Hernando De Soto MONEY, Congress, MS (1839-1912)

MONEY, Hernando De Soto, (cousin of James Kimble Vardaman), a Representative and a Senator from Mississippi; born at Zeiglersville, Holmes County, Miss., August 26, 1839; moved in early childhood to Carrollton, Carroll County, Miss.; received his early education in the public schools and from a private tutor; graduated from the law department of the University of Mississippi at Oxford; admitted to the bar and commenced practice in Carrollton about 1860; served in the Confederate Army throughout the Civil War; engaged in planting in Leflore County; returned to Carrollton and edited the Conservative; moved to Winona, Montgomery County, Miss., and edited the Winona Advance 1873-1875; mayor of Winona 1873-1874; elected as a Democrat to the Forty-fourth and to the four succeeding Congresses (March 4, 1875-March 3, 1885); declined to be a candidate for renomination in 1884; chairman, Committee on Post Office and Post Roads (Forty-sixth and Forty-eighth Congresses); engaged in the practice of law in Washington, D.C., until 1891, when he returned to Carrollton, Miss.; elected to the Fifty-third and Fifty-fourth Congresses (March 4, 1893-March 3, 1897); elected in January 1896 as a Democrat to the United States Senate for the term commencing March 4, 1899; during the interim was appointed in October 1897 and subsequently elected to the United States Senate to fill the vacancy caused by the death of James Z. George; reelected in 1904 and served from October 8, 1897, to March 3, 1911; declined to be a candidate for reelection; Democratic caucus chairman (1909-1911); chairman, Committee on Corporations Organized in the District of Columbia (Sixtieth Congress), Committee on Additional Accommodations for the Library (Sixtieth Congress); returned to his home near Biloxi, Harrison County, Miss., and died there September 18, 1912; interment in the family vault at Carrollton, Carroll County, Miss.

Bibliography

American National Biography; Dictionary of American Biography; Schlup, Leonard. “Hernando De Soto Money: War Advocate and Anti-Imperialist, 1898-1900.” Journal of Mississippi History 60 (Winter 1998): 315-39.

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