USA > Indiana > Decatur County > A Genealogical and biographical record of Decatur County, Indiana : compendium of national biography > Part 22
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THOMAS E. WATSON, lawyer and congressman, the well-known Geor- gian, whose name appears at the head of this sketch, made himself a place in the his- tory of our country by his ability, energy and fervid oratory. He was born in Col- umbia (now McDuffie) county, Georgia, September 5, 1856. He had a common- school education, and in 1872 entered Mer- cer University, at Macon, Georgia, as fresh- man, but for want of money left the college at the end of his sophomore year. He taught school, studying law at the same time, until 1875, when he was admitted to the bar. He opened an office and com- menced practice in Thomson, Georgia, in November, 1876. He carried on a success- ful business, and bought land and farmed on an extensive scale.
Mr. Watson was a delegate to the Demo- cratic state convention of ISSo, and was a member of the house of representatives of the legislature of his native state in ISS2. In 1888 he was an elector-at-large on the
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Cleveland ticket, and in 1890 was elected to represent his district in the fifty-second congress. This latter election is said to have been due' entirely to Mr. Watson's " dash- ing display of ability, eloquence and popular power." In his later years he championed the alliance principles and policies until he became a leader in the movement. In the heated campaign of 1896, Mr. Watson was nominated as the candidate for vice-presi- dent on the Bryan ticket by that part of the People's party that would not endorse the nominee for the same position made by the Democratic party.
F REDERICK A. P. BARNARD, mathe- matician, physicist and educator, was born in Sheffield, Massachusetts, May 5, 1809. He graduated from Yale College in 1828, and in 1830 became a tutor in the same. From 1837 to 1848 he was professor of mathe- matics and natural philosophy in the Uni- versity of Alabama, and from 1848 to 1850, professor of chemistry and natural history in the same educational institution. In 1854 he became connected with the Univer- sity of Mississippi, of which he became president in 1856, and chancellor in 1858. In 1854 he took orders in the Protestant Episcopal church. In 1861 Professor Barnard resigned his chancellorship and chair in the university, and in 1863 and 1864 was con- nected with the United States coast survey in charge of chart printing and lithography. In May, 1864, he was elected president of Columbia College, New York City, which he served for a number of years.
Professor Barnard received the honorary degree of LL. D. from Jefferson College, Mississippi, in 1855, and from Yale College in 1859; also the degree of S. T. D. from the University of Mississippi in 1861, and that of L. H. D. from the regents of the
University of the State of New York in 1872. In 1860 he was a member of the eclipse party sent by the United States coast sur- vey to Labrador, and during his absence was elected president of the American Asso- ciation for the Advancement of Science. In the act of congress establishing the National Academy of Sciences in 1863, he was named as one of the original corporators. In 1867 he was one of the United States commis- sioners to the Paris Exposition. He was a member of the American Philosophical Society, associate member of the Amer- ican Academy of Arts and Sciences, and many other philosophical and scientific societies at home and abroad. Dr. Barnard was thoroughly identified with the progress of the age in those branches. His published works relate wholly to scientific or educa- tional subjects, chief among which are the following: Report on Collegiate Education; Art Culture; History of the American Coast Survey; University Education; Undulatory Theory of Light; Machinery and Processes of the Industrial Arts, and Apparatus of the Exact Sciences, Metric System of Weights and Measures, etc.
EDWIN McMASTERS STANTON, the secretary of war during the great Civil war, was recognized as one of America's foremost public men. He was born Decem- ber 19, 1814, at Steubenville, Ohio, where he received his education and studied law. He was admitted to the bar in 1836, and was reporter of the supreme court of Ohio from 1842 until 1845. He removed to Washington in 1856 to attend to his prac- tice before the United States supreme court, and in 1858 he went to California as counsel for the government in certain land cases, which he carried to a successful conclusion. Mr. Stanton was appointed
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attorney-general of the United States in December, 1860, by President Buchanan. On March 4, 1861, Mr. Stanton went with the outgoing administration and returned to the practice of his profession. He was appointed secretary of war by President Lincoln January 20, 1862, to succeed Simon Cameron. After the assassination of Presi- dent Lincoln and the accession of Johnson to the presidency, Mr. Stanton was still in the same office. He held it for three years, and by his strict adherence to the Repub- lican party, he antagonized President John- son, who endeavored to remove him. On August 5, 1867, the president requested him to resign, and appointed General Grant to succeed him, but when congress convened in December the senate refused to concur in the suspension. Mr. Stanton returned to his post until the president again renioved him from office, but was again foiled by congress. Soon after, however, he retired voluntarily from office and took up the practice of law, in which he engaged until his death, on December 24, 1869.
A LEXANDER CAMPBELL. the eminent theologian and founder of the church known as Disciples of Christ, was born in -the country of Antrim, Ireland, in June, 1788, and was the son of Rev. Thomas Campbell, a Scoth-Irish "Seceder." After studying at the University of Glasgow, he, in company with his father, came to America in 1808, and both began labor in western Pennsylvania to restore Christianity to apostolic simplicity. They organized a church at Brush Run, Washington county, Pennsylvania, in ISII, which, however, the year following, adopted Baptist views, and in 1813, with other congregations joined a Baptist association. Some of the under- lying principles and many practices of the
Campbells and their disciples were repug- nant to the Baptist church and considerable friction was the result, and 1827 saw the separation of that church from the Church of Christ, as it is sometimes called. The latter then reorganized themselves anew. They reject all creeds, professing to receive the Bible as their only guide. In most mat- ters of faith they are essentially in accord with the other Evangelical Christian churches, especially in regard to the person and work of Christ, the resurrection and judgment. They celebrate the Lord's Supper weekly, hold that repentance and faith should precede baptism, attaching much importance to the latter ordinance. On all other points they encourage individual liberty of thought. In 1841, Alexander Campbell founded Bethany College, West Virginia, of which he was president for many years, and died March 4, 1866.
The denomination which they founded is quite a large and important church body in the United States. They support quite a number of institutions of learning, among which are: Bethany College, West Virginia; Hiram College, Hiram, Ohio; Northwestern Christian University, Indianapolis, Indiana; Eureka College, Illinois; Kentucky Univer- sity, Lexington, Kentucky; Oskaloosa College, Iowa; and a number of seminaries and schools. They also support several monthly and quarterly religious periodicals and many papers, both in the United States and Great Britain and her dependencies.
W TILLIAM L. WILSON, the noted West . Virginian, who was postmaster-gener- al under President Cleveland's second ad- ministration, won distinction as the father of the famous " Wilson bill," which became a law under the same administration. Mr. Wilson was born May 3, 1843, in Jeffer-
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son county, West Virginia, and received a good education at the Charlestown Academy, where he prepared himself for college. He attended the Columbian Col- lege in the District of Columbia, from which he graduated in 1860, and then attended the University of Virginia. Mr. Wilson served in the Confederate army dur- ing the war, after which he was a professor in Columbian College. Later he entered into the practice of law at Charlestown. He attended the Democratic convention held at Cincinnati in 1880, as a delegate, and later was chosen as one of the electors for the state-at-large on the Hancock ticket. In the Democratic convention at Chicago in 1892, Mr. Wilson was its per- manent president. He was elected pres- ident of the West Virginia University in 1882, entering upon the duties of his office on September 6, but having received the nomination for the forty-seventh congress on the Democratic ticket, he resigned the presidency of the university in June, 1883, to take his seat in congress. Mr. Wil- son was honored by the Columbian Uni- versity and the Hampden-Sidney College, both of which conferred upon him the de- gree of LL. D. In 1884 he was appointed regent of the Smithsonian Institution at Washington for two years, and at the end of his term was re-appointed. He was elected to the forty-seventh, forty-ninth, fiftieth, fifty-first, fifty-second and fifty- third congresses, but was defeated for re- election to the fifty-fourth congress. Upon the resignation of Mr. Bissell from the office of postmaster-general, Mr. Wilson was ap- pointed to fill the vacancy by President Cleveland. His many years of public serv- ice and the prominent part he took in the discussion of public questions gave him a national reputation.
C ALVIN S. BRICE, a successful and noted financier and politician, was born at Denmark, Ohio, September 17, 1845, of an old Maryland family, who trace their lineage from the Bryces, or Bruces, of Airth, Scotland. The father of our subject was a prominent Presbyterian clergyman, who removed to Ohio in 1812. Calvin S. Brice was educated in the common schools of his native town, and at the age of thir- teen entered the preparatory department of Miami University at Oxford, Ohio, and the following year entered the freshman class. On the breaking out of the Civil war, although but fifteen years old, he enlisted in a company of three-months men. He re- turned to complete his college course, but re-enlisted in Company A, Eighty-sixth Ohio Infantry, and served in the Virginia campaign. He then returned to college, from which he graduated in 1863. In 1864 he organized Company E, One Hundred and Eightieth Ohio Infantry, and served until the close of hostilities, in the western armies.
On his return home Mr. Brice entered the law department of the University of Michigan, and in 1866 was admitted to the bar in Cincinnati. In the winter of 1870- 71 he went to Europe in the interests of the Lake Erie & Louisville Railroad and pro- cured a foreign loan. This road became the Lake Erie & Western, of which, in 1887, Mr. Brice became president. This was the first railroad in which he had a personal interest. The conception, build- ing and sale of the New York, Chicago & St. Louis Railroad, known as the "Nickel Plate," was largely due to him. He was connected with many other railroads, among which may be mentioned the following: Chicago & Atlantic; Ohio Central; Rich- mond & Danville; Richmond & West Point
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Terminal; East Tennessee, Virginia & Georgia; Memphis & Charleston; Mobile & Birmingham; Kentucky Central; Duluth, South Shore & Atlantic, and the Marquette, Houghton & Ontonagon. In 1890 he was elected United States senator from Ohio. Notwithstanding his extensive business inter- ests, Senator Brice gave a considerable time to political matters, becoming one of the leaders of the Democratic party and one of the most widely known men in the country.
BENJAMIN HARRISON, twenty-third president of the United States, was born August 20, 1833, at North Bend, Hamilton county, Ohio, in the house of his grandfather, General William Henry Har- rison, afterwards president of the United States. His great-grandfather, Benjamin Harrison, was a member of the Continental congress, signed the Declaration of Inde- pendence, and was three times elected gov- ernor of Virginia.
The subject of this sketch entered Farm- ers College at an early age, and two years later entered Miami University, at Oxford, Ohio. Upon graduation he entered the office of Stover & Gwyne, of Cincinnati, as a law student. He was admitted to the bar two years later, and having inherited about eight hundred dollars worth of property, he married the daughter of Doctor Scott, pres- ident of a female school at Oxford, Ohio, and selected Indianapolis, Indiana, to begin practice. In 1860 he was nominated by the Republicans as candidate for state supreme court reporter, and did his first political speaking in that campaign. He was elected, and after two years in that position he organized the Seventieth Indi- ana Infantry, of which he was made colonel, and with his regiment joined General Sher-
man's army. For bravery displayed at Re- saca and Peach Tree Creek he was made a brigadier-general. In the meantime the office of supreme court reporter had been declared vacant, and another party elected to fill it. In the fall of 1864, having been nominated for that office, General Harrison obtained a thirty-day leave of absence, went to Indiana, canvassed the state and was elected. As he was about to rejoin his command he was stricken down by an attack of fever. After his recovery he joined General Sherman's army and participated in the closing events of the war.
In 1868 General Harrison declined to be a candidate for the office of supreme court reporter, and returned to the practice of the law. His brilliant campaign for the office of governor of Indiana in 1876, brought him into public notice, although he was defeated. He took a prominent part in the presidential canvass of ISSo, and was chosen United States senator from Indiana, serving six years. He then returned to the practice of his profession. In 1888 he was selected by the Republican convention at Chicago as candidate for the presidency, and after a heated campaign was elected over Cleveland. He was inaugurated March 4, 1889, and signed the Mckinley bill October 1, 1890, perhaps the most distinctive feature of his administration. In 1892 he was again the nominee of the Republican party for president, but was defeated by Grover Cleveland, the Democratic candidate, and again resumed the practice of law in Indian- apolis.
JOHN CRAIG HAVEMEYER, the celebrated merchant and sugar refiner, was born in New York City in 1833. His father, William F. Havemeyer, and grand- father, William Havemeyer, were both sugar
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refiners. The latter named came from Buckeburg, Germany, in 1799, and settled in New York, establishing one of the first refineries in that city. William F. succeeded his father, and at an early age retired from business with a competency. He was three times mayor of his native city, New York.
John C. Havemeyer was educated in private schools, and was prepared for college at Columbia College grammar school. Owing to failing eyesight he was unable to finish his college course, and began his business career in a wholesale grocery store, where he remained two years. In 1854, after a year's travel abroad, he assumed the responsibility of the office work in the sugar refinery of Havemeyer & Molter, but two years later etablished a refinery of his own in Brooklyn. This afterwards developed into the immense business of Havemeyer & Elder. The capital was furnished by his father, and, chafing under the anxiety caused by the use of borrowed money, he sold out his interest and returned to Havemeyer & Molter. This firm dissolving the next year, John C. declined an offer of partnership from the successors, not wishing to use borrowed money. For two years he remain- ed with the house, receiving a share of the profits as compensation. For some years thereafter he was engaged in the commission business, until failing health caused his retirement. In 1871, he again engaged in the sugar refining business at Greenport, Long Island, with his brother and another partner, under the firm name of Havemeyer Brothers & Co. Here he remained until 1880, when his health again declined. During the greater part of his life Mr. Havemeyer was identified with many benev- olent societies, including the New York Port Society, Missionary Society of the Methodist Church, American Bible Society,
New York Sabbath School Society and others. He was active in Young Men's Christian Association work in New York, and organized and was the first president of an affiliated society of the same at Yonkers. He was director of several railroad corpo- rations and a trustee of the Continental Trust Company of New York.
W ALTER QUINTIN GRESHAM, an eminent American statesman and jurist, was born March 17, 1833, near Cory- don, Harrison county, Indiana. He ac- quired his education in the local schools of the county and at Bloomington Academy, although he did not graduate. After leav- ing college he read law with Judge Porter at Corydon, and just before the war he be- gan to take an interest in politics. Mr. Gresham was elected to the legislature from Harrison county as a Republican; previous to this the district had been represented by a Democrat. At the commencement of hostilities he was made lieutenant-colonel of the Thirty-eighth Indiana Infantry, but served in that regiment only a short time, when he was appointed colonel of the Fifty- third Indiana, and served under General Grant at the siege of Vicksburg as brigadier- general. Later he was under Sherman in the famous "March to the Sea," and com- manded a division of Blair's corps at the siege of Atlanta where he was so badly wounded in the leg that he was compelled to return home. On his way home he was forced to stop at New Albany, where he re- mained a year before he was able to leave. He was brevetted major-general at the close of the war. While at New Albany, Mr. Gresham was appointed state agent, his duty being to pay the interest on the state debt in New York, and he ran twice for congress against ex-Speaker Kerr, but was
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defeated in both cases, although he greatly reduced the Democratic majority. He was held in high esteem by President Grant, , who offered him the portfolio of the interior but Mr. Gresham declined, but accepted the appointment of United States judge for Indiana to succeed David McDonald. Judge Gresham served on the United States district court bench until 1883, when he was appointed postmaster-general by Presi- dent Arthur, but held that office only a few · months when he was made secretary of the treasury. Near the end of President Arthur's term, Judge Gresham was ap- pointed judge of the United States circuit court of the district composed of Indiana, Illinois and contiguous states, which he held until 1893. Judge Gresham was one of the presidential possibilities in the National Re- publican convention in 1888, when General Harrison was nominated, and was also men- tioned for president in 1892. Later the People's party made a strenuous effort to induce him to become their candidate for president, he refusing the offer, however, and a few weeks before the election he an- nounced that he would support Mr. Cleve- land, the Democratic nominee for president. Upon the election of Mr. Cleveland in the . fall of 1892, Judge Gresham was made the secretary of state, and filled that position until his death on May 28, 1895, at Wash- ington, District of Columbia.
E LISHA B. ANDREWS, noted as an ed- ucator and college president, was born at Hinsdale, New Hampshire, January 10, 1844, his father and mother being Erastus and Elmira (Bartlett) Andrews. In 1861, he entered the service of the general gov- ernment as private and non-commissioned officer in the First Connecticut Heavy Ar- tillery, and in 1863 was promoted to the
rank of second lieutenant. Returning home he was prepared for college at Powers In- stitute and at the Wesleyan Academy, and entered Brown University. From here he was graduated in 1870. For the succeeding two years he was principal of the Connecti- cut Literary Institute at Suffield, Connecticut. Completing a course at the Newton Theo- logical Institute, he was ordained pastor of the First Baptist church at Beverly, Massa- chusetts, July 2, 1874. The following year he became president of the Denison University, at Granville, Ohio. In 1879 he accepted the professorship of homiletics, pastoral duties and church polity at Newton Theological Institute. In 1882 he was elected to the chair of history and political economy at Brown University. The Uni- versity of Nebraska honored him with an LL. D. in 1884, and the same year Colby University conferred the degree of D. D. In 1888 he became professor of political economy and public economy at Cornell University, but the next year returned to Brown University as its president. From the time of his inauguration the college work broadened in many ways. Many timely and generous donations from friends and alumni of the college were influenced by him, and large additions made to the same.
Professor Andrews published, in 1887, "Institutes of General History," and in 1888, "Institutes of Economics."
JOHN WILLIAM DRAPER, the subject of the present biography, was, during his life, one of the most distinguished chemists and scientific writers in America. He was an Englishman by birth, born at Liverpool, May 5, 1811, and was reared in his native land, receiving an excellent education, graduating at the University of London. In 1833 he came to the United States, and
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settled first in Pennsylvania. He graduated in medicine at the University of Philadel- phia, in 1836, and for three years following was professor of chemistry and physiology at Hampden-Sidney College. He then be- came professor of chemistry in the New York University, with which institution he was prominently connected for many years. It is stated on excellent authority that Pro- fessor Draper, in 1839, took the first photo- graphic picture ever taken from life. He · was a great student, and carried on many important and intricate experiments along scientific lines. He discovered many of the fundamental facts of spectrum analysis, which he published. He published a number of works of great merit, many of which are recognized as authority upon the subjects of which they treat. Among his work were: " Human Physiology, Statistical and Dyna- mical of the Conditions and Cause of Life in Man," "History of Intellectual Develop- ment of Europe," "History of the Ameri- can Civil War," besides a number of works on chemistry, optics and mathematics. Pro- fessor Draper continued to hold a high place among the scientific scholars of America until his death, which occurred in January, 1882. -
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EORGE W. PECK, ex-governor of I the state of Wisconsin and a famous journalist and humorist, was born in Jeffer- son county, New York, September 28, 1840. When he was about three years of age his parents removed to Wisconsin, settling near Whitewater, where young Peck received his education at the public schools. At fifteen he entered the office of the "Whitewater Register," where he learned the printer's art. He helped start the "Jefferson County Republican" later on, but sold out his interest therein and set type in the office of 11
the "State Journal," at Madison. At the outbreak of the war he enlisted in the Fourth Wisconsin Cavalry as a private, and after serving four years returned a second lieutenant. He then started the "Ripon Representative," which he sold not long after, and removing to New York, was on the staff of Mark Pomeroy's "Democrat." Going to La Crosse, later, he conducted the La Crosse branch paper, a half interest in which he bought in 1874. He next started "Peck's Sun," which four years later he removed to Milwaukee. While in La Crosse he was chief of police one year, and also chief clerk of the Democratic assembly in 1874. It was in 1878 that Mr. Peck took his paper to Milwaukee, and achieved his first permanent success, the circulation increasing to So,000. For ten years he was regarded as one of the most original, versa- tile and entertaining writers in the country, and he has delineated every phase of country newspaper life, army life, domestic experience, travel and city adventure. Up to 1890 Mr. Peck took but little part in politics, but in that year was elected mayor of Milwaukee on the Democratic ticket. The following August he was elected gov- ernor of Wisconsin by a large majority, the "Bennett School Bill" figuring to a large extent in his favor.
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