William V. Sullivan

William Van Amberg Sullivan (* December 18, 1857 in Winona, Montgomery County, Mississippi, † March 21, 1918 in Oxford, Mississippi ) was an American politician (Democratic Party), who represented the state of Mississippi in both chambers of Congress.

William Sullivan attended the public schools in Panola County, and later the University of Mississippi in Oxford, where he St. Anthony Hall belonged to the secret student connection. He graduated in 1875 from Vanderbilt University in Nashville, after which he was admitted in the same year to the bar and in Austin (Mississippi) started practicing.

From 1877 lived Sullivan in Oxford, where he also sat on the city council. In 1896 he was elected to the House of Representatives of the United States, where he represented the Second District of Mississippi from March 4, 1897. He laid down his mandate on 31 May 1898 after he was appointed to the U.S. Senate; yet he succeeds the late Edward C. Walthall. Sullivan also ruled the by-election for himself and remained thus until March 3, 1901 Senate; the next regular election, he did not start.

Thereafter, Sullivan retired from politics. In the public eye, he joined again on September 8, 1908, when he led a lynch mob in Oxford, killed the African American Nelse Patton. This had been accused of murdering a white woman. The next day the New York Times Sullivan quoted with these words: "I led the mob to which Nelse Patton has lynched, and I'm proud of it. I have passed every movement of the mobs and did everything I could to see him lynched. " What are the consequences arose for Sullivan from this fact, is not known.