Mitchell Campbell King (born June 1815 in

Charleston, South Carolina Charleston is the largest city in the U.S. state of South Carolina, the county seat of Charleston County, and the principal city in the Charleston–North Charleston metropolitan area. The city lies just south of the geographical midpoint o ...

; died 1901) was a planter and physician in the

Carolinas The Carolinas are the U.S. states of North Carolina and South Carolina, considered collectively. They are bordered by Virginia to the north, Tennessee to the west, and Georgia to the southwest. The Atlantic Ocean is to the east. Combining Nort ...

. Mitchell Campbell King was the son of teacher, lawyer and Judge Mitchel King (Kingo) and his first wife Susanna Campbell. The elder King headed to

South Carolina )''Animis opibusque parati'' ( for, , Latin, Prepared in mind and resources, links=no) , anthem = " Carolina";" South Carolina On My Mind" , Former = Province of South Carolina , seat = Columbia , LargestCity = Charleston , LargestMetro = ...

in 1810 and both married on 23 February 1811 in Charleston. They had seven children. Mitchell C. King was the second-oldest; and with him began the family tradition in using his mother's maiden name

Campbell Campbell may refer to: People Surname * Campbell (surname), includes a list of people with surname Campbell Given name * Campbell Brown (footballer), an Australian rules footballer * Campbell Brown (journalist) (born 1968), American television ne ...

in remembrance of the family's Scottish heritage. He studied medicine at the Charleston Medical College in South Carolina and at

Göttingen University Göttingen (, , ; nds, Chöttingen) is a university city in Lower Saxony, central Germany, the capital of the eponymous district. The River Leine runs through it. At the end of 2019, the population was 118,911. General information The orig ...

in Germany. In Göttingen he was friends with Amory Coffin (1813–1884) from

Coffin Point Plantation Coffin Point Plantation, is a historic plantation house located in the Frogmore area of Beaufort County, South Carolina, USA. A Sea Island plantation. Ebenezer Coffin, born in Boston in 1763, received 1120 acres and 63 chattel slaves from his ...

and

John Lothrop Motley John Lothrop Motley (April 15, 1814 – May 29, 1877) was an American author and diplomat. As a popular historian, he is best known for his works on the Netherlands, the three volume work ''The Rise of the Dutch Republic'' and four volume ''His ...

. The three of them became friends with the later

German Chancellor The chancellor of Germany, officially the federal chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany,; often shortened to ''Bundeskanzler''/''Bundeskanzlerin'', / is the head of the federal government of Germany and the commander in chief of the Ger ...

Otto von Bismarck Otto, Prince of Bismarck, Count of Bismarck-Schönhausen, Duke of Lauenburg (, ; 1 April 1815 – 30 July 1898), born Otto Eduard Leopold von Bismarck, was a conservative German statesman and diplomat. From his origins in the upper class of J ...

there in 1832.

Jonathan Steinberg Jonathan Steinberg (8 March 1934 – 4 March 2021) was the Walter H. Annenberg Professor of European History Emeritus and Chair of the Department of History at the University of Pennsylvania. Career Steinberg received his undergraduate degree ...

: ''Bismarck: a life.'' Oxford University Press; New York 2011
Google Books preview
Both Bismarck and King joined

Corps Hannovera Göttingen Bismarck 1836 The Corps Hannovera Göttingen is one of the oldest German Student Corps, a Studentenverbindung or student corporation founded on January 18, 1809 at the Georg August University of Göttingen by students like Georg Kloss. The nam ...

—a

German Student Corps Corps (or Korps; "''das ~''" ('' n''), (''sg.''), (''pl.'')) are the oldest still-existing kind of ''Studentenverbindung'', Germany's traditional university corporations; their roots date back to the 15th century. The oldest corps still existi ...

committed to

academic fencing Academic fencing (german: link=no, akademisches Fechten) or is the traditional kind of fencing practiced by some student corporations () in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Latvia, Estonia, and, to a minor extent, in Belgium, Lithuania, and Pol ...

—as fellows. Mitchell C. King finished his medical education with an

M.D. Doctor of Medicine (abbreviated M.D., from the Latin ''Medicinae Doctor'') is a medical degree, the meaning of which varies between different jurisdictions. In the United States, and some other countries, the M.D. denotes a professional degree. T ...

from Charleston Medical College and settled on one of the family's farms in South Carolina and

Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States Georgia may also refer to: Places Historical states and entities * Related to the ...

. In the summer time the King family lived in the mountains of Flat Rock in the western part of

North Carolina North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia and So ...

. Later in his life he concentrated on practicing as a physician there in Henderson County. He maintained a lively correspondence with Bismarck until 1875. Bismarck's letters to him are preserved in the U.S.

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library is ...

, while some of King's letters are kept by the Otto-von-Bismarck-Stiftung in

Friedrichsruh Friedrichsruh () is a district in the municipality of Aumühle, Herzogtum Lauenburg district, Schleswig-Holstein, in northern Germany. Friedrichsruh manor is known as a residence of the princely House of Bismarck, mainly of Chancellor Otto von Bis ...

near

Hamburg (male), (female) en, Hamburger(s), Hamburgian(s) , timezone1 = Central (CET) , utc_offset1 = +1 , timezone1_DST = Central (CEST) , utc_offset1_DST = +2 , postal ...

(Germany), which is a commemorative German Government Foundation in memory of the Chancellor of the

German Empire The German Empire (),Herbert Tuttle wrote in September 1881 that the term "Reich" does not literally connote an empire as has been commonly assumed by English-speaking people. The term literally denotes an empire – particularly a hereditary ...

(similar to the

Presidential libraries A presidential library, presidential center, or presidential museum is a facility either created in honor of a former president and containing their papers, or affiliated with a country's presidency. In the United States * The presidential libr ...

in the United States). Mitchell C. King married Elizabeth Laura Middleton in Charleston. They had eleven children. King was buried in

Magnolia Cemetery (Charleston, South Carolina) Magnolia Cemetery is a historic rural cemetery in Charleston, South Carolina. The first board for the cemetery was assembled in 1849 with Edward C. Jones as the architect. It was dedicated in 1850; Charles Fraser delivered the dedication address ...

References

University of North Carolina The University of North Carolina is the multi-campus public university system for the state of North Carolina. Overseeing the state's 16 public universities and the NC School of Science and Mathematics, it is commonly referred to as the UNC Sy ...

Mitchell King Papers, 1801–1862
* Kösener Korpslisten 1910, 70. Göttingen (Hannovera), No. 121 * Thomas E. Mullen and Helmuth Rogge: ''Zwei unbekannte Briefe Bismarcks: gerichtet an seinen Göttinger Jugendfreund Mitchell C. King'' in ''Historische Zeitschrift'' Vol. 202 (1966), pp 352–362 (in German with text of the letters in Englis

* G. W. Curtis (Editor): ''The Correspondence of John Lothrop Motley'', 1889, Chapter II: ''Germany; University Life'
Internet Archive
* Rüdiger B. Richter, Hans-Georg Balder: ''Korporierte im amerikanischen Bürgerkrieg''. 2nd ed., Hilden: WJK-Verlag, 2013, p. 176 (in German)

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:King, Mitchell Campbell 1815 births 1901 deaths 19th-century American physicians 20th-century American physicians American planters Physicians from Charleston, South Carolina Physicians from North Carolina People from Flat Rock, Henderson County, North Carolina Medical University of South Carolina alumni University of Göttingen alumni Burials at Magnolia Cemetery (Charleston, South Carolina)