination in 1918; died in
Washington, D.C., April 20, 1919; interment in the Old Gray Cemetery,
Knoxville, Tenn.
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