Christopher Gustavus Memminger

Background

Christopher Gustavus Memminger was born in Würtemberg, Germany, on January 9, 1803. After the death of his father, Gottfried Memminger, Memminger and his mother emigrated to Charleston, South Carolina. When his mother, Eberhardina Memminger, died, he was taken into the home of Thomas Bennett, later governor of the state.

Education

After graduating from South Carolina College (now University of South Carolina) in 1819, Memminger studied law and then established a successful practice in Charleston.

Career

Christopher Memminger was admitted to the bar in 1824, the same year he became an American citizen.

He became a successful lawyer in Charleston. An opponent of nullification, he served in the lower house of the state legislature during 1836-1852 and 1854-1860. Foreign twenty years he was chairman of the Ways and Means Committee of the state House. In 1855, he served on the Committee of Free Schools in Charleston.

He was a unionist delegate to the convention of the Southern rights in 1852, South Carolina’s emissary to persuade Virginia to secede in 1860, and a delegate to the South Carolina secession convention. He supported secession and was elected to the provisional Confederate Congress, where he served on the Commercial Affairs Committee and chaired the committee which drafted the provisional constitution. President Davis appointed him Secretary of the Treasury in 1861, and he served until June 15, 1864, when he resigned because he saw no way to remedy the Confederacy’s financial condition. His businesslike manner offended many politicians, but his relationship with the president was excellent. He was aware of the necessity to raise finances, but his attempts to control the inflation caused by loans, dwindling supplies, and worthless bonds were unsuccessful. With little cooperation from Congress, Memminger’s taxation schemes also failed. Attempts to float bond issues abroad failed largely because of Confederate military reverses.

After his resignation, Christopher Memminger retired to North Carolina and gave no further service to the Confederacy. He received a pardon in 1867 and returned to his law practice in Charleston. In 1868, he founded a company that manufactured sulphuric acid.

Achievements

• Christopher Memminger tried to stabilize the Confederate economy, establish its credit, and draw money from the states into the Richmond government coffers. Though he agitated to increase bond sales, restrict currency issues to control inflation, and prod Congress into passing a comprehensive tax bill, the States-Rights faction thwarted his attempts to control the flow of cash and credit at a national level. Considering Congress' sluggishness, cotton's uselessness as a cash crop, and widespread resistance to the central government, it is unlikely that anyone could have done better.
  
  Memminger was selected to write the legal justification for South Carolina's secession in the "Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union."

Works

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  • Address of the Hon CG Memminger 1969
  • Instructions for Collectors of Taxes: Confederate States of America, Treasury Department, Richmond, May 15, 1863 1863
  • Mr. Memminger's Opinion And Reply Upon The Question Of Forfeiture Of Bank Charters By Reason Of Suspensions Of Specie Payments
  • Lecture delivered before the Young men's library association, of Augusta, April 10th, 1851. Showing African slavery to be consistent with the moral and physical progress of a nation 1851
  • The Mission of South Carolina to Virginia 1860

Politics

A conservative Democrat, Christopher Memminger opposed independent action by South Carolina in response to the issue of slavery but defended slavery as an institution. By the time of John Brown's Raid he firmly believed both secession and unified action by the Southern states a necessary defense against Northern domination.

Connections

Memminger's marriage in 1832 to Mary Wilkinson produced eight children. She died and Memminger married her sister, Sarah A. Wilkinson, in 1878.

Father:

Gottfried Memminger

Mother:

Eberhardina Memminger

late wife:

Mary Withers Wilkinson Memminger

1812-1875

Wife:

Sarah Ann Wilkinson Memminger

1814-1894

Daughter:

Ellen Memminger

1835-1916

Son:

Thomas B. Memminger

1836-1918

Son:

Robert Withers Memminger

1839-1901

Daughter:

Mary Memminger

1843-1843

Daughter:

Lucy Wilkinson Memminger Pinckney

1844-1874

Son:

Willis Wilkinson Memminger

1845-1876

Daughter:

Susan Chisolm Memminger

1846-1846

Son:

Allard Belin Memminger

1847-1852

Daughter:

Sarah Virginia Memminger Middleton

1848-1895

Daughter:

Rose Memminger

1850-1850

Son:

Allard Memminger

1854-1936

Son:

Edward Read Memminger

1856-1949

References

• The Life and Times of C. G. Memminger
  2019
• Jefferson Davis and His Cabinet by Rembert W. Patrick
  1944
• The Confederate States of America, 1861-1865: A Financial and Industrial History of the South During the Civil War
  2018