Joseph Carter Abbott

Joseph Carter Abbott

Joseph Carter Abbott (born July 15, 1825 in Concord , New Hampshire , † October 8, 1881 in Wilmington , North Carolina ) was an American lawyer, journalist, businessman and politician. During the Civil War he served as a member of the Union Army ; then he was from 1868 to 1871 Republican Senator for the state of North Carolina.

Lineage and Early Life

Joseph Carter Abbott was a son of the farmer Aaron Carter Abbott and Nancy Badger. In the seventh generation, he was a descendant of George Abbot, who immigrated from the northern English county of Yorkshire to New England in what is now the United States around 1640 .

After graduating from Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts (1846) Abbott completed a law degree in Concord, New Hampshire, in which state he was admitted to the bar in 1852. From 1852 to 1857 he was the owner and successful editor of the Manchester Daily American magazine . He then advanced in his journalistic career by serving as editor of the established Whig newspaper Boston Atlas and Bee from 1859 to 1861 . At the same time he was from 1855 to 1861 adjutant general of New Hampshire and helped in this position in the reorganization of the militia of this state. He was also one of the commissioners who negotiated the border between New Hampshire and Canada . Politically, he joined the Know-Nothing Party and often wrote articles for this party in magazines.

Role in the American Civil War

When the Civil War broke out, Abbott, as Adjutant General of New Hampshire, was one of the first to provide troops to President Abraham Lincoln in April 1861 . In December 1861 he became a lieutenant colonel in the 7th regiment of New Hampshire Volunteer Infantry. He took part in the battles of Port Royal (November 3–7, 1861), Fort Pulaski (April 10–11, 1862), St. John's Bluff (October 1–3, 1862) and Fort Wagner ( April 18–11 , 1862) . July 1863). In November 1863 he was colonel of the regiment and led it in on the floor of Florida discharged Battle of Olustee (February 20, 1864) and during the campaign of Bermuda Hundred (May 1864) in Virginia .

During the siege of Petersburg, also taking place in Virginia (June 9, 1864 to March 25, 1865), Abbott commanded the 2nd Brigade of the 1st Division of the X Corps in the battle of Chaffin's Farm (September 29-30 , 1864) and the ensuing skirmishes at Darbytown and New Market Roads (October 7, 1864). At that time the James Army was reorganized and Abbott commanded the 2nd Brigade of the 2nd Division of the XXIV Corps, which was attached to the Fort Fisher Expeditionary Corps under Brigadier General Alfred Terry and participated in the Second Battle of Fort Fisher (13th - 13th). January 15, 1865) and the capture of Wilmington (February 11-22, 1865) in North Carolina. On January 25, 1865, President Lincoln proposed Abbott's promotion to Brevet Brigadier General of Volunteers for his courageous dedication to the capture of Fort Fisher , with that promotion retroactive to January 15, 1865. The Senate confirmed this award on February 14, 1865. Abbott was stationed in Wilmington for the final stages of the war.

Later career

After retiring from the military, Abbott stayed and settled in North Carolina. He bought 3,000 acres of land 50 miles from Wilmington, built a sawmill, and produced lumber. He founded the town of Abbottsburg in Bladen County and, over time, expanded the business of his flourishing company to include wood processing.

Abbott also took an interest in the politics of the fledgling Republican Party and soon became one of its leaders in North Carolina. He was nominated permanent chairman at the Raleigh State Republican Party Conference held in September 1867 . Despite support from the African American side , Abbott encountered resistance from many delegates, but was ultimately allowed to keep his post; at the same time William Woods Holden was chairman of the party's state board.

In 1868 Abbott attended the North Carolina constitutional assembly and helped develop the new constitution. In May of that year he traveled to Chicago for the Republican Convention to help Ulysses S. Grant elect a presidential candidate . After North Carolina was re-admitted to the North American Confederation (July 1868), he succeeded in being elected as the representative of that state in the US Senate . He served as a senator from July 14, 1868 to March 4, 1871 and was also a member of the Republican National Committee as a representative of North Carolina. Politically, he was able to rely in particular on the Afro-American population group. For his part, he advised his black electorate, for example, to carry weapons for self-defense, which made him unpopular with conservative whites.

In the Senate, Abbott advocated a strengthening of federal authority over the individual states and advocated the free right to vote for all male, adult African-Americans, i.e. the passage of the 15th Amendment to the United States Constitution , which he expressed in an opinion on around February 8, 1869 Speech expressed. He also tried to get federal funding for the renewal of the port of Wilmington and pondered a US federal constitution to merge the railways of North Carolina and South Carolina , so that they would form the eastern part of a southern transcontinental transportation system. But he did not get a positive response with the projects mentioned. Disagreements within the North Carolina Republican Party and personal animosity weakened Abbott's political position, and when the Democrats came to power in that state's parliament in 1870, he was no longer nominated for a second term to the Senate.

After leaving the Senate, Abbott lived in Wilmington again, remained active in the Republican Party and published its weekly Wilmington Post in the 1870s , but no longer gained significant political influence in North Carolina. He also managed a wood processing company again and acted under US Presidents Ulysses S. Grant and Rutherford B. Hayes as Wilmington's port collector and special agent for the US Treasury .

Abbott, who had married three times but had no children, died in Wilmington on October 8, 1881, at the age of 56. He was initially buried in the National Cemetery in this city , but his remains were reburied in 1887 in Valley Cemetery in Manchester .

literature

• Leonard Schlup: Abbott, Joseph Carter. In: American National Biography (ANB). Volume 1 (1999), pp. 28f.

Web links

• Joseph Carter Abbott in the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress (English)