{{Short description|American politician (1791–1863)}} {{Use mdy dates|date=January 2022}} {{Infobox officeholder | name = Thomas Carbery | image = ThomasCarbery.png | office = 6th Mayor of the City of Washington, D.C. | term_start = June 14, 1822 | term_end = June 14, 1824 | predecessor = Samuel N. Smallwood | successor = Samuel N. Smallwood | birth_name = | birth_date = {{birth date|1791|6|26}} | birth_place = St. Mary's County, Maryland, U.S. | death_date = {{death date and age|1863|5|23|1791|6|26}} | death_place = | resting_place = Mount Olivet Cemetery<br/>Washington, D.C., U.S. | party = | spouse = {{marriage|Mary H. Manning|1826|1834|reason=died}} | children = 4 | education = | signature = | module = {{Infobox military person | embed = yes | allegiance = {{flag|United States|1815}} | branch = {{army|United States|1815}} | service_years = 1813–1815 | rank = Captain | unit = 36th Infantry | battles = War of 1812 }} }} '''Thomas Carbery''' (or Carberry) (June 26, 1791 – May 23, 1863) was the sixth mayor of the City of Washington (now Washington, D.C.), serving from 1822 to 1824. He ran again for mayor in 1824 and 1826 but was not re-elected.
==Early life== Thomas Carbery was born and raised in St. Mary's County, Maryland, one of at least eleven known children of Thomas Carbery Sr. and Mary Asonath Simmons. His Carbery forebears were of Irish extraction. Thomas' family relocated to the District of Columbia, near Georgetown, around 1805.<ref name="jstor">{{cite journal |last1=Clark |first1=Allen C. |title=The Mayors of the Corporation of Washington: Thomas Carbery |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/40067058 |journal=Records of the Columbia Historical Society, Washington, D.C. |year=1916 |volume=19 |pages=61–98 |publisher=Historical Society of Washington, D.C. |jstor=40067058 |access-date=12 April 2021}}</ref> The future mayor of Washington, D.C. was the nephew of Colonel Henry Carbery, a Revolutionary War officer and the first Adjutant General of Maryland. Another close relative, his aunt Eleanor Sewall ''née'' Carbery, was the wife of the prominent Georgetown City Tavern proprietor, Clement Sewall,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://72.32.212.225/$sitepreview/citytavernclubdcguests.org/main.cfm |title=City Tavern Club V2's Tenant Handbook:History of the Club |publisher=72.32.212.225 |date=17 January 1981 |access-date=1 November 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120426062722/http://72.32.212.225/%24sitepreview/citytavernclubdcguests.org/main.cfm |archive-date=26 April 2012 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Archives of Holy Trinity Church: Marriages and Baptisms (1775-1805) |url=https://repository.library.georgetown.edu/bitstream/handle/10822/557003/MARB1795_05.pdf |website=Georgetown University Library |publisher=Holy Trinity Church |access-date=25 February 2021 |page=46}}</ref> another Revolutionary War officer and childhood friend of Colonel Henry Carbery.<ref>Revolutionary War Pension and Bounty-Land-Warrant Application Files. National Archives and Records Administration, retrieved April 12, 2021.</ref>
==Mayor of Washington, D.C.== When the beloved (and first popularly elected) mayor of Washington, Samuel N. Smallwood, announced that he would not run for a second elected term as mayor, Carbery sought the office. In 1822 he defeated Roger C. Weightman in a race so close that Weightman sued him; the lawsuit was tied up in court for the entire two years of Carbery's term.
In 1824, Smallwood again sought the office of mayor, defeating the incumbent Carbery's bid for re-election. Carbery ran again in 1826, re-matched with Weightman, and lost.
==Career== He was president of the National Metropolitan Bank, one of the largest financial institutions in Washington (it underwrote the payroll of the entire U.S. Army during the War of 1812.<ref>{{cite news| url=http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/stories/2004/10/11/focus10.html | first=Mike | last=Livingston | title=Metropolitan Bank keeps up with stately neighbors|website=Bizjournals.com | date=October 11, 2004}}</ref> Carbery himself was a captain in the U.S. Army's 36th Infantry. He enlisted on April 30, 1813 and was honorably discharged on June 15, 1815.<ref name="jstor"/>
Carbery was a charter member and officer of the Washington National Monument Society, the group that ultimately financed the construction of the Washington Monument, in the 1830s.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.nps.gov/archive/wamo/history/chap1.htm|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070108022137/http://www.nps.gov/archive/wamo/history/chap1.htm|url-status=dead|archive-date=January 8, 2007|title=A History of the Washington Monument (Chapter 1)|website=Nps.gov|access-date=2017-08-19}}</ref> He ultimately became chairman of the monument's building committee when construction began in 1848.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.cr.nps.gov/history/online_books/wamo/stones.pdf|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061009095013/http://www.cr.nps.gov/history/online_books/wamo/stones.pdf|url-status=dead|archive-date=October 9, 2006|title=Microsoft Word - WAMO CS G title.doc|website=Cr.nps.gov|access-date=2017-08-19}}</ref>
During the 1820s, Carbery was a member of the prestigious Columbian Institute for the Promotion of Arts and Sciences, who counted among their members former presidents Andrew Jackson and John Quincy Adams and many prominent men of the day, including well-known representatives of the military, government service, medical and other professions.<ref name="rathbun">{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MY-5AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA118 |title=The Columbian institute for the promotion of arts and sciences: A Washington Society of 1816-1838. |first=Richard |last=Rathbun |access-date=2010-06-20|year=1904 |publisher=Bulletin of the United States National Museum, October 18, 1917}}</ref>
In 1844, Carbery was appointed by President John Tyler as Justice of the Peace for Washington County. He would be re-nominated by every succeeding president until his death.
==Personal life== Carbery married Mary H. Manning of Loudoun County, Virginia on November 2, 1826, but she died young in 1834. All four of their children also died young, none reaching the age of ten.<ref>Clark, p. 84.</ref>
Carbery lived in a large house on 17th Street NW, adjacent to The Ellipse, known as Carbery House. The house, built in 1818, survived 85 years before being demolished in 1903.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.clocations.com/cviewmap.aspx?list=lid&lid=337699|title=cLocations|website=Clocations.com|access-date=2017-08-19|url-status=usurped|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070927031358/http://www.clocations.com/cviewmap.aspx?list=lid&lid=337699|archive-date=2007-09-27}}</ref> (Carbery also maintained an estate off Seventh Street Road (now known as Georgia Avenue NW) in the northernmost section of the District of Columbia that is now the Takoma neighborhood.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://takomadc.info/history-long.htm|title=TAKOMA PARK HISTORIC DISTRICT|website=Takomadc.info|access-date=2017-08-19|url-status=usurped|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070929140908/http://takomadc.info/history-long.htm|archive-date=2007-09-29}}</ref>)
Carbery's sister, Ann Mattingly, who lived with him in her widowhood, became extremely ill in 1817 with what doctors diagnosed as an internal cancer. The family, devout Roman Catholics, summoned Father Anthony Kohlmann, a French Jesuit priest, who referred the matter to a priest in Germany who was famous for miraculous cures. In March 1824, Kohlman held a novena with the family, then, at a time coordinated with the German, said a Mass in her home while the German did the same from Hamburg. She soon sat up in bed, the affliction apparently gone.<ref>Clark, pp. 78-83.</ref> Many Catholics considered this much-publicized incident to be one of the first miracles documented in the United States,<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.focustv.org/novena.html |title=The History of the Novena to the Most Holy Name of Jesus |access-date=2007-01-29 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071006161357/http://www.focustv.org/novena.html |archive-date=2007-10-06 }}</ref> though the hierarchy of the Catholic Church never endorsed this view.
==Later life== Captain Carbery died at his home in 1863. He was interred in Mount Olivet Cemetery in Washington.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.congressionalcemetery.org/Education/Tours/WalkingTour_Mayors.pdf|title=Belva Lockwood And The 'Way Of The World'|website=Congressionalcemetery.org|access-date=2017-08-19|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070704071847/http://www.congressionalcemetery.org/Education/Tours/WalkingTour_Mayors.pdf|archive-date=2007-07-04}}</ref>
Thomas H. Carbury Elementary School on 5th Street NE between D and E in Washington, D.C. was named in his honor. It has since been closed.
==References== {{Reflist}}
==External links== {{Commons category}}
{{s-start}} {{s-off}} {{succession box | before = Samuel N. Smallwood| title = Mayor of Washington, D.C. | years = 1822–1824| after = Samuel N. Smallwood}} {{s-end}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Carbery, Thomas}} Category:1791 births Category:1863 deaths Category:19th-century mayors of Washington, D.C. Category:19th-century Roman Catholics Category:American Roman Catholics Category:Burials at Mount Olivet Cemetery (Washington, D.C.) Category:Catholics from Washington, D.C. Category:People from St. Mary's County, Maryland Category:Place of birth unknown Category:United States Army officers Category:United States Army personnel of the War of 1812