James Brown CLAY, Congress, KY (1817-1864)

CLAY, James Brown, (son of Henry Clay), a Representative from Kentucky; born in Washington, D.C., November 9, 1817; pursued preparatory studies; attended Transylvania University, Lexington, Ky., and Kenyon College, Gambier, Ohio; clerk in a countinghouse in Boston 1832-1834; studied law at Lexington Law School; was admitted to the bar and practiced with his father in Lexington; Chargé d’Affaires to Portugal from August 1, 1849, to July 19, 1850; was a resident of Missouri in 1851 and 1852, when he returned to Lexington, Ky.; elected as a Democrat to the Thirty-fifth Congress (March 4, 1857-March 3, 1859); was not a candidate for renomination in 1858; declined the appointment by President Buchanan to a mission to Germany; member of the peace convention of 1861 held in Washington, D.C., in an effort to devise means to prevent the impending war; during the Civil War identified himself with the Confederacy; died in Montreal, Canada, January 26, 1864, where he had gone for his health; interment in Lexington Cemetery, Lexington, Kentucky.

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