Biography
William Upham was born in Leicester, Massachusetts to Samuel Upham and Martha (Livermore) Upham. He moved with his father to Montpelier, Vermont in 1802. He attended the district schools, the Montpelier Academy, and was privately tutored; he studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1811 and commenced practice in Montpelier in 1812. He was a member of the Vermont House of Representatives from 1827 to 1828 and was State's attorney for Washington County in 1829; he was again a member of the Vermont House of Representatives in 1830.
In 1843 he was elected as a Whig to the U.S. Senate. He was reelected in 1849 and served from March 4, 1843 until his death in Washington, D.C. in 1853. While in the Senate, he was chairman of the Committee on Agriculture (Twenty-eighth Congress) and of the Committee on Pensions (Twenty-ninth Congress).
Upham died in office in 1853. Interment was in the Congressional Cemetery. He was suffering from smallpox at the time of his death, but is unknown if it was the cause of death.
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