James Garrard

Infobox Governor
name= James Garrard


caption=
order=2^nd
office= Governor of Kentucky
term_start= June 7, 1796
term_end= September 5, 1804
lieutenant= Alexander Scott Bullitt (1800-1804)
predecessor= Isaac Shelby
successor= Christopher Greenup
birth_date= birth date|1749|1|14|mf=y
birth_place= Stafford County, Virginia
death_date= death date and age|1822|1|9|1749|1|14|mf=y
death_place= Bourbon County, Kentucky
spouse=
profession= Soldier, minister, farmer, lumber miller, distiller
party= Democratic-Republican
religion=Baptistcite web |url=http://www.nga.org/portal/site/nga/menuitem.29fab9fb4add37305ddcbeeb501010a0/?vgnextoid=9eb2c895ddf56010VgnVCM1000001a01010aRCRD&vgnextchannel=e449a0ca9e3f1010VgnVCM1000001a01010aRCRD |title=Kentucky Governor James Garrard |publisher=National Governors Association |accessdate=2007-03-09]
footnotes=

James Garrard (January 14, 1749ndash January 9, 1822) was an American soldier and second Governor of Kentucky from 1796 to 1804.

Early life

Garrard was born in Stafford County, Virginia. He served in the Virginia militia during the American Revolutionary War. As a captain of a schooner, he was captured by the British but later escaped. He was promoted to colonel in the Stafford County militia and probably saw action during the 1781 British invasion of Virginia and at Gloucester during the Yorktown campaign.Harry M. Ward. "Garrard, James". "American National Biography Online", February 2000.] He was elected to a seat in the Virginia House of Delegates in 1779 and served one term. Garrard was a zealous advocate of the bill for the establishment of religious liberty.

He moved to Kentucky in 1782 (then a county of Virginia) and settled on Stoner Fork of the Licking River, near Paris, where he became a member of the convention which framed the first constitution of the state. He was ordained to the Baptist ministry having also been a farmer, lumber miller, and whiskey maker. In 1791 Garrard was chairman of a committee that reported to the Elkhorn Baptist Association a memorial and remonstrance in favor of excluding slavery from the commonwealth by constitutional enactment.

Political career

Garrard was elected governor as a Democratic-Republican in 1796, and re-elected in 1800—the only Kentucky governor to serve a successive term until the state's constitution was amended in the late 1990s. His election was not without controversy. The state's electoral college named Garrard governor on the second ballot. Benjamin Logan contested the election and petitioned the legislature, which refused to overturn the second ballot. Logan had received 21 votes to Garrard's 17. Garrard was reelected in 1800, the state's first popular vote for the office. During his governorship, twenty-six counties (including Garrard County) were created, the circuit courts were established, and he was the first governor to live in the Governor’s Mansion. Garrard attempted to get a prisons bill and a public education system established, but both were defeated by the legislature.

Later life and death

Garrard died at Mount Lebanon, his residence in Bourbon County, Kentucky. He is buried in the Garrard Family Burial Grounds at Ruddels Mills in Bourbon County; the Kentucky Legislature erected a memorial over his grave in 1823. Garrard County, Kentucky was named for him in 1797.

Four of his grandsons, Israel Garrard, Jeptha Garrard, Kenner Garrard, and Theophilus T. Garrard, became generals in the Union Army during the American Civil War.

References

External links

* [http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=18123008 Find-A-Grave profile for James Garrard]
* [http://politicalgraveyard.com/bio/garnet-garretson.html James Garrard at The Political Graveyard]
* [http://www.rootsweb.com/~kygenweb/kybiog/bourbon/garrard.j.txt Biography from Lawyers and Lawmakers of Kentucky]