Leonard Wright Colby
American politician
Leonard Wright Colby (August 5, 1846 – November 18, 1924) was an American politician and veteran of the American Indian Wars, who served as United States Assistant Attorney General under Benjamin Harrison. As a teenager, he fought in the American Civil War. During his career, he commanded both Nebraska and U.S. troops. He served as commander of the Nebraska National Guard.
Family, education, and early military activities
Colby was born in Cherry Valley Township, Ohio in 1846. The fifth of seven children, his parents were Rowel and Abigail (Livingston) Colby. His parents were from Grafton County, New Hampshire. When he was about four years old his parents removed to a farm five miles from Freeport, Illinois.
As a teenager, he enlisted in the 8th Illinois Volunteer Infantry Regiment and served the Union Army in the American Civil War. Wounded at the Battle of Fort Blakeley in 1865, in almost the last battle of the Civil War, he was recommended for promotion and a commission for gallant and meritorious services in the charge at Fort Blakeley and the siege of Mobile, Alabama, where he captured a Confederate flag; he was discharged that year.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Leonard Wright Colby” as american politician. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the people & ideas register because the source frames it as american politician. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 15, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q17626550. VIAF identifies the subject as 3143150808959619000000. The Library of Congress control number is no2017132403. None of the 3 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1846, 1924 and 1865.
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This entry incorporates text from “Leonard Wright Colby” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.