USA > Iowa > The United States biographical dictionary and portrait gallery of eminent and self made men, Iowa volume > Part 112
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In 1868 he was a delegate-at-large to the national democratic convention held at New York, which nominated Seymour and Blair for president and vice-president. In this convention Mr. Parker was a zealous advocate of the claims of President John- son to the nomination, and supported his candidacy with great earnestness and persistency. Pending the
nomination he received the following telegram from Mr. Johnson, which, on account of its historic im- portance, we submit entire :
To GEO. H. PARKER, ESQ. WASHINGTON, July 8, 1868.
Dear Sir : The will of the people, if truly reflected, would not be doubtful. I have experienced ingratitude so often that any result will not surprise me now. 1 thank you most sincerely for the voluntary part you have taken in my behalf. It is appreciated the higher because unsolicited.
You have no doubt read in this morning's newspapers Stephens's articles of impeachment, together with his speech thereon, in which he states that the " block " must be brought out and the axe sharpened, and that the only resource from intolerable tyranny is Brutus's dagger - which, however, he hopes may not be used.
How is it possible for me to maintain my position against a vindictive and powerful majority, if abandoned by those who profess to agree in principles with, and to be support- ers of, the policy of the administration? Such an abandon- ment at this moment, when the heaviest assaults are being made, would seem an admission that the administration was wrong in its opposition to the series of despotic measures which have been, and are proposed to be, forced upon the country. Yours, etc., ANDREW JOHNSON.
During the winter of 1868-9 Mr. Parker was nom- inated for the position of United States Minister to Ecuador, and was recommended for confirmation by the senate committee on foreign affairs, of which Messrs. Sumner and Harlan were members; but the session coming to an abrupt termination, the case was not acted upon, hence he did not proceed to his post of duty.
In 1871 Mr. Parker was one of the originators, if not the prime mover, in organizing the so-called liberal party, which nominated Horace Greeley for the Presidency in 1872. The movement referred to was inaugurated by the following letter from Mr. Parker, addressed to the public in general, the object being to draw upon the moderate element of both parties and form a new organization on the basis of conciliation and mutual concession :
Editors of Democrat :
Having faithfully served as a member of the democratic organization for over twenty years, and still having the full- est confidence in the cardinal principles of that party, I am impelled to declare my conviction that the organization has outlived its usefulness, and that it is the duty of democrats to openly acknowledge that the democratic party is dead. All efforts at departure, or to galvanize it into life, have proved a failure. The prestige of its general policy, or, rather, the lack of policy during the late war will cling to it, and prevent success, no matter how much we may be- come purified by change of heart. The results of the recent elections are sufficient proof of this fact. We can reorgan- ize by forming some integral part of a new party, and prob- ably resurrect our principles, but the body must be buried and the stench of its putrid remains removed from the pub- lie nostrils. The present is the proper emergency to test the patriotism of members of the democratic party.
If we love our country better than we do our party, abandon the organization and unite with patriots, disregard- ing political antecedents, and we may reasonably hope for a change of administration, in IS72, that will protect and guarantee equal rights to all sections of our common coun-
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try. Centralized power will vanish, the war will soon be forgotten, and our country again be peaceful, prosperous and happy. GEO. H. PARKER.
DAVENPORT, IOWA, November 27, 1871.
The sensation which this letter produced through- out the nation was of the most intense character ; and while it received the indorsement and counte- nance of such papers as the New York " Herald," the Chicago " Times," and a number of other lead- ing journals, it was denounced as traitorous and dis- loyal by all the extreme publicists of the democratic party. For many weeks it constituted the chief topic of discussion in the newspapers and of conversation in political circles generally, until George H. Parker became one of the most familiar names in the nation. The movement, for a time, seemed popular, and con- tinned to gain strength until it was adopted and swal- lowed up by the democratic national convention at Baltimore, when the republicans who had formerly favored it withdrew and adhered to their own organ- ization. It is still the opinion of many that if the democratic party, as an organization, had declined to take action on that occasion, and tacitly united with the "liberal movement," it would have been successful in 1872. But, as Mr. Parker truly pre- dicted, the odium of its war policy clung to it and swamped the ship in which it took refuge, which might otherwise have weathered the storm and got safely into port.
Mr. Parker was an earnest and active supporter of Mr. Tilden's candidacy for the Presidency, but is at the present time in accord with the policy of the Hayes administration on questions of reconciliation and civil service reform.
In 1854 he was one of the projectors of what is now the prosperous city of Clinton, of which he was also one of the original proprietors. He was one of the original directors of the Iowa Central railroad.
In 1866 he procured the charter of the Citizens' Na- tional Bank of Davenport, of which he continued a director until 1875. In 1870 he was one of the or- ganizers of the Davenport Central (city) Railroad Company, of which he is still a member. He was also for several years a director of the Davenport and Saint Paul Railroad Company.
In 1877 he formed a copartnership for the prac- tice of law with Wm. H. Gabbert, Esq., which still continues.
Mr. Parker is a firm believer in the christian re- ligion according to the Protestant forms of it, but is not in union with any congregation.
He is a distinguished member of the Masonic fra- ternity, and a Knight Templar of St. Cyrene Com- mandery, of Davenport.
In 1873 he made a six months' trip through Europe with his family, visiting the principal cities and coun- tries of that most distinguished quarter of the globe, and returned with recruited health and a vastly in- creased store of knowledge.
Mr. Parker is eminently a self-made man; his large accumulation of knowledge and superior men- tal culture are the result of his incessant study of books, men and things. As a lawyer, he is one of the ablest members of the bar in the state; zealous, honest and indefatigable. As a politician, he is de- scribed as a live man, a positive character, of great brain power and nerve force- the man for an emer- gency. He is a gentleman of acknowledged ability and integrity, of generous and lofty impulses, decided in his opinions, strong in his likes and dislikes. He is a good citizen, enjoying the confidence of all who know him.
The fruit of his marriage with Miss Doran was one child, Katie E., now the wife of Henry R. Tyner, Esq., of Davenport.
HON. WILLIAM B. FAIRFIELD,
CHARLES CITY.
W WILLIAM BONNAIRE FAIRFIELD, twen- ty-one years a resident of Floyd county, Iowa, is a native of New York, and was born at Hudson on the 24th of August, 1835. He is the son of Jo- siah W. Fairfield, a lawyer, railroad man and banker, and Laura Britton. The Fairfields were from France, the Brittons from England. Asa Britton, the father of Laura, was a resident of Cheshire county, New
Hampshire, and was a sergeant belonging to General Washington's body-guard during the revolution. Will- iam B. received his early education at Hudson and College Hill, Poughkeepsie; entered the freshman class of Williams College in 1851, the class which included General J. A. Garfield, of Ohio, and Gov- ernor G. C. Walker, of Virginia; went to Hamilton College the next year, and there graduated in 1855.
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He read law at Clinton with Hon. Theodore W. Dwight; was admitted to the bar at that place in 1856, and that year settled in Charles City, then a village hardly two years old, and containing less than thirty families. He was pleased with its location, saw its promise, and was willing to let his business grow with the place. Charles City is now a railroad town, with three thousand inhabitants, and for many years Mr. Fairfield has been one of the leading at- torneys of the city. He was one of the founders of the first bank started in Charles City, a private. in- stitution, still in operation. In the autumn of 1864 he was elected judge of the twelfth judicial district, taking his seat on the bench on the Ist of January, 1865; was reelected in 1868, and resigned in 1870. He has high legal attainments, and made a candid, impartial jurist.
Of late years Judge Fairfield has given some at- tention to railroad building and farming. He and Judge E. H. Williams built, in Clinton county, the first narrow-gauge railroad in the State of lowa. He enjoys a beautiful residence three-fourths of a mile southeast of the city, and a well improved farm one
and a half miles east of town, the farm being well stocked with blooded animals. He has Shorthorn and Jersey cattle, Berkshire hogs and Clydesdale horses, and takes great pleasure in encouraging the stock-raisers in the upper Cedar valley to improve their breeds.
In politics, the judge has always been a republi- can. He is a member of the blue lodge in the Ma- sonic fraternity, and was master of the Charles City Lodge several years. In religious belief, he inclines to Unitarianism.
On the 25th of December, 1857, Miss Estelle M. Balch, daughter of Rev. W. S. Balch, then of New York city, became the wife of Judge Fairfield. They have had three children, all daughters, two of whom are now alive. The elder one is a student in Vassar College.
Judge Fairfield is five feet and eight and a half inches tall, and weighs two hundred and fifty pounds. He is of a sanguine-bilious temperament ; has blue eyes, a light complexion, a full face, a pleasant ex- pression of the countenance, and the manners of a gentleman.
EDWARD K. PITMAN,
LEON.
E DWARD KINKAID PITMAN, a native of Estill county, Kentucky, and a son of Thomas and Margaret Kinkaid Pitman, was born on the 15th of March, 1835. The Pitmans came from England, and early settled in Virginia. The Kinkaids are of Irish descent. The father of Margaret Kinkaid was captain of rangers in the second war with the mother country. When Edward was three years old the fam- ily moved to Canton, Illinois, where our subject was reared on a farm, his opportunities for education, after he was old enough to work, being limited to the winter term of a district school. In 1852 the family removed to lowa and settled on a farm seven miles south of Leon, in Decatur county, where Ed- ward labored until after the civil war broke out.
In the spring of 1862 he enlisted as a private in company G, 3d Missouri Cavalry, in which he served until the next December, when the regiment was broken up by hard service and divided, his company being assigned to the 7th Missouri Cavalry. From that time until the close of the war he was connected with the quartermaster's department, his main busi-
ness being the procuring of forage. While return- ing to his home he was seized with a species of ery- sipelas known as phlegmonedes ; was laid up, and at times delirious, for five or six weeks, and unable to do any business for nearly a year.
In the winter of 1865-6 he commenced teaching a district school near Pleasanton ; afterward taught in Pleasanton, continuing that occupation until the next autumn, when he was elected clerk of the county courts, and by reëlection served four years, making an efficient and popular county officer.
On leaving this position he purchased the Leon " Pioneer," editing and publishing it for two years. Since going out of journalism he has been a general trafficker and speculator.
He is a shrewd, straightforward, upright dealer, full of energy, and doing with his might whatever engages his hands and fully secures his attention.
In politics, Mr. Pitman has steadily affiliated with the democratic party, being known in the period from 1862 to 1865 as a war democrat of the most earnest and the bravest kind. In 1872 he was ap-
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pointed a delegate to the national convention which nominated Horace Greeley, but was unable to attend.
He is a Freemason ; has been twice master of the Leon Lodge, and was its secretary for three consec- utive years.
Mr. Pitman is a member of the Christian church, and very active in religious and philanthropic enter- prises. The cause of temperance receives his hearty, untiring and aggressive support. He is a true friend of his race.
Mr. Pitman has a second wife, his first being Miss Louisa Osborn, of Decatur county ; married on the
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6th of September, 1854. She died on the 31st of January, 1874, leaving four children. Marietta, the eldest child, is the wife of H. A. Lindsey, of Leon ; Adelia is the wife of Dell Hilliker, of Leon; the others, Ollie and Edward Kinkaid, are at home, at- tending the graded school. The present wife of Mr. Pitman was Mrs. Sarah I. Carter, daughter of James Parsons, of Decatur county; married on the 31st of January, 1875. She has two boys by her first hus- band: John M., twenty years old, who is operating with his step-father, and Joseph A., sixteen, pursuing his studies in Leon.
MILO GILBERT, CHARLES CITY.
O NE of the most energetic men in the Cedar valley, and the father of one of its most beau- tiful young cities, is Milo Gilbert, a Yankee in pedi- gree and a Vermonter by birth. He is a son of Hinsdale Gilbert, a farmer, and Polly Tyrrill, and first saw the light of this world at Manchester, Benning- ton county, on the 5th of September, 1823. His paternal grandfather commanded a company at the battle of Bennington, one hundred years ago. Hins- dale Gilbert moved his family to Wyoming county, New York, when Milo was about eight years old, settling on a farm near the village of Castile. There this son, with the rest of the children, seven in all, was early taught to work.
At seventeen Milo entered a hardware store at Castile, acting as clerk, and attending a select school three winters. In 1844 he came as far west as Rock- ford, Illinois. There he was in a hardware store a short time in company with his brother Seymour, and also taught mathematics in an evening school two winters; farmed three or four years ; then solic- ited stock for the Galena and Chicago Union (now Northwestern) Railroad Company in connection with W. B. Ogden ; came to Iowa early in 1854, and after halting a few months in Bremer county, and entering some lands, pushed up the Cedar to Charles City in the autumn of that year. Here he found half-a-dozen log dwelling houses, a log store and a log tavern. He saw the water-power of the Cedar river at this point; looked over the surrounding country; concluded that here must be a town and he would help make it; he bought of Joseph Kelley half of the town site, the whole consisting of four hundred and forty acres,
and for many years acted as agent of the Charles City Land Company, the village at that time, how- ever, having the name of Saint Charles, given to it by Mr. Kelley.
Mr. Gilbert built, in 1855, the first frame house, and in 1857 the first stone structure, ever put up in this place. In 1855 he opened a hardware store, and, with the exception of two seasons, ran it stead- ily about fifteen years, having, during all this time, various outside enterprises on hand, and, strange to say, letting none of them suffer for want of attention. Years ago he built and ran two saw-mills, at different times, and manufactured large quantities of lumber ; also built a large sash and blind factory, and recently he had the superintendency of the works for the Char- les City Water Power Company, putting in a new dam, a new race and a new flouring mill with six run of stone, one of the best mills of the kind in this valley. He had the entire supervision of everything con- nected with this last great enterprise, second in im- portance to none in the city. This water-power Mr. Gilbert bought of Mrs. Kelley for the company in the spring of 1876.
During the darkest period of our history in the last twenty years, in 1861 and 1862, he kept right on building, at that time putting up the stone block known as the Union House Block, giving it the name of " Union" to indicate his political sentiment. He is a radical republican, outspoken, frank and fearless. At this very time, the summer of 1877, he is nearly doubling the size of the Union Hotel, en- larging other premises and adding new buildings. This has been his practice nearly every year since
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he settled here, constantly adding something to the accommodations, mercantile or family, of the place. He has built several business houses and at least twenty dwelling houses.
Mr. Gilbert was town clerk a long time at an early day; was a supervisor some years; was the first mayor of Charles City, being elected without oppo- sition and serving two terms, and has been in office almost constantly since he became a citizen of Floyd county. His official, like his other work, has been thoroughly and faithfully performed.
Mr. Gilbert is a baptist in religious belief, and supplied more than half the funds when the Charles City church was built, in 1856, the first building of the kind in the place. He has since contributed liberally toward other houses of worship there, and shows his public spirit and liberality in many ways.
On the 25th of September, 1847, Miss Margaret Palmer, of Lockport, Illinois, became his wife, and she has been the mother of eight children, only four of them now living. Edwin, the eldest child, is mar- ried, has been a railroad man and is now deputy treasurer of the county; Emily is the wife of Eugene B. Dyke, editor and proprietor of the Charles City " Intelligencer," and the two youngest, Azro B. F. and Carrie E., are living at home. Mrs. Gilbert is a well educated woman. At an early day she was the light of more than her own house, and has " bated not a jot " of her kindly and cheerful nature. The sick and the needy early found a friend in her.
Mr. Gilbert is one of the few men who at an early period began to work for the interests of northern Iowa as well as his adopted home. As soon as 1855
he began to operate for the so-called Mississippi and Missouri River railroad, to run westward from Mc- Gregor, on the Mississippi, through Charles City. He was one of the originators of this enterprise, aided in securing the right of way, solicited stock, holding two or three offices at one time, and but for the financial cyclone of 1857 the road would have been built long before it was. When finally, in 1869, the road now known as the Iowa branch of the Mil- waukee and Saint Paul road came through, he was one of the men who did the hard work in getting it to Charles City. The same is true of the other rail- road, the Cedar Valley branch of the Illinois Central road, the first to reach Charles City. There is no public enterprise, perfected in or near his home, which does not bear the impress of his willing and toil-hardened hand. A more industrious man it would be difficult to find.
Mr. Gilbert possesses a very independent, self- reliant spirit, as a single fact in his early life will show. When about leaving New York state, in 1844, to come west, his father offered to let him have some money, but he had four and a half dollars in currency, and a shot gun, and started off. Reaching Buffalo, he bought a fifteen-cent market basket, put seventy-five cents' worth of provisions in it, took a deck passage on a steamer to Chicago, and there arrived with less than half a dollar. He immediately started on foot for Downer's Grove, about twenty miles distant, where he had a brother; halted at the Eau Plaines river over night; paid for lodging and reached his brother's in the forenoon with an empty pocket.
ROBERT F. PARSONS, M.D.,
ALLERTON.
R OBERT FERNALE PARSONS, twenty-four years a medical practitioner in Iowa, is a na- tive of the Granite State, being born in Effingham, Strafford county, on the 13th of April. 1821. His parents were Charles Moody and Martha Fernale Parsons, both of English descent. The Parsons family were early settlers in Maine. The maternal grandfather of Robert was in the continental army, and his paternal grandfather was a sailor, and com- manded a privateer in the second struggle with the mother country.
Charles M. Parsons immigrated from New Hamp-
shire to Maine about 1828, and was a cabinet-maker at Waterville; went from there to Richmond, in the same state; followed the sea four years, and then removed to Bangor, the son, during this period, at- tending district schools.
In 1836 the family came as far west as Paines- ville, Ohio, where the subject of this notice attended an academy for about two years. In 1841 Robert moved to Coshocton county, and the next year com- menced the study of medicine with Dr. E. Mast, of Rochester, in that county, subsequently attending lectures in the medical department of Western Re-
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serve College in Cleveland ; commenced practice in 1848 at Rochester, Coshocton county ; followed the profession there and in Independence, Richland county, until 1854, when he removed to Iowa and located at Brighton, Washington county. There he was in practice for twenty-two years. Washington county was sparsely settled at the time Dr. Parsons located there, and his rides extended over a radius of fifteen or twenty miles. During this long period at Brighton his labors were very trying to his phys- ical system, and in 1876, with health partially im- paired, he removed to Allerton and started the drug business, intending to go out of the country prac- tice. This he has done, but has a fair practice, all that he could desire, in the city of Allerton. He has a pleasant homestead of six acres, selected two years ago, on the western line of the city, and is
preparing to raise all kinds of small fruits. He is making it an Eden of beauty.
Dr. Parsons was originally a whig; gave enthusi- astic support to Mr. Lincoln, both by vote and voice, during the civil war, but latterly has affiliated with the democratic party.
He is very liberal in his religious views. He is a member of the blue lodge in the Masonic fraternity.
In March, 1849, he was united in marriage with Miss Lucinda Draper, of Rochester, Ohio, and they have had eight children, only five of them living. All are single except Alice, the eldest daughter, who is the wife of O. H. Wood, of Albia, Iowa. Albert E., the eldest son, is a graduate of the literary and law department of the Iowa State University, and an attorney in Allerton. The other three, Ellen T., Fred and Ernest are being educated at home.
WILLIAM B. WATERS, M. D.,
MARSHALLTOWN.
T HE subject of this brief monograph was an early settler in Marshall county, Iowa, and witnessed the great yet bloodless county-seat fight between Marietta and Marshalltown. He comes of a long-lived race. His paternal grandfather lived to be ninety-seven years old, and his maternal grandmother one hundred and four, both dying in Connecticut, in which state his ancestors on both sides were early settlers.
Dr. Waters, like four-fifths of the men whose names appear in this book, sprung from the agri- cultural class, his father, Charles Waters, living in Delaware county, Ohio, where the son was born on the 19th of March, 1819. His mother was Harriett Bennett, and both sides of his family are of Scotch pedigree. William B. gave his youth to farm work and mental discipline, finishing his literary educa- tion at the Worthington Academy, Franklin county. He taught school three years in Ross and Highland counties ; read medicine simultaneously most of this time with Dr. William McCollum, of Petersburg, Highland county ; attended one course of lectures in the medical department of the Ohio University, Cincinnati; practiced a year with his preceptor at Petersburg ; attended a second course of lectures, this time at Starling Medical College, Columbus, and there graduated in March, 1848.
After practicing six years at Oceola, Crawford
county, he left his native state, settling in Marietta, Iowa, in the summer of 1854, being the first edu- cated and regular physician in that place. Seven years later he followed the county seat to Marshall- town, where he is still one of the leading practitioners.
In the autumn of 1862 he went into the service as surgeon of the 32d regiment Iowa Infantry ; be- came enfeebled by disease in about a year and a half, and early in the spring of 1864 resigned and returned to his home in Marshalltown. Dr. Waters regained most of his strength in a short time, re- sumed practice, and has seemingly been growing in popularity ever since. His labors in the army were at times very severe, and proved too much for him, but as a school in surgery they were of incalculable benefit to him. His reputation in this direction stands very high, and it is not an uncommon thing for him to ride fifty and a hundred miles to attend difficult surgical cases.
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