Encyclopedia article about Amos Tappan Akerman, a Georgia lawyer who rose to prominence as U.S. attorney general during Reconstruction. He was born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, on February 23, 1821. He went south to teach after graduating from Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire, in 1842, starting in North Carolina, then in Richmond County, Georgia. In 1846 Akerman accepted a position as tutor in the Savannah home of John Macpherson Berrien, U.S. senator and former attorney general. As he taught the Berrien children, Akerman studied law in the senator's library, and he was admitted to the Georgia bar in 1850. He practiced first in Clarkesville, then in Elberton. In 1864 he married Martha Rebecca Galloway, with whom he had eight children, one of whom died. He participated in drafting the Georgia Constitution of 1868 and supported equal political rights for African Americans.

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Cite as: "Amos T. Akerman (1821-1880)," New Georgia Encyclopedia. Retrieved [date]: http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org.

Forms part of the New Georgia Encyclopedia.