Thomas Elliott Bramlette was born on January 3, 1817 in Cumberland County, Kentucky, a part of the state favored by nature much less than the Blue Grass section. He was the son of Colonel Ambrose S. and Sarah (Elliott) Bramlette. His father served two terms in the Kentucky Senate and several terms in the Kentucky House of Representatives.
Bramlette grew up with what meager schooling Blue Grass section afforded. Believing the legal profession would be the easiest road to distinction, he studied law.
After receiving his law degree, Thomas Bramlette was admitted to the bar when twenty years of age. Four years later he was elected to represent Clinton County in the legislature, and having identified himself prominently with the Whig party he secured in 1848 the appointment of commonwealth's attorney from John J. Crittenden, the incoming governor. In this position he attracted attention by his strict adherence to duty and his fearless prosecution of criminals. After two years he resigned to resume his legal practise and in 1852 he removed to Columbia, Adair County.
In 1856 he was elected judge for the 6th circuit and for the next five years served with distinction, his decisions being so clear and logical as rarely to be reversed by the court of appeals. With the approach of the Civil War he assumed a strong attitude in favor of the preservation of the Union, exhibiting little sympathy or patience for the strange neutrality doctrine the state had set forth in 1861.
In July of this year while Kentucky was attempting to maintain her neutral position, he accepted a commission in the Federal Army and boldly set about raising the 3rd Kentucky Infantry, which he commanded as colonel--all of which was in violation of the state's tacit agreement with the Federal Government. On account of a disagreement in 1862 as to the unit he should command, he resigned from the army, and, on being offered by President Lincoln the position of United States district attorney, accepted. Using the same vigor and energy which characterized his work as commonwealth's attorney, he sought to enforce the wartime laws passed by Kentucky against Confederates and Southern sympathizers. He succeeded in convicting of treason Thomas C. Shacklett and saw him sentenced to ten years in jail, fined $10, 000, and deprived of his slaves. But it was as governor during the last two years of the war and the two years following that Bramlette made his most lasting reputation.
In 1863 he was designated as the Union Democratic candidate for governor on the rejection of the honor by Joshua F. Bell, the candidate named by the convention. On account of army supervision of the election he won by an overwhelming majority over Charles A. Wickliffe, the Peace Democrat.
In the early part of 1864 when Lincoln ordered the enlistment of negro troops, he threatened to array the state against the Federal Government, and was long and persistently charged with having written but later having amended the proclamation "to bloodily baptize the state into the Confederacy. "
In 1867 on leaving the governorship he aspired to the United States Senate but failed of election. He thereupon settled in Louisville and practised law until his death.
He died in Louisville in 1875 when he was 58 years old.
Thomas E. Bramlette was appointed as a state court judge to represent the 6th Judicial District of Kentucky in 1856 and served until Kentucky abandoned its neutrality during the Civil War. Bramlette received a Colonel's commission to raise, organize, and command the 3rd Kentucky Volunteer Infantry. He led his regiment in the Siege of Corinth, and the Battles of Shiloh, Perryville, and Stones River. After he accepted an appointment made by President Abraham Lincoln, he became as the United States District Attorney for Kentucky in 1863. Later in the same year he rose to the rank of major general and was elected as Kentucky's 23rd Governor and served until 1867. One of his achievements while serving as a Governor, was the enforcement of Kentucky's wartime laws against Confederates and sympathizers. When the war was over, he sought to restore harmony in war-torn Kentucky and issued pardons to Confederate veterans.
Bramlette began his political career as a member of the Whig party after he was elected to represent Clinton County in the legislature and in 1848 the secured an appointment of commonwealth's attorney from John J. Crittenden, the incoming governor.
However, in 1863 he was designated as the Union Democratic candidate for governor and on account of army supervision of the election he won by an overwhelming majority of votes. He began his administration with as pronounced and as loud support of the war as could be heard in the state, yet within less than a year he was one of Lincoln's most bitter critics and opponents, undergoing much the same transformation as that which characterized the vast majority of Kentuckians. In the national Democratic convention of 1864 he was the choice of the Kentucky Democrats for vice-president, but he refused to countenance the move.
Bramlette opposed Lincoln's election and wrote him menacing letters. He bitterly quarreled with General Stephen G. Burbridge, the commander of Federal troops in Kentucky, and succeeded in February 1865 in having him removed. On Lincoln's death he repented of all the harsh things he had said about the President and appointed officially a day of prayer and mourning. Never sympathizing with the Federal military régime in Kentucky, he welcomed back the returning Confederate soldiers in 1865 and 1866 and recommended the repeal of all laws against them. He favored the thirteenth amendment and, without success, urged upon the legislature its adoption.
As the war came to a close and Reconstruction began, Bramlette opposed constitutional amendments giving rights to blacks in Kentucky.
Thomas Bramlette was married twice, first to Sallie Travis, in 1837, and after her death to Mrs. Mary E. Adams, in 1874.
1854–1937
1819–1872
1832–1886
1841–1872
1839–1872
1851–1888
Colonel
politician
Governor In 1848, Governor John J. Crittenden appointed Bramlette Commonwealth's Attorney.
