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Elihu B. Washburne (1816-1887) was a politician during and after the Civil War. He served as a congressman to Illinois and was a personal friend of Presidents Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant. He was a leader of the Radical Republicans, which opposed President Andrew Johnson’s reconstruction. He was appointed as Secretary of State by Ulysses S. Grant, and later appointed as Minister to France during the Franco-Prussian War.
Elihu B. Washburne was born in Livermore, Maine. He went to study law at Kent’s Hill Seminary before switching to Harvard Law. After being admitted to the bar, he left for Galena, Illinois. While in congress, he was an early supporter of Ulysses S. Grant and helped secure his army promotions. Though being appointed to Secretary of State by Grant, Washburne only served as such for 11 days.
Elihu retired from Government in 1877, and turned down a nomination for the Presidency in 1880 and 1884. He moved to Chicago, Illinois and served as president of the Chicago Historical Society from 1884 to 1887. Washburne St in Chicago was named in honor of him.
Elihu's Speech
Elihu's Speech
"It is under the empire of no ordinary emotion that I come today to this spot where I was born, to honor the memory of my father and mother and to pay a tribute of respect to the virtues, the intergrity, and the probity of the founders and early settlers of my native town of Livermore and of the county of Oxford." - Elihu Washburne
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