# Charles Clark (governor)

Charles Clark (May 24, 1811 – December 18, 1877) was the 24th governor of Mississippi from 1863 to 1865. A wealthy planter and lawyer, Clark served as a soldier in the Mexican-American War and joined the Confederate army as a general during the American Civil War. Severely wounded in battle, he ran for governor of Mississippi in 1863, serving in office until the final Confederate defeat in the spring of 1865.

## Early life and education

Clark was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, on May 24, 1811, and subsequently moved to Mississippi. He is the great-grandfather of Judge Charles Clark, who served on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit from 1969 to 1992 and was the chair of the United States Judicial Conference.
In the late 1830s and early 1840s, Clark, a lawyer, represented a settler in a dispute with some Choctaw Native Americans over land in the Mississippi Delta. The dispute led to a series of lawsuits before the Mississippi Supreme Court. The settler ultimately prevailed and gave Clark a large tract of land between Beulah, Mississippi and the Mississippi River as his legal fee. In the late 1840s, Clark formed a plantation on the land, naming it Doe-Roe, pseudonyms commonly used in the legal profession to represent unnamed or unknown litigants (e.g., John Doe, Roe v. Wade). However, because of poor local literacy, the plantation became known by its phonic representation, Doro. According to archives at Delta State University, "The plantation grew to over 5,000 acres (20 km$^2$) and became the most prosperous in the region, operating until 1913. It was prominent in the social, political and economic affairs of Bolivar County." He was also active in state politics, being elected as a member of the Mississippi House of Representatives several times.

## Military service

During the Mexican–American War, he served as a colonel of the 2nd Mississippi Regiment of Volunteers. Following the secession of Mississippi in early 1861, Clark was appointed as a brigadier general in the First Division, First Corps, a Mississippi Militia unit that later entered the Confederate States Army. He commanded the brigade at engagements in Kentucky and then a division under Leonidas Polk at the Battle of Shiloh, where he was slightly wounded. Clark led a division at the Battle of Baton Rouge, where he was severely wounded and captured. He spent time as a prisoner of war before being released, but was permanently disabled.

## Governor of Mississippi

John J. Pettus, the governor who led Mississippi to secede in 1861 was term-limited and could not run for reelection. Clark ran for governor in the October 1863 election on a conservative platform focused on caring for wounded soldiers and their families, as opposed to the "fire-eater" rhetoric that had led to secession after Pettus's election. Clark was elected as governor with 70% of the vote and inaugurated at Columbus on November 16. The state capital of Jackson had been captured and burned by Union forces earlier that year, and most of the other strategic points in Mississippi were already overrun by US troops by the time Clark took office.
Clark's administration focused on aiding the destitute civilian population of Mississippi, officially sanctioning contraband trade with US forces in exchange for essential goods and medicine. With the collapse of the Confederacy in the spring of 1865, Clark was forcibly removed from office by the United States Army on May 22 and briefly imprisoned at Fort Pulaski near Savannah, Georgia. Clark was replaced as governor by William L. Sharkey, a respected judge and staunch Unionist, who had been in total opposition to secession.
Clarke was ex officio President of the University of Mississippi Board of Trustees during his tenure as Governor of Mississippi. Despite losing the governorship, he remained on the Board for almost ten years after his term ended. In 1871, he purchased Routhland, an Antebellum mansion in Natchez, Mississippi.

## Death

Clark died in Bolivar County, Mississippi, on December 18, 1877, and was buried at the family graveyard in that county.