Title: Horace Maynard Letter

Date/Date Range :   1857 December 12

Extent: 0.1 linear feet

Abstract:

In a December 12, 1857 letter to Parson Brownlow in Knoxville, Horace Maynard, then serving in the U.S. House of Representatives, writes concerning his ideas for a new custom house to be built downtown.

Call number: MS-2231

Repository: University of Tennessee Special Collections Library, Knoxville, TN

Aquisition Information:

The collection was purchased by Special Collections.

Access Restrictions:

Collection is open for research.

Copyright:

The copyright interests in this collection remain with the creator. For more information, contact the Special Collections Library.

Preferred Citation:

[Identification of Item], Horace Maynard Letter, MS-2231. University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Special Collections Library.

Collection consists of a single folder.

Horace Maynard (1814-1882) was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1857 as a part of the American, or Know-Nothing, Party ticket. He was reelected twice: in 1859 with the Opposition Party and in 1861 with the Unionist Party. In 1863, Governor Andrew Johnson appointed Maynard to be the state's attorney general. Two years later, Maynard returned to Congress, where he served until 1875 when President Ulysses S. Grant appointed him ambassador to Turkey. He retained that position until President Rutherford B. Hayes in 1880 tapped him as postmaster general, a position he held until March 5, 1881. Maynard died in Knoxville on May 3, 1882.

William Gannaway "Parson" Brownlow (1805-1877) was an influential East Tennessee minister, journalist, and governor. In 1838 he became owner/editor of an Elizabethton newspaper popularly known as Brownlow's Whig. His newspaper, which, one the eve of the Civil War, reached nearly eleven thousand subscribers across the nation, moved to Knoxville in 1849. The Parson was a prominent spokesperson for the Whig Party and a staunch defender of the Union. After Tennessee left the Union, Brownlow continued speaking out against the Confederacy. He was eventually jailed in Knoxville and later expelled from the Confederacy for his anti-secession editorials. After traveling on a speaking tour throughout the North, the Parson returned to Knoxville with the Union troops in the fall of 1863, continuing to rail against the Confederacy and secession. In March 1865, Tennessee Unionists chose Brownlow to succeed Andrew Johnson as governor of Tennessee. After two terms as Tennessee's Reconstruction-era governor, Brownlow, in 1869, was chosen to represent the state in the U.S. Senate. He served only one term before returning to Knoxville, where he died on April 28, 1877.

In a December 12, 1857 letter to Parson Brownlow in Knoxville, Horace Maynard, then serving in the U.S. House of Representatives, writes about the political system in Washington, D.C. as well as the construction of a new custom house in Knoxville. Maynard begins the letter by outlining why he wanted to serve in Congress, stating that he is fighting to get a "just proportion" of government funding for the people of East Tennessee. He then begins speaking about a new custom house for Knoxville. Maynard outlines the importance of the building, saying that it is necessary for "building up the town." Maynard even describes the location that he feels would be optimal ( "between Cumberland & Clinch Streets on the north & south and Gay Street & Crooked Street east west" ).

• United States -- Politics and government -- 1853-1857.
• Knoxville -- Commerce and industry.