Background

James Hammond was born on November 15, 1807, at “Stoney Battery, ” Newberry District, South Carolina, United States. His father, Elisha Hammond, a native of Massachusetts and a descendant of Benjamin Hammond who came to Boston with his mother in 1634 and later settled in Sandwich and Rochester, Massachusetts, was a teacher, farmer, and merchant. His mother was Catherine Fox Spann of Edgefield District.

Education

Prepared by his father, James entered the junior class at South Carolina College and after two rather boisterous years was graduated in 1825.

Career

After graduation James Hammond wandered and taught for more than a year and then read law in Columbia and later in Augusta, Georgia, where he also began newspaper writing. Admitted to the bar in 1828, he built up by his own exertions a lucrative practice at Columbia. Entering politics early as an opponent of protection and of submission to it, he established a newspaper, the Southern Times, in support of nullification and, through his fiery advocacy of a convention, won the attention of the leaders of the state-rights party.

In 1831 Hammond moved to “Silver Bluff” on the Savannah River and began to operate a cotton plantation. He loved the soil, and for a time allowed agriculture to occupy his thoughts almost to the exclusion of politics. He made a few speeches in 1832 and was an unsuccessful candidate for the nullification convention.

When the state began military preparations, however, he threw himself with energy and success into the task of securing volunteers. He was elected colonel of the regiment from the Barnwell District, and was ready to turn over to the use of the state a large part of his crop of cotton and the services of all his negroes. He was opposed to allowing the intervention of the other states and to compromise, foreseeing in the suspension of the nullification ordinance to meet a lowered tariff the death of the doctrine of nullification. After the compromise he still urged military preparation. When the courts decided adversely to the test oath, he was a leader in advocating a constitutional amendment to authorize it without pretense of affection for the Union, he sought persistently for more than twenty years to secure the withdrawal from it of the Southern states. He was opposed to any consideration of secession by one state, desiring united action of at least five, and he may be regarded as one of the leading proponents of Southern nationalism.

In 1834 Hammond was elected to Congress. In Congress he delivered his first speech on the subject of anti-slavery petitions and made it clear that secession held no terrors for him. To him it now seemed inevitable. In 1836 his health failed rapidly and, resigning, he spent more than a year in European travel. Upon his return he was more than ever absorbed in farming and for a time resisted all pressure to return to public life. By 1839, however, he desired to be governor and was an unsuccessful candidate in 1840. He was still interested in the militia and was made general in 1841.

Hammond was elected to the governorship in 1842 and served two terms. There was much excitement in South Carolina over the tariff of 1842, and Hammond reached the conclusion that the time for secession had come and considered inquiring of the other Southern states whether they would unite in support of resistance by South Carolina. His message invited the legislature to take any action it saw fit to protect the state. Meanwhile he was taking steps to secure a plan of the defenses of Fort Moultrie. At the close of his term he returned to “Silver Bluff” and remained aloof from politics without losing any of his keen interest in public affairs. He was anxious to avoid war with Mexico, but if it came wished to see it conducted on a grand scale, crushing English power in Canada and “grasping the whole continent from Panama to the North Pole. ” He was prevented from election to the United States Senate in 1846 by the threat of disclosure of a grave indiscretion in his past life. In 1850 his hope of succeeding Calhoun in the Senate was destroyed by the governor’s appointment in succession of three other men, and when the legislature met he lost the election to R. B. Rhett and was greatly embittered by the defeat.

Hammond vigorously advocated the Southern Convention which met at Nashville in 1850 and attended as a delegate. He was “on all the committees and worked hard, ” but had no high opinion of the convention and declared that its results did not amount to much. In the crisis of 1850-1852 in South Carolina he proposed “simply to cut every tie” between South Carolina and the federal government “which can be cut without affording a pretext for collision, and to remain thus with one foot out of the Union until a sufficient number of States take the same ground. ” He refused to have anything to do with the convention of 1852.

In 1855 Hammond moved to “Redcliffe” on Beach Island in the Savannah River, where he built a beautiful house which was his home for the remainder of his life. He owned thousands of acres of land and more than three hundred negroes. He was a successful farmer, at once scientific and highly practical, and his plantations were superbly managed.

Elected to the Senate in 1857, he served until he resigned upon Lincoln’s election in 1860. He was contemptuous of the Senate, but while a member of that body he began to doubt the wisdom of secession, believing that a majority of people in the South, if assured of their rights, would prefer to remain in the Union, and forming the opinion that the South could control the Union. He was outraged by Southern disregard of Northern sentiment, which, he saw, clearly furnished the abolitionists with much of their campaign material. The chief event of his senatorial career was his speech of March 4, 1858, in reply to Seward’s boast that henceforth the North would rule the South as a conquered province. In this speech he advanced the theory that the slaves in the South, the wage-earners in the North, constituted “the very mudsills of society. " He did not attend the Charleston convention but hoped for the nomination of R. M. T. Hunter for the presidency. In the campaign he supported Breckinridge. He took no further part in politics, but gave his whole interest to economic questions.

In June 1861 Hammond went to Richmond to urge that cotton be held as a basis of credit. He abandoned free trade and became an advocate of protection. He was bitterly critical of Jefferson Davis and of the Confederate Congress, but he supported the Confederacy with all his power and when the end was in sight he collapsed.

Achievements

• James Hammond is regarded as one of the leading proponents of Southern nationalism and the major spokesmen in favor of slavery in the years before the American Civil War. He was part of a "sacred circle" of intellectuals who promoted reformation in the South in various forms. As supporters of slavery, they both justified it in terms of stewardship of inferior beings and promoted slaveholders' improvement of their treatment of slaves. As governor Hammond also advocated public education, brought about a state agricultural survey, and directed an attack on the Bank of the State of South Carolina which resulted in the imposition of requirements beneficial to the state.

Works

More photos

• book

  • An oration on the life, character and services of John Caldwell Calhoun: delivered on the 21st Nov., 1850, in Charleston, S. C., at the request of the City Council

    (This book was originally published prior to 1923, and rep...)

  • Secret and Sacred: The Diaries of James Henry Hammond, a Southern Slaveholder

    (This set of diaries (1841-1864) brings to light the journ...)

  • Selections From the Letters and Speeches of the Hon.: James H. Hammond, of South Carolina (Classic Reprint)

    (Excerpt from Selections From the Letters and Speeches of ...)

Politics

Hammond was elected to the United States House of Representatives as a member of the Nullifier Party, serving from 1835 until his resignation the next year due to ill health. Later as a Democrat, Hammond was best known as an outspoken defender of slavery and states' rights. Slavery he thought “the cornerstone of our Republican edifice. ” Emancipation he regarded as both impossible and undesirable and to be resisted by the Southern people even at the cost of their lives.

Views

Quotations: “You dare not make war on cotton - No power on earth dares make war upon it. Cotton is king. ”

Membership

Hammond was a founding member of the South Carolina Agricultural Society.

Connections

On June 23, 1831, Hammond married Catherine Fitzsimons of Charleston, the daughter of Christopher FitzSimons, a wealthy merchant.

Father:

Elisha Hammond

Mother:

Catherine Fox (Spann) Hammond

Spouse:

Catherine (Fitzsimons) Hammond

Daughter:

Elizabeth (Hammond) Eve

Daughter:

Katherine (Hammond) McCoy

Son:

Paul Fitzsimons Hammond

Son:

Edward Spann Hammond

Son:

James Henry Hammond

Son:

Charles Julius Hammond

References

• James Henry Hammond, 1807-1864
• James Henry Hammond and the Old South: A Design for Mastery (Southern Biography Series)