Jeremiah Clemens was a favored son of fortune. His career fell on the palmiest period of southern history. Possessed of varied talents, his life was correspondingly varied. He had power, and when exercised, the result was tremendous. His intellectual strength was of a high order, his literary taste delicate, his ability to command unquestioned, and his oratory brilliant and potent. His varied gifts led him into the four departments of law, politics, war, and literature. In none of these was he deficient, for he was an able advocate, a statesman of undeniable ability, a commander of no mean qualities, and a writer whose skill and deftness of touch made him popular.

The scholastic advantages of Colonel Clemens were superior. First a student at LaGrange College, at that time a school of high class, he completed his course at the University of Alabama. He afterwards took a law course at Transylvania University, Kentucky, and entered on the practice of law in 1834. His first public service was as United States District Attorney, and for a period of years he was a member of the legislature of Alabama.

The spirit of the warrior and patriot was stirred within him by the struggle of the Texans for independence, and he raised a voluntary force to join in that contest. Of this regiment thus voluntarily raised, he became the lieutenant-colonel. The command marched westward, shared in the battles of that land of plains, and returned when the struggle was ended. Again entering politics, he represented his county in the legislature of Alabama, where he won distinction as a debater and statesman, and later he became a Democratic elector in a presidential contest. In all these stations Colonel Clemens showed more than ordinary ability and won a degree of distinction.

Having gotten a taste of war in the struggle in Texas, he was again induced to employ his sword in the Mexican War. Becoming lieutenant-colonel of the Ninth Infantry, his command participated in a number of battles in Mexico. In 1849 he was appointed governor of the civil and military department of purchase in Mexico. In this connection he served till the close of the war with Mexico, after which time the army was reduced and Colonel Clemens returned to Alabama and resumed the practice of law.

Vast opportunity had thus been afforded this gifted man for the enlargement of his vision of affairs, and it had not been slighted. His military career had served to bring him into increased conspicuousness and to enhance his popularity. When Hon. Dixon H. Lewis died in New York, Colonel Clemens was elected to fill his unexpired term.

All this had been achieved by Colonel Clemens by the time he was thirty-five years old, a period when most men begin the accomplishments of life. In a wide and commanding orbit such as was afforded in the United States Senate, Colonel Clemens came to be one of its most popular members. He was an orator of the Ciceronian type, and his utterances flashed with the radiance occasioned by the friction of intense thought. His combined qualities and varied experience in different spheres of life served him admirably when on his feet in the Senate chamber. He could husband his resources with skill and with remarkable readiness, and his sentences fell from his lips like minted coin fresh from the stamp—bright, beautiful, and warm. Independence and self-assertion he had in abundance, nor was he lacking in genuine courage, but his temperamental disposition lent to these qualities a degree of dash which sometimes betrayed him into rashness which often induced men to hesitate to follow his leading. The spirit of the warrior in battle was often his in the rough and tumble of debate, but he found that the dash of the field in the leadership of man would not prevail in the cool, staid thoughtfulness of the forum. He was the dash of the mountain stream rather than the buoying and staying power of the deep lake. A rapid thinker and a man of brilliant action, he was more the subject of impulse than of calm and judicial poise. This neutralizing element alone prevented Colonel Clemens from becoming a great leader. That he had the qualities of leadership none denied, but he lacked the poise that made his position a stable one. Still this did not prevent his attainment to national distinction as a United States senator.

In the indulgence of his literary tastes Colonel Clemens published, in 1856, his first book, “Bernard Lile,” a romance fascinating alike for its rosy diction, its rapid movement, and its shifting episode. At the time of its appearance, the work created a considerable sensation. This was followed two years later by his second work, “Mustang Gray,” which was born of his observations and experiences in the Mexican War. The first work prepared the way for a wider circulation of the second, the popularity of which was derived in part from its proximity, in point of appearance, to the scenes and events of the recent war with Mexico. For a season “Mustang Gray” was the reigning novel. Within little more than a year from the time of the appearance of “Mustang Gray” there came from the prolific pen of Colonel Clemens “The Rivals,” based on the stirring scenes grouped about the period of Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton. The cast of the novel as a work of art has changed since the time of the appearance of these stories, but they aptly represent the romance of that period, and are not wanting in genuine merit.

Politically Colonel Clemens was a Unionist. He belonged to the school of politics of which Benjamin H. Hill was a conspicuous representative. From his antecedents and his cavalier dash, the inference would logically be that Jeremiah Clemens would be an ardent secessionist, but he was opposed to immediate secession, and preferred the adoption of a co-operative policy, after a thorough consultation of the states, which was aggrieved by the election of Mr. Lincoln. While opposed to the ordinance of secession, Colonel Clemens voted for it by a surrender of his conviction, because, such was the condition of the time, that not to support it would have placed him in opposition to his native state. In an emergency like this Colonel Clemens yielded his convictions and went with the state. He was appointed a major general, commanding the state troops of Alabama, a precautionary step taken by the state, provided it should be thrown back on itself as a result of its voluntary withdrawal from the Union. The union proclivities of Colonel Clemens never forsook him, and during the latter part of the Civil War he went to Philadelphia, where he wrote an unfortunate pamphlet, ill-timed and unwise, which gave great offense. He died near the close of the war.