Morgan County, Illinois Biographies

Illinois Genealogy Trails

Biographies of
Morgan County, Illinois Residents

CLOUD, Newton - clergyman and legislator, was born in North Carolina, in 1805, and, in 1827, settled in the vicinity of Waverly, Morgan County, Ill., where he pursued the vocation of a farmer, as well as a preacher of the Methodist Church. He also became prominent as a Democratic politician, and served in no less than nine sessions of the General Assembly, besides the Constitutional Convention of 1847, of which he was chosen President. He was first elected Representative in the Seventh Assembly (1830), and afterwards served in the House during the sessions of the Ninth, Tenth, Eleventh, Thirteenth, Fifteenth and Twenty-seventh, and as Senator in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth. He was also Clerk of the House in 1844-45, and, having been elected Representative two years later, was chosen Speaker at the succeeding session. Although not noted for any specially aggressive qualities, his consistency of character won for him general respect, while his frequent elections to the Legislature prove him to have been a man of large influence. [Historical Encylopedia of Illinois", 1901, transcribed by Kim Torp]