Buckner Thruston

Buckner Thruston (February 9, 1763 – August 30, 1845) was an American lawyer, slaveowner and politician who served as United States Senator from Kentucky as well as in the Virginia House of Delegates and became a United States circuit judge of the United States Circuit Court of the District of Columbia.

Early life and education

Born on February 9, 1764, in Petsworth Parish in Gloucester County, Colony of Virginia, British America, His grandfather had been colonel of the local militia, and a farmer who used enslaved labor. His father Charles Mynn Thruston also farmed, but was educated and ordained as a minister, then moved his family westward to Frederick County where he again farmed (using enslaved labor), as well as served as a minister until 1776. Rev. Thruston became known as a "fighting parson" for he recruited a military company, joined the Continental Army and rose to the rank of colonel, but also lost the use of an arm as a result of a combat wound. Meanwhile, back in Frederick County, Buckner Thruston received an education appropriate to his class. His mother had died when he was an infant, but his father remarried, so the family included several brothers and sisters. He traveled to Williamsburg for higher education and received an Artium Baccalaureus degree in 1783 from the College of William & Mary. Thus, he did not serve alongside his father, who was again one of the delegates representing Frederick County, Virginia in the previous and next sessions. After fellow legislators made his father a Virginia judge, Thruston became a commissioner for the boundary dispute between Kentucky and Virginia in 1791.

Kentucky legislators elected Thruston as a Democratic-Republican to the United States Senate, and he served from March 4, 1805, to December 18, 1809, when he resigned to accept a federal judicial appointment. In 1830, the Thruston household included five slaves. His son Charles Mynn Thruston, became a career U.S. Army officer, and retired to Cumberland, Maryland, where he farmed and became the mayor as the American Civil War started, when he resumed service as a general of volunteers in the Union Army, though he relinquished the post in 1862 in favor of a younger generation.