Crittenden, Thomas Leonidas

Life Span
to
    Full name
    Thomas Leonidas Crittenden
    Place of Birth
    Birth Date Certainty
    Exact
    Death Date Certainty
    Exact
    Gender
    Male
    Race
    White
    Sectional choice
    North
    Origins
    Slave State
    No. of Spouses
    1
    No. of Children
    1
    Family
    John J. Crittenden (father), Sarah Lee (mother), George Bibb Crittenden (brother), Kittie Todd (stepsister, wife), John J. Crittenden (son)
    Occupation
    Military
    Attorney or Judge
    Businessman
    Relation to Slavery
    White non-slaveholder
    Government
    Local government
    Military
    US military (Pre-Civil War)
    Union Army
    US military (Post-Civil War)

    Thomas Leonidas Crittenden (American National Biography)

    Scholarship
    Crittenden had brief duty as a private in the Kentucky Infantry in 1836 when war with Mexico seemed possible. During the Mexican War a decade later, as an aide on the staff of General Zachary Taylor, Crittenden was selected to carry news of the victory at Buena Vista to President James K. Polk. Crittenden then served as lieutenant colonel of the Third Kentucky Infantry in which John C. Breckinridge was major. The regiment joined General Winfield Scott's army after Mexico City was captured. Crittenden's standing with Taylor was enhanced in 1848 when his father abandoned his friend Henry Clay and helped General Taylor win the presidency. Thomas Crittenden then secured the lucrative consulship at Liverpool in 1849. Returning to Kentucky in 1853, he practiced law and engaged in business undertakings. He was appointed colonel of a volunteer Kentucky regiment in 1858, but the "Mormon War" ended before the troops could be sent to Utah.
    Lowell H. Harrison, "Crittenden, Thomas Leonidas," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00281.html.
    How to Cite This Page: "Crittenden, Thomas Leonidas," House Divided: The Civil War Research Engine at Dickinson College, https://hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu/node/5504.