Samuel Beall
land speculator, politician, Union Army officer; Lieutenant Governor of Wisconsin

Samuel Wootton Beall (June 16, 1807 – September 26, 1868) was an American land speculator, lawyer, and Wisconsin pioneer. He was the second lieutenant governor of Wisconsin (1850–1852) and lost his leg at the Battle of Shiloh, as a Union Army officer in the American Civil War.
Early life
Born in Montgomery County, Maryland, Beall graduated from Union College in Schenectady, New York, in 1827.
Career
Beall moved to what is now Green Bay, Wisconsin, in 1835, where he made a fortune in land speculation, and was admitted to the bar and practiced law. In the 1840s, he settled in Taycheedah.
Between 1832 and 1856, Beall loaned the Stockbridge and Munsee Indians' delegations to Washington, D.C. some $3,000 for their expenses while they pursued claims against the federal government. He was promised one third of whatever they recovered, but when they won their case, he claimed and recovered only his actual expenditures.
Beall was a delegate to both the first and second Wisconsin constitutional conventions from Marquette County, one of only six men to do so, as most members of the first convention declined to serve in the second.
Beall was a Democrat and was lieutenant governor for Nelson Dewey's second term as governor, from 1850 until 1852.
In December 1859, Beall was appointed by the Denver Town Company to lobby for Colorado's representation in Washington.
The public source identifies “Samuel Beall” as land speculator, politician, Union Army officer; Lieutenant Governor of Wisconsin. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Samuel, Beall and land.
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A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Samuel Beall”, the useful work is to connect “land speculator, politician, Union Army officer; Lieutenant Governor of Wisconsin” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.
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 4, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7410886. The first chronological checks are 1807, 1868, 1850 and 1852.
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This entry incorporates text from “Samuel Beall” 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.