Pettus, John Jones

Life Span
to
    Full name
    John Jones Pettus
    Place of Birth
    Burial Place
    Birth Date Certainty
    Exact
    Death Date Certainty
    Exact
    Gender
    Male
    Race
    White
    Sectional choice
    South
    Origins
    Slave State
    No. of Spouses
    2
    No. of Children
    3
    Family
    John Jones Pettus (father), Alice Taylor Winston (mother), Permelia Virginia Winston (first wife), Sarah H. Potts (second wife, 1861)
    Occupation
    Politician
    Attorney or Judge
    Farmer or Planter
    Relation to Slavery
    Slaveholder
    Political Parties
    Democratic
    Southern Democratic (1860)
    Other Affiliations
    Fire-Eaters (Secessionists)
    Government
    Governor
    State legislature
    Military
    Confederate Army

    John Jones Pettus (American National Biography)

    Scholarship
    Insisting that the Republicans would force emancipation on Mississippi and turn the state into "a cesspool of vice, crime and infancy," Pettus led the forces that took Mississippi out of the Union on 9 January 1861….

    Pettus was an energetic and forceful wartime governor. As soon as Mississippi seceded, he established a state armory, sent militia to Florida to assist in the seizure of Federal installations, and redoubled his efforts to acquire arms for the state. Although hampered by a cumbersome political structure that forced him to share power in 1861 with the legislature and secession convention, he moved decisively to put his office at the center of the Mississippi war effort. If anything, he was overly zealous. He accepted into state service far more troops than the number of four regiments of twelve-month volunteers authorized by the legislature. The problem of what to do with the idle troops who could not be equipped because of the lack of arms plagued Pettus until a mobilization order in September 1861 called these troops into the Confederate army. This order removed a political embarrassment for Pettus and strengthened his bid for reelection in October 1861. He carried all but four of the state's counties.
    William L. Barney, "Pettus, John Jones," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00782.html.
    Chicago Style Entry Link
    Dubay, Robert W. John Jones Pettus, Mississippi Fire-Eater: His Life and Times, 1813-1867. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1975. view record
    How to Cite This Page: "Pettus, John Jones," House Divided: The Civil War Research Engine at Dickinson College, https://hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu/node/6395.