Background
Charles Eames was born on March 20, 1812 at New Braintree, Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. His mother was a descendant of Ebenezer Tidd, who emigrated from Lexington to New Braintree in 1768.
Charles Eames was born on March 20, 1812 at New Braintree, Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. His mother was a descendant of Ebenezer Tidd, who emigrated from Lexington to New Braintree in 1768.
After preparation at Leicester Academy, he entered Harvard from which he was graduated in 1831, the first in a class which included Wendell Phillips and Motley the historian, with both of whom he maintained a friendship until his death.
Eames spent one year in the Harvard Law School and then studied law with John Duer in New York City.
Whether or not he was admitted to the bar, he abandoned the profession in 1845 to accept a prominent position in the Navy Department at Washington under Secretary George Bancroft. A few months later he engaged in newspaper work and as associate editor of the Washington Union acquired a high reputation for his political writings.
On January 12, 1849, he was appointed by President Polk as commissioner to Hawaii, succeeding Anthony Ten Eyck. A letter from Secretary of State Buchanan, Feburary 16, 1849, authorized him "to conclude a Treaty with the Hawaiian Government similar in all respects to their Treaties with Great Britain and France”. Accordingly, he met the Hawaiian plenipotentiary, Gerrit Parmele Judd, in San Francisco, and there concluded a treaty with him - an accomplishment which had baffled his two predecessors.
His work completed, he resigned on October 22, 1849, and returned to newspaper work, first as editor of the Nashville Union for six months and then as editor of the Washington Union until sent by President Pierce in 1854 as minister resident to Venezuela to succeed Isaac Nevett Steele.
A change in administration brought about his resignation and his return to Washington, where he devoted himself to the practise of international law.
During the Civil War, Eames was counsel for the Navy Department and the captors in all the prize cases and for the Treasury Department in all the cotton cases. While arguing before the United States Supreme Court the great prize case of the Sir William Peel, in which William M. Evarts was the opposing counsel, he was stricken down with the disease that terminated fatally two months later.
He rallied sufficiently in a month to appear again in the prize case of the Grey Jacket, involving a million dollars, which lie won for the government. This was his last professional appearance before his death.
Quotes from others about the person
Gov. Andrew, in a glowing obituary notice in a Boston newspaper, mentioned the home of Mr. and Mrs. Eames as the “most hospitable, agreeable and attractive house in Washington. ”
He was married.