Samuel J. Nicholls

Who was Samuel J. Nicholls?

Samuel Jones Nicholls was a United States Representative from South Carolina. He was born in Spartanburg, South Carolina. He attended Bingham Military Institute in Asheville, North Carolina; Wofford College, in Spartanburg, South Carolina; Virginia Polytechnic Institute in Blacksburg, Virginia; and the law department of the University of Chicago. He was admitted to the bar in 1906 and commenced practice in Spartanburg.

Nicholls was the city attorney of Spartanburg and prosecuting attorney of Spartanburg County, South Carolina. He was a member of the South Carolina House of Representatives 1907-1908. He served by special appointment as circuit judge and as associate justice of the Supreme Court of South Carolina. He also organized and was captain for three years of Company I, First Regiment, South Carolina National Guard Infantry.

Nicholls was elected as a Democrat to the Sixty-fourth Congress to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of Joseph T. Johnson. He was reelected to the Sixty-fifth and Sixty-sixth Congresses and served from September 14, 1915 to March 3, 1921 and declined to be a candidate for renomination in 1920.