Jacob W. Prout (1804–1849) was a Liberian politician and physician. He served as the secretary of the 1847 constitutional convention.

Biography

Prout was born free in 1804 in Baltimore, Maryland. He immigrated to the Commonwealth of Liberia in 1826. In the colonial Liberian government, Prout had been employed as a register of wills. In 1832, Prout returned to Baltimore with favorable accounts of Liberia.[1] On his return on 9 December 1832, 146 Black Marylanders emigrated to Liberia, in part due to his accounts. During the travel, the first officer David C. Landis accused Prout of a number of improprieties. Landis's charges included ignoring the medical needs of passengers, as well as a sexual indecency.[2] Prout served as a physician for the American Colonization Society until 1840, when Governor Thomas Buchanan abolished Prout's post to cut the colony's costs.[1]

On 5 July 1847, the delegates to Liberia's constitutional convention first convened and elected officers. Prout was elected as secretary of the convention.[3] Most of the papers relating to the convention have been lost, though a surviving account of the convention from Dr. James W. Lugenbeel, the American Colonization Society's white resident physician, criticized Prout's secretarial abilities, though it is unclear if Lugenbeel's negative portrayal of Prout's abilities are accurate.[1] The convention produced the Liberian Declaration of Independence, as well as the republic's first constitution.

Prout's son, William A. Prout, served as governor the Republic of Maryland.[1]

In 1847, Prout was elected as a member to the Senate of Liberia. In 1849, Prout died by drowning in Monrovia.[4][5]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Burrowes, Carl Patrick (1989). "Black Christian Republicans: Delegates to the 1847 Liberian Constitutional Convention". Liberian Studies Journal. 14 (2): 75–76. Retrieved 3 September 2022.
  2. ↑ Campbell, Penelope (1967). Maryland in Africa: The Maryland State Colonization Society, 1831-1851. p. 60-67.
  3. ↑ Huberich, Charles Henry (1947). The Political and Legislative History of Liberia. p. 821.
  4. ↑ Maryland State Colonization Society (1849). Maryland Colonization Journal. p. 122.
  5. ↑ American Colonization Society (1849). The African Repository and Colonial Journal. p. 378.
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