Date Died: October 18, 1894

Place Buried: Oakwood Cemetery, Raleigh, NC

Edwin Godwin Reade was born on November 13, 1812 near Mt. Tirzah in Person County, NC, the son of Robert Richard Reade and Judith Anderson (Gooch) Reade. At age eighteen he entered the academy of George Morrow in Orange County, then the academy of Rev. Alexander Wilson in Granville County, where he served as an associate teacher. Afterwards he read law at home from books borrowed from a retired lawyer, Benjamin Sumner, and he was admitted to the NC bar in 1835.

Soon thereafter, Edwin Godwin Moore launched his own law firm in Roxboro, NC.

In 1836, Edwin Godwin Reade married Emily Ann Moore, daughter of Phillips Moore and Elizabeth (Dudley) Moore of Person County; they had no children. Emily died in 1871.

In 1855, Edwin Godwin Reade was elected to represent the 4th NC District in the U.S. House of Representatives of the:
- 34th U.S. Congress that met from 1855 to 1857

He did not like being a U.S. Congressman, so he declined to run for re-election.

In 1863, Edwin Godwin Read was elected to the NC Superior Court, but before his term began, Governor Zebulon Baird Vance prevailed upon him to serve the remaining months of George Davis's term as Confederate Senator. He served as Confederate Senator from January 22, 1864 to February 18, 1864, when he was succeeded by William Graham.

In 1865, Edwin Godwin Reade was President of the State Convention focusing on Reconstruction.

Also in 1865, Edwin Godwin Reade was elected as an Associate Justice of the NC Supreme Court, replacing Matthias Evans Manly, who was not electable due to the 1865 Convention. Associate Justice Edwin Godwin Reade remained on the NC Supreme Court until 1879, when he resigned to accept a position as President of a bank in Raleigh, NC; his expert management rescued it from probable bankruptcy.

Also in 1865 and 1866, Edwin Godwin Reade was the Grand Master of the Masonic Order in Raleigh, NC.

On December 20, 1871, Edwin Godwin Reade married a second time, to Mrs. Mary Elizabeth Shaw Parmele, widow of Benjamin Parmele, of Washington, NC; they too had no children.

On October 18, 1894, Edwin Godwin Reade died, and he was buried in the Oakwood Cemetery in Raleigh, NC.

Reade served a single term in the 34th United States Congress as a member of the American Party (March 4, 1855 – March 3, 1857), and refused to run for re-election in 1856. In 1863, Governor Zebulon Vance appointed Reade to the Confederate Senate to fill the seat of George Davis, who had resigned to become the Confederacy's Attorney General.

Following the Civil War, Reade presided over the Reconstruction convention in 1865 in Raleigh, North Carolina. In 1868, he was named as associate justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court, a post he held until 1879. Following his retirement from government, Reade engaged in banking in Raleigh, where he died in 1894. He is buried in Raleigh's Oakwood Cemetery.

Edwin Godwin Reade (November 13, 1812 – October 18, 1894) was a U.S. Congressman from North Carolina between 1855 and 1857. He later served in the Confederate Congress during the American Civil War.

He was elected to Congress in 1855, but declined a re-election.

In 1863, he was appointed by Governor Zebulon B. Vance to the Confederate States Senate, and in the same year was chosen Judge of the NC Superior Court.

In 1865, he was elected by the Legislature to the NC Supreme Court to succeed Justice Matthias E. Manly, being the last judge chosen by the General Assembly.

In 1866 and 1867 he was elected Grand Master of the Masons.

In 1868, the NC Supreme Court having been enlarged by the new Constitution to consist of five members, Chief Justice Richmond Pearson and Justice Edwin Reade were chosen by the people to succed themselves, with William B. Rodman, Robert P. Dick, and Thomas Settle as their associates. Reade's term expired on January 1, 1879, when he was chosen president of the Raleigh National Bank, then somewhat embarrassed.

Like Chief Justice Thomas Ruffin, under similar circumstances, he restored the credit of the bank.

In 1865, he was elected almost unanimously to the State Convention and was elected its president by acclamation. It is said that in his prime he had no superior as an advocate in this State before a jury. He was on the NC Supreme Court for thirteen years. He died in Raleigh on October 18, 1894 in his 82nd year.