Biography

A prominent Lawyer of South Carolina, Chesnut became the state Senator of South Carolina from 1852-1856, later becoming a US Democratic Senator from 1858-1860. After the election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860, Chesnut resigned as US senator, and was the first southern Senator to do so. He is first mentioned in a letter between William Roland G. Mellen and Frances Miller Seward in 1861, when Chesnut was a delegate to the Confederate Provisional Congress.