Abel P. Upshur

Abel P. Upshur directed John Tyler’s effort to annex Texas before his death in 1844. A Virginia lawyer, legislator, and judge from a planter family, he had become secretary of the navy in 1841. There he supported modernizing warships and reorganizing naval administration before Tyler persuaded him to take charge of foreign affairs. ¹

Upshur became acting Secretary of State in 1843 and received the substantive appointment a month later. He reopened negotiations with the Republic of Texas, whose independence Mexico continued to contest. Upshur and Tyler favored admitting Texas as a state in which slavery would remain legal and feared that British influence might obstruct annexation. The proposed expansion therefore joined questions of American territory to the future of slavery and the risk of war with Mexico. ¹

Upshur also pursued discussion with Britain over the Oregon boundary, but neither that settlement nor Texas annexation was completed during his lifetime. He died when a gun exploded aboard the USS Princeton on the Potomac in 1844. John C. Calhoun succeeded him and carried the annexation effort forward. Texas entered the United States in 1845, and the Oregon boundary was settled in 1846, after the negotiations Upshur had helped initiate had passed to later officials. ¹