Early Life
Brown was born in Giles County, Tennessee, the son of Duncan and Margaret Smith Brown. His ancestors were Scots-Irish, and his grandfather, Angus Brown, was a veteran of the American Revolution. His father was an ardent Whig. Brown enrolled in the Manual Labor Academy in Spring Hill, Tennessee, and taught school in Giles County to pay his way. After studying law under Judge James Trimble, he was admitted to the bar in 1834, and briefly practiced in Pulaski, Tennessee.
In 1835, Brown moved to Texas, but quickly grew disillusioned with the lack of organization there, and returned to Tennessee after a few months. In 1836, he fought with the First Tennessee Mounted Volunteers in the Second Seminole War, and eventually rose to the rank of sergeant-major.
Read more about this topic: Neill S. Brown
Famous quotes containing the words early and/or life:
“The Americans never use the word peasant, because they have no idea of the class which that term denotes; the ignorance of more remote ages, the simplicity of rural life, and the rusticity of the villager have not been preserved among them; and they are alike unacquainted with the virtues, the vices, the coarse habits, and the simple graces of an early stage of civilization.”
—Alexis de Tocqueville (1805–1859)
“Only one endowed with restless vitality is susceptible to pessimism. You become a pessimist—a demonic, elemental, bestial pessimist—only when life has been defeated many times in its fight against depression.”
—E.M. Cioran (b. 1911)