Notes for Benjamin Chew Howard

Notes for Benjamin Chew Howard

Son of John Eager Howard; brother of George Howard. Born in Baltimore, Md., November 5, 1791. General in the U.S. Army during the War of 1812; member of Maryland state house of delegates, 1824-1825; U.S. Representative from Maryland, 1829-1833, 1835-1839 (5th District 1829-1831, 6th District 1831-1833, 4th District 1835-1839); member of Maryland state senate, 1840-1841; delegate to Maryland state constitutional convention, 1850. Died in Baltimore, Md., March 6, 1872. Interment at Greenmount Cemetery, Baltimore, Md. (See also his congressional biography.)
HOWARD, Benjamin Chew, (son of John Eager Howard), a Representative from Maryland; born at “Belvedere,” near Baltimore, Md., November 5, 1791; pursued classical studies, and was graduated from Princeton College in 1809; studied law; was admitted to the bar and commenced practice in Baltimore; served in the War of 1812; was promoted to command of the Fifth Regiment, subsequently becoming brigadier general, and continued for many years prominently identified with the State military organization; member of the city council of Baltimore in 1820; member of the State house of delegates in 1824; elected as a Jacksonian to the Twenty-first and Twenty-second Congresses (March 4, 1829-March 3, 1833); declined the mission to Russia tendered by President Van Buren; commissioned by President Jackson in 1835, with Richard Rush, of Philadelphia, as peace emissary of the National Government in the controversy over the boundary line between Ohio and Michigan; elected as a Jacksonian to the Twenty-fourth Congress and reelected as a Democrat to the Twenty-fifth Congress (March 4, 1835-March 3, 1839); chairman, Committee on Foreign Affairs (Twenty-fourth and Twenty-fifth Congresses); reporter of the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States 1843-1862; member of the peace conference of 1861, held in District of Columbia, in an effort to devise means to prevent the impending war; unsuccessful Democratic candidate for Governor of Maryland in 1861; died in Baltimore, Md., March 6, 1872; interment in Greenmount Cemetery.