Robert Byington Mitchell

Robert Byington Mitchell (born April 4, 1823 in Mansfield , Ohio , † January 26, 1882 in Washington, DC ) was an American general and politician . He was governor of the New Mexico Territory from 1866 to 1869 .

Early years

Mansfield studied law at Mount Vernon after elementary school . After his admission to the bar he practiced in Mansfield in his new profession. During the Mexican-American War he served as a lieutenant in the US Army. After the war he continued his legal practice in Mansfield.

Political and military advancement

Mitchell's political career began in 1855 when he was elected mayor of Mount Gilead , Ohio. A year later he moved to Linn County in the Kansas Territory . There he was a member of the territorial parliament between 1857 and 1858 and between 1859 and 1861 he was a chamberlain in that area. In 1860 he was also a delegate to the Democratic National Convention .

When the civil war broke out , he became a colonel in an infantry regiment . In 1862 he was promoted to brigadier general. He took part in several battles and was badly wounded in the process. He later commanded units in Nebraska and northern Kansas . With that he had nothing to do with the actual fighting. On January 15, 1866, Mitchell was honorably retired from the army. On the same day he was named the new Territorial Governor of New Mexico.

Territorial Governor of New Mexico

Mitchell took his oath of office on June 6, 1866. As governor, however, he did not take his duties very seriously. He was often absent and inaccessible to the politicians on his territory . This went so far that some bills had to be sent by Parliament to Washington and there were put into effect by Congress. That would actually have been the governor's job. In 1869, Mitchell resigned and returned to Kansas.

Another résumé

In 1872 Mitchell ran unsuccessfully for a seat in the US Congress. He then moved to Washington anyway, where he died in 1882. As an officer in the Union Army during the Civil War, he was buried in Arlington National Cemetery , Virginia .

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personal data
SURNAME	Mitchell, Robert Byington
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	American politician and soldier
DATE OF BIRTH	April 4, 1823
PLACE OF BIRTH	Mansfield , Ohio
DATE OF DEATH	January 26, 1882
Place of death	Washington, DC