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HISTORICAL ENCYCLOPEDIA OF ILLINOIS.
ing four consecutive terms, but declining a renomination, being about to remove to Jacksonville, where he resided from 1851 to 1856. Twice (1840 and '52) he was a Presidential Elector on the Democratic ticket. In 1856 he removed to Springfield, and, in 1859, re-entered Congress as Representative of the Springfield District; was re-elected in 1860, but resigned in 1861 to accept a commission as Brigadier-General of Volunteers from President Lincoln, being promoted Major-General early in 1862. He participated in the battles of Belmont, Fort Donelson, Shiloh and before Vicksburg, and was in command at the capture of Arkansas Post, but was severely criticised for some of his acts during the Vicksburg campaign and relieved of his command by General Grant. Having finally been restored by order of President Lincoln, he participated in the campaign in Louisiana and Texas, but resigned his commission in 1864. General McClernand presided over the Democratic National Convention of 1876, and, in 1886, was appointed by President Cleveland one of the members of the Utah Commission, serving through President Harrison's administration. He was also elected Circuit Judge in 1870, as succ essor to Hon. B. S. Edwards, who had resigned. Died Sept. 20, 1900. McCLURG, Alexander C., soldier and publisher, was born in Philadelphia but grew up in Pittsburg, where his father was an iron manufacturer. He graduated at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio., and, after studying law for a time with Chief Justice Lowrie of Pennsylvania, came to Chicago in 1859, and entered the bookstore of $. C. Griggs & Co., as a junior clerk. Early in 1861 he enlisted as a private in the War of the Rebellion, but the quota of three-months', men being already full, his services were not accepted. In August, 1862, he became a member of the "Crosby Guards," afterwards incorporated in the Eighty-eighth Illinois Infantry (Second Board of Trade Regiment), and was unanimously elected Captain of Company H. After the battle of Perryville, he was detailed as Judge Advocate at Nashville, and, in the following year, offered the position of Assistant Adjutant-General on the staff of General McCook, afterwards serving in a similar capacity on the staffs of
