Howard

lower house of the Kentucky legislature. A few
years later he was elected to the Tenth Congress
(1807-09). He appeared on the opening day of
his first term, and a few weeks later was apolo-
gizing in a speech for his forwardness in pre-
suming to take a part so early. He assumed a
broad, national outlook in his political career,
loyally standing behind the administration.
Though not classed as one of the "War Hawks,"
he nevertheless worked actively for a larger army
and for the protection of his country's interests.
Reflected to the Eleventh Congress, he resigned
during its second session when, in April 1810,
President Madison, who had been noting How-
ard's loyal support, appointed him governor of
the District of Louisiana, the organized part of
the Louisiana Purchase remaining after the Ter-
ritory of Orleans (the southern part) had been
cut off. When in 1812 the latter division was ad-
mitted into the Union as the state of Louisiana
and the District of Louisiana was renamed the
Territory of Missouri, Howard was continued
as the governor. On Mar. 12, 1813, however,
when he was appointed brigadier-general in the
United States Army, and assigned to the Eighth
Military Department, which embraced the re-
gions west of the Mississippi River, he resigned
from the governorship. He took little part in the
war beyond a few raids against the Indians, and
he died in St. Louis before the end of hostilities.
Howard County, organized in 1816, was named
for him,

[Lewis and R. H. Collins, Hist, of Ky. (1874), vol.
II; Biog. Dir. Am. Cong. (1928) ; F. B. Heitman, Hist.
Reg. and Diet. U. S. Army (1903), vol. I; Lucien Carr,
Missouri, A Bone of Contention (1888) ; W. B. Stevens,
Centennial Hist, of Mo. (1921), vol. I; H. Niles's
Weekly Register (Baltimore), Oct. 9, 1813; Daily Nat.
Intelligencer (Washington, D. C.), Oct. 15, 1814.]

E.M.C.

HOWARD, BENJAMIN CHEW (Nov. 5,
I79i-Mar, 6, 1872), lawyer, politician, was born
at "Belvedere," near Baltimore, Md. His father,
Col. John Eager Howard [<?.#.], was a distin-
guished Revolutionary officer; his mother, Peggy
Oswald (Chew) Howard, was the daughter of
Benjamin Chew [g.z^.], president of the high
court of errors and appeals of Pennsylvania.
Young Howard received his elementary educa-
tion in the Baltimore schools and at the age of
fourteen entered the College of New Jersey
(Princeton), where he graduated with the de-
gree of B.A. in 1809. Three years later he re-
ceived the master's degree from the same insti-
tution. Toward the close of 1812 he studied law
in a Baltimore law office and about 1816 was ad-
mitted to the Maryland bar and began to prac-
tise his profession. During the second war with
Great Britain, he was captain of the "Mechanical

Howard

Volunteers of Baltimore," who played a promi-
nent part in the defense of that city at the battle
of North Point, fought Sept. 12, 1814. He main-
tained his connection with the Maryland militia
and was eventually commissioned brigadier-gen-
eral. In 1818 he married Jane Grant Gilmor.
Though he had a lucrative practice, he was not
dependent upon it and gave much time to civic
affairs. He was elected a member of the Balti-
more City Council in 1820, and four years later
a member of the Maryland House of Delegates.
When a group of citizens met to consider a
means of regaining for Baltimore "that portion
of the Western trade which had lately been di-
verted from it by the introduction of steam navi-
gation and other causes" (quoted in Maryland
Historical Magazine, March 1920, p. 15), How-
ard was a member of the committee which rec-
ommended the construction of a railroad between
Baltimore and the Ohio River.

In 1829 he was elected as a Democrat to the
Twenty-first Congress, and was reflected for the
succeeding term, serving Mar. 4, i829-Mar. 3,
1833. In 1835 President Jackson commissioned
him one of the peace commissioners of the United
States government in the boundary dispute be-
tween Ohio and Michigan. The same year he
was again elected to Congress, was reflected,
and served Mar.-4, i835-Mar. 3, 1839, being for
a time chairman of the committee on foreign rela-
tions* In 1840-41 he was a senator from Balti-
more in the Maryland General Assembly, and as
chairman submitted the Report of the Select
Committee to Whom were Referred Resolutions
of the States of Maine, Indiana and Ohio, in Re-
lation to the North-Eastern Boundary (1841).
He resigned before the expiration of his term,
and, on Jan. 27, 1843, was appointed reporter of
the United States Supreme Court. He wrote
twenty-four volumes of Supreme Court Reports,
covering the period 1843-62 (42-63 United
States Reports). These volumes were models of
clarity, diction, and thoroughness. He resigned
in 1861 to accept the Democratic nomination for
governor of Maryland, but was defeated at the
polls by Augustus W. Bradford [q.v.], an uncon-
ditional Unionist. In February 1861 he was a
Maryland delegate to the Peace Conference at
Washington. He died in Baltimore after a lin-
gering illness.

[Biog. Dir. Am. Cong. (1928) ; 13 Wallace's Reports,
vii; Md. Hist. Mag., Sept. 1914, Mar. 1920, Sept. 1922;
J. D. Warfield, The Founders of Anne Arundfl and
Howard Counties, Md. (1905) J M. P. Andrews, Ter-
centenary Hist, of Md. (i9^S), vol I; obituary in the
Sun (Baltimore), Mar. 7, 1872.] W.G.E.

HOWARD, BLANCHE WILLIS (July 21,
i847-0ct 7, 1898), author, daughter of Daniel

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