The Biographical Dictionary of America/Allen, John M.

ALLEN, John M., representative, was born in Tishomingo county, Miss., July 8, 1847. He received a common-school education, and at the age of fifteen enlisted in the Confederate army, in which he served as a private throughout the civil war. He then studied law at the Cumberland university, Tenn., and at the University of Mississippi, where he was graduated in 1870. He opened a law office at Tupelo, Lee county, and in 1875 was chosen district attorney for the first judicial district of Mississippi, and served for four years. In 1884 he was elected to represent his district in the 49th Congress, and was returned to the 50th, 51st, 52d, 53d, 54th, 55th and 56th Congresses. He became universally known as "Private Allen," through a happy repartee which he made in a political speech during the canvass for his first election to Congress. In a joint debate his competitor opened his speech with: "Fellow citizens, I slept one night in a tent on the mountainside, awaiting the battle on the morrow." When he had finished his speech, Allen rose to his feet and said: "Friends and fellow citizens, what General Tucker has told you about sleeping in his tent that night before the battle is true. I know, for I was guarding that tent all night long in the cold and the wet. Now, I want to say to all of you who were generals in the war, and slept at night in your guarded tents, vote for him; but all you fellows that guarded the generals' tents in the wet and cold, like me, you vote for 'Private Allen.'" Allen was triumphantly elected. In Congress he showed himself a ready and effective debater.