USA > Connecticut > Encyclopedia of Connecticut biography, genealogical-memorial; representative citizens, v. 1 > Part 51
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57
He married (first) Matilda E. Webster, and (second) Josephine E. Ward, who bore him two sons and a daughter.
PYNCHON, Thomas Ruggles,
Clergyman, Educator.
The Rev. Thomas Ruggles Pynchon, ninth president of Trinity College, was born in New Haven, Connecticut, Janu- ary 19, 1823, son of William Henry Ruggles and Mary (Murdoch) Pynchon, grandson of Thomas Ruggles and Re-
Conn-1-23
353
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF BIOGRAPHY
becca Pynchon and of James and Mary Murdoch, and a descendant of Colonel William and Anna (Andrew) Pynchon, immigrants to Massachusetts from Eng- land in 1630. His grandfather was a prominent physician of Guilford, Connec- ticut.
Thomas R. Pynchon was fitted for col- lege at the Boston Latin School; gradu- ated at Trinity College, Hartford, Connec- ticut, Bachelor of Arts, 1841, Master of Arts, 1844, and was a tutor in classics there, 1843-47. He studied theology ; was admitted to the diaconate, June 14, 1848, and to the priesthood, July 25, 1849; was rector of St. Paul's, Stockbridge, and Trinity, Lenox, Massachusetts, 1849-54; Scoville Professor of Chemistry and Na- tural Sciences at Trinity College, 1854-77 ; studied in Paris, and made a geological tour through Southern France, Italy and Sicily, with special reference to volcanic action, including the ascent of Mount Etna by night, 1855-56; was librarian of Trinity College, 1857-82; chaplain, 1860- 64 and 1866-67; president, 1874-83; in 1877 became professor, and in 1888 Brownell Professor of Moral Philosophy. Immediately after his becoming president of Trinity, he began to push forward the work of erecting the new college build- ings. In 1875, ground was broken, and in 1878 the west side of the proposed quadrangle, including Seabury and Jarvis halls, was completed. Large additions were made to the library and cabinet dur- ing Dr. Pynchon's administration, and the number of students was larger in 1877-80 than had ever been before. He became an associate fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences ; a founder and vice- president of the American Metrological Society, and a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and of the Geological Society of France. He received the degree of Doctor
of Divinity from, St. Stephen's College, New York, in 1865, and Doctor of Laws from Columbia College in 1877. He was the author of: "A Treatise on Chemical Physics" (1869); "An Examination and Defense of Bishop Butler's Analogy, and his Argument Extended" (1889) and sev- eral treatises. He was the owner of one of the three copies extant of "The Meri- torious Price of Our Redemption," pub- lished in 1650, by his ancestor, William Pynchon, aforementioned. Dr. Pynchon died in 1904.
KELLOGG, Stephen Wright, Congressman, Governor.
The surname Kellogg is found in Eng- land early in the sixteenth century, and there are differences of opinion as to its origin. The earliest record of the family is in Debden, County Essex, England, when in January, 1525, Nicholas Kellogg was taxed. Phillippe Kellogg, the ear- liest known ancestor of the line here- in followed, lived in 1583 in Bocking, County Essex, England, a parish adjoin- ing Braintree. His son, Martin Kellogg, was baptized in Great Leigh, November 23, 1595, died at Braintree, in 1671. He married Prudence Bird. Their son, Lieu- tenant Joseph Kellogg, was baptized at Great Leigh, England, April 1, 1626, died in 1707; he was the immigrant ancestor ; he was selectman of Hadley many years ; he married (first) Joanna and (second) Abigail Terry. His son, John Kellogg, was baptized in Farmington, December 29, 1656; lived in Farmington and Hadley ; married (first) Sarah Moody, and (second) Ruth -- , who survived him. His son, Joseph Kellogg, was born in Hadley, November 6, 1685, and resided in South Hadley ; married Abigail Smith. Their son, Jabez Kellogg, was born Feb- ruary II, 1734 ; removed to Hanover, New
354
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF BIOGRAPHY
Hampshire, in 1775, and died there in 1791 ; he married Abigail Catlin. Their son, Julian Kellogg, was born in South Hadley, September 27, 1765, died in Shel- burne, August 4, 1813; he was a repre- sentative to the General Court in 1808; he married Molly Pool. Their son, Jacob Pool Kellogg, was born in Shelburne, February 16, 1793, died there, October 6, 1843; he married Lucy Prescott Wright, and they were the parents of General Stephen Wright Kellogg, of this review.
General Stephen Wright Kellogg, son of Jacob Pool Kellogg, was born April 5, 1822, in Shelburne, died January 27, 1904. His early life was spent on his father's farm, where he worked in the summer until twenty years old. After he was sixteen he taught school in the winter months, and attended an academy at Shel- burne Falls for a short time. At the age of twenty he entered Amherst College, where he remained for two terms, then, at the beginning of the third term, entered Yale. He graduated from, the latter in 1846, with one of the three highest honors of his class. In the fall of that year he became principal of an academy in Win- chendon, Massachusetts, but the follow- ing winter returned to New Haven and entered the Yale Law School. In June, 1848, he was admitted to the New Haven bar, and immediately opened an office in Naugatuck, where he remained until 1854. In that year he was elected judge of pro- bate for the Waterbury district, which in- cluded Naugatuck, and removed to Waterbury, where he had his law office. In 1851 he was clerk of the Connecticut Senate ; 1853 a member of the Senate from the Waterbury district, and in 1856 a member of the house. In 1854 he was appointed by the Legislature judge of the New Haven county court, and held the office of judge of probate for seven years. From 1866-69 he was city attorney, and
during that time secured the first legisla- tion for supplying the city with water. From 1877 to 1883 he was again city attor- ney, and drew up a bill for the establish- ment of a sewerage system for the city, procuring its passage by the Legislature.
In 1860 he was a delegate to the Re- publican National Convention, and a member of the committee in that conven- tion which drew up the platform upon which Abraham Lincoln was first elected President. He was also a delegate to the National conventions, 1868 to 1876, and in the latter chairman of the Connecticut delegation. In the Civil War, from 1863 to 1866, he was colonel of the Second Regiment of the Connecticut National Guard, and from 1866 to 1870, brigadier- general. In 1869 he was elected to the Forty-first Congress, and reelected in 1871-73. During his six years of service in Congress he was a member of the com- mittees on the judiciary, patents, war claims and Pacific railroads, and chairman of the committee on civil service reform in the Forty-third. He was thought to be one of the best representatives the district ever had, with a peculiar aptitude for the practical side of legislation. From the organization of the Bronson Library in 1868 he was one of the agents, and while in Congress succeeded in making it one of the six depositories in the State for the valuable publications of the government. After his retirement from Congress Mr. Kellogg devoted himself to the practice of his profession. He never lost his inter- est in public affairs, and frequently wrote articles for the press upon political and other subjects of interest.
He married, September 10, 1851, Lucia, daughter of Major Andre Andrews, born July 8, 1782, and Sarah Mehitable Hos- mer, born August 4, 1794, and grand- daughter of Chief Justice Hosmer, of Middletown. She was born March II,
355
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF BIOGRAPHY
1829, in Buffalo, New York. Children, born in Waterbury: Sarah Andrews, September II, 1852, married Frank Cam- eron Plume; Lucy Wright, January 14, 1855; Frank Woodruff, July 26, 1857; John Prescott, March 31, 1860; Elizabeth Hosmer, March 14, 1864; Stephen Wright, March 8, 1866; Charles Poole, April 27, 1868.
LOUNSBURY, George Edward, Legislator, Governor.
George Edward Lounsbury, fortieth Governor of Connecticut, was born at Poundridge, Westchester county, New York, May 7, 1838, and died in Farming- ville, Connecticut, August 16, 1904. He was a son of Nathan and Delia A. (Scofield) Lounsbury, grandson of Enos and Catharine (Waterbury) Lounsbury, great-grandson of Nathan and Elizabeth (Seeley) Lounsbury, great-great-grand- son of Henry Lounsbury, and great- great-great-grandson of Richard Louns- bury, the immigrant ancestor, of Louns- bourgh, England, who settled at Stam- ford, Connecticut, about 1651.
George Edward Lounsbury removed with his parents to Ridgefield, Connec- ticut, when he was an infant. He was graduated at Yale College with high honors in 1863, and from the Berkeley Divinity School, Middletown, in 1866. He had charge of Episcopal parishes in Suf- field and Thompsonville for some time, and was obliged to give up the pulpit on account of an affection of the throat. In 1867, with his brother, Phineas C. Louns- bury, he engaged in the shoe manufactur- ing business in South Norwalk, Connec- ticut, and for many years he was con- nected with that enterprise under the name of Lounsbury, Mathewson & Com- pany. He was also president of the First National Bank of Ridgefield, Connecticut.
He had never aspired for public office, but in 1895 was elected as a Republican State Senator, and was reelected in 1897, serving as chairman of the committees on finance and humane institutions, and as chairman of the latter presided over the hearings and wrote the report in an im- portant reformatory matter as well as in the difficulty over the oral instruction for deaf in the Mystic school. In 1898 he was elected Governor of Connecticut, on the Republican ticket, and served from Janu- ary, 1899, to January, 1901, when he was succeeded by George P. McLean. He kept up the economical policy of his pre- decessor, Governor Cooke, reducing the State debt by $1,000,000. He vetoed seven measures, among them being the "Cash Bill" which lessened the amount of railroad taxation, one raising the salary of the school-fund commissioner, and two bills giving the right of eminent domain to private corporations ; in every instance his veto was overwhelmingly sustained by the Legislature. He received the hon- orary degree of Doctor of Laws from Wesleyan University in 1900. He became an acknowledged authority on the history and legislation of the State.
Governor Lounsbury was married, in New York City, November 29, 1894, to Frances Josephine, daughter of Joseph J. Potwin, of Amherst, Massachusetts.
COIT, Robert,
Public Official.
For upwards of two hundred and fifty years the members of the Coit family have been prominently identified with the in- terests of the ancient town of New Lon- don. The progenitor of the New London and Norwich branches of the family was John Coit, a native of Wales, who came to Salem, Massachusetts, prior to 1638, six years later moved to Gloucester, Mas-
356
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF BIOGRAPHY
sachusetts, afterwards received a grant of land in New London, where he settled in 1650; he married Mary Ganners, or Jen- ners; he died August 29, 1659, and his widow died January 2, 1676. Their son, Deacon Joseph Coit, born about 1633, died March 27, 1704; he spent the greater part of his life in New London, Connecticut ; he married Martha Harris. Their son, John Coit, was born in New London, De- cember 1, 1670, died October 22, 1744; he married Mehetabel Chandler. Their son, Joseph Coit, born in New London, November 15, 1698, died April 27, 1787 ; he married (first) Mary Hunting, (second) Lydia Lathrop. His son, Hon. Joshua Coit, born in New London, October 7, 1758, died September 5, 1798; he was a graduate of Harvard in 1776; practiced law in New London ; represented New London in the lower house of the General Assembly in 1784-85-88-89-90-92-93, serv- ing repeatedly as clerk and speaker, was a representative in the United States Con- gress from 1793 until his death; he mar- ried Ann Boradill. Their son, Robert Coit, born November 16, 1785, died in Oc- tober, 1874; he was a successful business man of New London ; served as president of the Union Bank and the Savings Bank, and as deacon in the Congregational church of New London; married Char- lotte Coit and they were the parents of Robert Coit, of this review.
Robert Coit was born in New London, Connecticut, April 26, 1830, died there, June 19, 1904. He attended private schools of New London and Farmington, then entered Yale College, and was gradu- ated with the class of 1850. He studied law with William C. Crump, and at the Yale Law School, and was admitted to the bar in New London county in 1853, and commenced the practice of his pro- fession in his native town. In 1860 he was elected judge of probate for the New
London district and served for four years, then became registrar of bankruptcy for his district, continuing as long as it was in force. In 1867 he became treasurer of the New London & Northern Railroad, of which he was afterwards made presi- dent, and he held both these offices until his death. He was elected mayor of New Lon- don in 1879, and in the same year he be- came State Representative, and served on the judiciary committee and the com- mittee on constitutional amendments. Following this service he was for four years a member from the Ninth District of the State Senate, where he served on various committees, being chairman of the committees on corporations, cities, boroughs and insurance. During his second term of two years, he was presi- dent pro tempore of the Senate. In 1879 he was again elected to the General Assembly, and was chairman of the committee on corporations. For many years he was identified with the banking interests of New London, and with other corporations and enterprises, being presi- dent of the Union Bank, vice-president of the New London Savings Bank, president of the New London Steamboat Company, president of the New London Gas & Elec- tric Company, secretary and treasurer of the Smith Memorial Home, and a trustee of the J. N. Harris estate.
Mr. Coit married, August 1, 1854, Lu- cretia Brainard, and they were the par- ents of two children: Mary Gardner and William Brainard.
HOLLISTER, David Frederick, Prominent Attorney.
John Hollister, immigrant ancestor, came to this country about 1642, prob- ably from Weymouth, England. He served as deputy to the General Court at Hartford, and was a lieutenant of the
357
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF BIOGRAPHY
militia. He married Joanna Treat. Their son, Stephen Hollister, married (first) Abigail Treat, (second) Elizabeth Rey- nolds. His son by first wife, Gideon Hol- lister, was born in 1698, married Rebecca Sherman. Their son, Captain Gideon Hollister, was born September 21, 1725, was an officer in the Revolution, married (first) Esther Preston, (second) Patience Hurd. His son by second wife, Gideon Hollister, was born January 13, 1761, died January 2, 1835; married Currence Hicock. Their son, Gideon Hollister, was born February 2, 1792, died September 25, 1867 ; married (first) Harriet Jackson, (second) Lydia J. Minor. He and his first wife were the parents of David F. Hollister, of this review.
David Frederick Hollister was born at Washington, Litchfield county, Connecti- cut, March 31, 1826, and died at his home in Bridgeport, May 4, 1906. He attended the public schools of his native town, and in his sixteenth year removed with his family to the town of Woodbury and con- tinued, by the wish of his father, to follow farming several years more. He finally secured the consent of his father to pre- pare for college. He was for a short time a student at the Gunnery, but largely by private study fitted himself. When he left home to take the examinations at New Haven he assured his friends that in spite of his lack of preparation he would not be seen at home again until he was a member of the class of 1851. He was suc- cessful, however, and had a brilliant col- lege career. He was the first president of the Linonian Literary and Debating So- ciety of Yale, then deemed the highest tribute to scholarship in the gift of his classmates. He graduated in 1851 and in the following December was admitted to the Litchfield county bar and immediately opened an office and began to practice at Salisbury, Connecticut. From 1854 to the
time of his death he lived and practiced law in Bridgeport. He became a leader in his profession and was a prominent attorney for more than half a century. In 1866 he was given the honorary degree of Master of Arts by Yale.
In 1858 he was elected judge of probate for the district of Bridgeport and re- elected in 1859. In 1862 President Lin- coln appointed him collector of internal revenue for the fourth district of Connec- ticut and he served until his district and the second were consolidated, and after- ward as collector of the new district under appointment from President Grant, serv- ing until 1883, when all the districts of the States were consolidated. During the twenty-one years in which he was col- lector, he served under Presidents Lin- coln, Johnson, Grant, Hayes, Garfield and Arthur. At the time of the Civil War he was exempt from, service on account of disability from an accident to his foot, received in youth, but he was a zealous supporter of the Union and paid for two substitutes in the field. Owing to his official position, he performed various duties that called for personal interviews with President Lincoln, for whom he always had the highest regard and appre- ciation. At the expiration of his official life, he resumed the practice of law in the firm of Hollister & Kelsey.
Judge Hollister was prominent in var- ious business enterprises and philan- thropic institutions in Bridgeport. Soon after moving to that city, he invested in land in various sections and from time to time took pleasure and profit in laying out and developing the property. He obtained the charter for the Young Men's Chris- tian Association, in which he was par- ticularly active, the Boys' Club, the Citi- zens' Water Company, and the West Stratford Horse Railroad Company. He was ruling elder in the Presbyterian
358
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF BIOGRAPHY
church forty-three years, and the beautiful church, chapel, Sunday school building and parsonage of the First Presbyterian Church, corner of State street and Myrtle avenue, Bridgeport, are in great measure the result of his planning and efforts, as chairman of the building committee. He was one of the organizers and for many years was vice-president of the Boys' Club. He was president of the City Sav- ings Bank, trustee and attorney of the Bridgeport Orphan Asylum, and at one time a member of the Bridgeport Board of Trade. In politics he was a Repub- lican. He was a member of St. John's Lodge, Free and Accepted Masons, and of the Seaside Club of Bridgeport. He married, September 23, 1852, Mary E. Jackson, of Brooklyn, New York, daugh- ter of Samuel Jackson. Children: Har- riet Lydia, married Frederick W. Read, of Bridgeport ; Mary Francis, married the Rev. Harris Schenck, of Philadelphia ; she is deceased.
TORRANCE, David, Civil War Veteran, Jurist.
David Torrance, late Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Errors of Connec- ticut, was born near Edinburgh, Scotland, March 3, 1840, son of Walter and Ann (Sharp) Torrance, who emigrated to the United States in 1849, and settled at Nor- wich, Connecticut.
David Torrance attended the public schools of Norwich, but at an early age went to work in a cotton mill there, and subsequently learned and for some years worked at the trade of paper making. On July 17, 1862, during the progress of the Civil War, he enlisted as a private in Com- pany A, Eighteenth Regiment Connecti- cut Volunteers, and shortly afterward was made a sergeant in the company. In 1863 he was captured and held prisoner in Libby Prison and at Belle Island. In July, 1864, he was appointed captain of
Company A, Twenty-ninth Connecticut Colored Regiment, was advanced from that rank to major, then to lieutenant- colonel, all in the same year. After the fall of Richmond, he remained with his regiment in the defenses there for a time, later did guard duty in Maryland, and in the summer of 1865 sailed with the com- mand for Texas. He was mustered out of service at Brownsville, Texas, October 24, 1865.
He then returned to Derby, New Haven county, Connecticut, where he took up the study of law. He was admitted to the bar in 1868, and shortly afterward formed a partnership with Colonel Wooster, under the firm name of Wooster & Torrance, a relation that continued until the appointment of the junior member as judge in 1885. He was chosen to represent Derby in the lower house of the State Legislature in 1871, and served in that and the follow- ing year; in 1878 was elected Secretary of State, on the Republican ticket; and served during 1879-80; appointed judge of the New Haven Court of Common Pleas in 1880 to serve for four years from 1881 ; in 1885 was appointed judge of the Superior Court by Governor Henry B. Harrison ; in 1890 was appointed by Gov- ernor Morgan G. Bulkeley to be judge of the Supreme Court of Errors, reappointed, and from October 1, 1901, until his death. was Chief Justice, term 1901 to 1909. He was a member of the Army and Navy Club of Connecticut, of the Order of Free and Accepted Masons, of the Grand Army of the Republic, and was connected with the Congregational church.
He married, February 1I, 1864, Annie France, daughter of James and Margaret France, and they were the parents of three children : Walter S., James F .. Margaret, wife of Walter W. Holmes, of Waterbury. Judge Torrance died at his home in Derby, September 6, 1906.
359
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF BIOGRAPHY
ATWOOD, Lewis John,
Successful Manufacturer.
The surname Atwood originated in the custom of designating persons by the lo- cality in which they lived to distinguish them from others bearing the same bap- tismal name, hence John At-the-wood, later Atwood. The medieval spelling of this surname was Atte Wode, modified to Atwood and in most cases to Wood. Some branches of the family, however, have re- tained the prefix and spell the name At- wood. Dr. Thomas Atwood, the immi- grant ancestor of this branch of the fam- ily, was born in England, and was one of Oliver Cromwell's captains of horse dur- ing what is known as the first civil war in England ; he settled at Plymouth about 1650, removed to Wethersfield, Connec- ticut, in 1663, and died there in 1682. His son, Dr. Jonathan Atwood, was born June 8, 1675, died January 1, 1733; he settled in Woodbury, Connecticut, and was one of the first physicians in that section. He married Sarah Terrill. Their son, Oliver Atwood, was born in Woodbury, March II, 1717, died January 30, 1810; he mar- ried (first) Lois Wheeler, (second) Nancy Wells, (third) Naomi Fairchild. His son, Deacon Nathan Atwood, was born in Woodbury, 1741, died in 1803 ; he married Rhoda Warner. Their son, Nathan (2) Atwood, was born in Watertown, May 30, 1767, died in 1853; he married (first) Susanna Minor, (second) Althea Gillette. His son, Norman Atwood, was baptized at Watertown in 1792; settled in Goshen, Connecticut ; married Abigail Woodward, and they were the parents of Lewis John Atwood, of this review.
Lewis John Atwood, son of Norman Atwood, was born in Goshen, April 8, 1827. Healthy and active in his boyhood, he learned in early life habits of industry and self-reliance. His youth was spent
partly on a farm in the country, partly in the village. He attended the public schools and had little time for play. He was fond of mechanics and early in life developed much skill, but he was obliged to earn his livelihood and took the oppor- tunity first at hand and worked as clerk in a store at Watertown, beginning at the age of twelve. For five years he divided his time between the store, the farm, the grist mill and saw mill. In 1845 he left Watertown for Waterbury and continued in mercantile business there. At the age of twenty-one he entered partnership with Samuel Maltby, of Northford, Connecti- cut, in the manufacture of buckles and buttons, but they lacked capital, and he soon returned to mercantile business, as clerk in a flour and feed store. He next embarked in business on his own account as a manufacturer of daguerreotype cases, lamp burners and other brass goods. In January, 1869, he and others organized the firm of Holmes, Booth & Atwood, now the well-known Plume & Atwood Manu- facturing Company. At first he had charge of a department in the manufac- ture of lamp burners for kerosene lamps, etc. When the concern was incorporated as the Holmes, Booth & Atwood Manu- facturing Company he was one of the principal stockholders. The business grew rapidly to large proportions and be- came one of the most prosperous indus- tries of the city of Waterbury. From 1874 to 1890 he was secretary of the cor- poration ; since that time until his death he was the president. In 1865 he became interested also in the American Ring Company and for many years was man- ager of that company.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.