Carl SCHURZ, Congress, MO (1829-1906)

SCHURZ, Carl, a Senator from Missouri; born in Liblar, near Cologne, Germany, March 2, 1829; educated at the gymnasium of Cologne and the University of Bonn; having taken part in the German revolutionary movement of 1848, he was compelled to flee from Germany; was a newspaper correspondent in Paris and later taught school in London; immigrated to the United States in 1852 and settled in Philadelphia, Pa.; moved to Watertown, Wis., in 1855; studied law; admitted to the bar and practiced in Milwaukee, Wis.; unsuccessful candidate for lieutenant governor and governor of Wisconsin; appointed Minister to Spain in 1861 but resigned in 1862; during the Civil War was appointed brigadier general of volunteers in the Union Army; engaged in newspaper work after the war in St. Louis, Mo.; elected as a Republican to the United States Senate and served from March 4, 1869, to March 3, 1875; was not a candidate for reelection in 1874; served in the Cabinet of President Rutherford Hayes as Secretary of the Interior 1877-1881; editor of the New York Evening Post 1881-1884; contributor to Harper’s Weekly 1892-1898; president of the National Civil Service Reform League 1892-1901; engaged in literary pursuits; died in New York City, May 14, 1906; interment in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, Tarrytown, N.Y.

Bibliography

American National Biography; Dictionary of American Biography; Schurz, Carl. Reminiscences. 3 vols. New York: McClure Co., 1907-1908; Trefousse, Hans L. Carl Schurz: A Biography. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1982.

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