Charles Slaughter Morehead

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Birth Date

1802-07-07

Death Date

1868-12-21

Gender

Race Description

White

Entity Type

Person

"Charles Slaughter Morehead" in the Civil War Governors of Kentucky Digital Documentary Edition, discovery.civilwargovernors.org/document/N00002722, (accessed November 4, 2025).

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Governor of the Commonwealth of Kentucky from 1855 to 1859. Nelson County, Kentucky, native. Married to Amanda Leavy in 1823. Married to Margaret Leavy in 1831. Graduate of Transylvania University. Attorney in Christian County and Franklin County. Member of the House of Representatives of the Commonwealth of Kentucky from 1828 to 1829, from 1838 to 1842, and in 1844. Speaker of the House of Representatives of the Commonwealth of Kentucky from 1840 to 1841 and in 1844. Attorney general of Kentucky from 1830 to 1835. Served as a Whig in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1847 to 1851. Elected governor on the American Party ticket in 1855 and served until 1859. Attorney in Louisville from 1859 to 1861. Attended the Washington Peace Conference in February 1861 and the Border State Convention in May 1861. Arrested and held on suspicion of pro-Confederate sedition from September 1861 to January 1862. Fled into exile in Canada, Europe, and Mexico until the end of the Civil War.

Lowell H. Harrison, "Morehead, Charles Slaughter," in The Kentucky Encyclopedia, ed. John E. Kleiber (Lexington, KY: The University Press of Kentucky, 1992), 648.
James A. Ramage, "Charles Slaughter Morehead (1855-1859)," in Kentucky's Governors, Updated Edition, Lowell H. Harrison, ed. (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2004), 75-77.

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