Thomas J. Robertson


Thomas James Robertson was a United States Senator from South Carolina. Born near Winnsboro, he completed preparatory studies and graduated from South Carolina College at Columbia in 1843. He engaged in planting and was a member of the State constitutional convention in 1865.
Upon the readmission of the State of South Carolina to representation in 1868, Robertson was elected as a Republican to the U.S. Senate; he was reelected in 1871 and served from July 15, 1868, to March 4, 1877, and was not a candidate for reelection. While in the Senate he was chairman of the Committee on Manufactures. He retired from public life and active business due to ill health, and in 1897 died in Columbia. Interment was in Elmwood Cemetery.