William Wellington CORLETT, Congress, WY (1842-1890)

CORLETT, William Wellington, a Delegate from the Territory of Wyoming; born in Concord, Ohio, April 10, 1842; attended the district schools, and was graduated from the Willoughby (Ohio) Collegiate Institute in 1861; enlisted in the Union Army in 1862 and served in the Twenty-eighth Regiment, Ohio Volunteer Infantry and the Eighty-seventh Regiment, Ohio Volunteer Infantry; captured with the command at Harpers Ferry September 15, 1862; was paroled and returned to Ohio, where he taught school in Kirkland and Painesville; reentered the Army with the Twenty-fifth Ohio Battery; was later placed on detached service with the Third Iowa Battery; returned to Ohio in 1865; attended the law school of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, and was graduated from Union Law College, Cleveland, Ohio, in July 1866; was admitted to the bar the same year; professor in elementary law at the State University and Law College and lecturer at several commercial colleges in Cleveland; settled in Cheyenne, Wyo., August 20, 1867, and engaged in the practice of law; unsuccessful Republican candidate for Delegate to the Forty-first Congress in 1869; postmaster of Cheyenne in 1870; member of the Territorial senate in 1871; prosecuting attorney of Laramie County 1872-1876; elected as a Republican a Delegate to the Forty-fifth Congress (March 4, 1877-March 3, 1879); was not a candidate for renomination in 1878; resumed the practice of law; declined the appointment as chief justice of Wyoming Territory in 1879; member of the legislative council 1880-1882; died in Cheyenne, Wyo., July 22, 1890; interment in Lakeview Cemetery.

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