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Arthur P. Bagby

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Arthur Pendleton Bagby
U.S. Minister to Russia
In office
January 14, 1849 – May 14, 1849
PresidentJames K. Polk
Zachary Taylor
Preceded byRalph I. Ingersoll
Succeeded byNeill S. Brown
10th Governor of Alabama
In office
November 30, 1837 – November 22, 1841
Preceded byHugh McVay
Succeeded byBenjamin Fitzpatrick
Member of the Alabama House of Representatives
In office
1821–1822
1824
1834–1836
Member of the Alabama Senate
In office
1825
United States Senator
from Alabama
In office
November 24, 1841 – June 16, 1848
Preceded byClement Comer Clay
Succeeded byWilliam R. King
Personal details
Born1794
Louisa County, Virginia, US
DiedSeptember 21, 1858 (aged 63–64)
Mobile, Alabama, US
Political partyDemocratic

Arthur Pendleton Bagby (1794 – September 21, 1858) was[1] the tenth Governor of the U.S. state of Alabama from 1837 to 1841. Born in Louisa County, Virginia, in 1794, he studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1819, practicing in Claiborne, Alabama. He was a member of the Alabama State House of Representatives in 1821, 1822, 1824, and 1834–1836, serving as the youngest-ever speaker in 1822 and 1836, and he served in the Alabama State Senate in 1825. A slaveowner, he served in the U.S. Senate from November 21, 1841, when he was elected to fill the vacancy caused by Clement C. Clay's resignation, to June 16, 1848, when he resigned to become Minister to Russia from 1848 to 1849.

During his time in the Senate, he was chairman of the Committee on Territories, the Committee on Claims, and the Committee on Indian Affairs. As a Senator, he supported the annexation of Texas. Bagby died in 1858 in Mobile, Alabama, and he is interred in Magnolia Cemetery there.

Panic of 1837

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During Bagby's administration, the country was plagued by economic depression due to the Panic of 1837. Bagby introduced measures to assist the state banks, but the state legislature rejected most measures. All the state banks were closed by Bagby's successor, Governor Benjamin Fitzpatrick.[2]

Arthur P. Bagby, Jr.

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His son, Arthur P. Bagby, Jr., was a Confederate colonel in the Civil War, who was assigned to command as a brigadier general on April 13, 1864, to rank from March 17, 1864, and as a major general on May 16, 1865, to rank from May 10, 1865, by General Edmund Kirby Smith in the Trans-Mississippi Department. Neither appointment was confirmed by the Confederate Senate, which had held its final session before the major general assignment.

Bagby's first wife, Emily Steele of Georgia, died in 1825 and is buried in Claiborne, Alabama.

References

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  1. ^ "Congress slaveowners", The Washington Post, 2022-01-19, retrieved 2022-01-24
  2. ^ "Arthur Pendleton Bagby". Alabama Department of Archives and History. Retrieved 2012-06-23.

Sources

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Party political offices
Preceded by Democratic nominee for Governor of Alabama
1837, 1839
Succeeded by
Political offices
Preceded by Governor of Alabama
1837–1841
Succeeded by
U.S. Senate
Preceded by U.S. senator (Class 3) from Alabama
November 24, 1841 – June 16, 1848
Served alongside: William R. King and Dixon H. Lewis
Succeeded by
Diplomatic posts
Preceded by United States Ambassador to Russia
June 15, 1848 – May 14, 1849
Succeeded by