William Gannaway "Parson" Brownlow

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Birth Date

1805-08-29

Death Date

1877-04-29

Gender

Race Description

White

Entity Type

Person

"William Gannaway "Parson" Brownlow" in the Civil War Governors of Kentucky Digital Documentary Edition, discovery.civilwargovernors.org/document/N00005294, (accessed November 4, 2025).

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Knoxville, Tennessee, newspaper editor, politician, and seventeenth governor of Tennessee. Wythe County, Virginia, native. Son of Joseph A. Brownlow and Catherine Gannaway Brownlow. Married to Eliza O'Brien Brownlow. Father of Susan Brownlow, John B. Brownlow, James P. Brownlow, Mary Brownlow, Fannie Brownlow, Annie Brownlow, and Caledonia T. Brownlow. Traveling minister from 1826 to 1836. Editor of Brownlow's Whig in Knoxville, Knox County, Tennessee, from 1839 to 1865. Employed William O'Brien, Francis Small, William Neal, and Hannibal Lathan as printers in Knoxville in 1850. Governor of the State of Tennessee from 1865 to 1869.

Seventh Manuscript Census of the United States (1850), Population Schedules, Kentucky, Knox County, Knoxville, p. 107B.
Eighth Manuscript Census of the United States (1860), Population Schedules, Kentucky, Knox County, District 1, p. 97.
Ninth Manuscript Census of the United States (1870), Population Schedules, Kentucky, Knox County, Knoxville Ward 3, p. 378A.
"Death of Ex-Senator W.G. Brownlow," The Morristown Gazette (Morristown, TN), May 2, 1877, p. 2.
Zella Armstrong, Notable Southern Families, vol. 1 (Chattanooga, TN: The Lookout Publishing Co., 1918), 39-45.
"William Gannaway Brownlow (1805-1877)," Find A Grave, Memorial 6842094, accessed April 26, 2023, https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/6842094.

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