Philip Barton Key II

Philip Barton Key II (April 5, 1818 – February 27, 1859) was an American lawyer who served as U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia.

Biography

Born in Georgetown, D.C., Key was the son of Francis Scott Key He married Ellen Swan, the daughter of a Baltimore attorney, on November 18, 1845. and by 1859 a widower with four children, Key was known to be flirtatious with many women.

Key was appointed to his father's former position, United States Attorney for the District of Columbia, by President Pierce in September 1853, during a recess of the Senate; the Senate later confirmed his nomination in March 1854. Four years later, he was nominated, and confirmed again, for another four-year term; thus, he would serve until his death.

Harper's Weekly engraving of Mrs. Sickles from a photograph of Mathew Brady Sometime in the spring of 1858, Teresa Sickles began an affair with Key. informing him of his wife's affair with Key.

Death

Sickles saw Key sitting on a bench outside the Sickles home on February 27, 1859, signalling to Teresa, and confronted him. and with a pistol repeatedly shot the unarmed Key, who was pleading for his life.

Sickles was acquitted based on temporary insanity, a crime of passion, in one of the most controversial trials of the 19th century. It was the first successful use of the defense in the United States. One of Sickles' attorneys, Edwin Stanton, later became the Secretary of War. Newspapers declared Sickles a hero for "saving" women from Key.

Key is buried in Oak Hill Cemetery, with a dedicatory in his son-in-law's family plot in Westminster Hall and Burying Ground in Baltimore.