biography
| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1794–1865)
|
| biography:
| US representative and senator, educator, and orator, born in Dorchester (now part of Boston), Massachusetts, USA. A Harvard valedictorian (1811), he served as pastor of the Brattle Street Church in Boston (1814–15) then, after studying abroad, became a professor of Greek literature at Harvard (1819–25). He was a US representative (Independent, Massachusetts, 1825–35), governor of Massachusetts (Whig, 1836–9), US ambassador to England (1841–5), president of Harvard (1846–9), secretary of state (1852–3), and US senator (1853–4). He turned to lecturing and, as an advocate of compromise over slavery, he ran as vice-president on the Constitutional Union Ticket in 1860. When the war broke out he became an ardent speaker on behalf of the Union, and he delivered the two-hour keynote speech at Gettysburg (Nov 1863) which was followed (and his historical reputation unfairly eclipsed) by Lincoln's Gettysburg Address. He continued his public lectures almost to the end of his life. |
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