Parson Brownlow
American newspaper editor, minister, and politician (1805-1877) · United States · On the map · Journalists · Died at 71
William Gannaway "Parson" Brownlow was an American newspaper publisher, Methodist minister, book author, prisoner of war, lecturer, and politician who served as the 17th governor of Tennessee from 1865 to 1869 and as a United States senator from Tennessee from 1869 to 1875.
Parson Brownlow is read about 34 times a day, in 12 languages.
A typical day, 30 days to 8 October 2026
The middle day of the days counted, so one week of news cannot move it. The line under it is the last 120 days, one point a day.
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Photos 12
Engraving from Brownlow's book The Great Iron Wheel Examined, showing a Baptist minister changing clothes in front of horrified women after administering a baptism by immersion.
Ad in an 1848 issue of the Jonesborough Whig, attacking presidential candidate Lewis Cass
Brownlow as he appeared on the frontispiece of his 1856 book, The Great Iron Wheel Examined
Heading for "F.A. Ross' Corner," a series in Brownlow's Jonesborough Whig that attacked Presbyterian minister Frederick Augustus Ross.
Engraving from Brownlow's The Great Iron Wheel Examined, showing an ex-Congressman attacking James Robinson Graves for slander.
Illustration in Barton's A Hero In Homespun, showing Brownlow delivering a pro-Union speech in Sevierville in 1861
Brownlow (center) watches as condemned bridge-burner Harrison Self bids goodbye to his daughter; Self was eventually pardoned by Jefferson DavisAbout this person
Brownlow rose to prominence in the late 1830s and early 1840s as editor of the Whig, a polemical newspaper in East Tennessee that promoted Henry Clay and the Whig Party ideals, and also that repeated Brownlow's opposition to secession by the southern slave states in the years leading up to the American Civil War. Brownlow's uncompromising and radical viewpoints made him one of the most divisive figures in Tennessee political history and one of the most controversial Reconstruction era politicians of the United States.
