Lewis Malone Ayer was a South Carolina politician. He served as a Confederate Congressman during the American Civil War.
Background
Lewis Malone Ayer was born on 21 November 1821, at his father’s Patmos plantation near Barnwell. His parents were Lewis Malone Ayer and his third wife, Rebecca Daniel Erwin. His father had been a courier for Gen. Francis Marion as a boy during the American Revolution and had represented Barnwell District for twenty-five years in the South Carolina House and Senate.
Education
Lewis Malone Ayer studied in several schools and academies as a child, until he entered the University of South Carolina in 1838. He left that university before graduating to attend the University of Virginia in sessions 16-17 from 1839 to 1841. In addition, he studied law at Harvard University, though he is not listed as a graduate of that institution.
Lewis Malone Ayer set up a law practice in Barnwell District, with partner Angus Patterson. He was active in the SC State Militia, attaining the rank of brigadier general of the Third Brigade. He represented Barnwell District in the State House of Representatives for several terms.
Though Ayer had been elected to the United States Congress upon his return from Kansas, he had not taken office by the time the Civil War broke out in April 1861. He was one of the signers of the ordinance of South Carolina secession and became a member of the Confederate House of Representatives where he served for the duration of the war. After the Civil War, Ayer became a tobacco factor in Charleston, SC, until 1868, when he began farming again on his plantation in Barnwell District. In 1872, he became a Baptist minister. He taught at Anderson Female Academy from 1879-1887 and Patrick Military Academy till 1890.
Achievements
Religion
Lewis Malone Ayer thought that through Jesus' death on the cross, and his resurrection, God has broken the power of all that is evil, in the world and in people.
Politics
The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 attempted to resolve the conflict between pro- and anti-slave elements peacefully, by allowing settlers to bring slaves into the territories and letting the residents of the states that were formed decide for themselves whether to be slave or free. However, this did not settle the problem and the territories that were to become Kansas and Nebraska experienced violent armed conflict between the two parties. In 1856, at the height of this conflict, Lewis Malone Ayer organized and equipped a unit that he led to Kansas to defend the pro-slavery viewpoint. These events had a direct part in causing the Civil War, as it ended up with Kansas being admitted into the Union with an anti-slavery constitution in January 1861.
Views
Lewis Malone Ayer disapproved of the profitable tax-in-kind and of the "monstrous" efforts to give the government more control over manpower, army personnel, and organization, and "even over the habeas corpus in the most extreme situations."
Connections
In 1842, Lewis Malone Ayer married his partner's daughter, Anna Elizabeth Patterson, and the couple had five children: Francis Trotti, Lewis Malone, Alfred Aldrich, Thomas Raysor, and Anna Iris Ayer. In 1864, Ayer married his second wife, Lillie Moore, and had four children with her: Hartwell Moore, Marie Louise, Verna Blythe, and Paul Earle Ayer.