Benjamin Gwinn Harris

File:Benjamin Gwinn Harris (Maryland Congressman).jpg

Benjamin Gwinn Harris, Maryland Congressman.

Benjamin Gwinn Harris (December 13, 1805 – April 4, 1895) was a U.S. Representative from Maryland.

Born near Leonardtown, St. Mary's County, Maryland, Harris attended Yale College in the late 1820s, and Harvard Law School from 1829 to 1830. He served as member of the Maryland House of Delegates in 1833 and 1836, and was admitted to the bar in 1840.

Harris was elected as a Democrat to the Thirty-eighth and Thirty-ninth Congresses (March 4, 1863 – March 3, 1867). His vote on the Thirteenth Amendment is recorded as nay. He was censured by the House of Representatives on April 9, 1864, for treasonable utterances. He was tried by a military court in Washington, D.C. in May 1865 for harboring two paroled Confederate soldiers, and sentenced to three years imprisonment and forever disqualified from holding any office under the United States Government, but President Andrew Johnson subsequently remitted the sentence. He died on his estate, "Ellenborough," near Leonardtown, Maryland, April 4, 1895. He was interred in the family burying ground on his estate.

References

• Benjamin Gwinn Harris at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
• Benjamin Gwinn Harris at Find a Grave

United States House of Representatives
Preceded by Francis Thomas	Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Maryland's 5th congressional district 1863–1867	Succeeded by Frederick Stone

 This article incorporates public domain material from websites or documents of the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.