Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition/United States/Andrew, John Albion

Andrew, John Albion (1818–1867), governor of Massachusetts from 1861 to 1866, was born at Windham, Me., May 31, 1818. He became a graduate of Bowdoin College in 1837, and was admitted to the bar in Boston in 1840. He entered political life as a Whig, and the intensity of his anti-slavery convictions stood in his way until 1859, when he was sent to the State legislature. In 1860 he was elected governor. Foreseeing the coming struggle, he organized and equipped the militia of the State, and urged the other New England governors to do likewise. Lincoln’s call for troops was received at Boston, April 15; Andrew had volunteers in motion the next morning; on the afternoon of the 16th three regiments were ready; the Massachusetts Sixth left Boston on the 17th, fought its way through Baltimore on the 19th, and reached Washington the same day. All through the war, Andrew’s devotion to his duties was indefatigable, and it is to his influence that Massachusetts owes her place of pre-eminence in that great struggle. He died suddenly of apoplexy, October 30, 1867. P. W. Chandler has written a memoir of Andrew, and A. S. Brown a sketch of his official life.