Richard Wigginton Thompson

Birth Date

1809-06-09

Death Date

1900-02-09

Gender

Race Description

White

Entity Type

Person

Vigo County, Indiana, attorney and politician. Culpeper, Virginia, native. Son of William Mills Thompson and Catherine Wigginton Broadus Thompson. Married to Harriet Eliza Gardner Thompson in Ohio on May 5, 1836. Father of Mary Thompson, Frederick Thompson, Richard Thompson, Charles Thompson, Harry Thompson, and Jennie Thompson. Store-keeper’s clerk in Louisville, Kentucky c1831. Admitted to the bar in 1834. Practiced law in Bedford, Indiana. Member of the Indiana House of Representatives from 1834 to 1836. Member of the Senate of the State of Indiana from 1836 to 1838. President pro tempore of the state senate and acting lieutenant governor of Indiana. Presidential elector in 1840 and 1864. Elected as a Whig to the United States House of Representatives from 1841 to 1843 and from 1847 to 1849. Attorney in Terre Haute in 1860.

Eighth Manuscript Census of the United States (1860), Population Schedules, Indiana, Vigo County, Terre Haute, Ward 2, p. 705.
Ninth Manuscript Census of the United States (1870), Population Schedules, Indiana, Vigo County, Honey Creek, p. 193A.
Ohio Marriage Records, 1774-1993, Franklin County Courthouse, Franklin County Marriages, 1803-1840, Film #000285142, p. 138, p. 271 of 329 of microfilm (accessed via Ancestry.com).
John Fiske and James Grant Wilson, ed., Appleton's Cyclopædia of American Biography, vol. 6, (New York: Appleton, 1889), 94.
“ Thompson, Richard Wigginton (1809-1900),” Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, https://bioguide.congress.gov/search/bio/T000214 (accessed April 29, 2021).
Sons of the American Revolution Membership Applications, 1889-1970. Long Beach, California: National Society of the Sons of the American Revolution. Microfilm, volume 307, p. 152 of 438 of microfilm (accessed through Ancestry.com on April 29, 2021).
Find A Grave, “Richard Wigginton Thompson (1809-1900)," Memorial # 1717, https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/1717/richard-wigginton-thompson (accessed April 29, 2021).
KYR-0001-017-0003.

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