biography
| name: |
Wilson, Henry
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| |
originally Jeremiah Jones Colbath
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| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1812–75)
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| biography:
| US vice-president and abolitionist, born in Farmington, New Hampshire, USA. A poor farm labourer with little formal schooling, at 21 he renamed himself and went off to Massachusetts, where he soon had a successful shoe factory. After a trip to Virginia (1836) exposed him to slavery, he devoted the rest of his life to abolishing it, frequently changing political affiliations until he found a party, the new Republican Party, opposed to slavery. He represented Massachusetts in the US Senate (1855–73), and then became Ulysses S Grant's second-term vice-president, but died in office. |
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