Brooks, Preston Smith

Life Span
to
Full name
Preston Smith Brooks
Place of Birth
Birth Date Certainty
Exact
Death Date Certainty
Exact
Gender
Male
Race
White
Origins
Slave State
No. of Spouses
2
No. of Children
4
Family
Whitfield Brooks (father), Mary Caroll Brooks (mother), Caroline Harper Means (first wife), Martha Caroline Means (second wife)
Education
University of South Carolina
Occupation
Politician
Military
Political Parties
Democratic
Government
US House of Representatives
Military
US military (Pre-Civil War)

Preston Smith Brooks (Congressional Biographical Directory)

Reference
BROOKS, Preston Smith, a Representative from South Carolina; born in Edgefield District, S.C., August 5, 1819; attended the common schools and was graduated from South Carolina College (now the University of South Carolina) at Columbia in 1839; studied law; was admitted to the bar in 1845 and commenced practice in Edgefield, S.C.; member of the State house of representatives in 1844; served in the Mexican War as captain in the Palmetto Regiment of South Carolina Volunteers; elected as a Democrat to the Thirty-third and Thirty-fourth Congresses and served from March 4, 1853, until July 15, 1856, when he resigned even though the attempt to expel him for his assault upon Charles Sumner on May 22, 1856, had failed through lack of the necessary two-thirds vote; chairman, Committee on Expenditures in the Department of State (Thirty-fourth Congress); reelected to the Thirty-fourth Congress to fill the vacancy caused by his own resignation and served from August 1, 1856, until his death in Washington, D.C., January 27, 1857; had been reelected to the Thirty-fifth Congress; interment in Willow Brook Cemetery, Edgefield, S.C.
"Brooks, Preston Smith," Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, 1774 to Present, http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=B000885.
Chicago Style Entry Link
Gienapp, William E. "Crime Against Sumner: The Caning of Charles Sumner and the Rise of the Republican Party." Civil War History 25, no. 3 (1979): 218-245. view record
Sinha, Manisha. "The Caning of Charles Sumner: Slavery, Race, and Ideology in the Age of the Civil War." Journal of the Early Republic 23, no. 2 (Summer 2003), 233-262. view record
How to Cite This Page: "Brooks, Preston Smith," House Divided: The Civil War Research Engine at Dickinson College, https://hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu/index.php/node/5206.