Russell A. Alger

**Russell Alexander Alger** (February 27, 1836 – January 24, 1907) was an American politician and businessman. He served as the 20th Governor of Michigan, U.S. Senator, and U.S. Secretary of War. He was also a army officer, financier, lumber baron and railroad owner.

## Childhood
Russell Alexander Alger was born on February 27, 1836, in Lafayette, Ohio.

His parents died in 1848, leaving Russell the oldest of three orphan children, without money and with a brother and sister to care for and support. He served as a captain and major in the 2nd Michigan Cavalry Regiment. On January 13, 1866, President Andrew Johnson made Alger a brevet brigadier general on June 11, 1865, and the U.S. Senate confirmed the award on March 12, 1866. On February 28, 1867, President Johnson nominated Alger for the award of the grade of brevet major general of volunteers to rank from June 11, 1865, and the U.S. Senate confirmed the award on March 2, 1867.

## Grand Army of the Republic
In 1868, he was elected the first commander of the Michigan department of the Grand Army of the Republic. In 1889, he became the Grand Army's National Commander-in-Chief.

In order to transport the lumber, Alger led his company to create the Detroit, Bay City and Alpena Railroad, of which Alger served as president.

At the turn of the 20th century, he and Florida landowner Martin Sullivan established the Alger-Sullivan Lumber Company, which milled lumber in Foshee, Alabama and Century, Florida.

## Political life
Alger was active in politics as a Republican. In 1866, he was a delegate to the party's Wayne County convention and its state convention. In October 1872, Alger was a vice president of the assembly that organized a Republican event which featured a speech by James G. Blaine and served as the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives.

In June 1876, Alger was a vice president of the assembly which supported a Republican rally in Detroit that began that year's presidential campaign. In early October 1876, Alger was a vice president of the assembly that organized a mass Republican rally in Detroit which featured a speech by former governor Edward Follansbee Noyes of Ohio. In late October 1876, he was one of the vice presidents of the assembly that organized a Republican rally in Detroit which included a speech by U.S. Senator James G. Blaine of Maine.

In early June 1880, Alger was a delegate to a huge meeting of Union veterans which met in Chicago to make a plan for supporting Republican candidates in that year's elections. In mid-June, he presided over the Republican meeting in Detroit which was organized to approve the results of the 1880 Republican National Convention, which had been held earlier in the month.

## Governor of Michigan
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In 1884, Alger was elected Governor of Michigan and served from January 1, 1885, to January 1, 1887. Highlights of his term included creation of the state board of pardons, the founding of a veterans home in Grand Rapids, the creation of two new counties (Alger and Iron), and creation of the Michigan College of Mines. "Algerism" became an epithet to describe the claimed incompetence of the army, especially as compared to the more stellar performance of the navy.

Alger left at President McKinley's request, August 1, 1899. He published a personal history of the war, titled *The Spanish–American War*, in 1901.

### Rivalry with John S. Mosby 
John Singleton Mosby accused Alger of placing a feud against him during Alger's tenure as War Secretary. Mosby had been a Confederate soldier during the American Civil War. In 1878, Hayes appointed Mosby to Hong Kong, where Mosby served until 1885.

## Personal life 
Alger was the founder of a prominent family, many of whom became involved in 20th century Michigan politics and active in the Republican Party.

The Algers had a home in Black River, Alcona Township, Michigan, from which Alger oversaw his lumbering operations.

On April 2, 1861, he married Annette Huldana Squire Henry of Grand Rapids.

## Death 
He died in Washington, D.C., in 1907. He was buried at Elmwood Cemetery in Detroit, Michigan.

## Legacy
, New York]]
In a memorial address, Senator John Spooner of Wisconsin said of Alger, "No man without noble purpose, well-justified ambitions, strong fiber, and splendid qualities in abundance could have carved out and left behind him such a career."

An early movie entitled *General Wheeler and Secretary of War Alger at Camp Wikoff* documents an official visit to Camp Wikoff, New York as Secretary of War. The visit and film were produced to garner support from the New York newspapers.

In May 1898, the War Department established Camp Russell A. Alger on a farm near Falls Church and Dunn Loring, Virginia. Faced with a typhoid fever epidemic, it was abandoned the month at the war's end in August 1898 and sold the following month. In its brief existence, 23,000 men trained there for service. It is known by an official Virginia historical marker.

### Places named after him 
* Alger, Michigan (1882)
* Alger County, Michigan (1885)
* Russell A. Alger Street and Alger Street in Black River, Michigan
* Alger Street in Lincoln, Michigan
* Alger Heights, a neighborhood of Grand Rapids, Michigan
* A United States Liberty ship named the  was planned but cancelled in 1942 before construction.

### Monuments 
In 1909, a monument to Alger was erected on the William G. Mather Building in Munising, Michigan. It consists of a bronze bust of Alger on a stone pedestal, and was sculpted by Detroit sculptor Carlo Romanelli with funds provided by the heirs of Alger and by the Board of Education of the Munising Township Schools.

In 1921, a memorial fountain to Alger was built in Grand Circus Park, Detroit by sculptor Daniel Chester French and architect Henry Bacon.

## References
;Attribution
*  

## Bibliography
* 
* *Dictionary of American Biography*
* Bell, Rodney E. "A Life of Russell Alexander Alger." Ph.D. dissertation, University of Michigan, 1975'
* Eicher, John H., and David J. Eicher, *Civil War High Commands.* Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001. .
* U.S. Congress. *Memorial Addresses for Russell Alexander Alger*. 59th Cong., 2nd sess. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1907.
* Michigan Historical Commission. 1924. *Michigan Biographies: Russell Alger*, Lansing.
* Michigan Commandery of the Military of the Loyal Legion of the United States.
* *Final Journal of the Grand Army of the Republic*, 1957. Compiled by Cora Gillis, Jamestown, New York, Past National President, Daughters of Union Veterans of the Civil War from 1861 to 1865, Inc. and last National Secretary of the Grand Army of the Republic.
 Retrieved on 2008-02-11

## Other websites
* Russell Alexander Alger in Library of Congress's The World of 1898: The Spanish–American War
* 
* Biography of Alger through 1891 from "Chapter LIII: Grand Rapids and Kent County in the War for the Union," Baxter, Albert, *History of the City of Grand Rapids*, New York and Grand Rapids: Munsell & Company, Publishers, 1891.
* Image of Russell Alger from "1888 Presidential Possibilities" card set t207.com
* 
* Grosse Pointe War Memorial - Russell Alger, Jr. Mansion
* Memorial Library 
* Public Arts and Sculpture, Russell A. Alger Fountain.
* Russell A Alger Biography at Elmwood Cemetery 
* Russell A. Alger Family Papers at the William L. Clements Library
* Russell Alexander Alger, late a senator from Michigan, Memorial addresses delivered in the House of Representatives and Senate frontispiece 1907