President James Abram Garfield is my 7th cousin 5x removed. The ancestor who connects us as relatives is, Francis Newcombe, my 11th great grandfather.

Historical narrative. James Abram Garfield (November 19, 1831 – September 19, 1881) had been the 20th president of the United States. Garfield served from March 4, 1881, until their death by assassination, six and a half months. Garfield had been the initial sitting member of Congress to be elected towards the presidency and remains the just sitting House user to gain the White House.

Garfield joined politics as a Republican in 1857. He served as an associate of the Ohio State Senate from 1859 to 1861. Garfield opposed Confederate secession, served as a significant basic when looking at the Union Army through the American Civil War, and fought within the battles of Middle Creek, Shiloh, and Chickamauga. Garfield had been first elected to Congress in 1862 to represent Ohio’s 19th District. Throughout Garfield’s extensive congressional service following the Civil War, he securely supported the gold standard and gained a reputation as a talented orator. Garfield initially consented with Radical Republican views regarding Reconstruction, but later preferred a moderate approach for civil legal rights enforcement for freedmen.

At the 1880 Republican National Convention, Senator-elect Garfield went to as campaign manager for Secretary of the Treasury John Sherman and gave the presidential nomination speech for him. When neither Sherman nor their rivals – Ulysses S. Grant and James G. Blaine – could quickly get enough votes to secure the nomination, delegates opted for Garfield as a compromise from the 36th ballot. Into the 1880 presidential election, Garfield conducted a low-key front porch campaign and narrowly defeated Democrat Winfield Scott Hancock.

Garfield’s achievements as president incorporated a resurgence of presidential authority against senatorial courtesy in executive appointments, removing crime within the Post Office, and appointing a U.S. Supreme Court justice. He improved the powers of the presidency as he defied the influential New York senator Roscoe Conkling by hiring William H. Robertson to the lucrative post of Collector of the Port of New York, beginning a fracas that ended with Robertson’s verification and Conkling’s resignation through the Senate. Garfield advocated agricultural technology, an informed electorate, and civil liberties for African Americans. Garfield also proposed substantial civil service reforms; those reforms had been eventually passed away by Congress in 1883 and finalized into legislation by their successor, Chester A. Arthur, once the Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act.

On July 2, 1881, Garfield was shot during the Baltimore and Potomac Railroad facility in Washington D.C. by Charles J. Guiteau, a disappointed workplace seeker. The wound was not instantly fatal for Garfield, but he succumbed on September 19, 1881. Guiteau ended up being executed for the murder of Garfield in June 1882. Some historians elect to forgo listing Garfield in rankings of U.S. presidents because of the short timeframe of his presidency.

My genealogical chart that shows the ancestor who connects us as relatives:

President James Abram Garfield (1831 – 1881)
7th cousin 5x removed

Abram Garfield (1799 – 1833)
Father of President James Abram Garfield

Asenath Hill (1778 – 1851)
Mother of Abram Garfield

Ebenezer Hill (1744 – 1834)
Father of Asenath Hill

Ebenezer Hill (1716 – 1815)
Father of Ebenezer Hill

Rachel Adams (1680 – 1758)
Mother of Ebenezer Hill

Peter Adams (1652 – 1723)
Father of Rachel Adams

Rachel Newcomb (1632 – 1690)
Mother of Peter Adams

Francis Newcombe (1605 – 1692)
Father of Rachel Newcomb

Francis Newcombe II (1630 – 1716)
Son of Francis Newcombe

Reference
James A. Garfield – Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_A._Garfield