Everything about Nathaniel P Banks totally explained
Nathaniel Prentice (or Prentiss) Banks (
January 30,
1816 –
September 1,
1894) was an
American politician and
soldier, served as
Governor of Massachusetts,
Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives and as a
Union general during the
American Civil War.
Early life
Banks was born at
Waltham, Massachusetts, the first child of Nathaniel P. Banks, Sr., and Rebecca Greenwood Banks. He received only a common school education and at an early age began work as a bobbin boy in a local cotton factory; throughout his life he was known by the humorous nickname, Bobbin Boy Banks. Subsequently, he apprenticed as a mechanic, briefly edited several weekly newspapers, studied law and was admitted to the
bar at age 23, his energy and his ability as a public speaker soon winning him distinction. His booming, distinctive voice and oracular style of delivery made him a commanding presence before an audience. On
April 11 1847, at
Providence, Rhode Island, he married Mary Theodosia Palmer, an ex-factory employee, after a lengthy courtship.
Political career
Banks served as a
Democrat in the
Massachusetts House of Representatives from 1849 to 1853, and was speaker in 1851 and 1852; he was president of the state
Constitutional Convention of 1853, and in the same year was elected to the
United States House of Representatives as a coalition candidate of Democrats and
Free-Soilers. In 1854, he was reelected as a
Know Nothing.
At the opening of the Thirty-Fourth Congress, men from several parties opposed to slavery's spread gradually united in supporting Banks for speaker, and after the longest and one of the most bitter speakership contests ever, lasting, from
December 3 1855 to
February 2 1856, he was chosen on the 133rd ballot. This has been called the first national victory of the
Republican party. He gave antislavery men important posts in Congress for the first time, and cooperated with investigations of both the Kansas conflict and the caning of Senator
Charles Sumner. Yet, he also left a legacy of fairness in his appointments and decisions. He played a key role in 1856 in bringing forward
John C. Frémont as a moderate Republican presidential nominee. As a part of this process, Banks declined, as pre-arranged, the presidential nomination of those Know-Nothings, opposed to the spread of slavery, in favor of Republican Frémont. For the next few years, Banks was supported by a coalition of Know-Nothings and Republicans in Massachusetts. His interest in the Know-Nothing legislative agenda was minimal, supporting only some tougher residency requirements for voting.
Re-elected in 1856 as a Republican, he resigned his seat in December 1857, and was
governor of Massachusetts from 1858 to 1860, during a period of government contraction forced by the depression of those years. He made a serious attempt to gain the Republican presidential nomination in 1860, but discord within his party in Massachusetts, a residence in a "safe" Republican state, and his Know-Nothing past doomed his chances. He then was briefly resident director in
Chicago, Illinois, of the
Illinois Central Railroad, hired primarily to promote sale of the railroad's extensive lands.
Civil War
As the Civil War became imminent,
President Abraham Lincoln considered Banks for a cabinet post, and eventually chose him as one of the first
major generals of volunteers, appointing him on
May 16 1861. Perceptions that the Massachusetts militia was well organized and armed at the beginning of the Civil War likely played a role in the appointment decision, as Banks had also been considered for
quartermaster general. He was initially resented by many of the generals who had graduated from the
United States Military Academy, but Banks brought political benefits to the administration, including the ability to attract recruits and money for the Federal cause.
First command
Banks first commanded at
Annapolis, Maryland, suppressing support for the
Confederacy in a slave-holding state that was at risk of seceding, then was sent to command on the upper
Potomac when Brig. Gen.
Robert Patterson failed to move aggressively in that area.
The Shenandoah Valley Campaign
When Maj. Gen.
George B. McClellan entered upon his
Peninsula Campaign in spring 1862, the important duty of keeping the Confederate forces of
Stonewall Jackson in the
Shenandoah Valley from reinforcing the defenses of
Richmond fell to the two divisions commanded by Banks. When Banks's men reached the southern Valley at the end of a difficult supply line, the president recalled them to
Strasburg, Virginia, at the northern end. Jackson then marched rapidly down the adjacent Luray Valley, driving Banks's retreating men from
Winchester, Virginia, on
May 25, and north to the
Potomac River. Jackson's campaign of maneuver and lightning strikes against superior forces in the Valley—under Banks and other Union generals—humiliated the North and made him one of the most famous generals in American history.
On
August 9, Banks again encountered Jackson at
Cedar Mountain, in
Culpeper County, and attacked him to gain early advantage, but a Confederate counterattack led by
A.P. Hill repulsed Banks's corps and won the day. The arrival at the end of the day of Union reinforcements under Maj. Gen.
John Pope, as well as the rest of Jackson's men, resulted in a two-day stand-off there. The Northern newspapers provided flattering versions of Banks's performance while Southern newspapers (and virtually all military historians) called the battle a Southern victory.
The Army of the Gulf
Banks next received command of the defense forces at
Washington. In November 1862 he was asked to organize a force of 30,000 new recruits, drawn from
New York and
New England. As a former governor of Massachusetts, he was politically connected to the governors of these states, and the recruitment effort was successful. In December he sailed from
New York with a this large force of raw recruits to replace Maj. Gen.
Benjamin Butler at
New Orleans, Louisiana, as commander of the Department of the Gulf. Under orders to ascend the
Mississippi River to join forces with
Ulysses S. Grant, who was then trying to capture
Vicksburg, Banks first pushed a Confederate force up the
Teche Bayou and marched to
Alexandria, Louisiana, hauling off slaves, cotton, and cattle from a rich agricultural area.
Siege of Port Hudson
When the Confederates reduced their garrison at
Port Hudson, Louisiana, on the Mississippi, he invested that place in May 1863. Two attempts to carry the works by storm during the
Siege of Port Hudson, as at Vicksburg, were dismal failures. Port Hudson was the first time African American soldiers were used in a major Civil War battle, as permitted by Banks. Low on food and ammunition, the garrison surrendered on
July 9,
1863, after receiving word that Vicksburg had fallen. The entire Mississippi River was then under Union control.
In the autumn of 1863, Banks organized two seaborne expeditions to
Texas, chiefly for the purpose of preventing the French in
Mexico from aiding the Confederates or occupying Texas, and he eventually secured possession of the region near the mouth of the
Rio Grande and the Texas outer islands.
Red River Campaign
The
Red River Campaign, March–May 1864, was considered a strategic distraction by his superior, Ulysses S. Grant, who wanted Banks to drive east to capture
Mobile, Alabama, as part of a coordinated series of offensives in the spring of 1864. Banks himself disagreed with the plan, hoping instead to mount an expedition to capture Galveston, but the movement was ordered by Chief of Staff
Henry Halleck. Halleck's plan was approved by the Lincoln administration and General Banks went ahead with it under official protest. He fought against General
Richard Taylor (son of former President
Zachary Taylor) and was forced to return after a campaign that accomplished little. The naval force under
David Dixon Porter arrived on the Red River with intent to take on cotton as lucrative prizes of war, and Banks allowed rich speculators to come along for the gathering of cotton. Added to the mix was a cooperating force unable to arrive overland from Arkansas, two attached corps belonging to General
William T. Sherman acting semi-independently, and dangerously low water levels on the river that supplied the army. The Confederates on the Red River under
Jonathan H. Carter didn't surrender until June 1865, two months after
Robert E. Lee sued for peace at
Appomattox Court House in
Virginia.
Administrative duties
Removed from his field command, President Lincoln placed Banks on leave in Washington, where he lobbied for months for the president's reconstruction plans for
Louisiana. Banks had earlier engineered the election victory of a moderate loyalist civilian government in Louisiana, inaugurated by elaborate celebrations he organized and funded. The secret presidential investigating commission headed by conservative Democrats
William Farrar Smith and James T. Brady in early 1865 devoted considerable effort to trying to connect Banks with vice and irregular trading permits in the New Orleans area. The somewhat one-sided final commission report, which didn't specifically accuse him of wrongdoing, was never released. But he'd definitely granted special favors without apparent compensation to men later connected to the
Crédit Mobilier scandal and to a few others of questionable reputation.
Postbellum career
In August 1865, Banks was mustered out of the service by President
Andrew Johnson, and from 1865 to 1873, he was again a representative in Congress, serving as chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee and sometimes as chair of the Republican caucus. He played a key role in the final passage of the
Alaska Purchase legislation and was one of the strongest early advocates of
Manifest Destiny. He wanted the United States to acquire Canada and the Caribbean islands to reduce European influence in the region. He also served on the committee investigating the Crédit Mobilier scandal.
Unhappiness with the course of the administration of President Ulysses Grant led, in 1872, to his joining the
Liberal-Republican revolt in support of
Horace Greeley. While Banks was campaigning across the North for Greeley, an opponent successfully gathered enough support to defeat him in his Massachusetts district as the Liberal-Republican and Democratic candidate. He thought his involvement with a start-up Kentucky railroad and other railroads would substitute for the political loss. But the
Panic of 1873 doomed the railroad, and Banks went on the lecture circuit and served in the Massachusetts Senate.
In 1874, he was elected to Congress again as an independent and served the following two terms, again as a Republican (1875–1879). He was a member of the committee investigating the irregular 1876 elections in
South Carolina. Defeated for yet another term, the president appointed him
United States marshal for Massachusetts, a post he held from 1879 until 1888, when for the tenth time, he was elected to
Congress as a Republican. This final term saw significant mental deterioration, and he wasn't renominated. He died at
Waltham, and is buried there in Grove Hill Cemetery.
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