For generations the name of Forsyth has been associated with distinction in the records of southern history. The original member of the family, Robert Forsyth, came from England to America before the revolution, and was a member of the military family of Washington. His son, John Forsyth, was at various times attorney general and governor of Georgia, a member of congress for a period of fifteen years from that state, minister to Spain, and was instrumental in procuring the cession of Florida. For six and a half years he served as secretary of state, during the administrations of Jackson and Van Buren. Robert Forsyth was the grandfather of John Forsyth, late of Mobile, while John Forsyth, Sr., was his father.

Enjoying unusual advantages, socially and scholastically, the subject of the present sketch turned them to great practical benefit. Among the advantages which he enjoyed was that of a residence of two years at the Spanish court during the administration of his distinguished father as minister to Spain. He was a graduate from Princeton University, from which he bore away the first honors of his class and delivered the valedictory address.

Entering on the practice of law at Columbus, Ga., he continued there but one year, when he located in Mobile, in the year 1835. He soon received the appointment of United States attorney for the southern district of Alabama, but the death of his father occurring in Georgia, necessitated his return to that state, where he remained for twelve years, having taken charge of his father’s estate and devoting his time to planting, the practice of law and the editorial management of the Columbus Times. It was during that period that he enlisted to serve in the Mexican war as the adjutant of the First Georgia Regiment.

He returned to Mobile in 1853, entered the lumber business, was burnt out, and entered again the field of journalism by purchasing the Mobile Register. In 1856 he was appointed by President Pierce minister to Mexico, in which capacity he served for two years.

Colonel Forsyth’s mission to Mexico was attended by much labor and perplexity, as the duty was imposed on him of adjusting varied and numerous claims against the Mexican government, which claims originated in the nature of the war waged by the Mexicans. There were claims for imprisonments, murders, confiscation, and others, and while Colonel Forsyth labored without abatement, he had but timorous support from the Buchanan administration.

As a matter of fact, President Buchanan was gravely absorbed in the rush of events which tended toward the approaching Civil War, which broke like a storm over the country in 1861, and his foreign policy was one of conciliation. The reason of this presidential policy concerning Mexico is now obvious. In view of the pending conflict in the American states, the hostility of Mexico, for any reason, would be serious.As an earnest advocate of the rights of the citizens of the American states at the Mexican capital, Colonel Forsyth was gravely embarrassed by the feeble support lent by his government, and this led to the severance of his relations with the diplomatic service. Having resigned, he returned to Mobile and resumed his editorial work.

With qualifications so varied, he was frequently called into active service by the people. While his pen was actively employed, he was summoned to such important posts as that of mayor of Mobile, legislator, alderman in his adopted city, and other stations of public interest.

In March, 1861, Colonel Forsyth was sent, together with Messrs. Crawford of Georgia, and Roman of Louisiana, on a peace commission to Washington. There was but slight hope of accomplishing anything, and it is doubtful if there was any more serious intention involved in the mission than that of gaining time for a more efficient equipment of the South for the pending struggle. It was a time for tactics, and a play for advantage. The mission was a bootless one, and in due time the war burst on the country.

During the Civil War, Colonel Forsyth served for a time on the staff of General Braxton Bragg, meanwhile retaining his connection with his paper, for, after all, the pen was the most potent instrument in the hand of Colonel Forsyth. After the close of the war he proved to be one of the most masterly spirits in steering the state through the storm of reconstruction. The pen of no one in the South was more powerful during that chaotic period. Statesman, jurist and journalist, he was equipped for guidance in an emergency like this, and with the zeal of a patriot he responded to every occasion that arose. His excessive labor made sad inroads on his constitution, his health was broken, but despite this he was persistent in labor. He was of that type of public servants who sought not applause for its own sake, but was impelled by an unquestioned patriotism which yielded to demands of whatever kind, high or low, in order that he might serve the public.

Much as Colonel Forsyth did in the exercise of his superior versatility, all else was incidental to the wield of his prolific pen. He became the South’s most brilliant journalist. The compass of his vision was that of a statesman, and during the troublous times which followed the Civil War, the counsel of one like him was needed, and that counsel found most profitable expression through the nib of his powerful pen.

Day after day, for a long period of years, the columns of the Mobile Register glittered with thought that moved on the highest level and that found expression in polished and incisive diction. It was brightened by the loftiest tone of rhetoric, sustained throughout by the best strain of scholarship, never lapsing, either in tone or expression, into the commonplace. There was a fastidious touch in his style, a classical mold to his thought, which, while they pleased the most scholarly of readers, equally charmed the common people.

Under the sway of his forceful and trenchant pen the Mobile Register became one of the most dominant factors in southern thought. That journal found readers in all the states, and more than any other in the South at that time, it won the attention of the metropolitan press. In no editorial sanctum has he been surpassed in rareness of diction, nor in power of expression.