William Winston was born on January 11, 1785 at the stately homestead "Chelsea" in King William County, Virginia, United States, the son of Augustine and Mary (Winston) Seaton. The Seatons, whose forefather, Henry, settled in Gloucester County, Virginia, in 1690, were of Scottish, and the Winstons of English, ancestry; both were of the Virginia gentry.
First trained by tutors, William entered Ogilvie's academy in Richmond, where he acquired a taste for drama, literature, art, and journalism.
At eighteen, having already gained a practical knowledge of printing in a Richmond newspaper office, Seaton entered on his journalistic career. After brief service as an assistant editor of the Richmond Virginia Patriot, he edited successively the Petersburg Republican and the North Carolina Journal of Halifax, North Carolina.
In 1809 he moved to Raleigh, North Carolina, and became associated with the elder Joseph Gales of the Raleigh Register, a Jeffersonian newspaper. In 1812 he joined his brother-in-law, the younger Joseph Gales, as associate editor of the National Intelligencer of Washington, District of Columbia. Seaton's policy as an editor of the "Court Paper" for fourteen years became conservative, nationalistic, and free from partisanship. His ablest work, however, was done as a reporter of the debates in the Senate while Gales reported the debates of the House. Masters of shorthand, the brothers-in-law were the exclusive reporters of Congress from 1812 to 1829.
Upon the authorization of Congress their shorthand reports, with those of the earlier reporters, covering the years from 1789 to 1824, were published by Gales & Seaton (42 vols. , 1834 - 56), as The Debates and Proceedings in the Congress of the United States, better known by the half-title, Annals of Congress. They also issued the Register of Debates in Congress, covering the years 1824-37 (1825 - 37), and the monumental series, American State Papers (38 vols. , 1832 - 61).
He was an alderman of Washington from 1819 to 1831 and mayor from 1840 to 1850.
He served in the state militia in Virginia, enrolled as a private in the War of 1812, and saw service at Bladensburg. For many years he was an official in the American Colonization Society.
He retired from his editorial work in 1864. Seaton died in 1866 of skin cancer.
William Winston Seaton and his brother-in-law were the only reporters of congressional proceedings. Their Annals of Congress, Debates and Proceedings in the Congress of the United States from 1798, till 1824 (42 volumes), and their Register of Debates in Congress from 1824 till 1837 (29 volumes) are sources of the utmost importance on the history of the times. During his 10 years as mayor of Washington, Seaton was instrumental in the development of the city's public education system and in numerous civic improvements, including telegraph and gas lines as well as the construction of the first waterworks. He led the Washington Monument, was active in the organization of the Smithsonian Institution and acted as its treasurer.
William Winston Seaton was a Whig. He preferred Crawford to Adams for president in 1824, and never accepted the leadership of Jackson, whom he respected as an honest, patriotic citizen but considered a rough frontiersman and an advocate of a low type of democracy. Seaton's personal tastes were aristocratic, although he sympathized with the laboring class, gave freely to the unfortunate, and died a poor man.
He favored gradual emancipation and freed his own slaves, but opposed the Garrison abolitionists and maintained that the national government should not interfere with slavery. Though he was at all times a compromiser on slavery, he was stanchly Unionist.
Seaton was genial, generous, captivatingly courteous, and a good conversationalist; in appearance he was tall, vigorous and handsome.
He was skilled in the use of the rod and gun.
On March 30, 1809 Seaton married Gales's daughter, Sarah Weston Gales. His witty and charming wife, who translated Spanish documents for him to use in the National Intelligencer, was a capable and attractive hostess, maintaining an elegant house to which came men and women of the higher circles of society.
His two sons died in 1827 and 1835, respectively; his wife died in 1863, leaving only his daughter, Josephine, to survive him.
