Painting of William Lowndes. Google Arts & Culture.
(1782-1822) He was the son of Rawlins Lowndes and Sarah Jones. He was christened William Jones, but he never used his middle name. He was educated at private academies in England and Charleston and was a model student and outstanding orator. He studied law and was accepted to the bar but practiced for less than a year before quitting the legal profession. Lowndes married Elizabeth Brewton Pinckney, the daughter of former governor Thomas Pinckney, and they had three children.
Lowndes served in the SC House of Representatives and the U.S. Congress. Because of Lowndes’s talent and influence in national affairs, he was nominated, but declined, two offers to become secretary of war and diplomatic appointments to Russia, Turkey, and France. Lowndes was nominated by the South Carolina legislature as a presidential candidate but died of illness while en route to England.
