Charles Pomeroy

Charles Pomeroy (September 3, 1825 – February 11, 1891) was a one-term Republican U.S. Representative from Iowa’s 6th congressional district. He was born in Meriden, New Haven County, Connecticut, where he received an academic education that prepared him for a professional career. After his schooling, he studied law, was admitted to the bar, and commenced the practice of law, beginning a vocation that would underpin his later work in public service.

In 1855, Pomeroy moved west to Iowa, settling in the then-thriving but now-defunct community of Boonesboro in Boone County. There he continued to practice law and also engaged in agricultural pursuits, reflecting the mixed professional and agrarian character of many mid-19th-century Iowa leaders. As the Republican Party emerged in the 1850s, Pomeroy aligned himself early with the new party and became active in its political affairs.

Pomeroy’s prominence within the Republican ranks in Iowa grew steadily, and in 1860 he served as one of the presidential electors for Abraham Lincoln, participating in the Electoral College that confirmed Lincoln’s first election to the presidency. His political reliability and administrative abilities led to his appointment as receiver of the United States land office at Fort Dodge, Iowa, a key federal position in a rapidly developing region. He held that office from September 11, 1861, through the Civil War and into the Reconstruction era, serving until March 3, 1869. His work involved overseeing federal land transactions at a time when settlement and railroad expansion were transforming Iowa, and he resigned the post in order to take up his duties in Congress.

In 1868, Pomeroy was elected as a Republican to represent Iowa’s 6th congressional district in the Forty-first Congress. At that time, the Sixth District encompassed the northwestern third of the state, extending from the Missouri River as far east as Waterloo and from the Minnesota state line as far south as Marshalltown, an area that included many of the frontier and developing communities whose growth he had witnessed as a land office official. Pomeroy served a single term in the U.S. House of Representatives, from March 4, 1869, to March 3, 1871, participating in the legislative work of the Reconstruction period. In 1870, he sought renomination but was unsuccessful, losing the Republican nomination to Jackson Orr, which ended his brief congressional career.

After leaving Congress, Pomeroy relocated to Washington, D.C., where he drew on his legal background and federal experience to work as a claim agent. In that capacity, he represented individuals and entities in their efforts to secure settlements or payments from the federal government, a common post-congressional occupation in the late 19th century. He continued in this work until his death in Washington, D.C., on February 11, 1891. Pomeroy was interred in Oak Hill Cemetery in the capital, a burial ground that became the resting place of many notable public figures.

Pomeroy’s name endured in Iowa through the small town of Pomeroy in Calhoun County, which was named in his honor. The naming reflected the esteem in which he was held in the state he had served as a lawyer, federal land official, and member of Congress, and it linked his legacy to the ongoing development of the region whose early growth he had helped to administer.