Person

Cassius Marcellus Clay (Madison County, Kentucky, farmer, politician, and major general (U.S.A.))

b. 1810-10-10 d. 1903-07-23

Madison County, Kentucky, farmer, politician, and soldier (U.S.A.). Madison County, Kentucky, native. Son of Green Clay and Sally Lewis Clay. Married to Mary Jane Warfield Clay. Father of Elisha Warfield Clay, Green Clay, Mary B. Clay, Sally L. Clay, Cassius Clay, Brutus J. Clay, Laura R. Clay, and Ann Clay. Attended Centre College in Danville, Kentucky. Attended Transylvania University in Fayette County. Graduate of Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, in 1832. Member of the House of Representatives of the Commonwealth of Kentucky from Madison County from 1835 to 1837. Delegate to the Whig National Convention in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, in 1839. Owned eight enslaved persons in Lexington, Kentucky, in 1840. Served in the 1st Kentucky Cavalry (U.S.A.) as captain from 1811 to 1847. Editor of The True American, an antislavery newspaper, in Lexington from 1845 to 1847. Farmer in Madison County in 1850. Owned seventeen enslaved persons in Madison County in 1850. Farmer in Madison County in 1860. Unsuccessful Republican candidate for the vice presidency in 1860. Served as minister to Russia, appointed by President Lincoln, from March 28, 1861, to April 1861. Organized Clay's Battalion (U.S.A.) to defend Washington, D.C., in April 1861. Served as minister to Russia to June 1862. Served as major general of volunteers from June 1862 to March 1863. Served as minister to Russia from March 1863.

Details

Sex
Male
Race
White

Bibliography

Sixth Manuscript Census of the United States (1840), Population Schedules, Kentucky, Fayette County, Lexington, p. 126.

Seventh Manuscript Census of the United States (1850), Population Schedules, Kentucky, Madison County, District 1, p. 207A.

Seventh Manuscript Census of the United States (1850), Slave Schedules, Kentucky, Madison County, District 1, p. 485.

Eighth Manuscript Census of the United States (1860), Population Schedules, Kentucky, Madison County, Western Subdivision, p. 255.

"Cassius Marcellus Clay (1810-1903)," Find A Grave, Memorial #8009, accessed June 22, 2021, http://www.findagrave.com/memorial/8009.

"Clarke-Street to Claytree," Index to Politicians, The Political Graveyard, accessed June 22, 2021, https://politicalgraveyard.com/bio/clarken-claytee.html.

Daughters of the American Revolution, Lineage Book of the Charter Members of the DAR, vol. 53 (Washington, D.C.: Press of Judd & Detweiler, Inc., 1919), 91.

Index to Compiled Service Records of Volunteer Soldiers who Served during the Mexican War, NARA RG 94, Microfilm Series M616, Roll 0007.

The Union Army: A History of Military Affairs in the Loyal States, 1861-1865, vol. 8 (Madison, Wisconsin: Federal Publishing Company, 1908), 56.

Citation

Clay, Cassius Marcellus. Accessed via the Civil War Governors of Kentucky Digital Documentary Edition, https://discovery.civilwargovernors.org/document/S32207171 (November 12, 2026).

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