Moses Wisner
|
|
Moses Wisner (June 3, 1815–January 5, 1863) was a politician and soldier from the U.S. state of Michigan.
Wisner was born in Springport, New York and received an education in the common schools while working on his parent's farm. In 1837, he moved to Michigan and settled on a farm in Lapeer County. Two years later, he gave up on farming and moved to Pontiac, Michigan.
He studied law while working at the law firm of his brother, George W. Wisner, and Rufus Hosmer. In 1841, he was admitted to the bar at Pontiac and then moved to the village of Lapeer, Michigan to began to a practice. He was appointed prosecuting attorney for Lapeer County in 1843 by Governor William Woodbridge. He moved back to Pontiac to join a law firm there.
He was not especially active in politics until after the election of U.S. President Franklin Pierce in 1852, when he became active in the anti-slavery movement. He was one of the foremost critics in Michigan of the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 which repealed the Missouri Compromise and opened the territories to slavery. He participated in the first convention of the U.S. Republican Party in Jackson, Michigan in July, 1854.
In 1858 he was elected Governor of Michigan and served one term from 1859 to 1861. In 1862, he worked to raise the 22nd Michigan regiment and was commissioned a colonel, but died of typhoid fever in Kentucky while en route to deployment in the Civil War. He left behind his wife, Angeolina Hascall, the daughter of Gen. C. C. Hascall, of Flint, Michigan, and four children.
He is interred at Oak Hill Cemetery in Pontiac.
Wisner's Greek Revival-Style mansion in Pontiac, now called the Moses and Angeolina Hascall Wisner House, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Wisner Township, Michigan in Tuscola County is named after Moses Wisner.
External links
- Biographical Portraits (http://www.usgennet.org/usa/mi/county/tuscola/book/book141-146.htm) 1892 Portrait & Biographical Album of Genesee, Lapeer & Tuscola Counties, Chapman Bros.