William F. De Saussure

Who was William F. De Saussure?

William Ford De Saussure was a United States Senator from South Carolina. Born in Charleston, the son of Henry William de Saussure and Elizabeth Ford De Saussure. He graduated from Harvard University in 1810, studied law, was admitted to the bar and practiced in Charleston and Columbia. In the 1820s William de Saussure serve two terms as Intendent, or Mayor, of the City of Columbia. He was a member of the South Carolina House of Representatives in 1846 and a judge of the chancery court in 1847.

De Saussure was appointed, and subsequently elected, as a Democrat to the U.S. Senate to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of R. Barnwell Rhett and served from May 10, 1852, to March 4, 1853; he resumed the practice of law in Columbia, and was a trustee of South Carolina College at Columbia for many years. In December 1860 he was a delegate to South Carolina's Secession Convention and became a signer of the Ordinance of Secession which led directly to the opening hostilities of the Civil War. He died in Columbia in 1870; interment was in the First Presbyterian Churchyard.