Albert Pike (December 29, 1809April 2, 1891) was an American author, poet, orator, editor, lawyer, jurist, and prominent member of the Freemasons.
He then served as an associate justice of the confederate Arkansas Supreme Court from 1864 until the surrender of the Trans-Mississippi Department of the Confederacy in May 1865. ==Early life and education== Albert Pike was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on December 29, 1809, the son of Benjamin and Sarah (Andrews) Pike, and spent his childhood in Byfield and Newburyport, Massachusetts.
In August 1825, he passed entrance exams at Harvard University, though when the college requested payment of tuition fees for the first two years, he chose not to attend.
In 1831, he left Massachusetts to travel west, first stopping in Nashville, Tennessee, and later moving to St.
Under Pike's administration, the Advocate promoted the viewpoint of the Whig Party in a politically volatile and divided Arkansas in December 1832.
Trapping was minimal and, after traveling about , half of it on foot, he finally arrived at Fort Smith, Arkansas. ==Career== Settling in Arkansas in 1833, Pike taught in a school and wrote a series of articles for the Little Rock Arkansas Advocate under the pen name of "Casca." The articles were sufficiently well received for him to be asked to join the newspaper's staff.
After marrying Mary Ann Hamilton in 1834, he purchased the newspaper. He was the first reporter for the Arkansas Supreme Court.
His first collection of poetry, Prose Sketches and Poems Written in the Western Country, was published in 1834.
Pike began to study law and was admitted to the bar in 1837, selling the Advocate the same year.
The rightful author was Emily Rebecca Page. ==Freemasonry== Pike first joined the fraternal Independent Order of Odd Fellows in 1840.
In the United States, Pike is still considered an eminent and influential Freemason, primarily in the Scottish Rite Southern Jurisdiction. ==Military service== ===Mexican–American War=== When the Mexican–American War started, Pike joined the Regiment of Arkansas Mounted Volunteers (a cavalry regiment) and was commissioned as a troop commander with the rank of captain in June 1846.
Pike was discharged in June 1847.
This situation led finally to an "inconclusive" duel between Pike and Roane on July 29, 1847, near Fort Smith, Arkansas.
He proved to be a highly effective lawyer, representing clients in courts at every level, which continued after he received permission to practice before the United States Supreme Court in 1849. He also made several contacts among the Native American tribes in the area.
In 1852, he represented Creek Nation before the Supreme Court in a claim regarding ceded tribal land.
Although several shots were fired in the duel, nobody was injured, and the two were persuaded by their seconds to discontinue it. After the war, Pike returned to the practice of law, moving to New Orleans for a time beginning in 1853.
In 1854 he advocated for the Choctaw and Chickasaw, although compensation later awarded to the tribes in 1856 and 1857 was insufficient.
He returned to Arkansas in 1857, gaining some amount of prominence in the legal field. At the Southern Commercial Convention of 1854, Pike said the South should remain in the Union and seek equality with the North, but if the South "were forced into an inferior status, she would be better out of the Union than in it." His stand was that state's rights superseded national law and he supported the idea of a Southern secession.
In 1854 he advocated for the Choctaw and Chickasaw, although compensation later awarded to the tribes in 1856 and 1857 was insufficient.
He attended the national convention in 1856, but walked out when it failed to adopt a pro-slavery platform.
In 1854 he advocated for the Choctaw and Chickasaw, although compensation later awarded to the tribes in 1856 and 1857 was insufficient.
He returned to Arkansas in 1857, gaining some amount of prominence in the legal field. At the Southern Commercial Convention of 1854, Pike said the South should remain in the Union and seek equality with the North, but if the South "were forced into an inferior status, she would be better out of the Union than in it." His stand was that state's rights superseded national law and he supported the idea of a Southern secession.
In 1859, he received an honorary Master of Arts degree from Harvard. ==Poetry== As a young man of letters, Pike wrote poetry, and he continued to do so for the rest of his life.
In 1859 he was elected Sovereign Grand Commander of the Scottish Rite's Southern Jurisdiction.
This stand is made clear in his pamphlet of 1861, "State or Province, Bond or Free?" ===American Civil War=== In 1861, Pike penned the lyrics to "Dixie to Arms!" At the beginning of the war, Pike was appointed as Confederate envoy to Native American nations.
In this capacity he negotiated several treaties, one of the most important being with Cherokee chief John Ross, which was concluded in 1861.
Ross later changed his mind and left Indian Territory, but the succeeding Cherokee government maintained the alliance. Pike was commissioned as a brigadier general in the Confederate States Army on November 22, 1861, and given a command in the Indian Territory.
Although initially victorious at the Battle of Pea Ridge (Elkhorn Tavern) in March 1862, Pike's unit was defeated later in a counterattack, after falling into disarray.
When Pike was ordered in May 1862 to send troops to Arkansas, he resigned in protest.
Both these charges were later found to be considerably lacking in evidence; nevertheless Pike, facing arrest, escaped into the hills of Arkansas, submitting his resignation from the Confederate States Army on July 12, 1862.
His resignation was accepted on November 11, and he was allowed to return to Arkansas. As Union troops advanced toward the state capital in September 1863, the State Supreme Court retreated to Washington, Arkansas, which was made the new Confederate state capital.
He then served as an associate justice of the confederate Arkansas Supreme Court from 1864 until the surrender of the Trans-Mississippi Department of the Confederacy in May 1865. ==Early life and education== Albert Pike was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on December 29, 1809, the son of Benjamin and Sarah (Andrews) Pike, and spent his childhood in Byfield and Newburyport, Massachusetts.
He then served as an associate justice of the confederate Arkansas Supreme Court from 1864 until the surrender of the Trans-Mississippi Department of the Confederacy in May 1865. ==Early life and education== Albert Pike was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on December 29, 1809, the son of Benjamin and Sarah (Andrews) Pike, and spent his childhood in Byfield and Newburyport, Massachusetts.
On June 24, 1865, Pike applied to President Andrew Johnson for a pardon, disowning his earlier interpretation of the U.S.
Susan Lawrence Davis, whose father was a founding member of the Klan in Alabama, writes in her sympathetic account titled Authentic History: Ku Klux Klan, 1865-1877, published in 1924, that Pike was personally chosen by Nathan Bedford Forrest to serve as the Klan's "Chief Judicial Officer" and to head the Klan in Arkansas.
President Johnson pardoned him on April 23, 1866. ==Later life== During the Arkansas political conflict known as the Brooks-Baxter War, Pike was one of the lawyers to speak on behalf of Elisha Baxter. ==Death and legacy== Pike died on April 2, 1891, in Charleston, South Carolina, at the age of 81, and was buried at Oak Hill Cemetery, despite the fact that he had left instructions for his body to be cremated.
In 1939's Invisible Empire: The Story of the Ku Klux Klan, 1866-1871, Stanley Horn also reports that Forrest appointed Pike and credits him with a surge of local Klan activity in April 1868.
In 1939's Invisible Empire: The Story of the Ku Klux Klan, 1866-1871, Stanley Horn also reports that Forrest appointed Pike and credits him with a surge of local Klan activity in April 1868.
Trelease, author of 1971's White Terror: The Ku Klux Klan Conspiracy and Southern Reconstruction, as being doubtful of Pike's membership, as the offices Pike allegedly held are not mentioned in "The Prescript", the Klan constitution. Pike's only known writing on the Klan, an 1868 editorial in the Memphis Daily Appeal, indicates that his main problems lay not with its aims, but with its methods and leadership.
He remained Sovereign Grand Commander for the rest of his life, devoting a large amount of his time to developing the rituals of the order. He published a book called Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry in 1871, the first of several editions.
Albert Pike (December 29, 1809April 2, 1891) was an American author, poet, orator, editor, lawyer, jurist, and prominent member of the Freemasons.
President Johnson pardoned him on April 23, 1866. ==Later life== During the Arkansas political conflict known as the Brooks-Baxter War, Pike was one of the lawyers to speak on behalf of Elisha Baxter. ==Death and legacy== Pike died on April 2, 1891, in Charleston, South Carolina, at the age of 81, and was buried at Oak Hill Cemetery, despite the fact that he had left instructions for his body to be cremated.
The House of the Temple contains numerous memorials and artifacts related to Pike, including his personal library. A memorial to Pike was erected in 1901 in the Judiciary Square neighborhood of Washington, D.C.
Walter Lynwood Fleming, in 1905's Ku Klux Klan: Its Origin, Growth and Disbandment, lists Pike as the Klan's "chief judicial officer".
Susan Lawrence Davis, whose father was a founding member of the Klan in Alabama, writes in her sympathetic account titled Authentic History: Ku Klux Klan, 1865-1877, published in 1924, that Pike was personally chosen by Nathan Bedford Forrest to serve as the Klan's "Chief Judicial Officer" and to head the Klan in Arkansas.
In 1939's Invisible Empire: The Story of the Ku Klux Klan, 1866-1871, Stanley Horn also reports that Forrest appointed Pike and credits him with a surge of local Klan activity in April 1868.
In 1944, his remains were moved to the House of the Temple, headquarters of the Southern Jurisdiction of the Scottish Rite.
Trelease, author of 1971's White Terror: The Ku Klux Klan Conspiracy and Southern Reconstruction, as being doubtful of Pike's membership, as the offices Pike allegedly held are not mentioned in "The Prescript", the Klan constitution. Pike's only known writing on the Klan, an 1868 editorial in the Memphis Daily Appeal, indicates that his main problems lay not with its aims, but with its methods and leadership.
Southern Agrarian poet John Gould Fletcher, who grew up in Little Rock in a house that Pike built, also believed Pike was the poem's author. However, Walter Lee Brown in his 1997 biography, found a lack of evidence that Pike was a member of the Klan.
He was the only Confederate military officer with an outdoor statue in Washington, D.C., and in 2019 Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton called for its removal.
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