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Biographical Sketches of Members of Congress, Members of the Legislature,
Officers of the State Governement and judges of the Supreme Court of Appeals,
West Virigina, 1917
Source:
West Virginia Legislative Hand Book and Manual and Official Register, 1917,
Compiled and Edited by John T. Harris, Clerk of the Senate,
The Tribune Printing Co., Charleston, West Va.
pgs. 719 - 770
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES
pg. 719
LEGISLATIVE DEPARTMENT.
United States Senators.
NATHAN GOFF (Republican), of Clarksburg, was born at Clarksburg, Va.
(now W. Va.), February 9, 1843; was educated at the Northwestern Virginia
Academy, Georgetown College, and the University of the City of New York;
was admitted to the bar in 1865; in 1867 was elected a member of the West Vir-
ginia Legislature; in 1868 was appointed United States attorney for the dis-
trict of West Virginia, to which position he was reappointed in 1872, 1876, and
1880; resigned the district attornyship in January, 1881, when he was appointed
Secretary of the Navy by President Hayes; in March, 1881, President Garfield
appointed him district attorney for West Virginia, which position he again re-
signed in July, 1882; enlisted in the Union Army in June, 1861, in the Third
Regiment Virginia Volunteer Infantry; served as lieutenant and adjutant of
Company G, and as major of the Fourth Virginia Volunteer Cavalry; was Re-
publican candidate for Congress in 1870 and 1874 in the first West Virginia dis-
trict; was candidate of the Republican Party for governor of West Virginia in
1876, and was defeated by Hon. H. M. Mathews; was elected to the Forty-
eighth, Forty-ninth, and Fiftieth Congresses; in 1888 was elected governor on
face of the returns, but the legislature, which was Democratic, seated his op-
ponent; was appointed United States circuit judge in 1892 for the fourth judicial
circuit, including the States of West Virginia, Maryland, Virginia, North Caro-
lina, and South Carolina, and was married in 1867 to Miss Laura E. Despard, of
Clarksburg, and has two sons; was elected United States Senator by the legis-
lature February 21, 1913. His term of service will expire March 3, 1919. Com-
mittee assignments Sixty-fifth Congress: Banking and Currency, Claims,
Conservation of National Resources, Expenditures in the Department of Labor,
Immigration, Interoceanic Canals, Pensions, Philippines, Railroads, and Uni-
versity of the United States.
Submitted by: Valerie Crook <vfcrook@trellis.net>
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