Solomon P. Sharp
Solomon Sharp | |
---|---|
Attorney General of Kentucky | |
In office October 30, 1821 – November 7, 1825 | |
Governor | John Adair Joseph Desha |
Preceded by | Ben Hardin |
Succeeded by | Frederick Grayson |
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Kentucky's 6th district | |
In office March 4, 1813 – March 3, 1817 | |
Preceded by | Joseph Desha |
Succeeded by | David Walker |
Personal details | |
Born | Solomon Porcius Sharp August 22, 1787 Kentucky militia |
Years of service | 1812 |
Rank | Colonel |
Battles/wars | War of 1812 |
Solomon Porcius Sharp (August 22, 1787 – November 7, 1825) was an American lawyer and politician, serving as attorney general of Kentucky and a member of the United States Congress and the Kentucky General Assembly. His murder by Jereboam O. Beauchamp in 1825 is referred to as the Beauchamp–Sharp Tragedy or "The Kentucky Tragedy."
Sharp began his political career representing Warren County in the Kentucky House of Representatives. He briefly served in the War of 1812, then returned to Kentucky and was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1813. He was re-elected to a second term, though his support of a controversial bill regarding legislator salaries cost him his seat in 1816. Allied with Kentucky's Debt Relief Party, he returned to the Kentucky House in 1817; in 1821, he accepted Governor John Adair's appointment to the post of Attorney General of Kentucky. Adair's successor, Joseph Desha, re-appointed him to this position. In 1825, Sharp resigned as attorney general to return to the Kentucky House.
In 1820, rumors surfaced that Sharp had fathered a
Personal life
Solomon Sharp was born on August 22, 1787, at
Sharp "[intermittently attended] one of Logan County's academies" during his childhood years; the schools of Logan County were primitive at the time.[10] He read the law and was admitted to the bar in 1806.[11] He opened a practice in Russellville, but soon relocated to the busier Warren County seat of Bowling Green, which had 154 residents in 1810.[12] He engaged in land speculation, sometimes in partnership with his brother, Dr. Leander Sharp, and by 1824, had acquired 11,000 acres, mostly north of the Barren River in Warren County.
Marriage and family
After becoming established, on December 17, 1818, Sharp at the age of 31 married Eliza T. Scott, the daughter of a physician who had served as an officer in the War of 1812. She was from Frankfort and above him in social standing.[13] They had three children together. He moved the family to the state capital of Frankfort in 1820 for his political career.[14][15]
Political career
In 1809, Sharp was elected to represent Warren County in the Kentucky House of Representatives.
Sharp's political service was interrupted by the
U.S. Representative
In 1812,
Sharp was re-elected to the Fourteenth Congress, during which he served as chairman of the Committee on Private Land Claims.[18] He supported the controversial Compensation Act of 1816 sponsored by fellow Kentuckian Richard Mentor Johnson.[24] The measure, which paid Congressmen a flat salary instead of paying them on a daily basis for the days when they were in session, was unpopular with the voters of his district.[24] When the next congressional session opened in December 1816, Sharp reversed his position and voted to repeal the law, but the damage was already done; he lost his seat in the House in the next election.[24]
In 1817, Sharp was again elected to the Kentucky House of Representatives. During his term, he supported measures for internal improvements, but opposed the creation of a state health board and a proposal to open the state's vacant lands to the widows and orphans of soldiers killed in the War of 1812. Most notably, he supported the creation of 46[25] new banks in the state, and proposed a tax on the branches of the Bank of the United States in Lexington and Louisville.[24]
Accusations of illegitimate child
In May or June 1820, Anna Cooke, an unmarried planter's daughter in her early 30s, claimed that Sharp was the father of her illegitimate child;[26][27] Sharp denied her claim.[28] The stillborn child was rumored to have dark skin, and some speculated that it was a mulatto, with a black father.[28] After her father's death and the sale of their plantation in Fairfax County, Virginia, Cooke had moved with her mother and siblings to Warren County between 1805 and 1810, when she may have met Sharp. In addition to losing the child, Cooke suffered the deaths of three of her five brothers between 1818 and 1821.[26]
The scandal soon abated for Sharp, as Anna had a reputation as "a freethinker, reader of romantic fiction, and a libertine".[29] Although Sharp's political opponents would continue to call attention to his putative child in future campaigns, his reputation remained largely untarnished.[29]
Attorney general of Kentucky
In 1821, Sharp began a campaign for a seat in the Kentucky Senate. His opponent, attorney John U. Waring, was a notably violent and contentious man, frequently in court because of altercations.[26] (In 1835, he shot and killed the attorney Samuel Q. Richardson).[30]
Waring sent two threatening letters to Sharp, and on June 18, 1821, published a handbill attacking Sharp's character. Five days later, Sharp ceased campaigning for the senatorial seat. He accepted an appointment by Governor John Adair to the position of attorney general of Kentucky. Sharp's nomination was unanimously confirmed by the legislature on October 30, 1821.[31]
Sharp took office at a critical time Kentucky's history. Still reeling from the financial Panic of 1819, state politicians had split into two camps: those who supported legislation favorable to debtors (the Debt Relief Party) and those who favored the protection of creditors (typically called Anti-Reliefers.) Sharp had identified with the Relief Party, as had Governor Adair.[32]
In the 1824 presidential election, Sharp alienated some of his constituency by supporting his former House colleague John C. Calhoun instead of Kentucky's favorite son, Henry Clay. When it was clear that Calhoun's bid would fail, Sharp threw his support behind Andrew Jackson. He served as secretary of a meeting of Jackson supporters in Frankfort on October 2, 1824.[33]
After Governor Adair's term expired in 1825, he was succeeded by another Relief Party member, General
Sharp's role in the Relief Party's plan to abolish the old court and replace it with a new, more favorable court is not known. As he was the administration's chief legal counsel, historians believe he was closely involved. He is known to have issued the order for Old Court clerk Achilles Sneed to turn over his records to New Court clerk
State House of Representatives
On May 11, 1825, Sharp was chosen to represent the Desha administration in welcoming the
The Anti-Relief partisans nominated former Senator John J. Crittenden for one of the two seats apportioned to Franklin County in the state House.[37] The Relief Party countered with Sharp and Lewis Sanders, a prominent area lawyer.[37] During the sharply contested campaign, both John U. Waring and Patrick Henry Darby, a land speculator, said that Sharp's life was at risk if he won. Opponents revived the charges of Sharp's illegitimate child.[38] It was also alleged that Sharp had claimed that the child was mulatto and said he had a certificate from Cooke's midwife to that effect;[26] whether Sharp made this claim may never be known for certain.[38] Despite the controversy, Sharp netted the most votes in the election, winning by 69 out of a total of 1600 votes cast in the county.[26][38]
Murder and aftermath
In the early hours of November 7, 1825, the day the General Assembly was to open its session, a man knocked on the door of Sharp's residence. When Sharp answered the door, the visitor grabbed him with his left hand and used his right to stab him in the heart with a poisoned dagger. Sharp died at approximately two o'clock in the morning. After lying in state in the House of Representatives Hall, he was buried in Frankfort Cemetery.[39]
Because of the bitterness of the campaign and the timing of the murder, speculation mounted that Sharp had been killed by an Anti-Relief partisan. For some time, rumors traveled that Darby was implicated in his death. Sharp's political rival, John J. Crittenden, tried to blunt such accusations by personally introducing a resolution condemning the murder and offering a $3000 reward for the capture of the assassin.[40] The trustees of the city of Frankfort added a reward of $1000, and an additional $2000 reward was raised from private sources.[41][42] In the 1825 session of the General Assembly, a measure to form Sharp County from Muhlenberg County died on the floor due to the tumultuous politics of the session.[7]
In the investigation that followed, the evidence quickly pointed to Jereboam O. Beauchamp, 23, who had married the much older Anna Cooke in 1824. On November 11, 1825, a four-man
He was tried and convicted of Sharp's murder on May 19, 1826. His sentence – execution by hanging – was to be carried out on June 16, 1826.[43] Beauchamp requested a stay of execution so that he could write a justification of his actions; he continued to assert his avenging his wife's honor. The request was granted, allowing Beauchamp to complete his book, The Confession of Jereboam O. Beauchamp: who was hanged at Frankfort, Ky., on the 7th day of July, 1826, for the murder of Col. Solomon P. Sharp. After two suicide attempts with his wife, who died as a result of the second incident, Beauchamp was hanged for his crime on July 7, 1826.[44] Beauchamp's Confession was published in 1826.[45] Some editions included The Letters of Ann Cook as an appendix. Historians dispute whether Cooke was their author.[45]
The following year, Sharp's brother, Dr. Leander Sharp, wrote Vindication of the Character of the Late Col. Solomon P. Sharp to defend him from the charges contained in Beauchamp's confession.[45] In Vindication, Dr. Sharp portrayed the killing as a political assassination: he named Patrick Darby, a partisan of the Anti-Relief faction, as co-conspirator with Beauchamp, an Anti-Relief stalwart.[46] Darby threatened to sue Sharp if he published his Vindication; and Waring threatened to kill him.[46] Heeding these threats, Sharp did not publish his work; all extant manuscripts remained in his house, where they were discovered many years later during a remodeling.[46]
In popular culture
The events have inspired numerous works of fiction, drama and history:[47]
- Charles Fenno Hoffman's novel, Greyslayer
- William Gilmore Simms's novel, Beauchamp
- Edgar Allan Poe's unfinished play, Politian
- J.G. Dana and R.S. Thomas's history, Beauchamp's Trial.
- L.F. Johnson included it in his Tragedies and Trials.
- 1950, J. Winston Coleman published a history of the events.
- 1950, Robert Penn Warren wrote a novel that was a "critique of romantic values" in World Enough and Time.
- Richard Taylor's play, Three Kentucky Tragedies, was based on this.
- 1992 John Hawkins created an outdoor drama on this subject, Wounded is the Wounding Heart, produced in Frankfort, Kentucky.
See also
Notes
- ^ Whited, pp. 404–405
- ^ a b Cooke, Part I, p. 27
- ^ Schoenbachler, p. 14
- ^ a b c Levin, p. 109
- ^ Cooke, Part I, pp. 26-27
- ^ Allen, p. 256
- ^ a b c d Mathias, 814
- ^ Bruce, p. 9
- ^ Schoenbachler, p. 15
- ^ Schoenbachler, p. 22
- ^ Schoenbachler 24
- ^ Cooke, Part I, pp. 27, 29
- ^ a b c Cooke, Part I, p. 31
- ^ Bruce 11
- ^ Schoenbachler 67
- ^ a b c Cooke, Part I, p. 30
- ^ Schoenbachler, p. 27
- ^ a b c Congressional Bio
- ^ Schoenbachler 29
- ^ a b c Cooke, Part I, p. 33
- ^ Cooke, Part I, pp. 32–33
- ^ Schoenbachler, p. 30-31
- ^ (Schoenbachler, p. 34)
- ^ a b c d Cooke, Part I, p. 34
- ^ Schoenbachler, p. 40
- ^ a b c d e Cooke, "Portrait of a Murderess", pp. 209-210
- ^ Bruce 10
- ^ a b Cooke, Part I, p. 38
- ^ a b Cooke, Part I, p. 39
- ^ L. Johnson, pp. 58-59
- ^ Cooke, Part I, pp. 39–40
- ^ Cooke, Part II, pp. 121–125
- ^ Cooke, Part II, p. 126
- ^ Cooke, Part II, pp. 126–130
- ^ Cooke, Part II, pp. 130–131
- ^ Cooke, Part II, p. 134
- ^ a b Kirwan, p. 58
- ^ a b c Cooke, Part II, p. 135
- ^ Cooke, Part II, pp. 137–140
- ^ Kirwan, p. 60
- ^ L. Johnson, p. 48
- ^ Cooke, Part II, p. 140
- ^ L. Johnson, p. 49
- ^ Cooke, Part II, pp. 143–146
- ^ a b c Whited, p. 404
- ^ a b c Johnson, "New Light of Beauchamp's Confession"
- ^ Cooke, Sharp, Part I
References
- Allen, William B. (1872). A History of Kentucky: Embracing Gleanings, Reminiscences, Antiquities, Natural Curiosities, Statistics, and Biographical Sketches of Pioneers, Soldiers, Jurists, Lawyers, Statesmen, Divines, Mechanics, Farmers, Merchants, and Other Leading Men, of All Occupations and Pursuits. Bradley & Gilbert. Retrieved 2008-11-10.
- Bruce, Dickson D. (2006). The Kentucky Tragedy: A Story of Conflict and Change in Antebellum America. Louisiana State University Press. ISBN 0-8071-3173-3.
- J.W. Cooke (1991), "Portrait of a Murderess: Anna Cook(e) Beauchamp", Filson Historical Quarterly, April, Vol. 65, No. 2, pp. 209–210
- Cooke, J.W. (January 1998). "The Life and Death of Colonel Solomon P. Sharp Part 1: Uprightness and Inventions; Snares and Net" (PDF). The Filson Club Quarterly. 72 (1): 24–41.
- Cooke, J.W. (April 1998). "The Life and Death of Colonel Solomon P. Sharp Part 2: A Time to Weep and A Time to Mourn". The Filson Club Quarterly. 72 (2): 121–151.
- Johnson, Fred M. (1993). "New Light on Beauchamp's Confession?". Border States Online. Archived from the original on 2014-02-03. Retrieved 2008-12-18.
- Johnson, Lewis Franklin (1922). Famous Kentucky tragedies and trials; a collection of important and interesting tragedies and criminal trials which have taken place in Kentucky. The Baldwin Law Publishing Company. Archived from the original on 2005-03-08. Retrieved 2008-11-22.
- Kirwan, Albert Dennis (1974). John J. Crittenden: The Struggle for the Union. Greenwood Press. ISBN 0-8371-6922-4.
- Levin, H. (1897). Lawyers and Lawmakers of Kentucky. Chicago, Illinois: Lewis Publishing Company. Retrieved 2008-01-10.
- Mathias, Frank F. (1992). Kleber, John E (ed.). The Kentucky Encyclopedia. Associate editors: ISBN 0-8131-1772-0.
- Schoenbachler, Matthew G. (2009). Murder & Madness: The Myth of the Kentucky Tragedy. Lexington, Kentucky: The University Press of Kentucky. ISBN 978-0-8131-2566-4.
- United States Congress. "Solomon P. Sharp (id: S000295)". Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.
- Whited, Stephen R. (2002). "Kentucky Tragedy". In Joseph M. Flora and Lucinda Hardwick MacKethan (ed.). The Companion to Southern Literature: Themes, Genres, Places, People. Associate Editor: Todd W. Taylor. LSU Press. ISBN 0-8071-2692-6. Retrieved 2008-01-24.
Further reading
- Beauchamp, Jereboam O. (1826). The confession of Jereboam O. Beauchamp: who was hanged at Frankfort, Ky., on the 7th day of July, 1826, for the murder of Col. Solomon P. Sharp. Retrieved 2008-01-10.
- Bruce, Dickson D. (2003). "The Kentucky Tragedy and the Transformation of Politics in the Early American Republic". The American Transcendental Quarterly. 17.
- Coleman, John Winston (1950). The Beauchamp-Sharp tragedy; an episode of Kentucky history during the middle 1820s. Frankfort, Kentucky: Roberts Print. Co.
- St. Clair, Henry (1835). The United States Criminal Calendar. Charles Gaylord. Retrieved 2008-12-09.
- Sharp, Leander J. (1827). Vindication of the character of the late Col. Solomon P. Sharp. Frankfort, Kentucky: A. Kendall and company.