Preston Brooks
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Preston Smith Brooks was an American slaveholder, politician, and member of the U.S. House of Representatives from South Carolina, serving as a member of the Democratic Party from 1853 until his resig
Brooks in 1856
Laurence M. Keitt
J.L. Magee's famous political cartoon of the attack on Sumner
Charles Sumner
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Charles Sumner was an American lawyer and statesman who represented Massachusetts in the United States Senate from 1851 until his death in 1874. Before and during the American Civil War, he was a lead
Preston Brooks
…in July 1856 and again from August 1856 until his death. He is most remembered for his May 22, 1856, attack upon abolitionist and Republican Senator Charles Sumner, whom he beat nearly to death with a cane on the floor of the United States Senate in retaliation for an anti-slavery speech in which Sumner verbally…
Portrait c. 1865
Sumner's birthplace at 58 Irving Street, Beacon Hill, Boston
1860 steel-engraved portrait of Sumner