Beverly B. Douglas

Beverly Browne Douglas
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Virginia's 1st district
In office March 4, 1875 – December 22, 1878
Preceded by	James B. Sener
Succeeded by	Richard L. T. Beale
Member of the Virginia Senate from King William, King and Queen and Essex Counties
In office 1852–1865
Preceded by	District created
Succeeded by	District abolished
Personal details
Born	(1822-12-21)December 21, 1822 Providence Forge, Virginia
Died	December 22, 1878(1878-12-22) (aged 56) Washington, D.C.
Resting place	Zoar, Aylett, Virginia
Political party	Democratic
Spouse	Elizabeth
Children	at least 3 daughters
Alma mater	College of William and Mary Yale College University of Edinburgh
Occupation	Attorney, planter
Military service
Allegiance	Confederate States
Branch/service	Confederate States Army
Rank	Major
Unit	5th Virginia Cavalry 9th Virginia Cavalry
Battles/wars	American Civil War

Beverly Browne Douglas (December 21, 1822 – December 22, 1878) was a Democrat who served as U.S. Representative from Virginia, as well as in the Virginia Senate representing King William, King and Queen and Essex Counties.

Early life

Born at Providence Forge in New Kent County, Virginia, to Elizabeth, the wife of planter William Douglas. Young Beverley Douglas attended Rumford Academy across the river in in King William County. In his college years, he attended the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, as well as Yale College, and the University of Edinburgh, Scotland. At some point he studied law at a school operated by Judge Beverly Tucker. Upon returning to the United States Douglas reentered William and Mary, and graduated from the law department in 1843.

Career

Lawyer and planter

Admitted to the bar in 1844, Doublas began his legal practice in his native New Kent County, as well as Norfolk, Virginia. By 1846 he had moved his legal practice to King William County, Virginia.

Douglas owned 20 slaves in King William County in 1850, and 33 slaves in 1860.

Virginia politician

In 1850 Douglas began his political career by winning an election to become one of five delegates to the Virginia Constitutional Convention of 1850. Together with Francis W. Scott, Corbin Braxton, Eustace Conway and Edward W. Morris, he represented Caroline, Spotsylvania, King William and Hanover counties. That Convention drafted a new state constitution which increased representation of increasingly populated western Virginia counties in part by redrawing districts in Tidewater Virginia. Thus, while King William and King and Queen counties had been jointly represented in the Virginia Senate by John W. C. Catlett together with three counties mostly to the east (Gloucester, Mathews and Middlesex counties) in the 1850-1851, those two counties were now combined with Essex county to the west (Essex had previously been combined with Spotsylvania and Caroline counties in a state senatorial district represented by Austin M. Trible).

Following the convention, Douglas won election from the new senatorial district which combined and continued to win re-election to the the Senate of Virginia during the period 1852–1865. Douglas for five years became chairman of the powerful finance committee, and served as presidential elector for the Democratic ticket of Breckinridge and Lane in 1860.

Civil War officer

As the Civil War began, Douglas continued to serve as state senator, and even chaired the committee on military affairs, but also volunteered to join the Confederate States Army. He initially accepted a commission as a first lieutenant in Lee's Rangers, a cavalry company which for the first months of the conflict was attached to infantry regiments to perform picket duty as well as to provide couriers to field officers in norther Virginia. At some point Douglas was elected captain. In December 1861 that unit became Company H of the 9th Virginia Cavalry, but the regiment was not geographically united until April 1862, when Federal forces pushed toward Fredericksburg and W.H.F. Lee was made colonel. During early June 1862, the regiment drilled regularly under Col. Lee, but did not participate in the Battle of Seven Pines. However, six of its companies participated on June 12-15 in General J.E.B. Stuart's famous ride around McClellan's Army.

On June 24, 1862, the day before General R.E. Lee began complex maneuvers which launched his Seven Days offensive, Douglas was promoted to the rank of major, but transferred to the newly reorganized Fifth Virginia Cavalry. That regiment had been composed of companies drawn from southern Tidewater counties and had protected coastal areas south of the James River (including North Carolina). However, on April 18, Federal troops had landed at Elizabeth City, so during the next month those companies guarded Williamsburg and Yorktown before a complete reorganization at the end of may. Captain Henry Clay Pate of the Petersburg Rangers (a/k/a Letcher Mounted Guards, who had gained fame as a slavery advocate in Kansas and fought in western Virginia in the war's early months), had envisioned a cavalry unit of men from every Virginia county to protect the Confederate capital, Richmond. On May 25, 1862 Pate organized the 2nd Battalion Virginia Cavalry, which on June 23 General J.E.B. Stuart reorganized as the 5th Virginia Cavalry following the dismemberment of the previous unit. Pate became the regiment's Lieutenant Colonel under Col. Thomas L. Rosser, and Douglas became Major in the unit, with Pate's brother Otho K. Pate as adjutant. As part of Stuarts's cavalry, the unit saw considerable action in northern Virginia from Manassas to Fairfax and into Maryland that summer. Douglas briefly took command at Piedmont on November 3, as Stuart's cavalry resisted the Federal advance in Loudoun county and Col. Williams C. Wickham of the 4th regiment was wounded in the action. However, Douglas resigned on January 8, 1863 to return to the Virginia legislature.

Postwar legislator

Following the conflict, the Virginia legislature was reorganized, and Mathers, Gloucester and Middlesex Counties combined with King and Queen, King William and Essex counties in a senatorial district whose voters elected Warner T. Taliaferro was elected. Then after passage of the Virginia Constitution of 1869, King william was combined with Caroline and Essex Counties and that district's voters elected Edmund W. Massey, who had represented them at the convention. However, Douglas's political career had not ended. In 1868 he was a delegate to the Democratic convention which nominated Seymour and Blair, who lost to Republicans in the general election.

In 1874 voters elected Douglas as a Democrat to the Forty-fourth and Forty-fifth Congresses. He served from March 4, 1875, until his death in Washington, D.C., December 22, 1878. However, he did not hold positions of importance, his most important service being as chairman to investigate the Freedman's Savings Bank.

Personal life

He outlived his wife, the former Eliza Dandridge Pollard, daughter of Robin Pollard, and whose family members served for years as court clerk of King William County. He was survived by at least three married daughters. Elizabeth Dandridge “Bessie” Douglas Moncure (1849-1934), Evelyn Spotswood Douglas Causey (1854-1934) and Mary Ellen Douglas Weathers (1861-1941)

Death

Beverly Browne Douglas was interred in the family burying ground at "Zoar," near Aylett, Virginia.

Elections

• 1874; Douglas was first elected to the U.S. House of Representatives with 50.69% of the vote, defeating Republican James Beverley Sener.
• 1876; Douglas was re-elected with 56.53% of the vote, defeating Republican L.C. Boiston.

See also

• List of United States Congress members who died in office (1790–1899)

Bibliography

• Pulliam, David Loyd (1901). The Constitutional Conventions of Virginia from the foundation of the Commonwealth to the present time. John T. West, Richmond. ISBN 978-1-2879-2059-5.

• United States Congress. "Beverly B. Douglas (id: D000450)". Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.