Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1892, volume 3).djvu/490

454 state until age obliged him to retire. The son was graduated at Princeton in 1790 with the highest honors of his class, studied law in the office of Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, and was admitted to the bar in 1793. He was elected to represent Charleston in the legislatures of 1794-'6 and 1796-'8, and after his last election was chosen speaker of the house of representatives. At this session the court of common pleas was organ- ized, and William Johnson, Louis Trezevant, and Ephraim Ramsey were made judges. On 6 March, 1804, he was appointed an associate justice of the U. S. supreme court. He was an ardent supporter of the constitutional principles advocated by Thomas Jefferson. In May, 1808, the collector of the port of Charleston, acting under the authority of the embargo act and the instructions of the president of the United States through the secre- tary of the treasury, which prohibited vessels from carrying goods from American ports, refused clear- ances to five ships. The question of the right of the president to give such an order was submitted by consent to Justice Johnson, on a motion for a mandamus to the collector, directing him to issue such clearances. Justice Johnson decided that the order was without warrant in law and ordered the mandamus to issue, and the vessels named were cleared. Mr. Jefferson referred all the proceedings of the circuit court of South Carolina in the man- damus proceedings to Cesar A. Rodney, U. S. at- torney-general, who prepared an elaborate discus- sion, attacking the conduct of Justice Johnson, and insisting that the executive department must of necessity be independent of the judicial, and that the decision of the South Carolina, court if submitted to would make the latter department subordinate to the former. Justice Johnson replied by a vigorous discussion in the public press. Dur- ing his judicial career he constantly resisted the extension of the admiralty jurisdiction, then being pressed by Mr. Justice Story and some of his asso- ciates upon the bench of the supreme court. When the nullification agitation arose in South Carolina in 1831-'3, Justice Johnson found himself arrayed against the great body of his fellow-citizens. Be- lieving that his judicial position required complete neutrality, he absented himself from the state, and during the summer of 1833 resided in western Pennsylvania. Princeton' gave him the degree of LL. D. in 1818. He edited " The Life and Corre- spondence of Major-General Nathanael Greene," with annotations (2 vols., Charleston, 1822). — His brother, Joseph, phvsician, b. in Charleston, S. C, 15 June, 1776 ; d. there, 6 Oct., 1862, was gradu- ated at the Charleston college in 1793, and received his medical degree at the University of Pennsyl- vania in 1797. He began to practise medicine in Charleston, and in 1807 was made president of the Medical societv of South Carolina. He was presi- dent of the U.* S. branch bank from 1818 till 1825, and mavor of Charleston in 1826. He was an ac- tive leader in the nullification controversy, and an efficient worker in the literary and philosophical societies. For many years he was commissioner of the public schools, was president of the Appren- tices library association from its establishment in 1826, for more than sixty years a member of the South Carolina society, and for twenty years its pre- siding officer. He published, besides many trea- tises, essays, and orations, " Traditions and Remi- niscences of the Revolution " (Charleston, 1851).

JOHNSON, William Bullien, clergyman, b. in Sir John Island, S. C, 13 June, 1782; d". in Green- ville, S. C, 10 Jan., 1862. He was ordained pastor of the Baptist church in Eutaw, officiated at Co- lumbia, S. C, and Savannah. Ga., and in 1822 was principal of a female academy in Greenville. He taught there and at Edgeville and Anderson for many vears, but finally returned to Greenville, where he was pastor until his death. He was a member of the Bible revision society, forty years president of the Georgia Baptist convention, and three years president of the General Baptist con- vention of the United States. Brown conferred on him the degree of D. D. in 1833. He contributed largely to current religious literature, published " Infant Baptism Argued from Analogy," " The Church's Argument for Christianity," "Exami- nation of Snodgrass on Apostolic Succession," " Examination of Confirmation Examined," and a " Memoir of Rev. Nathan P. Knapp," and edited " Knapp's Select Sermons."

JOHNSTON, Albert Sidney, soldier, b. in Washington, Mason co., Ky., 3 Feb., 1803 ; d. near Pittsburg Landing, Tenn., 6 April, 1862. He was the youngest son of Dr. John Johnston, a country physician, a native of Salisbury, Conn. Albert Sidney was graduated at the U. S. military acad- emy, eighth in his class, in 1826, and was assigned to the 2d infantry, in which he served as adjutant until his resignation, 24 April, 1834. In 1829 he married Henrietta Preston, who died in Au- gust, 1835. During the Black Hawk war in 1832 Lieut. Johnston was chief of staff to Gen. Henry Atkin- son. His journals furnish an original and accu- rate account of that campaign. After his wife's death he was a farmer for a short time near St. Louis, Mo., but in August, 1836, joined the Texas patriots, devoted himself to the service of that state, and by his personal qualities, physical and mental, soon attained notice. He was specially admired for his fine horsemanship, and his feats of daring, one of which was the killing of a puma with his clubbed rifle. He had entered the ranks as a private, but rapidly rose through all the grades to the command of the army. He was not allowed to assume this, however, until he had encountered his competitor, Gen. Felix Huston, in a duel, in which he received a dangerous wound. In 1838 President Mirabeau B. Lamar made him secretary of war, in which office he provided for the defence of the border against Mexican invasion, and in 1839 conducted a campaign against the intruding U. S. Indians in northern Texas, and in two bat- tles, at the Salines of the Neches, expelled them from the country. In 1843 he married Miss Eliza Griffin, and engaged in planting in Brazoria county, Texas : but when the Mexican war began he joined the army, under Gen. Zachary Taylor, on the Rio Grande. His regiment, the 1st Texas rifles, was soon disbanded, but he continued in service, and was inspector-general of Butler's division at the battle of Monterey. All his superiors recommended him as a brigadier-general, but he was set aside by the president for political reasons, and retired to his farm. Gen. Taylor said he was " the best soldier he ever commanded." Gen. Johnston remained on his plantation in poverty and neglect until,