29 Facts About Richard Hawes

Richard Hawes was part of the politically influential Hawes family.

Richard Hawes's brother, uncle, and cousin served as US Representatives, and his grandson Harry B Hawes was a member of the United States Senate.

At the outbreak of the Civil War, Richard Hawes was a supporter of Kentucky's doctrine of armed neutrality.

When Kentucky's Confederate government was formed in Russellville, Richard Hawes was offered the position of state auditor, but declined.

Richard Hawes relocated to Virginia, where he conducted a Confederate government in exile for Kentucky and continued to lobby President Jefferson Davis to attempt another invasion of the state.

Richard Hawes swore an oath of allegiance to the Union, and was allowed to return to his law practice.

Richard Hawes was elected county judge of Bourbon County, a post he held until his death in 1877.

Richard Hawes was one of eleven children born to Richard and Clara Walker Hawes.

On November 13,1818, Richard Hawes married Hetty Morrison Nicholas of Lexington.

Richard Hawes pursued classical studies at Transylvania University, then studied law under Robert C Wickliffe.

Richard Hawes began his political career in 1828 when he was elected as a Whig to represent Clark County, Kentucky, in the Kentucky House of Representatives.

Richard Hawes was an unsuccessful candidate for US Representative in 1834, but was elected to represent Henry Clay's "Ashland District" three years later, serving from March 4,1837, to March 3,1841.

Richard Hawes then moved to Paris, Kentucky in 1843 and continued the practice of law.

Richard Hawes was once close friends with Clay, though the friendship between them cooled when Richard Hawes supported Zachary Taylor instead of Clay for president in 1848.

When Kentucky's neutrality was breached in September 1861, Richard Hawes fled to Virginia to escape imprisonment by Federal authorities.

Richard Hawes resigned his military commission two days later, but his departure for Bowling Green was delayed when he was stricken with typhoid fever.

Richard Hawes later denied ever taking the oath of office, and became a vocal critic of Bragg.

Scant records show that, on December 30,1862, Richard Hawes summoned the council, auditor, and treasurer to his location at Athens, Tennessee, for a meeting on January 15,1863.

Richard Hawes unsuccessfully lobbied President Davis to remove Richard Hawes's former superior, Humphrey Marshall, from command.

Richard Hawes was embarrassed to admit that neither he nor anyone else seemed to know what became of approximately $45,000 that had been sent from Columbus to Memphis, Tennessee, during the Confederate occupation of Kentucky.

Records show that as late as September 16,1864, Richard Hawes still maintained hope for another military advance into Kentucky.

Richard Hawes never had to act on the request as Morgan was suspended from command on August 10 and killed by Union troops on September 4,1864.

Finally satisfied that it was safe to return to Kentucky, Richard Hawes arrived in Paris to find his home had been burned by Union troops.

Four of Richard Hawes's sons served in the Confederate Army, including brigadier general James Morrison Richard Hawes; only three sons returned home from the war.

On September 18,1865, Richard Hawes took an oath of allegiance to the United States, and was allowed to return to his previous career as a lawyer.

Richard Hawes based this decision on the fact that the Bureau's powers extended only to states that had been part of the rebellion, which Kentucky had not.

Richard Hawes was chosen master commissioner of the circuit court in 1866.

In 1871, Richard Hawes was mentioned as a possible candidate for governor of Kentucky.

Richard Hawes died in Paris, Kentucky, on May 25,1877, and was interred in Paris Cemetery.