Richard Hawes

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Richard Hawes (February 6, 1797 — May 25, 1877) was a United States Representative from Kentucky and Confederate Governor of Kentucky. He was a brother of Albert Gallatin Hawes, a nephew of Aylett Hawes, and a cousin of Aylett Hawes Buckner, who were also U.S. Representatives.

[edit] Biography

Born near Bowling Green, Virginia, to Richard and Clara (Walker) Hawes, he moved to Kentucky in 1810 with his parents, who settled in Fayette County, near Lexington. He pursued classical studies at Transylvania University, studied law, and was admitted to the bar in 1824, commencing practice in Winchester. Richard Hawes served in the Black Hawk War and was a member of the Kentucky House of Representatives in 1828, 1829, and 1834. He was an unsuccessful candidate for election in 1834 to the Twenty-fourth Congress.

Hawes was elected as a Whig to the Twenty-fifth and Twenty-sixth Congresses (March 4, 1837-March 3, 1841). He moved to Paris, Kentucky in 1843 and continued the practice of law. An opponent of secession, he worked to avoid the coming conflict, but without success.

When Confederate forces entered Kentucky, Hawes, though now 64 years of age, hastened to volunteer. He was made brigade commissary for General Humphrey Marshall with the rank of major. He occupied this position until he resigned after coming down with typhoid fever.

On October 1862, he was installed by Confederate sympathizers as Provisional Governor, after the death of George W. Johnson. Hawes learned of his unexpected appointment while he was still recovering from his illness.

Hawes was sworn in as Kentucky's Confederate governor at Frankfort On October 3, 1862, during Braxton Bragg's 1862 Kentucky campaign. However, Bragg's campaign faltered after the drawn battle of Perryville, and Hawes was forced to leave his state with the retreating Confederates. He served as Confederate Governor until the war's end, though the office was now largely an empty one. He returned home in May 1865 to find his home that had been burned by Union troops and that one of his four sons -- all of whom served in gray -- had given his life for the defeated Confederacy.

Hawes rebuilt his life in Paris, Kentucky and was chosen a Bourbon County judge in 1866. Later in the same year, he was chosen master commissioner of the circuit and common pleas courts. He served in this capacity until his death in Paris, Kentucky in 1877; interment was in Paris Cemetery.