John Selden Roane, the fourth governor of Arkansas and a Confederate general during the Civil War, died on this day at his home in Pine Bluff, Arkansas. Born to a prominent Tennessee family, Roane had been educated at Cumberland College and moved to Arkansas in 1837 when he was twenty. He began a law practice and was elected to the state assembly before enlisting for service in the Mexican War. A Democrat, he was narrowly elected state governor and was in office from 1850 to 1852. Never a popular figure, he served indifferently as a Confederate officer. He is buried in Pine Bluff. He was fifty years old. (By John Osborne)
"Obituaries," The American Annual Cyclopedia and Register of Important Events of the Year 1867 ... (New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1870), 560.
