page_title: Emerson Etheridge
section_title: Civil War
hierarchical_section_title: Emerson Etheridge / Civil War
context_page_description: Henry Emerson Etheridge was an American politician and a member of the United States House of Representatives for Tennessee's 9th congressional district from 1853 to 1857, and again from 1859 to 1861. He also served one term in the Tennessee House of Representatives and one term in the Tennessee Senate. After Tennessee seceded in 1861, he was elected Clerk of the United States House of Representatives, serving until 1863.
  One of the most powerful and eloquent speakers of his day, Etheridge was one of the few Southern congressmen to oppose the expansion of slavery and denounce Southern secession on the eve of the Civil War. Though a Southern Unionist, he criticized Abraham Lincoln over the Emancipation Proclamation. In the years following the war, Etheridge was a bitter critic of Governor William G. Brownlow, and ran against Brownlow for governor in a violent campaign in 1867.
  After leaving the state senate in 1871, Etheridge remained active in state Republican Party politics. He was offered the party's nomination for governor in 1878, and ran unsuccessfully for Congress in 1884. He worked as the Surveyor of Customs at Memphis in the early 1890s.
context_section_description: During the Spring of 1861, Etheridge returned to Tennessee to campaign against secession, often speaking to bitterly divided audiences.  At one stop in Paris, Tennessee, a mob of secessionists broke up the rally, killing one Unionist in the process. After Tennessee voted to secede in June 1861, Etheridge returned to Washington (as did Andrew Johnson).  In recognition of his dedication to preserving the Union, the House elected him Clerk of the House of Representatives in July 1861.
  After the Union Army regained control of Nashville in early 1862, Etheridge returned to the city and spoke before a crowd of 1,200.  He threw his support behind Andrew Johnson, who had by then been appointed Military Governor of Tennessee.  Etheridge turned against the Lincoln Administration after Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, as he considered its issuance a betrayal of his promise to Southern Unionists not to tamper with slavery.  In December 1863, he joined an unsuccessful plot to give Democrats and Southern Unionists control of the House, using his position as Clerk to try and invalidate the credentials of Republican congressmen.  In response, the House voted to replace him as Clerk that same month.
  By June 1865, Etheridge was the most vocal critic of William "Parson" Brownlow, an ardent anti-secessionist who had been elected governor after Johnson became vice president earlier that year.  Etheridge considered several measures passed by Brownlow and his supporters in the state legislature tyrannical, especially attempts to deny ex-Confederates the right to vote.
  Etheridge campaigned for reelection to Congress in 1865, but so strong was his criticism of Brownlow and Lincoln that he was arrested by military authorities for "attempting to incite the people of Tennessee to reinaugurate revolution and bloodshed" and "insulting the revered memory of Abraham Lincoln," and jailed in Columbus, Kentucky, until after the August election. Though he was eventually acquitted of the charges, he was defeated in the election.
caption: Hon. Emerson Etheridge, photographed by Mathew Brady
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