Rhett, Robert B.

Born: 1800-12-21 Beaufort, South Carolina

Died: 1876-09-14 Saint James, Louisiana

Alternate name: Smith

Born Robert Barnwell Smith, Robert and his brothers changed the family name to Rhett in 1837, to honor an ancestor whose male line had died out. Rhett completed preparatory studies and studied law. In 1824, he earned admittance to the South Carolina bar and started a practice in Beaufort. He won election to the South Carolina House of Representatives, for St. Bartholomew's Parish, in 1826, 1828, 1830, and 1832. He married Elizabeth Washington Burnet in 1827; they had twelve children before her death in 1852. He won election and served as attorney general of South Carolina in 1832. Rhett won election, as a Democrat, to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1837 and reelection to the five succeeding Congresses, serving until 1849. He served alongside Abraham Lincoln during the Thirtieth Congress. Rhett served as a member of the Nashville convention in 1850. He won election, as a Democrat, to the U.S. Senate to fill a vacancy in 1850 and served until he resigned in 1852. Rhett remarried in 1854 to Catharine Herbert Dent. He served as a delegate to the South Carolina secession convention in 1860, and served as a delegate to the Confederate Provisional Congress in 1861. Rhett served as chairman of the committee that reported the constitution of the Confederate States.

Biographical Directory of the American Congress 1774-1996 (Alexandria, VA: CQ Staff Directories, 1997), 1724; Phyllis F. Field, "Rhett, Robert Barnwell," American National Biography, ed. by John A. Garraty and Mark C. Carnes (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 18:395-96; Gravestone, Magnolia Cemetery, Charleston, SC.