VARNUM, Joseph Bradley, (brother of James Mitchell Varnum), a Representative and a Senator from Massachusetts; born in Dracut, Middlesex County, Mass., January 29, 1750 or 1751; largely self-taught; farmer; served in the Revolutionary War; member of the Massachusetts state house of representatives, 1780-1785; member of the Massachusetts state senate, 1786-1795; delegate to the Massachusetts state convention that ratified the Federal Constitution in 1788; justice of the court of common pleas; chief justice of the court of general sessions; elected to the Fourth and to the eight succeeding Congresses and served from March 4, 1795, to June 29, 1811, when he resigned, having been elected Senator; Speaker of the House (Tenth and Eleventh Congresses); chair, Committee on Elections (Fifth Congress); elected as a Democratic Republican to the United States Senate in 1811 to fill the vacancy in the term commencing March 4, 1811, and served from June 29, 1811, to March 3, 1817; served as President pro tempore of the Senate during the Thirteenth Congress; chairman, Committee on Militia (Fourteenth Congress); delegate to the Massachusetts state constitutional convention in 1820; member of the Massachusetts state senate, 1817-1821; died in Dracut, Mass., September 21, 1821; interment in Varnum Cemetery.
View Record in the Biographical Directory of the U.S. Congress
[ Top ]Kaplan, Lawrence S., ed. "A New Englander Defends the War of 1812: Senator Varnum to Judge Thacher." Mid-America 46 (October 1964): 269-80.
Smith, William Henry, ed., Speakers of the House of Representatives of the United States with Personal Sketches of of the Several Speakers. Baltimore: Simon J. Gaeng, 1928, pp. 47-52.
Varnum, James M., ed. "Autobiography of General Joseph B. Varnum." Magazine of American History 20 (November 1888): 405-14.
Varnum, John Marshall. A Sketch of the Life and Public Services of Joseph Bradley Varnum of Massachusetts. Boston: D. Clapp & Sons, 1906.
