USA > Connecticut > Fairfield County > Redding > The history of Redding, Connecticut : from its first settlement to the present time > Part 18
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MAJOR-GENERAL D. N. COUCH.
Major-General Darius N. Couch was born of Redding parents, in South-East, New York, July 25th, 1822. The following sketch of his
*See also the Sanford Family, Chapter XXIII.
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career, taken largely from Cullum's History of the Officers and Gradu- ates of the United States Military Academy, will be read with interest:
"Darius N. Couch, born in New York, appointed from New York, cadet at United States Military Academy from July Ist, 1842, to July Ist, 1846, when he was graduated and promoted in the army to Brevet Second Lieutenant 4th Artillery. Served in the war with Mexico in 1846-47-48, being engaged in the battle of Buena Vista, Mex., as Second Lieutenant in Captain Washington's Battery, Light Artillery, for which he was brevetted First Lieutenant for gallant and meritorious conduct. Participating in the occupation of the Seminole country in 1852-3, he planned and executed at his own expense a scientific expedition into Central and Northern Mexico, the results of which were very creditable to his enterprise. He married, in 1854, a daughter of Hon. S. L. Crock- er, of Taunton, Mass., and grand-daughter of Isaiah Thomas, founder of the Antiquarian Society of Worcester, Mass., and author of the 'His- tory of Printing.' The next year he resigned from the army. At the breaking out of the Rebellion, being settled in Taunton, Mass., he raised the 7th Reg. Mass. Vols., and proceeded to Washington in July, 1861. Was made Brigadier-General in August, and assigned to the command of a brigade in the defence of that city. In McClellan's Campaign on the Peninsula, General Couch commanded the Ist Division, 4th Army Corps, holding the left of the line at the siege of Yorktown. At the bat- tle of Fair Oaks, his brave Division held its ground for more than two hours against the combined attack of the Confederate troops. With part of his Division he reinforced Hooker in the hot action of Oak Grove, June 25th, 1862, and was in various skirmishes during the seven days until July Ist, on which morning General McClellan posted him on the main road leading to Richmond, where was fought the successful battle of Malvern Hill.
"Being promoted to the rank of Major-General, July 4th, 1862, he joined Pope with his Division on the retreat from Manassas, in the Northern Virginia Campaign. October, 1862, in command of the 2d Army Corps, Campaign of the Rapahannock. At Fredericksburg, De- cember 12th, 13th, 14th, and 15th, it fell upon General Couch to assault Mary's Heights, in which desperate work that brave, magnificent 2d Army Corps lost more than 4,000 men. The loss of his Corps at the disastrous battle of Chancellorsville, where he was second in command, was very heavy. In November, 1864, he joined Thomas, who was be- sieged at Nashville, and was assigned by that commander to the com- mand of an Army Corps. In the battle which followed he commanded a division, turned Hood's left, and captured several pieces of artillery and many prisoners. In North Carolina, March, April, and May, he aid-
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ed Sherman in closing the war. Resigned in June, 1865, the Great Rebellion having been crushed out.
"The General has for several years resided at Norwalk, Conn., hav- ing been Quartermaster-General at Hartford during the years 1877-78."
GIDEON H. HOLLISTER.
Hon. Gideon H. Hollister, of Litchfield, was a descendant of two of our Redding families, as will be seen by reference to the notes on the Gray and Jackson families. He was born December 14th, 1818, in Washington, Conn., and graduated at Yale College in 1840. Studied law in Litchfield, and was admitted to the bar in April, 1842. He prac- tised law in Litchfield until 1859, when he opened an office in New York. He went as United States Charge d' Affaires to Hayti when that country was under the administration of Salnave. In 1855 he published a His- tory of Connecticut in two volumes, of which two editions, of two thou- sand copies each, have been exhausted. He was the author of three his- torical dramas, one of them bearing the title of "Thomas a Becker." He also wrote a legal treatise on the Law of Eminent Domain.
ORVILLE H. PLATT.
Orville H. Platt, late Senator of the United States, was of Redding ancestry. (See Platt family.) He was born in Washington, Conn., July 19, 1827, and after receiving an academic education, studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1849. He at once opened a law office in Meriden, Conn., which city thereafter became his home. Entering politics he became Clerk of the State Senate, 1857; State Senator, 1861-2; member of the Connecticut House of Representatives, 1864, and again in 1869, when he served as Speaker. In 1879, he was elected to the Senate of the United States and held the office by successive re-elections until his death in 1905. Senator Platt was, at the time of his death, the recognized leader of the Senate, and high in the confidence of the Presi- dent and of the leaders of his party.
EBENEZER J. HILL.
Ebenezer J. Hill, who has represented the Fourth Congressional District of Connecticut in the House of Representatives at Washington since 1895, was born in Redding, August 4, 1845, (See Hill Family), and educated at the public schools of Norwalk, whither his father soon re- moved, and at Yale College. His first public office was that of Burgess of Norwalk, and he was twice chairman of the Board of School Visitors of that city. He was a delegate to the National Republican Convention of 1884; a member of the State Senate, 1886-7; one term on the State Republican Committee; and in 1895 was elected to represent the Fourth District in Congress, which office he now holds.
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BISHOP THOMAS F. DAVIES.
Bishop Thomas F. Davies of the Protestant Episcopal Diocese of Michigan, though born in Fairfield, was of Redding ancestry. For our sketch of him we cannot do better than to quote from a sermon of the Rev. Edward M. Jefferys, delivered in his former church of St. Peter's, Philadelphia, on the fourth Sunday after the Epiphany, 1906:
"Bishop Davies was descended from a Welsh family which came to America from Herefordshire in 1751. He was born in Fairfield County, Connecticut, August 31st, 1831. It was a year that is usually reckoned a turning point in American history-the year that saw great questions which had lain more or less dormant since the beginning of our history becoming questions of the day, and shaking society to its foundations. The Bishop was descended from a long line of ancestors who had been clergymen of the Church of England, and devoted to the crown. From these stanch loyalists he inherited a disposition which, while it was genial, tender and sympathetic, was always conservative in politics and churchmanship.
"His education was gotten in the famous schools of his native State, the New Haven Grammar School, Yale University, and Berkeley Divin- ity School at Middletown. At Yale he was a student at a time when there were many men in the University who afterwards became famous in the various walks of life, and yet it is stated by those who were then in a position to know, that he held a real leadership in the student body, and a distinct pre-eminence in the estimation of the Faculty.
"His wit and kindness, his bigness of frame and heart and mind, gave him the leadership of the undergraduates; his quiet dignity, his strength of character and his fine scholarship gave him influence with President Woolsey and the leading professors, and it is said by his college chum (ex-President White, of Cornell), that more than once he was used by the students as an ambassador to make intercession to the Faculty for some delinquent, and that 'in more than one case his intercession pre- vented severity.'
"At the age of twenty-two Bishop Davies obtained the Berkeley Scholarship, and graduated from Yale with the famous class of '53.
"Following in the footsteps of many of his ancestors, he decided to study for Holy Orders, and entered the Berkeley Divinity School under the Rt. Rev. John Williams, Bishop of Connecticut. For six years he lived with Bishop Williams, became his secretary, and laid the founda- tions of an intimate friendship which lasted till the Presiding Bishop's death.
"Bishop Davies had a remarkable talent for languages. He was one of the best Greek scholars Yale University ever produced, and two
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years after his graduation he occupied the chair of Hebrew and Cognate Languages at the Berkeley Divinity School. Bishop Davies was or- dained deacon by Bishop Williams in 1856, and priest the following year.
"In 1863, in the midst of the Civil War, he was called from the mis- sionary work about Middletown, and the chair of Hebrew at Berkeley, to the rectorship of St. John's Church, Portsmouth, New Hampshire.
"He remained in Portsmouth till 1868, when he was elected rector of St. Peter's Church, Philadelphia. He was rector of this parish for twenty-one years, and during all that time he maintained the high stand- ard left him by his distinguished predecessors.
"His rectorship in this parish was a conspicuous success. Statistics can never measure what he did, no matter how instructive they may be; but we must not forget that during his rectorship three thousand souls received Holy Baptism, one thousand persons were confirmed, the En- dowment Fund was begun and successfully continued, St. Peter's House established, two churches built, the influence of the Parish extended in many directions, and seven hundred thousand dollars contributed for Church purposes.
"On St. Luke's Day, 1889, the beloved rector was consecrated in this Church Bishop of Michigan. One of his consecrators was Bishop Wil- liams, of Connecticut, his life-long friend and mentor.
"Bishop Davies's ministry in the diocese of Michigan was abundantly blessed. His life-long missionary spirit served him well. Many new missions were established under his wise direction, and weak parishes were revived and strengthened. The Church in the city of Detroit en- joyed great prosperity during his entire episcopate, more than keeping pace with the development of the city in the period of its greatest growth. Bishop Davies died in the city of Detroit, Mich., November 9th, 1905."
JUDGE WILLIAM STRONG.
Judge Strong, though born in Somers, Conn. (1808), resided in Redding from 1830 to 1835, his father, the Rev. William L. Strong, having been pastor of the Congregational Church here during that period. Judge Strong graduated from Yale College in 1828, made his maiden speech as a lawyer before a Justice Court in Redding, settled as a lawyer in Reading, Pa., became a member of Congress, a Judge of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, and in 1870 was appointed a Jus- tice of the Supreme Court of the United States. (See also the Strong Family.)
WILLIAM A. CROFFUT.
William Augustus Croffut, author, was born in Redding in 1836. Entered newspaper work in 1854, was a private in the United States
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Army in the Civil War. Was some time editor of the Minneapolis Tri- bune, Rochester (N. Y.) Democrat, New Haven Palladium, and Daily Post of Washington, D. C. Executive officer of the U. S. Geological Survey, 1888-94. In 1899 he organized and became secretary of the Anti-Imperialist League; is President of the Liberty League ; is Ph. D. of Union College. Dr. Croffut is a prolific author, having written ten volumes of poems and several of verse, among the former being, "The Vanderbilts," "Folks Next Door," "A Mid-summer Lark," "The Open Door of Dreamland," and the "Crimson Wolf." He also wrote the opening ode for the World's Columbian Exposition in May, 1893. He resides in Washington, D. C.
DANIEL NASH MORGAN.
The first paternal ancestor of Mr. Morgan in this country was James, of Handoff, the fourth son of William Morgan, of a branch of the Trede- gar Morgans of Wales, who was born in 1607, and came to Boston, Mass., in 1636, and to New London, Conn., in 1640. He married Mar- gery Hill, of Roxbury, Mass., August 6th, 1640. (His brother Miles settled in Springfield, Mass.) The succeeding generations were John Morgan, born 1645, who married Rachel Dymond, Nov. 16, 1665; Isaac Morgan, born Oct. 24th, 1670, died Nov. 25th, 1754; Peter Morgan, born about 1705, who died in Norwich, Conn., August 13th, 1786. He mar- ried Elizabeth Whitmore of Middletown, Conn., February 23, 1738.
Zedekiah Morgan was born in Norwich in 1744. He married Ruth Dart, (daughter of John Dart and Ruth Moor Dart, born Dec. 28, 1745), in New London, January 26th, 1769. He moved to Newtown in the Hopewell district, purchasing a tract of territory covering 690 acres, which is still known as the Morgan farm. He was in the Revolution- ary war and during one winter a large number of horses belonging to the American Army were kept on his premises. His son, Hezekiah Mor- gan, was born July 24th, 1773. He lived nearly all his life in Redding, Conn., and died March 24th, 1857. He married Elizabeth Sanford, the eldest daughter of John and Anna (Wheeler) Sanford of Redding, De- cember 27th, 1796. She was born October 13, 1763. and died August 5th, 1853.
Ezra Morgan, son of Hezekiah and Elizabeth (Sanford) Morgan, was born in Redding, February 21st, 1801. In his early manhood he moved to Newtown, and for more than forty years conducted a general store at what is still known as Morgan's Four Corners. He had a large farm, was president of the Hatters' Bank in Bethel for years, was a mem- ber of the Legislature three sessions, and held numerous other public positions. He died June 9th, 1871. He married, June 5th, 1838, Han- nah Nash, daughter of Regan Daniel Nash, of Westport, Conn. Mrs.
TOthewood
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Morgan passed from this life April 15th, 1883. Mr. Nash was born May 12, 1770, (a descendant of John Nash, the first white child born in Norwalk), and after a long, useful and successful career as a miller and financier, died August 2d, 1865. Mr. Nash married, Oct. 8, 1808, Re- becca Camp, of Norwalk, Conn. She was born December 18th, 1774, and died on April 8th, 1854.
Daniel Nash Morgan, the eldest son of Ezra and Hannah Nash Mor- gan, was born at Newtown, Conn., August 18th, 1844. He attended the district school until ten years of age, and then the Newtown Aca- demy or the Bethel Institute until he was sixteen; then for five years he was a clerk in his father's general store. For one year following his majority he was proprietor of the store. For about three years there- after he was of the firm of Morgan and Booth of Newtown Centre. In 1869 he went to Bridgeport and until January Ist, 1880, was in the dry goods and carpet business under the firm name of Birdsey and Morgan. At the earnest request of business friends he became, in 1877, a director of the City National Bank of Bridgeport, and in January, 1879, its presi- dent, holding that position until May 26, 1893, when he resigned to as- sume the office of Treasurer of the United States, having been appointed by President Grover Cleveland on April IIth, 1893, and confirmed by the Senate April 15, 1893. On June Ist, 1893, he gave to his predecssor a receipt for $740,817,419.78 2-3. On retiring from the office, July Ist, 1897, he took from his successor a receipt for $796,925,439.17 2-3.
Mr. Morgan has repeatedly held public office by gift of his fellow citizens, positions wholly unsought by him. As a Democrat in 1873-4 he was a member of the Common Council of his adopted city. In 1877-8, on the Board of Education, and again from 1898 to 1904. In 1880 he was elected Mayor of the City of Bridgeport and again in 1884. In 1883 he represented Bridgeport in the lower house of the State Legis- lature, and was a member of the State Senate in 1885, 1886, and 1893. It was during the latter session that he was appointed Treasurer of the United States, the eighteenth person to hold the position since the forma- tion of the government. In private life and in business Mr. Morgan has held many positions of trust. He was for many years vice-president and then president of the Mechanics and Farmers Saving Bank in the days of its infancy, when it needed strong hands to support it and gain the confidence of the public. From the inception of the Bridgeport Hospital he aided the enterprise and was for several years its President. He was parish clerk thirteen years, then Junior Warden and afterward Senior Warden of Trinity Protestant Episcopal Church. He was for two years Worshipful Master of Corinthian Lodge, 104, F. A. M., and is a member of Hamilton Commandery, 45, K. T., and of Pequannock Lodge, 4, I. O. O. F. Mr. Morgan was the candidate of his party for
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Governor in 1898, and in the election by the Legislature of Connecticut in 1899, of a United States Senator, he received their votes for that ex- alted position. He was also a member of the building committee of the Y. M. C. A. of Bridgeport, and for years one of its directors, and is also interested in the Bridgeport Scientific and Historical Society.
Mr. Morgan has been a wide traveler both in foreign lands and in his own country. If he has a fad it is for the collection of autographs and autograph letters, of which he has an exceptionally large and fine collection. His scrap books filled with clippings would make quite a library.
Mr. Morgan married, June 10th, 1868, Medora Huganen Judson, daughter of the late Captain William A. Judson, of Huntington, Conn., who was captain of a ship making a trip to China before he was 21. He was a descendant of William Judson of Stratford, Conn., in 1639. Mr. Judson was prominent in the affairs of his town, having been a mem- ber of both branches of the Legislature, County Commissioner, and was the trying Justice of the Peace for very many years.
Mr. and Mrs. Morgan have two children now living, Mary Hunting- ton Morgan, born November 29, 1873, who married, June 9th, 1904, Daniel Edwards Brinsmade, and William Judson Morgan, born May 17, 1881, who married, February 9th, 1904, Helen Jeannette Brinsmade, of Huntington, Connecticut, born Aug. 15th, 1881, daughter of Daniel Sey- mour Brinsmade and Jeannette ( Pardee) Brinsmade. A daughter, Flor- ence Newton Morgan, born in Huntington, Conn., Dec. 5th, 1876, died April 18th, 1878.
The following from Miss Rebecca D. Beach's history of "Reverend John Beach and John Sanford and their Descendants," will be of interest to some living in Newtown and Reading :
"Mrs. Morgan (Daniel N.) is herself a descendant of John Beach the first,
. Through John and Hannah Staples, Ebenezer and Mehitable Gibson, John and Rebecca, Hezekiah and - Silliman, Rebecca and Agur Judson, William Agur Judson and Marietta Beardsley. Marietta Beard- sley was the daughter of Ebenezer Beardsley and Maria Beach, who was the daughter of Ebenezer (brother of Hezekiah) and Abbie - Beach. The double connection explains itself. The marriages and full family records of the two brothers, Hezekiah and Ebenezer Beach, can be found in the first volume of Town Records (Huntington) at Shelton, Conn. (Town Clerk's Office).
Ezra and Hannah (Nash) Morgan had eight children. Elizabeth Sanford Morgan, the eldest child, born March 31st, 1839, married the late Rufus Davenport Cable, of Westport, Conn., Oct. 15th, 1862. Of
REV. A. J. SMITH.
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their six children, three daughters are living, Mrs. Marcus Bayard But- ler, Mrs. Edward J. Buehner, and Mrs. George A. Robson.
Mrs. E. S. (Morgan) Cable, beside the subject of this sketch, is now living.
The other children who are not living and who died unmarried, were: Mary Camp, Harriet Louisa, Cornelia Jane, Hannah Sophia, and Freder- ick Ezra Morgan.
The youngest member of the family, Edward Kemper Morgan, born March 16, 1859, died at Bridgeport, April 14th, 1906. He married Charlotte Adelaide Judson of Huntington, Sept. 27, 1883. She has two sons, Daniel Judson Morgan, born June 10, 1885, and Frederick Ed- ward Morgan, born February 13, 1890.
Mr. Morgan relates the following stories of his paternal and maternal grandfathers, Hezekiah Morgan and Daniel Nash :
"In 1844, the year of my birth, my grandfather Nash was seventy-four years old. That was four years before the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad was built. Mr. Nash was in New York of a Satur- day morning and anxious to get home. He missed the Harlem trains, which ran but once or twice a day, so he walked over forty miles to Westport that day, a part of the way in a snow storm. On his arrival home it was feared he had taken his last walk after such prolonged exer- tion, but he declared next morning that he did not have an ache or a pain in his body; and he lived for twenty-one years afterward, into his ninety-sixth year.
"When my grandfather Morgan was a youth, owing to an illness that indicated a fatal termination, his physician recommended a sea voyage as a remedy, which he took, taking with him his shroud. A friend went with him simply for a pleasant trip, but was taken sick and died while on the voyage, and was buried at sea, clothed in the funeral garb men- tioned above."
The late high sheriff, Thomas Sanford, related to me many years ago the following incident of Redding politics: "When the members of the Legislature were elected one at a time-when a town was entitled to two -and Redding so regularly Republican that Democrats voted simply to stand by their colors, after your grandfather (Hezekiah Morgan) had voted and started for home the count of votes showed that a Democrat had been elected, which so elated the victors that they sent me after your grandfather to return and vote for another candidate. When I over- took him and told him my errand, he replied that he felt like saying as did Simeon, 'Lord, let now thy servant depart in peace, for I have seen thy salvation.'"
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EDWIN GILBERT.
Edwin Gilbert was born in Georgetown, Conn., September 7th, 1812, and died at his winter home, Crescent City, Florida, February 28th, 1906. Mr. Gilbert's career emphasizes the fact often noted that in our country of opportunities men may succeed under the most adverse circumstances, provided they are born with a genius for mastery and leadership.
His father, Benjamin Gilbert, learned the allied trades of tanner, currier and shoemaker, and was following them when the lad was born and continued to do so for some six years later. But he possessed inven- tive genius and business ability of a high order and was not long con- tent with the humble role of village shoemaker. In 1818 he founded the present Gilbert & Bennett Manufacturing Company by taking the long hair of cattle, which he collected as a tanner, and weaving it into sieves for the use of house-wives in sifting meal and flour. Aided by his ener- getic wife, his business prospered, and at the age of sixteen the boy, Ed- win, left school and took a subordinate position in his father's factory. Here he displayed an inventive talent and business aptitude greater even than his father's, and rose through all the grades-including the selling of the firm's products "on the road," then almost the only way of dis- tributing goods-until in 1844, at the age of thirty-two, he was admitted a member of the firm, which some time before had been enlarged by the admission of his brother-in-law, Sturges Bennett, and of his elder broth- er, William J. Gilbert. Two years later, October 26, 1846, he was mar- ried to Miss Elizabeth Jones, of Wilton, Conn. Mr. Gilbert remained a member of the firm of Gilbert & Bennett until its incorporation in 1874 as the Gilbert & Bennett Manufacturing Company, when he was made a Director. The next year, 1875, he was elected Superintendent and Treasurer, and in 1884, President, which position he held for twenty- two years, or until his death in 1906, at which time he had been a mem- ber of the company for sixty-two years.
It is no injustice to Mr. Gilbert's able associates to say that much of the success of the great corporation of which he was so long the head, was due to his inventive genius, courage, energy, and business capacity. The many patented machines and improved processes by which the com- pany produces its specialties at a cost which enables it to hold the mar- ket were most of them invented by him. He had a keen judgment of men, and in the selection of subordinates for his great business, showed a sagacity that amounted almost to intuition. His courage and energy were most markedly shown at the time of the great fire of May 10, 1874, when nearly all of the "Upper Factories" were burned, entailing a loss of $200,000, on which there was an insurance of but $40,000. Those were the times that tried the souls of the officials of the company re-
RESIDENCE OF JESSE B. CORNWALL, Sanfordtown
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sponsible for its continued existence and success. Not only were the factories and finished product in ashes, but the complicated machinery, and in some cases the patterns themselves were destroyed. To restore them would be the work of months; meantime the firm's large orders for goods could not be filled and would be given to others ; notes also would come due that must be met. Then there were the employes, who must be given work and wages. To many the outlook seemed hopeless; but Mr. Gilbert never despaired.
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