Background
William Simpson Oldham was born on June 19, 1813, in Franklin County, Tennessee, United States. He was the son of Elias and Mary Burton Oldham. He was one of fourteen children.
- Photos
- Works
- Photos
- Works
book
Speech of Hon. W. S. Oldham, of Texas, on the Subject of the Finances: Senate, December 23, 1863
https://www.amazon.com/Speech-Oldham-Texas-Subject-Finances/dp/0243304307/ref=sr_1_fkmr3_2?keywords=The+Political+Career+of+Williamson+Simpson+Oldham&qid=1575618490&sr=8-2-fkmr3
1863
Speech of Hon. W. S. Oldham, of Texas, on the Resolutions of the State of Texas, Concerning Peace, Reconstruction and Independence: In the Confederate States Senate, January 30, 1865
https://www.amazon.com/Speech-Resolutions-Concerning-Reconstruction-Independence/dp/0656304545/ref=sr_1_fkmr1_2?keywords=The+Political+Career+of+Williamson+Simpson+Oldham&qid=1575618490&sr=8-2-fkmr1
1865
William Simpson Oldham
Edit ProfileEducation
Oldham was largely self-educated, but at the age of eighteen he opened a school in the Tennessee hills.
Career
William Simpson Oldham was admitted to the bar in Tennessee in 1836. Soon afterward he moved to Fayetteville, Arkansas, where he prospered in the practice of law and in politics.
In 1838 he was elected to the General Assembly, the Arkansas House of Representatives, from Washington County, and in 1842 he became speaker. In 1844 he was appointed associate justice of the Arkansas Supreme Court, where he served until 1848. He ran unsuccessfully for the United States House of Representatives in 1846 and was defeated in a senatorial race against R. W. Johnson in 1848. Suffering from a mild case of tuberculosis and hoping to repair his political fortunes, Oldham moved to Austin, Texas, in 1849.
In 1852 he was president of the Austin Railroad Association. From 1854 until 1857 he served as an editor of the Austin State Gazette. He ran for the Texas House of Representatives in 1853 and for Congress in 1859, without success. He moved to Brenham in 1859 and in 1861 was elected to the Secession Convention. That body sent him to Arkansas to encourage that state's secession and appointed him a member of the Provisional Congress of the Confederate States of America. The following November the Texas Senate elected him to the regular Confederate Senate, a position he held until the collapse of the Confederacy. Oldham chaired the Committee on Post Offices in both regular congresses and the Committee on Commerce in the Second. He served on the Indian Affairs, Naval Affairs, Finance, Judiciary, and Joint committees. As a firm believer in states' rights, he was fearful of what he called the "battering ram of executive influence" and the claim of "military necessity" as prejudicial to democratic principles. He opposed the building of a navy, the conscription of civilians, and centralized control of the economy, all features of a too-powerful central government.
With the end of the war, Oldham became an expatriate. He lived for a time in Mexico and then moved to Canada, where he learned photography and began a book about the Confederacy. Part of this manuscript, which he apparently never finished, was serialized after his death in De Bow's Monthly Review (1869–70) under the title "Last Days of the Confederacy." A longer version is in Oldham's papers at the Barker Texas History Center, the University of Texas at Austin, where his manuscript Memoirs of a Confederate Senator is also housed. Oldham returned to Texas in 1866 to make his home in Houston.
Achievements
Works
book
Politics
When state sovereignty was not a question, Oldham supported the Jefferson Davis administration by favoring high taxes and heroic methods of countering the rampant Confederate inflation. He was also an advocate of the arming of slaves for Confederate military service. Like other members of the Texas delegation, he argued forcibly for stronger defensive measures for the Texas frontier and protested many of the apparently arbitrary actions of the Confederate Cotton Bureau.
Connections
On December 12, 1837, William Simpson Oldham married the wealthy Mary Vance McKissick, daughter of Colonel James McKissick. The couple had five children prior to her death. On December 26, 1850, Oldham married Mistress Anne South Kirk, and, after her death, he married Agnes Harper on November 19, 1857.
- Father:
- Elias Oldham
- Mother:
- Mary Burton Oldham
- late wife:
- Mary Vance McKissick Oldham
- late wife:
- Anne South Kirk Oldham
- Wife:
- Agnes Harper Oldham
- Daughter:
- Sarah Jane Oldham
- Daughter:
- Mary Eliza Oldham
- Son:
- William Simpson Oldham
- Son:
- Williamson Simpson Oldham
- Daughter:
- Letitia Madeleine Oldham McCarty
- Daughter:
- Ada Yell Oldham Spratt
References
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Born
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Died
March 8, 1868 (aged 54) -
Resting place
Eagle Lake Masonic Cemetery Eagle Lake, Colorado County, Texas, United States -
Nationality
American -
Political Party
Democratic party
Career
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1844 - 1848
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1854 - 1857
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February 4, 1861 - February 17, 1862
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February 18, 1862 - March 18, 1865