|
WILLIAMS, Alpheus Starkey, a Representative from Michigan; born in Saybrook, Middlesex County,
Conn., September 20, 1810; was graduated from Yale College in 1831; studied
law; was admitted to the bar in 1837 and commenced practice in Detroit, Mich.;
judge of probate 1840-1844; editor of the Detroit Daily Advertiser 1843-1847;
served in the war with Mexico; commissioned lieutenant colonel of the First
Michigan Infantry December 8, 1847; mustered out July 29, 1848; postmaster of
Detroit 1849-1853; commissioned brigadier general of Michigan Volunteers April
24, 1861, and of United States Volunteers May 17, 1861; brevetted major general
of Volunteers January 12, 1865; mustered out January 15, 1866; unsuccessful
nominee for Governor of Michigan in 1866; Minister Resident to San Salvador
1866-1869; elected as a Democrat to the Forty-fourth and Forty-fifth Congresses
and served from March 4, 1875, until his death in Washington, D.C., December
21, 1878; chairman, Committee on District of Columbia (Forty-fifth Congress);
interment in Elmwood Cemetery, Detroit, Mich.
BibliographyCharnley, Jeffrey Gordon. Neglected Honor: The Life of
General A.S. Williams of Michigan, 1810-1878. Ph.D. diss., Michigan State
University, 1983; Williams, Alpheus S.
From the Cannons Mouth: The Civil War Letters of General Alpheus S.
Williams. Edited with an introduction by Milo M. Quaife. Detroit:
Wayne State Press and the Detroit Historical Society, 1959.
|