Memoirs of Georgia; containing historical accounts of the state's civil, military, industrial and professional interests, and personal sketches of many of its people. Vol. I, Part 54

Author:
Publication date: 1859
Publisher: Atlanta, Ga., The Southern historicl association
Number of Pages: 1294

USA > Georgia > Memoirs of Georgia; containing historical accounts of the state's civil, military, industrial and professional interests, and personal sketches of many of its people. Vol. I > Part 54

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survive-A. D. and Charles E. Schofield. The wife died and in 1866 Mr. Scho- field was married to Anna Franklin, of Washington county, Ga., and by her he had three children-of whom two survive, as follows: J. S., Jr., and H. A. During the war the senior Schofield was engaged in making shells and other munitions of war for the Confederacy. One of his sons, Joshua R., now deceased, was a private for two years in the Confederate service. After the death of the father in 1891, the iron works have been operated by his sons-A. D., Charles E. and John S., Jr., and the firm is now known as the Schofield Sons Company. Alonzo D. Schofield, president of the company, is prominently connected with a number of successful enterprises in his home city, and zealously watches the interests of his own factory, whose products have a reputation througout the whole state. He belongs to the Episcopal church of Macon. He was married to Elizabeth, a daughter of the late I. C. Plant, and they have three children-Elizabeth, A. D., Jr., and Gladys.

FMORY SPEER, United States judge for the southern district of Georgia, was born in Monroe county, Ga., Sept. 3, 1848. At the age of fifteen he entered the Confederate army as a private in company K, Fifth regiment, of Lewis' Kentucky brigade of mounted infantry. He took a part in several engagements in Georgia and South Carolina and surrendered with his command at Washington, Ga., in April, 1865. In September of the next year he entered the university of Georgia and allied himself with the Eta chapter of Chi Phi. He was graduated in 1869, after taking several college honors. He read law, and in the November following his graduation at the university of Georgia he was admitted to the bar. He was appointed solicitor-general of the state when twenty-three years of age by the first democratic governor of Georgia elected after the war. In 1878 he was elected a member of the Forty-sixth congress from the Ninth district of Georgia as an inde- pendent democrat by a majority of 225. Two years later he was re-elected by a majority of 4,064. As a member of the elections committee in his first term he pursued an independent course-notably by voting for Hon. W. D. Washburn against Ignatius Donnelly in a celebrated election contest for Minnesota. During his second term he was made a member of the ways and means committee, and was one of the conferrers between the house and the senate on the disagreements on the tariff bill of 1883. Immediately on the expiration of this term he was appointed by President Arthur United States attorney for the northern district of Georgia. Here he speedily evinced to the country his great ability, as a lawyer and advocate. His successful prosecution of the Banks county Ku-Klux, resulting in the conviction of eight white men for assaulting negroes-a case which produced the greatest excitement-was his cause celebre. Mr. Speer was afterward appointed special counsel for the government in the celebrated election trials at Columbia, S. C., in the fall of 1883. He was nominated by President Arthur to the position of district judge of the United States for the southern district of Georgia. His courts are held at Savannah, Macon, and Augusta, and he has presided in a number of cases of national importance. Judge Speer is the author of Speer on Removal of Causes, Little, Brown & Co., Boston. His decisions are noted for a strong and lucid style. He was eight years trustee of the university of Georgia, and although a member of the Methodist church is the president of the law school of Mercer university, the principal Baptist college of Georgia.

JAMES D. STETSON, vice-president of the American National bank, was born in Milledgeville, Ga., May 31, 1846, and lived in that city until 1863. He was educated at the private schools there, and later at Oglethorpe university, which he attended for two years, reaching the sophomore class. In the autumn of the year

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last mentioned he enlisted in the Georgia state troops, being mustered into the McIntosh light infantry. He entered the Confederate service as a private, was afterward elected first lieutenant of his company, and served in that capacity all through the war. He spent the most of the war period in Macon, attached to the quartermaster's department, but was captured in November, 1864, by a troop of Sherman's soldiers. He effected his escape the evening of the day on which he was taken prisoner, reaching his quarters little the worse for the unpleasant experi- ence. At the close of hostilities he located at Milledgeville and there engaged in mercantile business until 1867, when he removed to Baltimore, Md., staying there one year, and at the expiration of that term he journeyed to Savannah, where he took a position with J. W. Lathrop & Co., cotton factors. He remained with them until 1873 and then went to Hawkinsville, Ga., where he organized the Hawkins- ville Bank & Trust company, with a capital stock of $50,000. He was elected cashier of this company and served as such until 1891, in which year he came to Macon, to become the vice-president of the American National bank, which was opened April 2, 1891, with a capital of $250,000. In that year he was chosen vice-president of the Hawkinsville Bank & Trust company, and on the death of C. T. Lathrop, in September, 1893, was made president of that institution. In addi- tion to holding these important offices Mr. Stetson is a director of the National Security, Loan & Abstract company of Macon, and of the Georgia & Alabama rail- way company. He also served several years as commissioner of Pulaski county. He is a stanch democrat, but takes no active part in politics, and is also prominent in church affairs, being a deacon of the Tatnall Square Baptist church, Macon. He is also a trustee of Mercer university, and chairman of the prudential committee of the board of trustees of Mercer university. Mr. Stetson was married in 1872 to Eugenia, daughter of Maj. John H. Pate, a Georgian by birth, who served as major of the Forty-ninth regiment of Georgia troops in the last war. Mr. Stetson and his wife have four children-three sons and one daughter. His father was Daniel B. Stetson, who was born in Cohasset, Mass., in 1810, and in his boyhood was appren- ticed to a brick mason, but ran away to sea. Landing at Portsmouth, Va., at a subsequent date, he went to work as a contractor, one of the buildings he erected at that point being the old Seaboard & Roanoke freight depot, which was burned when Norfolk was evacuated by the Confederate troops in 1861. While a resident of Portsmouth he married Edith Wyatt, daughter of Maj. Wyatt, an officer of the revolutionary war. Daniel B. Stetson came to Georgia about the year 1842 and located in Milledgeville, where he was a merchant up to the breaking out of the war. He then retired from active business, but remained in Milledgeville, dying there in 1865. He was for some time judge of the inferior court of Baldwin county, Ga. His wife survived him many years and died in 1884. One of their sons, William S., was a lieutenant in the Fifty-seventh Georgia regiment, and fought all through the war. He was captured at the fall of Vicksburg, but paroled shortly afterward. He was severely wounded in the leg during the battle of Kennesaw mountain, July, 1864, and was again wounded by a piece of shell at the battle of Bentonville, N. C., the last battle of the war. He now resides in Florida. The Stetson family is of English origin, the emigrant ancestor reaching America in the Mayflower. James D. Stetson is highly csteemed in financial circles, his judgment and advice in monetary matters being eagerly sought and greatly valued.

MR. W. P. STEVENS was born in Baldwin county, Ga., March 31, 1859. of English parentage, and the youngest of three brothers. His parents were Henry and Matilda Stevens (for whose sketch see that of Henry Stevens, Baldwin county). After receiving a thorough education, he crossed the water and visited

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his father's old home, and spent quite a while prospecting among the clay indus- tries of Great Britain. On his return he accepted a position as superintendent for Stevens Bros. Co., Stevens Pottery, Ga., which position he held with credit until his father's death, at which time he launched out on his own account, in the saw and planing mill business and merchandising, in which he was successful and made money. After cutting all the timber contiguous to his mills he disposed of his interests in this line, formed a company, consisting of himself and two broth- ers, W. C. and J. H. Stevens, of Stevens Bros. Co., and built a sewer pipe plant at Macon, Ga., and commenced the manufacture of sewer pipe, fire brick, flue goods, etc., under the name of Henry Stevens Sons Co., the subject of this sketch being elected general manager and treasurer.

By never-failing courage and tenacity, and not knowing what "fail" means, Mr. Stevens soon built and equipped a modern plant, furnished with the best machinery, and by his shrewdness and foresight, the plant has -been a success since its inception, and has not shut down since it was started, except for repairs.

Mr. Stevens married Miss Emma G. Stephens, a daughter of John W. Steph- ens and C. A. Stephens. Her father belonged to a well-known Mississippi family, and died in Nashville, Tenn., while in the Confederate service. To them three bright and beautiful children have been born: Estelle, born Sept. 2, 1885; Fannie, born Aug. 27, 1888; and William Park, Jr., born June 25, 1892. Mr. Stevens claims that to his wife is due a great deal of the credit for his successful business career. He is charitable and courteous, but stern and positive in business trans- actions; says "No" without changing, and is what all practical business men, with whom he has dealings, term a shrewd and conservative business man. Mrs. Stev- ens is a prominent member of the Methodist church.

H. C. TINDALL, president of the Macon Hardware company, and a man of fine business ability, is a son of Henry W. Tindall and Judith McKey. His father was a native of Georgia, having been born near Augusta, in 1811. He was there reared to manhood, and in his early years removed to McDonough, Ga., where he embarked in the mercantile business and where he married, as above, the daughter of T. W. McKey. In 1846, he established himself in Macon, where he passed the remainder of his days, a leading spirit in the commercial life of the city. He was a man of exalted piety, and lived a life devoted in its religious bearing to the Methodist church. H. C. Tindall received his literary education in the schools of Macon and began his business career at fourteen years of age, in the wholesale establishment of Seymour, Tinsley & Co. Remaining with them five years, he concluded to invest his savings in that which always brings the best returns-an education. Having neither time nor inclination for a classical education, he con- cluded to take the course at Eastman college, Poughkeepsie, N. Y. He spent the summer of 1873 in that beautiful city, and graduated in the business course with honor. After he had been awarded his diploma, he was offered a good situation, through the college, with a large house in New York, but being thoroughly southern in his tastes, and having many ties at home that he could not sever, he refused the offer. Immediately upon his return to Macon, in September, he was given a place as bookkeeper with the wholesale house of Campbell & English, where he remained twelve years. He afterward became partner in the firm of wholesale tobacconists, Campbell, Tindall & Co., which he left only to become part- ner in the larger business of the wholesale firm of Campbell, Van Syckel & Co. By the death of Mr. Campbell the firm was changed to Nussbaum, Van Syckel & Tindall. This firm eventually merged into a stock company under style of Macon Hardware company, and Mr. Tindall is now its president. He was for two years

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secretary and treasurer of the Macon agricultural works and is now a director in that institution. He is also secretary and treasurer and director in the Excelsior Hook & Back Band company, whose trade covers the entire south. Mr. Tindall is a man who finds time from his secular duties to serve his church and even here his business ability is called into requisition, being trustee and treasurer of the Orphan house of the M. E. Church, South Georgia conference, and steward and trustee of Mulberry Street Methodist church of Macon. He was elected to the office of alderman in 1889, without even presenting his name for nomination, and received more votes than any candidate on the municipal ticket. He served one term (two years) in that capacity with so much gratification to the people that citizens of every class, color aftd station, urged him to accept the nomination for mayor, but being of a home-loving disposition and preferring business to politics he declined further honors in that field and is now happy and contented in follow- ing his chosen pursuit and in training his bright boys for the same vocation. Mr. Tindall lost his first wife, Miss Mamie L. Bass, of Covington, Ga., who died in 1887, the mother of five interesting children, for whom he subsequently found a mother in Miss Julia A. Cushman, of Columbus, Ga., a lady of the truest type.

BROOKS COUNTY.

T. N. ARRINGTON (deceased) was one of the pioneer settlers of Brooks county, who had by intelligent, faithful and painstaking labor made that piney-woods part of Georgia "blossom as the rose." In doing this none labored more earnestly or deserved more credit than Mr. Arrington. Systematic and progressive, the fruits of his careful management remain in the widely-known beautiful Ar- rington plantation at Hickory Head. The Arrington family came from Scotland to Virginia, removed thence to North Carolina, and later to Twiggs county, Ga. 'T. N. Arrington, son of Thomas and Martha Arrington, was born in Twiggs county March 13, 1825. Here he married his first wife, Lucinda Melton, who bore him four children: William, Martha, Louisa and Henry. After her death he mar- ried a widow Averett, who, in 1857, accompanied him to southern Georgia. He settled in the Hickory Head neighborhood, where a few years later his wife died, leaving no children. May 26, 1867, he married Frances Reissier, daughter of T. I. and Amanda (Groover) Denmark, of Brooks county. Six children blessed this union: Ann (Mrs. B. W. Stone), Thomasville; Briggs; Harriet (Mrs. James McMullen), and Clifford, Julia, and Thomas N., Jr., all young and at home. Mr. Arrington was esteemed as one of the most charitable of men, always ready and quick to respond to the calls of the needy. He took a deep interest in public affairs, and at the time of his death, Dec. II, 1881, was a member of the general assembly of Georgia. This sad event devolved on his bereaved widow the care and responsibility of training and preparing for the duties of life their family of interesting children. Fortunately for them she has proven fully equal to the great emergency, the task is being successfully accomplished, and they all promise to become worthy and useful members of society.

W P. BURKE, whose plantation home is at Hickory Head, Brooks Co., Ga., is perhaps better known as the inventor and patentee of "The Burke Auto- matic Steam Washer," one of the latest and most sensible inventions in that line

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ever placed on the market. While it would be a great impropriety to impair the dignity of this sketch to make it an advertising medium by describing the inven- tion, it is but simple justice to the inventor to say that by giving it to the world he takes rank as a public benefactor; for any invention that is labor-saving, more particularly that lightens the labor of the care-worn housewife, entitles the inventor to that honorable distinction. Mr. Burke comes from the distinguished Irish fam- ily which sheds honor on the Irish name. Michael Burke, his grandfather, came from Ireland to Savannah, Ga., with an uncle who was a Catholic bishop on some ecclesiastical business. He had been educated for the priesthood, but abandoning that idea, he studied medicine and became quite prominent as a practitioner in both Savannah and Charleston. After many years of useful and remunerative practice he retired and removed to Richmond county, Ga., where he died. Mr. Burke's father, R. B. E. Burke, was an only child and was born in Richmond county, Ga., where he married Eleanor Mccullough. He was well educated at Richmond college, Augusta, Ga., and followed the profession of a teacher in Ala- bama and southwest Georgia. In middle life he removed to Stewart county, Ga., where lie raised his children: M. F., Gadsden county, Fla .; B. E., Quitman; W. P., inventor, Brooks county; Catharine M. (Mrs. B. F. Worrell), Thomas county, and Elizabeth, deceased. Mrs. Burke died May 13, 1870, in Decatur county, Ga., and Mr. Burke died Sept. 2, 1882, in Thomas county, Ga. W. P. Burke was born in Russell county, Ala., Jan. 25, 1845. When the "war between the states" was precipitated his youthful enthusiasm, conjoined with his impulsive blood, inspired him to quickly respond to the call for volunteers. He enlisted in one of the first companies that was organized and served with it in state service around Savannah, Ga., until the spring of 1862, when he returned home. The next year he entered the regular service as a member of Company F, Fourth Georgia cavalry. This command did service in Florida first and participated in the battle of Olustee; afterward it was transferred to Hood's army and was in the Atlanta campaign. After the fall of that city his company formed part of Gen. John T. Morgan's brigade through Tennessee and Alabama, and then under Gen. Wheeler pursued Sherman through Georgia and was in southeast Georgia at the time of the sur- render. Mr. Burke returned to Brooks county after the war and was married Feb. 14, 1866, to Mary, daughter of James H. and Ellen Groover, a very old and highly respected family. To them have been born seven children: Ada I. (Mrs. W. J. Harrell), Quitman, Ga .; Pascal G., Ola E., Rufus E., Florrie E., and Linda O., young folks at home, and Walter J., the youngest, deceased. Mrs. Burke died Oct. 17, 1881, and Aug. 10, 1882, Mr. Burke was married to Fannie G. Harris, of Cuthbert, Ga. He is a democrat, a missionary Baptist, and a Master Mason. He lives on a fine 800-acre plantation six miles south of Quitman, and is considered one of the solid men of his community. He is now traveling in the interest of his invention.

ROUNTREE. This is one of the solid, substantial families of Quitman, Ga., whose different members occupy highly honorable positions, socially and financially, in this progressive little city. A. J. Rountree, the head of the family, has been a resident and leading merchant of Quitman for many years. By his sagacity and enterprise, strict attention to business, and unswerving integrity of character, he has secured the confidence of the community, established an enviable reputation, and accumulated a handsome fortune. He is of South Carolina stock, his grand- father and father having lived in Edgefield district. Richard Rountree, his grand- father, was living there during the revolutionary war, and was a very wealthy planter. He joined the patriot army, serving as a captain, and on one occasion

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while at home an incident occurred which showed his great nerve and courage. He was known as a man of wealth, and believed to be possessed of no small amount of money. This was a tempting bait to the tories, who, learning of his presence at home, surprised and captured him, and attempted to force him to divulge its hiding place. With determined courage he held out against them, although they went to the desperate extreme of tying and leaving him in the swamp. After the tories left a faithful negro released him after he had been in the swamp two days and saved his life, and he lived to raise a large family. This remarkable man had a family of eighteen children. Three daughters re- mained in South Carolina. One of these married Wiley Barry; another Samuel Stalnaker, and a third Thomas Goldsmith. Five of the daughters settled in Jasper county, Ga., one marrying Jefferson Smith, another Cary Cox, another Asa Cox, another Stevens and the fifth Willborn. James Rountree made York district, S. C., his home. Thomas went to reside near Huntsville, Ala., and William somewhere in Tennessee. The subject of this sketch is unable to mention the residence of the remaining six children. Daniel Rountree, son of Richard Rountree, was born in Edgefield district and was a man of some prominence, who for many years served as a magistrate and was a well-to-do planter. He married Fannie Nelson, same district, by whom he had eight children: Elvira, James, Martha, Parmela, Andrew J., W. D., Thomas J., and Myra, all of whom are dead except Andrew J. Mr. Daniel Rountree and his wife were Baptists, and lived and died in Edgefield district. Andrew J. Rountree was born in Edgefield district, S. C., Aug. 3, 1818. When seventeen years of age, becoming discontented with home, he left and worked his way to Alabama, where he remained a year as over- seer on a plantation in Wilcox county. He spent the next year in Lowndes county, during which he became a volunteer member of a company which did service in the Creek Indian war, for which he now draws a pension. At the end of two years (1837) he returned home, and the next two years went to school and worked on the plantation. In 1839 he went to Marengo county, Ala., remain- ing but a few months, and then pushing his way to Louisiana, he obtained a position as overseer in Claiborne parish. He remained here but two years, and then went to Natchitoches parish, where he remained five years. By this time he had accumulated some money, and concluded to return home and engage in merchandising, in which he has been unusually successful. He remained in Edge- field. S. C., until after the close of the war, when he made a prospecting tour in Southern Georgia, and being favorably impressed with the country about Quitman, he determined on making that place his home. So he removed and established himself and has built up a business and reputation as solid as any in that section of the state. Though still in robust health and quite active, he has partially retired from business, which is conducted by his sons. In 1847 Mr. Rountree was married in Edgefield district to Mary Zimmerman, who died four months afterward. In August, 1852, he married Savilla, daughter of Samuel Stevens, formerly of Connecticut, who had settled in Edgefield. By this second marriage he had seven children: Fannie C. (Mrs. Dr. T. W. Hunter), Quitman; Samuel S., merchant, Quitman; Daniel W., lawyer, Atlanta; Bartow, merchant, Quitman; Matt, Eliza (Mrs. Taylor Dukes), Quitman; Walter, deceased, and Edward N., Quitman. Politically Mr. Rountree is a lifelong, uncompromising democrat, and religiously a Baptist; he is also a member of the Masonic fraternity.

THOMAS IRVING DENMARK. This gentleman is one of the oldest of the living representatives of the pioneer settlers of the vast piney-woods region of southern Georgia, who wrested it from barbarism and blazed out the way for

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advancing civilization. Nearly a score of years ago he passed the allotted three score years and ten. Blessed with a strong constitution, not addicted to any debilitating excesses, careful not to abuse "God's temple," he has attained to remarkable longevity and retained wonderful physical vigor. Scrupulously abste- mious, he has never used tobacco nor liquor in any way except as a medicine. His colonist ancestors were of Scotch-Irish origin.

Mr. Denmark was born Sept. 30, 1809, in Bulloch county, Ga. His paternal grandfather, William Denmark, was the son of an Irishman, who settled in the state of North Carolina, on the Great Pedee river, many years before the revolu- tionary war. His maternal grandfather, William Wise, was a native of Scotland and emigrated to this country when quite a young man before the revolutionary war and settled in Scrcven county, Ga. The grandfathers on both sides were soldiers in the revolution. William Denmark, the paternal grandfather, removed to Georgia about the year 1770 and settled in Screven county. . He subsequently moved to Bulloch county, and late in life to Warren county, where he died at the advanced age of 102 years. William Denmark had two wives-his second wife being Emma Moye, a sister of his first. Emma Moye, second wife of William Denmark, is said to have lived to the age of 101 years. William Denmark had a number of children by each of his wives.

Mr. Thomas I. Denmark's father, Redden Denmark, the son of William by his second wife, Emma, was born in Screven county, and was rearcd partly in Screven and partly in Bulloch. Redden married Lavinia, daughter of William Wise, a planter in Bulloch county, where he raised the following named children: Elizabeth (Mrs. James Groover), deceased; Clarissa, deceased; Sarah (Mrs. William Last- inger), deceased; Thomas Irving, the subject of this sketch, and John, who died in 1894 in Perry, Florida. Redden Denmark, the father of Thomas Irving, died in 1814 in Bulloch county, Ga., at the age of forty-four. Lavinia, widow of Redden Denmark, and mother of Thomas Irving, a short time after the death of her first husband, was married to Mr. McNeeley, by whom she had several children, and lived to be about seventy years of age.

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Memoirs of Georgia; containing historical accounts of the state's civil, military, industrial and professional interests, and personal sketches of many of its people. Vol. I, Part 54

Author: Publication date: 1859 Publisher: Atlanta, Ga., The Southern historicl association Number of Pages: 1294

Author:
Publication date: 1859
Publisher: Atlanta, Ga., The Southern historicl association
Number of Pages: 1294