The biographical encyclopedia of Illinois of the nineteenth century, Part 100

Author: Robson, Charles, ed
Publication date: 1875
Publisher: Philadelphia, Galaxy
Number of Pages: 770

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ERGUSON, GEORGE, Pioneer and Settler of Galena, Illinois, was born in Fayette county, Kentucky, May 10th, 1805. He is the son of Nathaniel Ferguson and Phœbe Ferguson. His education was obtained in the common schools located in the vicinity of his home. His early years were passed in working on a farm. In IS28 he re- moved to Galena, and has since continued to reside there permanently. During the first four or five years he was en- gaged in mining, afterward occupying himself in general merchandising. In 1832-33 he took an active part in the Black Hawk Indian war, rendering efficient service. From 1865 to 1871 he officiated as City Treasurer of Galena, and throughout his term performed the duties of that office with ability and integrity. For more than thirty years he has been engaged in mercantile transactions in this city, and is intimately identified with its growth and interests.

IGGINS, LORENZO D., Physician, was born on October 17th, 1827, at Georgetown, Ohio. His father, Rev. James lIiggins, was a native of the State of New York, but removed to Kentucky at an early day, and at a later date located in Ohio, in which State he remained, in the pursuit of his calling, for a long term of years. The son attended the schools in Georgetown, and subsequently went through a course of study at the academy at Dayton. Very soon after leaving this institution he commenced the study of medicine, reading with Dr. Weaver, of New Hope, who was his preceptor during a period of two years. At the ex- piration of that time he began reading with Dr. Hubbard, of Amelia, with whom he remained for one year. At the end of the year he commenced attending the Eclectie Medical Institute at Cincinnati, where he remained until he graduated. Having received his diploma he commenced the practice of his newly acquired profession at Amelia, Ohio, in which place he remained only for a time. Hle removed from there to Illinois, and settled in Colchester in that State. For two years he remained there in the practice

OLLYER, REV. ROBERT, was born at Keighley, a village of Yorkshire, England, December 28th, 1823. Shortly after his birth his parents removed to Fewston parish, celebrated as being the seat of the great Fairfax family. ITis father, a black- smith by trade, dropped dead at his anvil, leaving the mother with no money and five children. Robert then attended school until he was seven and a half years old, and subsequently was put to work in a factory-the Factory Act not being then in force-where he remained until he had attained his fourteenth year. Upon leaving the linen fac- tory he was apprenticed to a blacksmith, named Birch, at Ilkley, in Wharfedale, with whom he labored at the forge for ten years. At his anvil there-since purchased from the old shop in Yorkshire by one of his parishioners-the only study table he had ever known, he employed all his leisure moments in reading the best books procurable, in study and in meditation. The Bible, " Pilgrim's Progress," " Robin- son Crusoe," Goldsmith, and other good writers, furnished him with abundant food for thought. While standing at the forge, waiting for his iron to heat, a book lay open be- fore him; beside his plate at meal time the same volume would reappear ; and even as he rode to and fro in the stage-coach, on business or on pleasure, he read steadily essay, poem, treatise, or story, culling from each and all the fairest fruit. An ardent lover of nature, his solitary rambles often extended far into the night, and in the woodland and on the moor he communed silently with tree, and book, and flower. In 1847, when twenty four years of age, influenced no doubt by one of those powerful preachers whose impres- sion upon the minds of the Yorkshiremen Mrs. Gaskell has so vividly portrayed, came that crisis in his experience called in the New Testament " the new birth," and he became a member of a Methodist Church in his neighbor- hood, which licensed him to preach in the course of the following year. His remarkable gift of speech, his culture, unusual in one of his class, his striking and magnetie influ- ence upon all classes of listeners, secured for him at once the favorable attention of all who came in contact with him. Resolving at New Year's, 1850, to emigrate to America, he with his wife and child landed at New York, May IIth, of the same year, after a fine passage of twenty-eight days. A week later he went to work at his trade, at Shoemakers-

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town, Pennsylvania, also pursuing at the same time his | edifice, the Cornell University made to him the following vocation as preacher. Having brought letters from England proposition : " If Mr. Collyer will with his own hands make a horseshoe, his church shall be presented with [sev- eral] thousands of dollars." The reply illustrates the man, that reply being the forwarding to the University of a horse- shoe manufactured by him expressly for the occasion. His language in the pulpit is a strong and convincing refutation of the assertion that the English language in its pure Saxon form is inadequate to express fully and eloquently all the varying phases, lights and shadows of the intellect and soul. Availing himself constantly of metaphor, simile, and alle- gory, he deals only with the simplest words, the homeliest expressions, couching them not unfrequently in the country dialect so dear to him through the recollections of his boy- hood; with a quaint story, sometimes ludicrous, oftener pathetic and sorrowful, he touches with equal cffect the heart of the untutored and the mind of the student; in de- nunciation and in reproof his expressions are marked by a fire and earnestness which have brought many scoffing infi- dels within the pale of Christianity and the Church; while as a spiritual eonsoler and adviser he is loved and revered by the entire community who follow his teachings. During the late civil war he was a prime mover and an efficient agent in many enterprises of a laudable nature; he was three months with the Union army, in the service of the Sanitary Commission, and visited every sufferer by the Quantrel massacre, assisting them greatly in various ways. After the battles of Fort Donelson and Pittsburgh Landing he was promptly on the ground, ministering to the many and grievous necessities of the wounded, and was promi- nent as a worker and comforter in the troubles which harassed Illinois and Iowa. While the people yet persisted in their blindness with respect to emancipation he urged eloquently and enthusiastically the adoption of this important and needed measure, and from the beginning to the end spoke and wrote against all compromises, and in favor of the use of every means that might carry the war to a triumphant consummation. His church in Chicago, built by him in conjunction with the Second Unitarian Society, a magnificent edifice, the largest Protestant church in the Northwest, was destroyed during the memorable conflagra- tion which produced such terrible havoc in that city. Within the ruined structure, roofless and shattered, he then convened his flock and held Sabbath service while its ashcs were still warm and smoking. As they worshipped beside the ruins he told them that he had once preachcd for seventy-five cents a year, and was ready, for their sakes, to do it again ; and that, if the worst came, he could still make as good a horseshoe as any blacksmith in Chicago. It was this remark called forth the offer of Cornell University. His efforts towards the rebuilding of the church were crowned with most complete success, the present structure being finer than the first. His "Nature and Life," a volume of sermons published by II. B. Fuller, in Bromfield introducing him to the Philadelphia Conference he was granted a license as a local preacher, receiving for nine years' service in that capacity one almanac, various little houschold necessaries, and ten dollars in money ; also that which he values much more than money, the love and good- will of his hcarers, and the richest experience of his life. During the last years of his blacksmith life his views leaped beyond the bounds prescribed by Methodism; he became acquainted with the Quakeress, Lucretia Mott, and the well-known philanthropist and scholar, Dr. Furness, whose views he found to be in harmony with his own; and having accepted an invitation of the latter to preach in his pulpit he was, in January, 1859, brought before the conference for heresy, and refused a renewal of his license as a preacher on the following grounds : that he could not believe in eternal punishment, nor in total human depravity, nor in the damnation of a good man because he does not believe in the Trinity. In February of the same year, the Chicago ministry at large being in need of an earnest and unseetarian worker, he was recommended to the place by Dr. Furness, and the Unitarian pulpit of that eity being then vacant he was invited to fill it the first Sunday after his arrival. At this time the slavery controversy agitated the country ; his ardent devotion to the two commandments upon which hang all the law and the prophets compelled him to be- come a participant in such a struggle; he sided with the North and Liberty, and espoused the cause of the slave. After his arrival at Chicago to take charge of the ministry at large, under the auspices of the Unitarian Congregation- alists, he began to preach in May for Unity Church, and for three years performed the duties attaching to both positions. At the expiration of that time he resigned the former posi- tion and has ever since devoted himself exclusively to the latter, with a success which has rendered him famous on both sides of the Atlantic. The following words of a Chicago writer present tersely and aptly his peculiar merits as a preacher : " Never shall I forget the impression, the magnetism, if I may be allowed the word, of this plain man's presence upon the minds of a few earnest men and women, who, for the first time in their lives, heard a sermon free from all abstractions, charged with homely, practical wisdom, abounding in genuine poetry, full of tender human sympathy, and containing, as it seemed to each listener, special words of encouragement for his struggling soul." A fervid and tireless philanthropy ; a brusque and rugged energy, through which the tender kindliness of a heart overflowing with charity and sympathetic impulses con- stantly crops forth ; an utter fearlessness as to the conse- quences that might ensue from the performance of an action which he deems timely, such are some of his more notice- able characteristics. After the burning of his church in the great Chicago fire, and while he was on a tour in the East, for the purpose of obtaining pecuniary help to rebuild the strcet, Boston, had in 1872 already reached a ninth edition,

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and immense success has attended another entitled " The | pushed the enemy out of Kentucky into Tennessee. His Life That Now Is; " while his lectures are annually claimed by the principal cities of the Union. His sermons, though masterpieces even in print, lose much of that marvellous force characterizing them when delivered by the lips of their author; for when coming warm from his teeming brain, his thoughts and fancies seem to flow spontaneously, without effort, thought suggesting thought, idea begetting idea, until-at times apparently, and only apparently, losing himself in the richness of his resources-his auditors.per- ceive at the end a harmonious whole, striking and lying close to the point originally started from. He has had many calls to New York and Boston, but is too fondly attached to Chicago to ever think of leaving that field of Christian endeavor. He was married on December 31st, 1849, the day preceding his departure for America. first considerable engagement was that near Murfreesboro', at Stone river, in the last days of December, and here, from the 31st of this month to the 2d of January, the 88th Regi- ment was more or less actively engaged. A long campaign of peculiar hardships was brought to a close by the battle of Chickamauga, which occurred September 19th and 20th, 1863. Here again the regiment saw hard fighting, and he bore himself with conspicuous gallantry. When the policy of arming the blacks had been fully entered upon, and proved by several trials to be successful, it was resolved by the authorities to recruit such a regiment in the State of Illinois. The endeavor, owing to various circumstances and the tenor of the State laws, was beset with many im- pediments, while it was extremely difficult to find capable officers willing to accept such service. In November, 1863, however, he was selected and detailed, and com- menced recruiting, establishing his head-quarters at Quincy, in order to avail himself of the exodus of the black popula- ROSS, LIEUTENANT-COLONEL JOHN ARMSTRONG, Lawyer, was born in Milford, Pike county, Pennsylvania, February 21st, 1826. His father, Deacon Moses Bross, is now a resi- dent of Morris, Illinois. John was the fifth son in a family of nine sons and three daughters. He received a thorough academical education under the guidance of his elder brother, William Bross, at the Chester Academy, Orange county, New York. Entertaining plans for a collegiate course, he had fitted himself for that pur- pose, but subsequent circumstances prevented the prosecu- tion of his designs. Selecting the legal profession, he began the study of law in Goshen, New York, but in December, 1848, removed to Chicago and entered the office of Hon. Grant Goodrich, with whom he remained until the completion of his studies. During the Pierce administration he served as Assistant United States Mar- shal, and until the time of his decease held the office of United States Commissioner. The duties of those Federal offices were executed by him with faultless fidelity and ability, and after concluding his duties as Assistant United States Marshal, he devoted himself to his profession, mak- ing a specialty of admiralty practice, and meeting with great success. During the summer of 1862, at a time when large numbers of recruits were needed to fill up the Union armies, he raised and organized two companies, one of which entered the 75th Illinois Volunteers. Of the other he was made Captain, and it became Company A of the 88th Illinois Regiment, which left Chicago September 4th, 1862, and went at. once into active service in Kentucky, first under Buell, and afterward under Rosecrans. Its first battle was at Perrysville, Kentucky, which occurred shortly after its entrance upon duty. The action is sometimes called that of Chaplin Hills, and the regiment, though under fire but a short timc, lost forty men. General Buell was subsequently superseded by Gencral Rosecrans, who tion passing from Missouri into Illinois at that point. After raising six companies he was commissioned as Lieutenant- Colonel on April 7th, 1864, and ordered to join the 9th Army Corps, then moving from Annapolis to the field. He passed through Chicago with his regiment May 27th, 1864, and there was presented by a number of his friends with a fine horse and equipments as a token of their high appreci- ation of his steadfast devotion to the cause of liberty, the address being made by Colonel F. A. Eastman. He was then placed in command of the colored brigade at Camp Casey, near Washington, a position which he held until after the battle of Spottsylvania, when, still with his brigade, he was ordered forward to White House, where he re- mained till an opportunity offered to go to the front. Gen- eral Grant had been fighting his way toward Richmond, and had succeeded in placing himself before Petersburg early in June. Thereupon an order was addressed to liim to detach one regiment to guard a wagon train to the front. IIe accordingly selected his own-the 29th-and left the command of the brigade. Upon reaching the main army he commenced work in the trenches before Petersburg on Junc 19th, where he remained until the day which ended his life. In the succeeding memorable assault of July 30th he was at the head of his regiment, and while his men were being cut down in scores by canister, led them into the thickest of the melee, and upon seeing the fifth color- bearer struck down, seized the staff, and rushing to the front, encouraged his troops by well-timed words. It is the testimony of Captain McCormick, that the regiment ad- vanced in the beginning through a narrow strip of timber, on reaching which they received the first fire of the enemy. The first Union line of earthworks was just beyond, and then an open plain, across which the troops charged to the demolished fort. Upon nearing the second line of Confed- eratc works they were met by an overwhelming force of the enemy, against which it was impossible for them to make

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headway. He then advanced to the parapet and plantcd body. At the suggestion of Governor Yates he had an in- his colors upon it. But upon observing more closely the aspect of affairs he gave the order to retreat, and in so doing was struck by a Minie bullet in the left side of the head, and as he fell dead uttered the words "O Lord !" In his religious life he was a true and unwavering Christian. He united with the Presbyterian Church, at Chester, Orange county, New York, in 1847. Upon coming to Chicago he connected himself, first with the Second Presbyterian Church, and afterward with the Third Presbyterian Church, with which he continued his membership until the time of his death. He was an exemplary and active member, being an attendant upon the church prayer meetings and aiding in the Sabbath-school. For many years he took charge of the choir and led the service of song, and also for a time was the Superintendent of its Sabbath-school. He was also a teacher in a mission school, taking out various teachers upon Sabbath afternoons during the entire summer of 1856. Amid engagements of other kinds, he found time for culture in music and literature, and was unusually familiar with the finest productions of both arts. The memorial sermon in honor of his life and services, preached in the Third Pres- byterian Church of Chicago, December 11th, 1864, by the pastor, Arthur Swazey, is an eloquent and masterly produc- tion. The news of his death was received in Chicago and elsewhere with profound regret, and the members of the bar in particular testified abundantly to their sorrow at the departure from among them of one beloved and esteemed. He was married June 5th, 1856, to Belle A. Mason, daughter of IIon. Nelson Mason, of Sterling, Whitesides county, Illinois. By her he had two children, a girl and a boy, the former of whom died while in her third year.

ANN, GENERAL ORRIN L., was born in Char- con, Geauga county, Ohio, November 25th, 1833. Soon after this date his father, a mechanic, moved to Michigan, where he dicd in 1843. At the age of twenty Orrin was still occupied on the farm, but engaged subsequently in blacksmithing, a trade which he was forced to abandon, however, after an apprenticeship of one year, owing to a severe injury reccived while working. Ile then applied himself to study at Albion, under the direction of C. T. Hinman, D. D. After pursuing his studies for a period of two years, he was compelled on account of straitened circumstances to leave school, and in 1853 removed to Chicago, where he found employment in a private school. In 1856 he entered col- lege at Ann Arbor, but compelled by ill health to abandon study in his junior year, he returned to Chicago. In 1861 he enlisted as a private " for three years or the war," and subsequently raised a company for the 39th Illinois Regi- ment, known as the "Yates Phalanx." Bearing letters to Governor Yates, he sought his influence in behalf of this

terview with Generals Lyon and Butler, tendering the regiment for service in Missouri. His efforts, however, did not meet with success. He was then introduced to Presi- dent Lincoln and his Secretaries of State and War by Senator Browning, and was told that it had been deter- mined to accept no troops until Congress should have perfected a military bill. On the President's advice he remained in Washington, encouraged by his assurance : " The boys from Illinois will, beyond a doubt, soon have a chance to fight." Congress convened July 4th, 1861, but it was not until the 23d, the day after the Bull Run disaster, that the government responded to the popular sense. On this day he was summoned to the War Department and directed to fill up the regiment at once. The career of the 39th is historical, and the barest outline of its record is sufficient. From Illinois it moved to Missouri, thence to Maryland, and soon after to Virginia, on the upper Potomac. Hle was then stationed-having been elected and commis- sioned Major of his regiment-at Berkeley Springs, to guard the approach to the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad. January 2d, 1862, with less than a company of infantry, and a few horse, he met, near Bath, the advance brigade of Stonewall Jackson's entire army. Falling back to Berkeley, he held that position all the next day with his three companies, and late in the evening retreated skilfully to Sir John's Run, where he forded the Potomac. This stubborn resistance, which retarded the advance of the enemy and enabled other troops to eross the river, secured his elevation to the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel, together with a commendatory notice from General Kelly, commanding. He was subsequently made a member of General A. S. Williams' staff, but was permitted, at his urgent request, to aecompany his regiment to western Virginia, whence he returned to participate in the first battle of Winchester, the scene of Jackson's first and only thorough defeat. In May the 39th was sent, under his command, into the Suray Valley to seize two im- portant bridges, which he accomplished after a severe engagement. During the latter part of the year, while the regiment was stationed at Suffolk, he served as President of a General Court-Martial. In January, 1863, he accom- panied it to Newbern, North Carolina, and thence to Hilton Ilead, South Carolina. The first to land on Folly island, the Yates Phalanx assisted efficiently in the construction of the works by which Morris island was eventually reduced. In the siege of Forts Wagner and Gregg he bore a promi- nent part, leading the brigade which entered the stronghold. He informed Gencral Gilmore by telegraph that the rebels were preparing to desert the fort, and requested permission to move upon their works. The request was granted, and the result-about sixty prisoners being taken, with slight loss-was announced to Gilmore in the following laconic telegram, which went the rounds of the papers : " The field officer of the trenches sends his compliments and congratu- lations from the bomb-proof of fallen Fort Wagner to the

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general commanding, and wishes to assure him that his confidence in God and General Gilmore is unshaken." He passed the greater part of the ensuing winter in the recruit- ing service, with head-quarters at Chicago. On the expira- tion of its term of service the 39th came home, in February, 1864. After a month's furlough, however, the entire com- mand re-enlisted and returned to the field as " veterans," and were assigned to duty on the James, under General B. F. Butler. May 14th the Colonel of the regiment, afterward Major-General T. O. Osborne, was scriously wounded, and on the following day the Major and a large number of line officers were either killed or wounded, which events left him the only remaining field officer. Six days later, Gen- eral Longstreet, having advanced along the linc of Bermuda Hundred, began entrenching his position, while the Union forces were driven back from a point which it was necessary to regain. The 39th was ordered to assume the advance, and came back with a large number of prisoners, among them a brigadier-general. For his gallantry in this decisive action, displayed at the expense of a gunshot wound in his left leg, he was brevetted Brigadier-Gencral. His wound, which was very serious then, kept him in hospital until autumn, but as soon as convalescent he served on a court- martial at Fortress Monroe. January Ist, 1865, being still incapacitated for the field, he was assigned to staff duty under Major-General Ord, and served as Provost-Marshal of the District of Eastern Virginia, with head-quarters at Norfolk. At this period the Provost-Marshal was Mayor and Common Council in one, administering at a most trying time the affairs of a city of mixed population numbering about twenty thousand. He was also Superintendent of an extensive public school system established by Gencral Butler; General Superintendent of a large military prison ; and Superintendent of the City Gas Company. Later, when promoted to a full Colonclcy, he was ordered to join his command at Richmond. The Norfolk marshalship was abolished and the city turned over to the civil authorities. Later, however, at the request of Major-General Terry, who decmed such a step advisable, he was re-assigned to his old district, with plenary powers according to his brevet rank, officiating as Provost- Marshal until December, IS65, when, returning to the West, he was mustered out with his regi- ment at Springfield, Illinois. He was afterward appointed Collector of Internal Revenue for the First District of Illinois.

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The biographical encyclopedia of Illinois of the nineteenth century, Part 100

Author: Robson, Charles, ed Publication date: 1875 Publisher: Philadelphia, Galaxy Number of Pages: 770

Author: Robson, Charles, ed
Publication date: 1875
Publisher: Philadelphia, Galaxy
Number of Pages: 770