Richard Henry Wilde

• Name — Richard Henry Wilde • State — Georgia • Constituency — (1827–1829) (1829–1835) • Term Start — November 17, 1827 • Term End — March 3, 1835 • Predecessor — John Forsyth • Successor — John W. A. Sanford • Constituency1 — at-large district • Term Start1 — February 7, 1825 • Term End1 — March 3, 1825 • Predecessor1 — Thomas W. Cobb • Successor1 — James Meriwether • Constituency2 — at-large district • Term Start2 — March 4, 1815 • Term End2 — March 3, 1817 • Predecessor2 — William Barnett • Successor2 — Joel Abbot • Office3 — 14th Attorney General of Georgia • Term Start3 — 1811 • Term End3 — 1813 • Predecessor3 — Alexander M. Allen • Successor3 — Alexander M. Allen • Born — 24 September 1789 • Birthplace — Dublin, Ireland • Died — 10 September 1847 • Place of death — New Orleans, Louisiana, U.S. • Resting Place — City Cemetery, Augusta, Georgia, United States • Party — Democratic-Republican

Wilde was born in Dublin, Ireland, in 1789 to Richard Wilde and Mary Newitt, but came to America at age eight and moved to Augusta, Georgia, in 1802. His brother was Judge John W. Wilde, a judge of Augusta, Georgia. He was a businessman and studied law. After gaining admittance to the state bar in 1809, Wilde practiced law in Augusta. He served as the solicitor general of the superior court of Richmond County, Georgia, and was also the attorney general of Georgia from 1811 to 1813 as a result of holding the Richmond County position. In 1814, Wilde was elected as a Democratic-Republican Representative to the 14th United States Congress and served one term from March 4, 1815, until March 3, 1817, as he lost his reelection campaign in 1816. Upon Thomas W. Cobb's resignation, Wilde successfully ran as a Crawford Republican to fill that seat in the 18th Congress and served only a month from February 7, 1825, to March 3, 1825. After several more unsuccessful Congressional campaigns in 1824 and 1826, Wilde ran again in 1827 as a Jacksonian to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of John Forsyth and won election to fill that term. He was reelected to three additional terms (21st, 22nd and 23rd Congresses) in that seat and served from November 17, 1827, to March 3, 1835. In 1828 he established the Casa Bianca Plantation, an antebellum cotton plantation southwest of Monticello in Jefferson County, Florida, in a partnership with was created by Joseph Mills White (1781–1839). Wilde lost his reelection campaign in 1834 and traveled in Europe from 1835 to 1840. In Italy he associated with Edward Everett, Horatio Greenough, Hiram Powers and Charles Sumner. In 1843, Wilde moved to New Orleans, returned to the practice of law and served as a professor of constitutional law at the University of Louisiana at New Orleans (current-day Tulane University). Wilde died in New Orleans on September 10, 1847, and was interred in a vault in a cemetery in New Orleans. In 1854, he was reinterred at Sand Hill family burying ground near Augusta and then reinterred an additional time in 1886 in Augusta's City Cemetery. In 1896, a marble memorial to Wilde was erected, by the Hayne Lyterary Circle of Augusta, on Greene Street.