A biographical history of eminent and self-made men of the state of Indiana : with many portrait-illustrations on steel, engraved expressly for this work, Volume I, Part 14

Author:
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Cincinnati, Ohio : Western Biographical Publishing Co.
Number of Pages: 1038

USA > Indiana > A biographical history of eminent and self-made men of the state of Indiana : with many portrait-illustrations on steel, engraved expressly for this work, Volume I > Part 14

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

REPRESENTATIVE MEN OF INDIANA.

Ist Dist.]

out Medicine, an article which has been freely copied by some of the leading English medical journals, such as the London Lancet. He is now preparing a work of great importance to his portion of the state, treating on general diseases peculiar to that region. The Doctor has in his possession several papers from General Sheri- dan, R. M. Johnson, Colonel J. L. Trainor, and Major Blake, expressive of their appreciation of him as a man, a surgeon, and a soldier during the war. His personal appearance is fine. He is of temperate habits, and in the enjoyment of good health. He is doing much good in the temperance field, accompanying his lectures with various diagrams showing the evil influences of in- toxicating liquors on the human system. He has been an Odd-fellow for some twelve years, in which he has taken all the degrees, including the Grand Lodge. In religious views he is liberal. His politics are Repub- lican.

MITH, EDWARD Q., of Evansville, chair manu- facturer, was born in Hunter, Greene County, New York, February 7, 1828. His father, Jeremiah Smith, was a carpenter and millwright, and withal an ingenious mechanic, who was superintendent of the machinery in a chair factory at Hunter. Here Edward when a boy was accustomed to assist his father, and as he grew older worked with him at the factory, learn- ing all the details of the business, and familiarizing him- self with the machinery for making chairs. He was em- ployed there until July, 1848, when he determined to see something of the Western country, and visited Mil- waukee, Chicago, St. Louis, Memphis, and other West- ern cities. While at St. Louis, after having returned from a trip to Memphis, he received a letter asking him to go to Cincinnati and assist in making and putting up machinery for the first machine chair factory west of the Alleghanies. He arrived there in January, 1849, and spent nearly two years in that city, assisting mate- rially in getting the chair factory into successful opera- tion. He then removed to Detroit, where he was en- gaged for about two years in a furniture and chair manufacturing establishment. He returned to Cincin- nati, and engaged as foreman of the largest chair factory in that city. Here he displayed his ingenuity by the invention of various kinds of wood-working machinery, and by making important improvements in the old ma- chines. Upon three of these inventions he secured patents, and all of them have been generally adopted by chair manufacturers. In 1858 he determined to begin manu- facturing chairs on his own account, and in November of that year he removed to Evansville, Indiana, where he erected a factory and commenced business. His ef- forts met with success, and, finding in the rapidly set- tling country a ready market, he was soon enabled to

enlarge his establishment, which has now become one of the largest, most convenient, and best equipped in the West. It contains the very best machinery adapted for the work to be done, some of which is the invention of Mr. Smith himself. Among other improvements it may be mentioned that he saws out the lumber used in the manufacture of chairs from the log, having a small saw-mill in operation for that purpose. He is regarded as one of Evansville's most enterprising manufacturers, gives employment annually to from fifty to sixty men, and turns out about sixty thousand chairs per year. The market for these is found mostly north of the Ohio River, and so favorably is he known that he has had all the orders he could fill, without soliciting by commercial travelers. Both as a manufacturer and inventor Mr. Smith is one of the representative men of Indiana. His in- genuity and inventive skill have resulted in greatly cheap- ening the products of labor, while his business energy and enterprise have built up one of the largest manu- facturing interests in Southern Indiana. He is esteemed for his honor and integrity, and is of a frank, genial, and social nature. He was married, at Detroit, in March, 1852, to Miss Marion W. Ray, daughter of Elijah Ray, of Vermont.

MITH, HAMILTON, of Cannelton, was born at Durham, New Hampshire, of a family that has been resident there since 1659, and which claims descent from the Smiths of Old Hough, County Chester, England, and, by a maternal line, from Chris- topher Hatton, Lord Chancellor in the reign of Eliza- beth. His father, the Hon. Valentine Smith, a leading magistrate in the county of Strafford, after wards Chief Justice in the Court of Sessions, and a Judge of the Court of Common Pleas, was a man of note and influ- ence. At the age of fourteen, Hamilton entered Phillips- Exeter Academy, a school distinguished for the educa- tion of such men in the past as Webster, Cass, and Woodbury. At twenty-one years of age he entered Dartmouth, and became prominent as a writer and as a speaker. He was a member of the Phi Beta Kappa, re- ceived one of the college honors of the class, and was elected orator of the literary society, an honor which was coveted more than any other. He graduated in 1829, and immediately went to Washington City, where he succeeded a gentleman, who afterwards became a Senator from Ohio, in the charge of a select school. He studied law while in Washington, and was admitted to the bar in 1832. After this he visited Cuba, and then returned to Louisville, Kentucky, where he opened an office and began the practice of his profession. In 1840 he became interested in a large tract of coal land at Cannelton, a point which had been selected by Robert Fulton as an important site for future operations, and to

REPRESENTATIVE MEN OF INDIANA.

[Ist Dist.

this point Mr. Smith directed his attention to the build- ing up of a "market at home." In 1847 he commenced a series of articles in the Louisville Journal, and through the influence of these papers induced a number of lead- ing gentlemen from Kentucky, Indiana, Mississippi, and Louisiana, to form a company, which contracted for the building of a cotton mill at Cannelton. In 1851 the mill was put in operation, and the ten thousand spindles and three hundred and seventy-two looms have been in opera- tion ever since. In behalf of this enterprise Mr. Smith took an active part, so impressed was he with the great importance of some relief to the people of the West by throwing off to a certain extent their dependence upon the East. There is a great lack of economy in raising all necessary articles in the West and South, and trans- porting them to the East to be made up, then returning them here, with the expense of double freight, and the loss to the Western community of the value of the labor.

WINT, WILLIAM, of Boonville, was born in Jas- per, Dubois County, Indiana, April 16, 1844, and was the fourth child and first son of a family of seven children, four of whom still survive. His parents were Catholics. His father, Conrad Swint (Schwint), was born at Heidelberg, Germany, May I, 1808, where he resided until 1830, when he was married to Miss Adaline Lechner, and in the same year emigrated to America. He died at Troy, Perry County, Indiana, April, 1859. He was a graduate of the Heidelberg University. His mother was born in January, 1812, and died January, 1869, and lies in the cemetery with her husband. She was the daughter of Franz Lechner, a soldier under Napoleon for twenty-four years, who died in Indiana at the age of eighty-nine. William Swint attended the common schools until twelve years of age, when he apprenticed himself in the Rockport Democrat office, where he remained until the breaking out of the Civil War. He enlisted in 1861 in the 25th · Indiana Regiment, at the age of seventeen years, serv- ing until mustered out of the service in 1864, and being engaged in all the campaigns and battles participated in by the regiment. After his return home he was for a time in the clerk's office of Spencer County; where he again took up his old position in the printing-office until 1868, when he removed to Louisville, Kentucky, and was employed on the Louisville Journal and Courier-Journal until 1870. At that time he removed to Boonville, In- diana, purchasing the Boonville Enquirer, a Democratic newspaper, in which he is still engaged, making it a vigorous and influential journal for the county and dis- trict, and engaging actively in politics. He has never aspired to any office, but has held the position of mem- ber of the school board in Boonville for four terms, and

was appointed a doorkeeper of the Forty-fifth Congress, but resigned that position. He was married, by Rev. S. Ravenscroft, in the spring of 1868, to Katie A .. Dreher, youngest of four daughters of Ezra and Catherine (Tiffin) Dreher ; her grandfather on her mother's side being Edward Tiffin, the first Governor of Ohio. She was born at Madison, Indiana, November 26, 1849, and died of pneumonia February II, 1879, after an illness of one week; leaving three children, two girls and one boy ; the latter born on Washington's birthday, 1877. As a writer Mr. Swint is characterized by precision and purity of style. In the presentation of a fact or the statement of a proposition he is always candid, lucid, and comprehensive; his writings abound in Saxon phrases. He has been a decided factor in the current political literature of his party, and has been recognized as of decided importance to the solution of the party problem. He is an honorable and dignified gentleman, and is an ornament to society ..

PENCER, ELIJAH M., of Mount Vernon, Indiana, attorney and counselor at law, was born in Erie County, Pennsylvania, December 6, 1831. His father was a native of Connecticut, and his mother of Vermont. Elijah was reared upon a farm, receiving an ordinary common school education, At the age of nineteen years he entered Allegheny College, at Mead- ville, Pennsylvania, from which he graduated in 1855, having in the mean time taught school for two or three winters to defray his college expenses. Immediately upon graduating, in May, 1855, he went to Rising Sun, Ohio County, Indiana, and began the study of law in the office of his brother, John W. Spencer, who subse- quently became Judge of the Circuit Court. In July, 1856, he was admitted to the bar, when he at once re- moved to Mount Vernon, Indiana, and began the prac- tice of his profession. In the fall of the same year, he was elected to the office of prosecuting attorney for the counties of Posey and Gibson, and held the office for two years, refusing to accept the nomination for the second term, as his practice had increased to such an extent as to demand his whole time and attention. In the fall of 1861, he was elected a Representative to the Indiana Legislature, and was re-elected to the same office in 1863, serving four years. Since then he has not held any public office, nor sought any, but has de- voted his time to the practice of law, and also, of late years, to farming. He has enjoyed a large and lucrative business for many years, and is ranked among the most eminent members of the bar of Posey County. In poli- tics he has always been a Democrat. Mr. Spencer was married, in November, 1860, to Miss Mary Morse, of Akron, Ohio.

REPRESENTATIVE MEN OF INDIANA.

Ist Dist.]

AYLOR, JOHN L., attorney-at-law, of Boonville, was born in Warrick County, Indiana, August 30, 1850. During his youth he was accustomed to the hard manual labor of a farm. At the age of twenty-one he decided to study law, and accordingly, in 1871, he entered the state university, from which he graduated in 1875. For a few years he taught school. In 1878 he attended a course of lectures and graduated in the Cincinnati Law School. On his return home he was elected by the Democratic party as Repre- sentative of Warrick County in the Legislature of the state. Mr. Taylor was married, in 1879, to Katie Brackenridge Barker, daughter of Doctor Barker, of Boonville. He has been successful in the practice of his profession, and bids fair to become one of the lead- ing men of the county.

ERRY, OLIVER C., mayor of the city of Mount Vernon, was born in the parish of Lafayette, Lou- isiana, August 3, 1834. His father removed to Evansville, Indiana, in 1845, and died there two years afterwards, leaving Oliver, at the age of thirteen years, to fight his own way in the world. In 1848 he was bound out at service to a wealthy planter named Whitman, in Henderson County, Kentucky, to remain until he was twenty-one years of age. Mr. Whitman was a large slave-owner, and the lad, being associated with the blacks in the labors of the plantation and after- wards as an overseer, at an early period of his life be- came imbued with strong anti-slavery sentiments. His education was received mostly in Kentucky, at the com- mon schools, and at the age of twenty years he was placed by Mr. Whitman in full charge of his plantation and his slaves. After remaining for a year beyond the expiration of the term of his bound service, his dislike for slavery had become so great that he determined to remove to a free state, and crossing the Ohio River he settled in Mount Vernon, Indiana, in 1856. He there engaged with L. II. Floyd, a merchant, as his clerk, and remained with him until after the breaking out of the war, in 1861, when he enlisted in the Ist Indiana Cavalry, raised and commanded by Colonel Baker, and was made orderly sergeant of his company. He re- mained in active service for about a year, when he was discharged on account of sickness, and returned to Mount Vernon. Soon after he was appointed to a posi- tion in the United States internal revenue service, and held various offices until 1872, including those of in- spector of tobacco and cigars, gauger of liquors, deputy United States collector of internal revenue, and deputy United States assessor of internal revenue. In 1868 he was elected city treasurer of Mount Vernon, and was four times re-elected, holding the office for ten years.

In 1873 he was appointed agent at Mount Vernon for the Adams Express Company, which position he still re- tains. In 1878 he was elected mayor of the city of Mount Vernon for a term of two years. In politics he has always been a firm Republican, has taken a deep interest in political matters, and for several years has been a member of the Republican county committee. In 1876 he received the nomination of his party for county clerk, and with the rest of his ticket shared de- feat, but led his party ticket by eight hundred votes. Mr. Terry has always been faithful to his numerous public and private trusts, and is highly esteemed for his honor and integrity by all with whom he has business or social relations. He was married, in July, 1863, to Miss Eliza Jane Burtis, of Mount Vernon.

ALKER, DR. GEORGE BRINTON, of Evans- ville, was born December 6, 1807, at Salem, New Jersey. His father, William Walker, was a resi- dent of Delaware; he married Miss Catharine Tyler, of Salem, at which place they took up their abode. Dr. Walker attended private schools in Salem and Cin- cinnati. He also pursued an extensive medical course, graduating in the year 1830; after which he practiced his profession in Cincinnati for five years. He then re- moved to Evansville, where he has been for over forty years. During the late Civil War he was hospital sur- geon at the soldiers' hospital at this place for over three years. He was president of the board of health of Evansville for several years, member of the medical college faculty, and dean and professor of obstetrics in the medical college of Evansville from its organiza- tion. He has been a member of the Evansville Med- ical Society, of the Vanderburg Medical Society, of the Indiana, Illinois, and Kentucky Tri-state Medical So- ciety, of the Drake Academy of Medicine, and of the American Medical Association. In politics Dr. Walker is a Democrat. His first vote for President was cast for General Jackson. During the late Civil War he was hospital surgeon at the soldiers' hospital in Evansville three years. His public services were not, however, confined to his profession. During the construction of the Evansville and Crawfordsville Railroad, he was a director. He was also a state director of the Evansville branch of the State Bank of Indiana, and a member of the board of directors of the Public Hall Company and of the Evansville Street Railway. In 1852 he was a dele- gate to the Democratic convention which met at Balti- more and nominated Franklin Pierce for the presidency. In 1856, in company with Judge Battell, Dr. Walker was appointed by the citizens of Evansville to visit In- dianapolis and request the Governor of the state to pro- vide means for the suppression of the riotous proceed-

REPRESENTATIVE MEN OF INDIANA.

[Ist Dist.

ings in Clay County, in the cutting of the banks of the canal. The delegation was successful, and the result was the breaking up of the "Clay County war." Dr. Walker was married to Miss Lizzie Clark, on the 23d of June, 1835. As a lecturer, he is regarded by the members of his profession as second to none in the United States. As a professor and practitioner in ob- stetrics he excels. He has some note also as a writer. As a man he is moderate and temperate in all things, kind and humane, much beloved and respected by all.

EDDING, CHARLES LEE, Rockport, the sub- ject of this sketch, is an illustrious example of that successful class of individuals known as self-made men. He was born of poor parentage, October 17, 1845, in Ohio County, Kentucky, on his father's little farm, where his infancy and boyhood were spent in the usual monotony of a farm life. Reared in the interior, he had but little opportunity afforded him of acquiring an education ; and inferior advantages found a powerful ally in retarding his progress in his delicate health and fragile constitution. Short, infre- quent terms at school, and incompetent teachers, gave to the ambitious youth but poor facilities for the culti- vation of his mind, especially at that time; for, twenty- five years ago, Kentucky was as famous for her imper- fect system of common schools as she then was, and still is, for the chivalry of her sons and the loveliness of her daughters. But this was not enough. The tedium of such an existence soon grew irksome. The sound of intellectual conflicts in the outer world reached the ear of the young Kentuckian; the gleam of crossing blades, engaged on the battle-fields of the mind, flashed across his view ; and ambition breathed "upon his lids a spell that murders sleep." He longed to leap into the arena and grapple with the intellectual athletes in their grand feats of gladiatorial skill. While still quite young, he selected the legal profession as the theater of action most suited to his tastes, and best adapted for the consummation of his wishes. He commenced the study of the law, at the early age of sixteen, by reading Blackstone at his home on his father's farm, with no college but "God's first temples," no classmate but solitude, and no preceptor but his energy. At the age of eighteen, after two years of untiring study, he passed a creditable examination, and was admitted to the bar in Kentucky, in 1864. Finding the courts of his native state suspended, and the business outlook gloomy, on · account of the agitation of the war then in progress, he removed to Rockport, Indiana, where he has ever since resided and pursued the practice of his chosen profes- sion. On his arrival, a smooth-faced boy of nineteen, he found the Rockport bar filled to repletion with able

and brilliant lawyers with an established reputation that gave them full sway over the legal practice, not only of their own county, but also of a large portion of Southern Indiana. This was decidedly a discouraging and gloomy prospect for the young lawyer, who was beardless, penniless, and an utter stranger. But un- daunted by these circumstances, which might well have appalled even a stouter heart, Mr. Wedding entered upon the practice of the law. Two lingering years of heart-sick waiting and deferred hope dragged their leaden hours by, and but little business or money came to cheer the lonely days or to realize the sanguine dreams of the daring youth. But

"In the lexicon of youth, which fate reserves For a bright manhood, there is no such word As fail."

Disregarding all the disadvantages under which he labored, all the discouragements that cast a shadow over his path, and all the remonstrances of those who wished to do him a kindness, he persevered in his determination to succeed. At length fortune ceased her frowning and began to smile. Mr. Wedding, at the end of two years, received an invitation, with but a few days' notice, to deliver an oration at a Fourth of July celebration at his new home. In compliance with this solicitation, he found his first opportunity of distin- guishing himself before the people of the county, and of exhibiting to them the powers with which nature had endowed him. So creditably did he acquit him- self on that occasion that he succeeded in winning no small amount of attention, and as a consequence his business horizon soon began to brighten. It was the dawning of a new day for the young disciple of Black- stone. Opportunity after opportunity was now in rapid succession afforded him to bring himself before the pub- lic view ; and each occasion only added honor to the growing fame of the young and rising lawyer. Cases of importance soon began to be intrusted to his care. A noted will case, which had been refused by some of the best lawyers of the bar, was undertaken by Mr. Wedding, and was finally won by him, in defiance of some of the keenest legal talent of the state. This was soon followed by an important contested election case, in which he was pitted, single-handed, against almost the entire legal talent of the bar; in this case his sagac- ity and skill, as well as his eloquence, which frequently blazed forth in the ten days' trial, successfully defended the cause of his client, and established his own reputa- tion as a lawyer. From that time his practice rapidly and steadily improved, until in a few years he became recognized as one of the leading members of the Rock- port bar, as well as one among the finest and most reli- able lawyers of the southern portion of his state. Ilis numerous cases and his successful practice in the Su- preme Court of Indiana and in the Federal Courts,

Joseph To Welborn

REPRESENTATIVE MEN OF INDIANA.

Ist Dist.]

attest that his ability is recognized, and his skill appre- ciated abroad as well as at home. He has a powerful auxiliary in the practice of the law, and in the pursuit of legal learning, in the large and extensive law library with which his office is furnished, a part of the fruits of his toil. It comprises the reports of the Supreme Court of the United States and of several of the states, as well as a large selection of elementary works and text- books, containing over two thousand volumes. Polit- ically Mr. Wedding was opposed to secession, serving during the war in the state militia of Kentucky, while only sixteen years of age. He voted with the Republi- can party, and advocated their cause until 1872, when, with the Liberals, he supported Greeley and Brown. He afterward took an active and important part in the canvass of 1876 in favor of Tilden and Hendricks, both in his own and neighboring states, and his powerful appeals in behalf of the cause he represented were doubtless the parents of many a Democratic vote. He has never been an office-holder or an office-seeker, and though in 1878 his name was favorably mentioned as a probable nominee for the office of attorney-general of the state of Indiana, he made no effort whatever to se- cure the nomination. As an orator Mr. Wedding ranks among the best speakers of his portion of the state. He made his first public speech in 1862 at a political meet- ing at Fordsville, Kentucky, and in his subsequent career he has often been called upon, on those occasions so fre- quent in the life of a lawyer, to give play to the powers of oratory which nature has bestowed upon him. If, as has been said, "oratory is the great art of persuasion," the successful practice of Mr. Wedding testifies that he possesses the gift in no ordinary degree. Its study seems to be his passion, almost his religion; and viewing him as he is to-day, a fluent and an able speaker, though only a young man, if the carping critic should seize upon an occasional fault, we might say of him as was said of Charles Phillips, the eminent Irish orator, in his palmiest days, "His youth carries with it not only much excuse, but much promise of future improvement, and doubtless he will not neglect to apply the fruits of study and the lights of experience to each succeeding exertion." The laurels he has won in the forum are mingled with the roses that entwine about his private life. In 1866 he was married to Mary English, an esti- mable young lady of Rockport, and has dwelt uninter- ruptedly since that time in the sunlight of a happy home. His family now consists of his wife and two little boys. In his private life he is sociable, hospita- ble, and generous; in his professional capacity he is of irreproachable integrity, and is zealous and energetic to an extraordinary degree, becoming almost vindictive on the trail of fraud or wrong. Although almost a veteran in the law, he is still studious and industrious. Nor does he confine his study to legal lore exclusively, for it is

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

A biographical history of eminent and self-made men of the state of Indiana : with many portrait-illustrations on steel, engraved expressly for this work, Volume I, Part 14

Author: Publication date: 1880 Publisher: Cincinnati, Ohio : Western Biographical Publishing Co. Number of Pages: 1038

Author:
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Cincinnati, Ohio : Western Biographical Publishing Co.
Number of Pages: 1038