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William Pitt Fessenden (October 16, 1806 – September 8, 1869) was an American politician from the U.S. state of Maine. Fessenden was a Whig (later a Republican) and member of the Fessenden political family.
When Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P. Chase resigned in 1864, President Lincoln promptly appointed William P. Fessenden (1806 - 1869) to succeed him. As Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee (1861 - 1864), Fessenden had taken a leading part in framing measures relating to revenue and appropriations to finance the Civil War.
William P. Fessenden: A Featured Biography. As chairman of the Senate Finance Committee during the Civil War, William Pitt Fessenden of Maine was the architect of many of the nation's wartime revenue policies.
Learn about the life and career of William Pitt Fessenden, who served as Abraham Lincoln's treasury secretary from 1864 to 1865. He was also a senator from Maine who voted against impeaching Andrew Johnson.
William Pitt Fessenden (born Oct. 16, 1806, Boscawen, N.H., U.S.—died Sept. 8, 1869, Portland, Maine) was an American Whig politician who was influential in founding the Republican Party in 1854. Fessenden graduated from Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine, in 1823 and began studying law.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Maine Senator (1855-64, 1865-69, Republican) William Pitt Fessenden was chairman of Senate Finance Committee, which had responsibility for raising funds for the Civil War. He held that position before he succeeded Salmon Chase as Secretary of the Treasury on July 1,1864 and returned to it eight months later.
Sep 8, 2023 · On September 8, 1869, however, it identified perhaps the most significant senator of the entire Civil War era—William Pitt Fessenden, Republican of Maine. When the 62-year-old Fessenden died on that day, his Senate colleagues genuinely grieved at the loss of a legislative giant.
