Nathaniel Silsbee

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American politician (1773–1850)

title: "Nathaniel Silsbee" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["1773-births", "1850-deaths", "massachusetts-state-senators", "presidents-of-the-massachusetts-senate", "members-of-the-massachusetts-house-of-representatives", "united-states-senators-from-massachusetts", "national-republican-party-united-states-representatives-from-massachusetts", "democratic-republican-party-united-states-senators", "massachusetts-whigs", "massachusetts-federalists", "democratic-republican-party-united-states-representatives-from-massachusetts", "politicians-from-salem,-massachusetts", "19th-century-american-merchants", "19th-century-members-of-the-massachusetts-general-court", "19th-century-united-states-representatives", "19th-century-united-states-senators"] description: "American politician (1773–1850)" topic_path: "people/1770s" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Silsbee" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary American politician (1773–1850) ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox officeholder"]

Field	Value
name	Nathaniel Silsbee
image	Nathaniel Silsbee.png
jr/sr	United States Senator
state	Massachusetts
term_start	May 31, 1826
term_end	March 3, 1835
preceded	James Lloyd
succeeded	John Davis
state2	Massachusetts
district2
term_start2	March 4, 1817
term_end2	March 3, 1821
preceded2	Timothy Pickering
succeeded2	Gideon Barstow
order3	President of the
Massachusetts State Senate
term_start3	1823
term_end3	1825
predecessor3	John Phillips
successor3	John Mills
birth_date
birth_place	Salem, Province of Massachusetts Bay, British America
death_date
death_place	Salem, Massachusetts, U.S.
party	Federalist
National Republican
Whig
spouse	Mary Crowninshield
relations	Jared Sparks, Son in law.
children	Nathaniel Silsbee, Jr.
Mary Crowninshield Silsbee
Georgina Silsbee
occupation	Merchant
::

Nathaniel Silsbee (January 14, 1773 – July 14, 1850) was a ship master, merchant and American politician from Salem, Massachusetts.

Early life

Silsbee was born on January 14, 1773 in Salem, Province of Massachusetts Bay, then a part of British America. He was the eldest child of Capt. Nathaniel Silsbee (1748–1791) and Sarah ( Becket) Silsbee (1750–1832). Among his younger siblings were Zachariah F. Silsbee, who married Sarah Boardman (a daughter of Capt. Francis Boardman). Through his brother Zachariah, he was uncle to Caroline Silsbee, who married fellow Salem merchant Dudley Leavitt Pickman.

Career

At the age of fourteen, to support his family upon the financial failures of his father, he went to sea and learned navigation. His able seamanship won him, at the age of nineteen, command of Elias Hasket Derby's Sloop "Sally". Silsbee continued commanding Derby vessels and had many interesting adventures and exploits with privateers, French Consuls, and such.

In 1795, he became part owner of the Schooner "Betsy" and continued to prosper and master his own vessels. He founded Silsbee & Pickman, one of the largest Salem trading houses, operated by Silsbee and Dudley Leavitt Pickman. In 1801 he placed his brothers, William and Zachariah, in charge of his ships. Nathaniel continued owning vessels in partnerships until the 1840s, but he actively retired from shipping when he commenced his political career.

Political career

Silsbee was elected to the United States House of Representatives and served two terms from March 4, 1817, to March 3, 1821, during which time he was chairman of the U.S. House Committee on Military Pensions in the Twenty-first Congress. He declined to be a candidate for renomination in 1820, choosing to serve in the Massachusetts House of Representatives instead. After one term, he was elected to the Massachusetts Senate, where he served as president from 1823 to 1825. He was a presidential elector in 1824.

He was elected to the United States Senate in 1826 to fill the vacancy in the term ending March 3, 1829, caused by the resignation of James Lloyd. He was re-elected in 1829 and served from May 31, 1826, to March 3, 1835. He was chairman of the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce in the Twenty-third Congress. He was a Whig presidential elector in 1836.

Later life

After his service as a U.S. Senator ended, Silsbee returned to Salem where he resumed mercantile pursuits.

Personal life

On December 12, 1802, Silsbee was married to Mary Crowninshield (1778–1835), the daughter of Mary ( Derby) Crowninshield and Capt. George Crowninshield, one of Salem's wealthiest merchants. Her brothers included Secretary of the Navy Benjamin Williams Crowninshield, U.S. Representative Jacob Crowninshield, and George Crowninshield Jr., who owned Cleopatra's Barge, the first yacht to cross the Atlantic. Together, they were the parents of:

Nathaniel Silsbee Jr. (1804–1881), who served as mayor of Salem from 1849 to 1850 and from 1858 to 1859.
Mary Crowninshield Silsbee (1809–1887), who married, as his second wife, Jared Sparks, the 17th President of Harvard College, in 1839. His first wife, Frances Anne Allen, had died in 1835.
Georgiana Crowninshield Silsbee (1824–1901), who married Francis Henry Appleton in 1846. After his death in 1854, she married Henry Saltonstall in 1855.

Silsbee died on July 14, 1850. He was interred at The Burying Point, the second oldest cemetery in the U.S.

Legacy

The Nathaniel Silsbee House is a historic building in Salem, maintained by the Knights of Columbus until the beginning of 2018 when they sold the building and it was converted to condominiums.

References

Cooke, Harriet Ruth Waters. (1889). "The Driver family: a genealogical memoir of the descendants of Robert and Phebe Driver". University Press.
(1919). "Report of the Harvard University Class of 1869". [[Harvard University]].
Curley, Jerome. (February 26, 2012). "From Teen Captain to the Knights of Columbus". Salem Patch.
King, Caroline Howard. (1937). "When I lived in Salem, 1822-1866". Stephen Daye Press.
(1879). "Historical Sketch of Salem, 1626-1879". Essex Institute.
"SILSBEE FAMILY PAPERS, 1637, 1754-1907".
"SILSBEE, Nathaniel 1773 – 1850". [[Biographical Directory of the United States Congress]].
(26 April 2023). "Ambition, Arrogance & Pride: Families & Rivals in 18th Century Salem". Bublish, Inc..
(1916). "One Hundredth Anniversary of the Building of "Cleopatra's Barge" 1816-1916: Catalog of the Commemorative Exhibition Held at the Peabody Museum ... July 17-September 30, 1916". [[Peabody Essex Museum.
(1913). "The Story of George Crowninshield's Yacht, Cleopatra's Barge: On a Voyage of Pleasure to the Western Islands and the Mediterranean, 1816-1817". Private Print..
"Mary Crowninshield Silsbee Sparks (Mrs. Jared Sparks) (1809-1887)". [[Harvard Art Museums]].
(1919). "Report of the Harvard University Class of 1869". [[Harvard University]].
Perkins Institute and the Massachusetts School for the Blind. (1902). "Seventieth Annual Report of the Trustees of the Perkins Institute and the Massachusetts School for the Blind for the year ending August 31, 1901". Perkins Institute and the Massachusetts School for the Blind.
(February 2, 2018). "Salem Knights of Columbus hall to be sold".
"Spire Investments to transform former Knights of Columbus building into 18 condominium units".
(June 2022)

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