USA > Washington DC > Eminent and representative men of Virginia and the District of Columbia in the nineteenth century. With a concise historical sketch of Virginia > Part 48
USA > Virginia > Eminent and representative men of Virginia and the District of Columbia in the nineteenth century. With a concise historical sketch of Virginia > Part 48
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Joseph Grice, Sr., enlisted in the army hood; Joseph, born September 29, 1869, is
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now living and resides with his mother in Salmon, in Richmond, with a cash capital Portsmouth, Va.
of $1,600, under the firm name of Salmon WILLIAM T. HANCOCK, & Hancock, and the firm did a very suc- the well known tobacco manufacturer of cessful tobacco manufacturing business Richmond, Va., is of good old Virginia for ten years, when Mr. Hancock bought out Mr. Salmon's interest, and by his energy, honesty and business abilities has raised the factory to its present propor- tions. Now having a surplus of capital, he has invested in and become a stock- holder in a number of enterprising mone- tary institutions in Richmond, among them the Security Savings bank, of which he is a director.
William F. Hancock was married, in 1856, to Miss Pauline Carrington, of North ness upon which civilized life depends, be Carolina, but had the misfortune to lose his wife in 1864. He then had the good fortune of winning the affection and hand of Mary J. Sutherland, of Richmond, to whom he is now happily wedded.
stock and was born in Chesterfield in 1835, a son of Ananias and Bessie (Stanton) Hancock, both natives of the state and descendants from its earliest settlers. Ananias Hancock was an extensive lum- berman and millman in Chesterfield county, and with him William T. passed his youth and adolescent years until he had reached the age of seventeen, when he went to Richmond in search of a better knowledge of life and of the busi- it scientific or industrial. With him both seemed to have combined, and he eventu- ally acquired wealth by adding knowledge to industry. His first act in Richmond was to enter the employ of J. W. Atkin- son, as manager, and after faithfully and satisfactorily filling the position for several years, he engaged with William Grainer, and was in that employ until the
LAFAYETTE HARMANSON
was born in Northampton county, October 16, 1824. He attended in his early youth William and Mary college, and after- ward the law school at the university of breaking out of the recent war, when in- Virginia, and was graduated there in 1845 spired with patriotism he entered the as a bachelor of law. He commenced ranks of the Tenth Virginia battalion, and served as a private until the surrender of Lee's army in 1865 with valor, unflinching courage and devotion to duty, having no desire for personal advancement and no ambition other than to serve his beloved state. During this service he took part in the battles of Seven Pines, Fort Gill- more, and a number of other sanguinary engagements in which his corps was conspicuous, and when the terms of peace
the practice of his profession the next year in the counties of Accomac and Northampton and practiced there until 1852, when he was elected clerk of the circuit and county courts of Northampton county, and served in these offices till 1869, when he was removed by the decla- ration of the military law. He thereupon resumed the practice of law and continued therein until he removed to Norfolk, where he has, since 1872, practiced with were proclaimed and the war closed, he Jas. E. Heath, his present partner. Mr. returned to Richmond and became man- Harmanson has held many positions of trust and honor, having been assistant ager for J. B. Pace, with whom he re- mained for seven years. In 1873 he clerk of Norfolk city under Thomas formed a partnership with William L. Pierce from July, 1870, until the spring of
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1872. He is now United States commis- sioner and was formerly under the late Federal bankrupt law register in bank- ruptcy. Mr. Harmanson has been twice happily married, his first wife having been Virginia C., daughter of Rufus and Susan Heath of Northampton county, and to them were born two children; Mary C., wife of Prof. James Dillard of St. Louis, Mo., and Anna G., wife of Lieut. Jno. M. Robinson, United States navy. The first wife died in 1875, and he wasagain married in 1879, this time to Sallie Pope Taylor, the estimable daughter of the late John C. Taylor of Norfolk. The father of Mr. Harmanson, John H. Harmanson, who was born in Northampton county in 1783, was educated in what is known in Vir- ginia as the "old field " schools, de- voted all his life to farming, and was a young woman of English parentage, whose brother, Capt. John Goodrich, was a Revolutionary soldier, and also a mem- ber of the Virginia house of burgesses. Their son, Edward Hatton, was born in Virginia, about 1770, during the stirring pre-revolutionary times. His son, John Goodrich Hatton, was born in 1800, and during the course of a long and useful life he followed various pursuits; being at different times a farmer, a naval store- keeper, a magistrate and a member of the old county court. His wife was Em- eline Lecky, the daughter of Alexander Lecky. Edward Alexander Hatton was their son, and he was born in Portsmouth, Va., in 1830. He was educated at the Norfolk academy, and afterwards took up the study of medicine in the Naval hospital at Portsmouth. His health never representative citizen of his day. He permitted him to follow the arduous call- was for many years a member of the old ing of the physician-though he did ren- county court and presiding magistrate of the same in the days when only men of the highest intelligence and social stand- ing were elected to the magistracy, as it was an office without any salary, which in der valiant service in the Portsmouth yellow fever epidemic of'55-and so at an early age he commenced farming, and continued in this work until after the war. It was during this period of his life that, a large measure kept it beyond the pale in 1860, he married Susan Rebecca Nash, of contention. He too was married a daughter of Dempsey and Elizabeth twice, the first alliance being with Cath- Nash, of Portsmouth. To them six chil- dren were born, two of whom died in in- arine Coleburn, by whom he had ten children, and the second with Juli- fancy and the others survive as follows: ette B., daughter of Nathaniel L. Hol- land, of Northampton county. To this union one child was born, Lafayette.
Goodrich; Elizabeth Nash; Edward A., and Leckey Hatton. After the war Mr. Hatton left his farm and went into the EDWARD ALEXANDER HATTON. real estate business. In 1880 he aban- The founder of the American branch of the Hatton family came to Virginia during the first half of the eighteenth century. He was an Englishman, Lewis Hatton by name, and he settled on Hat- ton's Point, Norfolk county, Virginia, doned this to become cashier of the bank of Portsmouth, which position he held until his resignation of it in October, 1890. He has retired from business life in order to more fully enjoy the rewards that his industry and sagacity have ac- where he became a large landed propri- quired, and to fill up the measure of his ctor. He married Elizabeth Goodrich, a days at home.
Witham Writ Henry.
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HON. WILLIAM WIRT HENRY.
the eldest son of John Henry and Elvira Bruce McClelland, was born February 14; 1831, at Red Hill, Charlotte county, Va. John Henry was the youngest son of the Revolutionary patriot, Patrick Henry, and his second wife Dorothea Spottswood Danridge, the granddaughter of Gov. Alexander Spottswood. Hon. Hugh Blair Grigsby, one of the most accom- plished historians ever produced by Vir- ginia, in an obituary notice of John Henry, says: "He was the youngest son of that illustrious man whose voice may be said to have called a nation into existence, and who, according to Fox, was more dreaded by George the Third than any other man of his generation. A visit to Red Hill, when John Henry was in the fullness of his health and before the raging of that terrible e storm which has prostrated the fortunes of the south, was a day long to be remembered by the recipients of the courtesies of that hospitable mansion. It was not his disposition to engage in the turmoils of public life. In the employ- ments of his beautiful plantation, in the rearing of a large and intelligent family and in the gentle and generous pursuits of literature, he spent a peaceful and honorable life. Just before his death, he had the gratification to read from the pen of his eldest son an able and conclusive vindication of his father's memory from all the charges which, in a time of unusual party rancour, had been cast upon it, and to feel that the honored name he bore might receive a fresh illustration in coming years." His wife, Elvira Bruce McClelland, was a daughter of Thomas Stanhope McClelland, a lawyer of emi- nence, and the granddaughter of Col. William Cabell of Union Hill, an officer in the Revolutionary army, and a mem-
ber of the committee of safety and of the Virginia conventions looking toward in- dependence. She was noted for her beauty of person and her loveliness of character. John Henry named his eldest son William Wirt, in compliment to the accomplished biographer of his father.
William Wirt Henry was educated at the university of Virginia, where he took the degree of master of arts in 1850. He read law with Judge Hunter H. Marshall, and came to the bar in 1853, at Charlotte Court House, Va. He practiced his pro- fession there and in the adjacent counties until his removal to the city of Richmond, in 1873, gaining a high reputation, and holding for a number of years the posi- tion of commonwealth's attorney. In 1854 he married Lucy Gray Marshall, daughter of Col. James Pulliam Marshall, a soldier of the war of 1812, and a man of great integrity and force of character. John Henry had been an ardent admirer of Henry Clay and raised his son with whig principles. The celebrated " Reply of Webster to Hayne" was one of the first political pamphlets placed in his hands. That son did not believe in South Carolina's doctrine of nullification and secession, but when Virginia took her stand with the southern states in 1861, he volunteered as a private soldier in an ar- tillery company commanded by Capt. Charles Bruce of the county of Charlotte, which saw service on the coast of Geor- gia and North Carolina. When the conscription act was passed by the Con- federate congress and the army was re- organized he was discharged from duty, not being liable to conscription, and re- turned to his home, where in different capacities he contributed to the service until the end of the war. While he felt that he was performing a sacred duty in
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taking up arms for his state, and protect-[ said of him -"He is a ready speaker, ing her from the invading foe, he was. fluent, logical, full of quaint sarcasm and free from the bitterness so generally en- sharp satire; an antagonist with whom it is dangerous to fence, for the button will fly from his foil. Tall, thin, and slender; with something of the air of the scholar and the recluse; earnest and determined, and at times, when on the war-path, in pursuit of the scalp of some obstrusive foe, there is something almost of grim- ness in his manner - which bodes no dendence of his renowned ancestor in his opinions, he sometimes reminds us of the descriptions of John Randolph of Roa- noke in the piquancy of his remarks and the pungency his satire, but in private upon him. He was elected in 1877 to the life he is a courteous and affable gentle- gendered by the war, and at the end he accepted the results in good faith and bent all his energies to the restoration of peace and prosperity within her borders. Upon his removal to Richmond he at once entered into a large law practice, principally in the supreme court of the state, in which he has been called upon to argue some of the most important cases good to his antagonist. With all the in- which have been before that court. Upon the death of Judge E. H. Fitzhugh, chan- cellor of the city of Richmond, he de- clined the appointment to fill the vacancy which the governor desired to confer house of delegates from the city of Rich- man and enjoys the personal friendship and esteem of a large circle of acquaint- ances." Since retiring from the senate he has taken no active part in politics except occasional contributions to the press. mond, and served two sessions in that body. He was then elected to the senate, in which he served two years, and de- clined re-election, preferring to devote himself to his profession and desiring to write the life of his grandfather, Pat- rick Henry. He was recognized as one of the leaders of debate in the house and in the senate. While he was in the house the plan of settlement of the Virginia state debt, known as the McCullough bill, was introduced. It met with the ap- probation of the creditors, and was in every way honorable to the state. Mr. southern wings of that body met in com- Henry was an advocate of it, and gave substantial aid in securing its passage. On the rise of the readjuster party, which
In 1855 he united himself with the Presbyterian church, and not long after- ward was elected an elder. In 1860, he was sent, as a delegate, by the West Hanover presbytery, to the general as- sembly of the Presbyterian church which met at Rochester, N. Y. This was the last occasion at which the northern and mon council. In that memorable assem- bly he heard the celebrated debat between Dr. Thornwell of South Carolina, got possession of the legislature, and re- and Dr. Hodge, of Princeton, on " What is Presbyterianism?" or " The Internal Polity of the Church." He was a mem- ber of the southern general assembly which met in Augusta, Ga., in 1886, and took a prominent part in the debates growing out of the relations of Dr. Wood-
pealed the Mccullough settlement, he found himself in a minority in the senate, but instead of acting upon the defensive, he boldly attacked the combination of repudiators and negroes which constituted the bulk of that party. A writer of the day, sketching the members of the house, row to the Theological seminary of South
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Carolina. His speech on that subject was tions ;" "Chapter on Sir Walter Raleigh " conceded to have settled the question at in Winsor's Narrative, and "Critical His- issue. He is now, and has been since his tory of the United States;" "Scotch- removal to the city, a ruling elder in the Irish in the South;" "Address before Second Presbyterian church, of which Dr. Scotch-Irish Congress." He has just Moses D.Hoge is pastor. He became pres- completed and published "The Life, Let- ident of the Virginia Historical society ters and Correspondence of Patrick upon the death of the Hon. A. H. Stuart, Henry," in three volumes. This has had and also succeeded Mr. Stuart on the much praise from the northern and south- Peabody board. He was president of the ern press. The New York Critic, the American Historical society for 1891. A highest authority in matters of literary few years ago Washington and Lee uni- versity conferred the degree of LL. D. upon him, and he has been made an hon- orary member of a number of historical societies. He delivered the oration in Philadelphia upon the centennial of the nation for independence, and was com- missioner from Virginia at the centennial celebration in Philadelphia of the forma- tion of the constitution. As a youth he found in his father's library Shakespeare, British classics, and the works of Sir Wal- criticism, says of this work: " With a love of order and sequence that reveals itself on every page, with a style at once lucid, consise and engaging, the biographer has made an offering of the first value to the splendid thesaurus of American history. Like the pillars of Hercules, this edition will stand at the end of the sea of Patrick Henry literature. As far as merit goes, we may write here, Ne plus ultra. . . . In American political and biographical literature it would be hard to point to ter Scott - upon these his taste for liter- anything superior to this work. . . . We ature was formed. He spends all the congratulate both author and publisher and the lovers of historical literature on this notable addition to the treasures of American prose."
time he can spare from his profession in reading and study. He has always been a devoted student of history and has a fine library and a unique collection of volumes on Virginia history, on which he is acknowledged to be the best authority in the state. His training as a writer commenced newspapers in early life. Among his
REV. DR. MOSES D. HOGE.
Among the distinguished Virginia cler- gymen who have lived within the last half century, none have left a more per- state of Virginia than has Dr. Moses D.
with occasional articles furnished the manent impression upon the people of the
writings are "Rescue of Captain Smith Hoge, the celebrated Presbyterian divine. by Pocahontas," "Patrick Henry, the Dr. Hoge was born in the county of Earliest Advocate of Independence," Prince Edward, Va., and is descended on the "Truth Concerning the Expedition his father's side from ancestors who emi- of George Rogers Clarke," published in grated from Scotland and settled in Potter's magazine; "Early History of Frederick county, Va., in 1736, on the do- Virginia with Reference to Attacks upon main of Thomas Lord Fairfax, of colonial Captain John Smith;" " Pocahontas and memory. His grandfather was Dr. Moses Rolfe;" "Virginia Historical Collec- Hoge, president of the Hampden-Sidney
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college, one of the best men who ever lived, and one of the most eminent among great and good ministers who have so richly blessed the Presbyterian church in Virginia. John Randolph says in one of his letters that he was the most eloquent man he ever heard in the pulpit or out of it. Three sons became ministers of the gospel, viz: Dr. James Hoge of Colum- bus, Ohio; John Blair Hoge of Richmond, Va .; and Samuel Davies Hoge, president of Athens college, Ohio. The last named died early in life; leaving two sons who became ministers of the gospel, the younger of whom was the late Rev. W. J. Hoge, D. D., and the elder is the gentle- man whose name heads this sketch. On the maternal side Dr. Hoge is descended from the family of Lacys, who emigrated from England to Virginia in early colonial times. His grandfather was Rev. Drury Lacy, D. D., president of Hampden- Sidney college, a minister of great eminence and worth. Two of his sons became ministers - the Rev. William S. Lacy, of Louisiana, and Rev. Drury Lacy, D. D., formerly president of Davidson college, and late of Raleigh, N. C. Many of the remoter descendants of Dr. Hoge and Dr. Lacy have also entered the office of the ministry. On both sides, there- fore, Dr. Hoge, is emphatically of the tribe of Levi. Dr. Hoge's ministry be- gan in Richmond in 1844. His church was built in 1848. Invitations to the presidency of Hampden-Sidney college; to become a pastor in Lexington, Va., St. Louis, Brooklyn, New York, Nashville, Philadelphia, New Orleans, Charleston and elsewhere, have never tempted him from the field of his first labors. It has fallen to the lot of few men to attract such congregations as habitually attended his ministry, and
still larger wherever he went to preach or lecture. During the first year of the Civil war Dr. Hoge was a volunteer chap- lain in the camp of instruction (Camp Lee). He preached to the soldiers two or three times a week without discontinu- ing his services in his own church. In 1864, he ran the blockade from Charles- ton and went to England by way of Nassau, Cuba and St. Thomas, to obtain Bibles and religious books for the Con- federate army. Lord Shaftesbury, the president of the British and Foreign Bible society, gave him a hearty welcome, and invited him to make an address to the society in explanation of the object of his mission. The result was a free grant of 10,000 Bibles, 50,000 testaments and 250,000 portions of the scripture, just what was most convenient to put in the soldiers' pockets, in all worth about 4,000 pounds. Dr. Hoge remained during the winter in London, superintending their shipment by the blockade runners to the Confederacy. He also obtained a large supply of miscellaneous religious books adapted to camp life, which were sent over in the same manner and most of them came in safely. On his return from England he delivered an address at an anniversary of the Virginia Bible society in St. Paul's church to one of the largest audiences ever assembled in that spacious building. By invitation of the Virginia legislature he delivered an oration at the unveiling of the Jackson statue, presented by English gentlemen to Virginia, in October, 1875. The ceremony occurred on the capitol square, where there had gathered an immense throng of people, and the scenes and incidents of the memo- rable day are yet fresh in the minds of hundreds of Virginians who were present. Dr. Hoge was appointed to positions of
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honor and responsibility by the southern there, he having from a small membership general assembly of the Presbyterian built it up to the largest and most in- church. In 1875, he was unanimously fluential christian organization in the city. elected to the moderator's chair in the He possessed the accomplishment, not assembly which met in St. Louis. In 1876, common with fine speakers, of also being in the assembly convened in Savannah, Ga. a fine writer, and as such earned a high reputation while he was associated with the Central Presbyterian. The degree of D. D. was conferred on Dr. Hoge by Hampden-Sidney in June, 1854, the degree of LL. D. by Washington and Lee univer- sity in 1886. As an orator he had few equals and no superior in any branch of learning in the Old Dominion. he advocated and carried by overwhelm- ing majorities two measures, greatly opposed at that time by some of the most distinguished members. These were the establishment of " fraternal relations" not "organic union " with the northern Pres- byterian church and the sending of com- missioners to represent the southern church in the alliance of the reformed churches of the world. In 1877, he was a DR. FRANK STANLEY HOPE, delegate to the Pan-Presbyterian council which met in Edinburgh. Dr. Hoge was also a delegate to the meeting of the evangelical alliance, which met in New York in 1873, in which he made an ad- dress in vindication of the civilization of the south. Also to the alliance of the re- formed churches of the world which met
a descendant of one of the prominent families of Virginia, was born in Ports- mouth, Va., in 1855. He was a grand- nephew of Commodore James Barron Hope, late of the United States navy. His grandfather's name was George Hope, who was born in Whitehaven, England, March 28, 1749, and who came to Amer- in Copenhagen in 1884, where he made ica in 1769. Being a shipbuilder, he first an address which obtained for him an located in Norfolk, Va., and later in Hampton, Va., where he remained un- til his death, which occurred in 1818. His wife's name was Mrs. Rebecca Bal- lard, née Meredith. The great-grand- father of Dr. Hope was John Hope, a native of Virginia, born in Hampton, Jan- uary 20, 1786. By trade he was a ship- Hampton, Va., he became the father of nine children, of whom the father of Dr. Frank Stanley Hope is the third, and only survivor. John Hope died in 1863. The doctor's father's name is William Mere- dith Hope, who was born in Hampton, Va., in 1812. He received his education at Hampton academy, leaving at the age of sixteen, since which time he has been invitation to visit the crown princess of Denmark at the palace. He was sent as a commissioner of the reformed churches which convened in London in 1888, and the subject of his speech before that body was "The Antagonisms of Society and How to Reconcile Them." His last mis- sion of the kind was at the conference of builder. Marrying Miss Ann Watkins, of the evangelical alliance in Boston, where he delivered a speech which was pro- nounced by the press of that city to have been one of the most effective of all that were made at that meeting, and extracts from which have been frequently pub- lished and commented on by the newspaper press. Dr. Hoge was pastor of the Second Presbyterian church for forty-five years; in fact all his ministerial life was passed a shipbuilder. For two years he was a
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member of the Portsmouth council, and ginia colonial navy, of which he was the was master shipwright in the Portsmouth commander-in-chief during the Revolu- navy yard under President Cleveland. In tion. The founder of the family on the 1840 he was married to Catherine F. Nil- paternal side was one George Hope, who lis, of Hampton, Va., by her having one accumulated a large estate, and on the child, which died in infancy. His first maternal side was one Samuel Barron, a wife died in 1841, and he was next mar- captain in the British navy, who, during ried to Miss Virginia Frances Owens, the supremacy of England in America, daughter of James Owens, of Portsmouth. commanded " Fort George," which occu- This union was blessed by the birth of pied the present site of Fortress Monroe. nine children, of whom five grew to ma- James Barron Hope received his earlier turity, as follows: Rev. Herbert M. Hope, education at Germantown, Penn., and at of Danville, Va .; William Owen Hope, of the Hampton academy. He was gradu- Portsmouth; Dr. Frank Stanley Hope; ated from William and Mary college in Dr. James Shirley Hope, of Portsmouth, July, 1847, with the degree of A. B. After and Virginia Lee, deceased wife of Dana a year spent at Williamsburg, Va., in the L. Roper, of Brooklyn, N. Y.
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