Clemens, Jeremiah

CLEMENS, Jeremiah, a Senator from Alabama; born in Huntsville, Ala., December 28, 1814; attended La Grange College and was graduated from the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa in 1833; studied law at Transylvania University, Lexington, Ky.; was admitted to the bar in 1834 and practiced in Huntsville; appointed United States district attorney for the northern district of Alabama in 1838; member, State house of representatives 1839-1841; raised a company of riflemen in 1842 and served in the Texas War of Independence; member, State house of representatives 1843-1844; served in the United States Army during the Mexican War, attained the rank of lieutenant colonel; unsuccessful candidate for election in 1848 to the Thirty-first Congress; elected as a Democrat to the United States Senate to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Dixon H. Lewis and served from November 30, 1849, to March 3, 1853; novelist; moved to Memphis, Tenn., in 1858 and became editor of the Memphis Eagle and Enquirer in 1859; returned to Alabama; delegate to the convention in 1861 in which Alabama voted to secede from the Union; held office under the Confederacy, but became a strong Union supporter in 1864; died in Huntsville, Madison County, Ala., May 21, 1865; interment in Maple Hill Cemetery.