Richmond Daily Whig (Richmond, Va.)
Historic newspapers carry the language, views and graphic reporting of their time, including racist content. They are shown to teen and adult profiles.
2,320 issues from 1842 to 1861, published in Richmond, Virginia, digitised for Chronicling America.
John Hampden Pleasants, born in Goochland, Virginia in 1797 and educated at William and Mary, practiced law before becoming a newspaper publisher in Richmond when he started the Whig in February of 1824. Initially published as a semiweekly under the title the Constitutional Whig, Pleasants’ newspaper competed with the Democratic Richmond Enquirer, published by his political nemesis, Thomas Ritchie. The discord between the two editors was so intense that it culminated in a duel on Feb. 27, 1846, an encounter that led to Pleasants’ death at age 49. Though its founder was gone, the Whig carried on for many years.
A daily edition of the Daily Richmond Whig began in 1828 with several title fluctuations throughout its lifespan, until it was absorbed by Richmond’s The Daily Times in 1888. Except for a suspension during the Civil War, a weekly edition of the paper was also published from 1841-1888. With the motto, “Democracy, the Constitution, and State Rights,” the Whig initially supported states’ rights and opposed national banks, but by the 1830s, had shifted its support to the Second National Bank. By the mid-nineteenth century, Richmond was a Whig stronghold, in spite of the rest of the state being solidly Democratic, which kept the paper a popular choice for local readers.
On the subject of slavery,the Whig endorsed gradual emancipation, until its unpopular position forced it to tone down its anti-slavery editorials. As sectional tensions grew and Civil War loomed, the Whig…
- Genres
- News
- Published in
- Richmond, Virginia, United States
- Language
- English
- Collection
- Chronicling America
- Licence or status
- None stated by the archive
- Rights
- The Library of Congress believes that the newspapers in Chronicling America are in the public domain or have no known copyright restrictions. Newspapers published in the United States more than 95 years ago are in the public domain in their entirety.
- Credit
- Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers, Library of Congress and the National Endowment for the Humanities
- Who can read it
- Teens profiles and older (placed by Invisible Network from what the archive says; archives give no ratings)
- Archive
- Library of Congress