Augustus Octavius BACON, Congress, GA (1839-1914)

BACON, Augustus Octavius, (cousin of William S. Howard), a Senator from Georgia; born in Bryan County, Ga., October 20, 1839; attended the common schools in Liberty and Troup Counties; graduated from the literary department of the University of Georgia at Athens in 1859 and from its law department in 1860; admitted to the bar in 1860 and commenced practice in Atlanta, Ga.; entered the Confederate Army at the beginning of the Civil War and served during the campaigns of 1861 and 1862 as adjutant of the Ninth Georgia Regiment in the Army of Northern Virginia; subsequently commissioned captain in the Provisional Army of the Confederacy and assigned to general staff duty; at the close of the war resumed the practice of law in Macon, Ga.; member of the State house of representatives 1871-1886, serving as speaker pro tempore for two terms and as speaker eight years; president of the Democratic State convention in 1880; elected as a Democrat to the United States Senate in 1894; reelected in 1900, 1906 and again in 1913, and served from March 4, 1895, until his death; served as President pro tempore during the Sixty-second Congress; chairman, Committee on Engrossed Bills (Sixtieth and Sixty-first Congresses), Committee on Private Land Claims (Sixty-first and Sixty-second Congresses), Committee on Foreign Relations (Sixty-third Congress); died in Washington, D.C., February 14, 1914; funeral services were held in the Senate Chamber; interment in Rose Hill Cemetery, Macon, Ga.

Bibliography

Dictionary of American Biography; Steelman, Lola Carr. “The Public Career of Augustus Bacon.” Ph.D. dissertation, University of North Carolina, 1950; U.S. Congress. Memorial Addresses. 63rd Cong., 3rd sess., 1914-1915. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1915.

Source: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, 1771-Present