- John F. Lewis
John Francis Lewis (
March 1 ,1818 –September 2 ,1895 ) was an Americanplantation owner and politician fromRockingham County, Virginia . He served two terms asLieutenant Governor of Virginia and representedVirginia as a Republican in theUnited States Senate during the Reconstruction period after the Civil War. John F. Lewis was born on the "Lynnwood" plantation in ruralRockingham County, Virginia , the son of T. Samuel Hance Lewis and Anna Maria (Lomax) Lewis. He attended an old field school and engaged in agricultural pursuits as a young adult. He married Serena Helen Sheffey in October 1842, and they raised six children.He was a delegate to the Virginia
secession convention in 1861, but refused to sign the ordinance of secession. He was the only member from east of theAllegheny Mountains that refused to endorse the document.Lewis was an unsuccessful Union Party candidate for Congress in 1865. He was elected as Virginia's lieutenant governor in 1869 and served from October of that year until January 1870. Upon the readmission of Virginia to representation in the U.S. Congress, Lewis was elected as a Republican to the United States Senate and served from
January 26 ,1870 , toMarch 3 ,1875 . He served on the Committee on the District of Columbia in the Forty-third Congress. He was not a candidate for reelection.He returned home and was appointed by Presidents
Ulysses S. Grant andRutherford B. Hayes as theUnited States Marshal for the western district of Virginia 1875-1882, when he resigned. Lewis was again elected lieutenant governor in 1881 and served until 1886.He retired from politics after his term and resumed his agricultural pursuits. He died at Lynnwood in Rockingham County, Virginia. He was buried in the family burial ground on the plantation.
References
* [http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=L000285 biographic sketch at U.S. Congress website]
External links
* [http://www.nndb.com/people/978/000051825/ brief biography of Lewis]
* [http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9904E2DE113DE433A25750C0A96F9C94649ED7CF New York Times, obituary for John F. Lewis, September 3, 1895]
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