Howell Cobb
U. S. House of Representatives, Georgia, 1843-1851
Governor, Georgia, 1851-1853
U. S. House of Representatives, Georgia, 1855-1857
U. S. Secretary of the Treasury, 1857-1860
Confederate Major General, 1862-1863
Born: September 7, 1815, at "Cherry Hill," Jefferson County, Georgia.
Died: October 9, 1868, New York City, New York.
- Moved with his father to Athens, Georgia, in childhood.
- Franklin College (then a part of the University of Georgia), Athens, Georgia, graduate, 1834.
- Studied law, was admitted to the bar, and commenced law practice in Athens, Georgia, 1836.
- Presidential elector on the Van Buren and Johnson ticket, 1836.
- Solicitor General of the Western Judicial Circuit of Georgia, 1837-1841.
- Elected from Georgia as a Democrat to the Twenty-eighth and to the three succeeding U. S. Congresses, March 4, 1843 - March 37 1851.
- Served as Speaker of the House of Representatives in the Thirty-first U. S. Congress.
- Governor, Georgia, 1851-1853.
- Elected to the Thirty-fourth U. S. Congress, March 4, 1855 - March 3, 1857.
- U. S. Secretary of the Treasury in the Cabinet of President Buchanan, serving from March 6, 1857 - December 10, 1860, when he resigned.
- Chairman of the convention of delegates from the seceded states which assembled in Montgomery, Alabama, February 24, 1861, to form a Confederate Government.
- At start of Civil War, commissioned Colonel, 16th Georgia, CSA, July 15, 1861.
- Brigadier General, CSA, February 13, 1862.
- Major General, September 9, 1863.
- Surrendered at Macon, Georgia, April 20, 1864.
Buried: Oconee Hill Cemetery, Athens, Clarke County, Georgia, in the family cemetery on his plantation ten miles northeast of Chatham, Virginia.
See also the Confederate Soldier Personnel Section
(Source: U.S. Congress. House. Biographical Directory Of The American Congress 1774-1949, 85th Cong., 2nd sess., H. Doc. 607 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1950), pp. 759-2057.)