He attended public school and Wake Forest College; was graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1848.

During the American Civil War, he served for a short time in the Confederate service, but withdrew and advocated sustaining the Federal Government.

He was appointed by the national Republican administration as United States consul general at Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on June 14, 1889, and served until July 1, 1893.

He tried to return to politics in 1896, He put his name forward to be Populist Party candidate for Lieutenant Governor of North Carolina but did not win the nomination.

(That year Republican Daniel Lindsay Russell was elected as governor, when a Populist candidate drew off some Democratic votes.)