Mason Mathews

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Mason Mathews
Member of the Virginia House of Delegates
from the Greenbrier district
In office
1859–1865
Preceded byThomas Creigh
Succeeded bySeat abolished
Personal details
BornDecember 15, 1803
Lewisburg, Virginia (now West Virginia)
DiedSeptember 16, 1878 (aged 74)
Lewisburg, West Virginia
Resting placeOld Stone Church, Lewisburg, West Virginia
Political partyWhig
SpouseEliza Shore Reynolds
Children
Eight, including:
  • Henry Mason Mathews
  • Alexander Ferdinand Mathews
Parents
  • Joseph Mathews (father)
  • Mary "Polly" Edgar (mother)
RelativesMathews family
Residence(s)1335 Washington East Street
Lewisburg, West Virginia
Committees
  • Committee on Claims
  • Joint Commission on Executive Expenditures
  • Treasurer's Account

Mason Mathews (December 15, 1803 – September 16, 1878) was an American merchant and politician in the U.S. State of Virginia (present-day

State of West Virginia in 1863, he continued to represent Greenbrier County in Virginia's Confederate legislature in Richmond until war's end. He was a member of the Mathews political family
.

Early life and business

See also: Mathews family

Mason Mathews was born on December 15, 1803, in

Greenbrier County, Virginia, to Mary Edgar and Joseph Mathews.[1] His family was politically prominent in western Virginia.[2] One of his great-uncles, Archer Mathews, served as an original trustee of the City of Lewisburg when it was founded in 1782.[3] Mason Mathews's father bought an early lot in the city, and moved his family from Augusta County (present-day Rockbridge County) to Lewisburg in the 1790s.[2]

Mason Mathews was primarily

Alexander Ferdinand, Joseph William, Eliza Thomas, and Sally Patton.[4]

Around 1827, Mathews moved to Frankford, Virginia (now West Virginia), where he established a successful mercantile business. Beginning in 1845, he resided at 1335 Washington Street East, in Lewisburg, West Virginia.[5] He sent his three sons to be educated at the University of Virginia.[1][2] In 1860, he owned 10 slaves.[6]

Political career

Local offices

Mathews was elected sheriff of Greenbrier County around 1825, under

Free Schools,[1] which raised and deployed funding for the education of poor children in the absence of a public school system.[7]

Virginia House of Delegates

In 1859, Mathews was elected to the Virginia House of Delegates for Greenbrier County as a representative of the Whig Party.[8] In the 1860 presidential election, Republican Abraham Lincoln won the presidency over Democrat John C. Breckinridge. As a result, Southerners began to discuss secession in earnest.[9] Mathews, like many western Virginians, opposed secession;[2] on April 11, 1861, Mathews wrote to a local newspaper, "I am in favor of the preservation of our glorious Union, and a resort to all Constitutional remedies for its restoration. Next to my Bible, I reverence [the] Constitution of my Country & the Union."[10] However, on April 17, Virginia's Ordinance of Secession passed. Mathews, along with Greenbrier County, chose to support the Confederate States of America.[2]

Unionists from northwestern Virginia soon met at the

State of West Virginia in June 1863.[12] Mathews chose to ignore the new state, and though he found himself living in Union territory, continued to travel to Richmond, Virginia to represent his county in the Confederate Virginia House of Delegates, where he kept his seat throughout the war.[2][13]

In the House, Mathews served on several standing committees related to state fiscal policy. These included the Committee on Claims, which generally dealt with issues related to private bills and petitions, and the Joint Commission on Executive Expenditures, from which body he submitted legislation supporting the families of soldiers injured in the war, and advocated for improved infrastructure in western Virginia by means of an extended Covington and Ohio Railroad.[14][2] He also was tasked with examining the state Treasurer's accounts.[2]

Civil War

General Floyd's retreat after Carnifex Ferry. The Confederate loss led to a public feud between him and fellow general Henry A. Wise, which Mason Mathews arbitrated.

On the outbreak of war, Mathews' sons volunteered for the

William S. Rosecrans. The battle was a strategic win for the Union, causing the Confederates to withdraw from the northwestern Virginia region. Generals Wise and Floyd each blamed the other for the loss, resulting in significant discord in the ranks and negative attention from newspapers.[16]

Mathews, to assess the urgency of the situation, spent several days in the camps of both Wise and Floyd, and then wrote to Confederate President Jefferson Davis urging that both men be deposed, stating, "They are as inimical to each other as men could be, and from their course of actions I am fully satisfied that each of them would be highly gratified to see the other annihilated."[17][18] Letters from Mathews and others, as well as the correspondence from the generals themselves, moved Davis to address the rift between the generals, which at this point had spread throughout their respective camps.[19] Davis removed Wise from his command.[16]

The 1862 Battle of Lewisburg, another Confederate loss, further destabilized the region.[20] Union occupations and raiding of Lewisburg followed, including the raiding of one of Mathews' properties during the fall of 1863. In a letter to a son, he recalled, "[t]hey appropriated everything they wished when they went, many fared worse than I did. I think we ought to be thankful that they treated us no worse."[21] He cited the loss of farming equipment, a vehicle, a horse, livestock, material goods, and a formerly enslaved person named Ned, who likely left with the Union troops.[21]

Later life

Mathews' gravesite, Old Stone Church, Lewisburg, West Virginia

When the Confederacy dissolved, all other Confederate soldiers and office holders were barred from holding state office. Mathews' eldest son,

governor of West Virginia.[22] Mason Mathews died of pneumonia at his home in Lewisburg on September 16, 1878, at the age of 74, and was buried at the Old Stone Church in Lewisburg, West Virginia.[23]

Mathews' daughter, Virginia Amanda Mathews, married Alfred S. Patrick in 1863. Their son

US Air Corps from the Air Service, and he served as the first Chief of the Air Corps from 1926-1927.[24]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g Callahan, p. 8
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Combs, p. 7
  3. ISBN 9780788408113
    .Page 284
  4. ^ Combs, p. 7-8
  5. ^ "Historic Walking Tour, Lewisburg West Virginia". Greenbrier County Convention & Visitors Bureau. Retrieved April 17, 2020.
  6. ^ "Population schedules of the eighth census of the United States, 1860, Virginia", United States census, 1967; page 246,.
  7. ^ Rice, p. 165
  8. ^ Kromkowski, C. (2005). "The Virginia Elections and State Elected Officials Database Project, 1776-2007". The Virginia Elections and State Elected Officials Database Project, 1776-2007. University of Virginia Library. Retrieved April 17, 2020.[permanent dead link]
  9. ISBN 978-1-57003-255-4
    .
  10. ^ Mathews, Mason (April 20, 1861). "To the Editor of the Chronicle". Lewisburg Chronicle. Lewisburg, West Virginia.
  11. ^ a b "VIRGINIA.; The Restored Government of Virginia—History of the New State of Things". The New York Times. June 26, 1864.
  12. ^ A State of Convenience:The Creation of West Virginia. West Virginia Archives & History. Retrieved November 12, 2014.
  13. ^ Rice, p. 132
  14. ^ "Journal of the House of Delegates of the State of Virginia, for the Called Session of 1863". Virginia General Assembly. Retrieved April 17, 2020.
  15. ^ Combs, p. 18
  16. ^ a b "Confederate General Henry Wise Relieved of Duty; 'Contraband' Allowed in Navy". Civil War Daily Gazette. 2011. Archived from the original on 2013-12-21. Retrieved April 17, 2020.
  17. ^ Rice, p. 264
  18. OCLC 262466842
    . Retrieved April 17, 2020.
  19. S2CID 161403386
    .
  20. ^ "Civil War in Greenbrier County: The Battle of Lewisburg". Greenbrier Historical Society. 2013. Retrieved April 17, 2020.
  21. ^ a b Combs, p. 22
  22. ^ a b Addkinson-Simmons
  23. ^ a b Combs, p. 41
  24. ^ "MAJOR GENERAL MASON M. PATRICK". Official United States Air Force Website. Retrieved April 17, 2020.

Bibliography

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