William Henry Tibbs

William Henry Tibbs (June 10, 1816 – October 18, 1906) was a Tennessee attorney and politician who served in the Confederate States Congress during the American Civil War. He was noted as a firebrand States' Rights advocate and Southern secessionist.

Tibbs was born in Appomattox, Virginia. In 1838, he married Mary McSherry in Bledsoe County, Tennessee. The couple had two children. However, she died four years later in Mississippi. Tibbs then married Cilena Augusta Hardwick on February 2, 1843 in Cleveland, Tennessee. They were to have four more children of their own. [ [http://familytreemaker.genealogy.com/users/s/k/i/Norma-D-Skinner/GENE8-0008.html Family Tree Maker] ] Tibbs owned and operated a prosperous hotel in Cleveland. He was a director of the Knoxville and Dalton Telegraph Company. ["Acts of the State of Tennessee Passed at the First Session of the Thirtieth General Assembly for the Years 1853-54". (Nashville: McKennie & Brown, 1854), p. 253.]

Tibbs unsuccessfully ran for the 8th Senatorial District's seat in the Tennessee State Senate in 1857. He filed a formal claim for the seat, but his appeal was denied. [Current, p. 1596.]

Following the state's ordinance of secession and the outbreak of the Civil War, he was a delegate from his East Tennessee district in the First Confederate Congress from 1862-64. A late 19th century historian compared him to two of his two colleagues in the House from East Tennessee, William G. Swan and Joseph B. Heiskell, claiming, "The third of these representatives, William H. Tibbs, was perhaps more extreme than either of the others, but of far less capacity." [Temple, p. 413.]

After the war, Tibbs was a director of the Dalton and Morgantown Railroad in northern Georgia. ["Acts Passed by the General Assembly of Georgia Passed in Atlanta, Georgia, at the Called Session, Beginning July 4, and ending October 6, 1868". Atlanta: Burke & Co., 1868, p. 103.]

Colonel Tibbs is buried in West Hill Cemetery in Dalton, Georgia. [ [http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=7115229 Find-a-Grave biography of Tibbs] ] [ [http://roadsidegeorgia.com/site/daltoncem.html Roadside Georgia: Dalton Cemetery] ]

Notes

References

* Richard N. Current, "Encyclopedia of the Confederacy". New York: Simon & Schuster, 1993. ISBN 0132760495.
* Robert M. McBride and Dan M. Robinson, eds., "Biographical Directory of the Tennessee General Assembly", Volume I, 1796-1861. (Nashville: Tennessee State Library and Archives and Tennessee Historical Commission, 1975).
* Oliver P. Temple, "East Tennessee and the Civil War". Cincinnati, Ohio: The Robert Clarke Company, 1899.

External links

* [http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=7115229 Find-a-Grave biography of Tibbs]