William Hayne Leavell, clergyman and diplomat, son of John Rowland and Elizabeth Jane (Chalmers) Leavell, was born in Newberry District, South Carolina, on May 24, 1850. He was graduated from Newberry College in 1866 and from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in 1870. On December 1, 1874, he married Mary George, and they had four children. Austin College conferred an honorary doctorate on him in 1895, and the University of Mississippi gave him another in 1908. Leavell served as pastor in Jackson and Meridian, Mississippi, and in Manchester, New Hampshire. He was called to the First Presbyterian Church in Houston, Texas, in 1893 and served it until 1905. He moved to Carrollton, Mississippi, in 1911. He was envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary to Guatemala from 1913 to 1919, when he returned to Houston. Leavell served on many synodical committees and was president of the board of directors of the Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary. He was a trustee of the William M. Rice estate and of Austin College. He edited and published George's Political History of Slavery in the United States (1915). He was a progressive Democrat. Leavell died in Houston on August 1, 1930.
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The following, adapted from the Chicago Manual of Style, 15th edition, is the preferred citation for this entry.
Clifton Caldwell,
“Leavell, William Hayne,”
Handbook of Texas Online,
accessed June 26, 2022,
https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/leavell-william-hayne.
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