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 39

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 39

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).

lanta. At the battle of Kenesaw Mountain he was among the first to occupy the enemy's position. Imme- diately after this engagement he was promoted to the rank of major for gallantry on the field. He was with General Stoneman in his famous raid to Andersonville, Georgia, and was complimented by that officer in his reports to the War Department. In the latter part of 1863, while stationed at Hutchinsville, Tennessee, he was engaged in a severe struggle, and was obliged to surrender after a desperate resistance of some three hours; but, with his men, was soon after paroled. In the latter part of 1864, he took part in the great Salt- ville campaign with General Burbidge, and led his men in two bold charges against the enemy's batteries, which it became necessary to silence or dislodge. In this he was successful, uncovering their position and compelling them to take refuge within their works. On the return from West Virginia the 11th Kentucky was given the post of honor, and ably performed the arduous duty of holding the army in check, saving it, by gallant con- duct, from severe loss. Immediately after this expedi- tion, June 1, 1865, Major Slater was promoted to the rank of lieutenant-colonel. At the close of the war he resumed mercantile business at Sparta, where he has since resided. June 26, 1856, Colonel Slater married Miss Sarah A. Carbett, of Kentucky. During the war, at the battle of Kenesaw Mountain, when he had scaled the top, he cut a walking-stick, which he pre- serves as a memento. He is a member of the Masonic Fraternity, and has attained the position of master of his lodge. While a resident of Aurora, in 1861, he was elected mayor on the Democratic ticket, and filled the position with credit to himself and satisfaction to his constituents.

TRADER, SAMUEL MCHENRY, of Madison, was born in Jefferson County, Indiana, March I, 1844, and is the son of Samuel McHenry and Ab- igail (Higgins) Strader. Samuel M. Strader, the younger, was educated at Hanover College, graduating in 1864, and afterwards taking a commercial course at Bartlett's Commercial College in Cincinnati. He was then appointed to a position as teller in the First Na- tional Bank of his native city, filling it with credit to himself. In 1867 he resigned to become secretary of the Firemen and Mechanics' Insurance Company, staying there two years, when he became a wholesale grocer, but resumed his former occupation in 1871. Upon the death of his father, who had been the president, he was chosen to the same place, which he still occupies. He was president of the Jefferson County Agricultural Society from 1874 to 1877. He was married March 27, 1879, to Lettie B. Carlile, daughter of ex-Congressman John S. Carlile, of Clarksburg, West Virginia.

REPRESENTATIVE MEN OF INDIANA.

4th Dist.]

AINES, ABRAHAM B., M. D., physician and surgeon, of Aurora, Ohio County, was born on the 29th of November, 1823. He is the son of Doctor Matthias and Elizabeth (Brower) Haines. His father was a native of New Hampshire, of old Puritan stock. Deacon Samuel Haines arrived in this country from England in 1680, and from him sprang all who bear that name. His mother was of Knicker- bocker descent, and was born in New York City. In 1816 his father, with a twin brother, migrated to Ris- ing Sun, Indiana, then completely covered with forest, except where a few clearings had been made for the purpose of putting up log-cabins at Rising Sun, Law- renceburg, and Aurora. In 1819 or 1820 Doctor Abra- ham Brower, with his family, removed from New York City and settled in Lawrenceburg. In 1822 Eliza- beth, his oldest daughter, became the wife of Matthias Haines. They settled at Rising Sun, where he began practice, and was among the earliest and most success- ful physicians. He was a gentleman who took great interest in the moral and intellectual development of the community in which he resided. Among other enter- prises to which he lent an active aid was the academy at Rising Sun. He died in 1863, at his old home, at the advanced age of seventy-five, respected and be- loved. His wife survived him nine years. They were both earnest members of the Presbyterian Church. Abraham B. Haines received his academic education in the Rising Sun Academy, then one of the principal scholastic institutions in Southern Indiana. The teachers were D. D. Pratt, afterwards United States Senator, and Professor Thomas Thomas, D. D. When he reached the age of sixteen he went to Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. Two years afterward he came to read medicine in the office of his father. He attended one course of lectures at the Ohio Medical College, in Cincin- nati, in the winter of 1843 and 1844. The next win- ter he attended another course, at the Western Re- serve College, in Cleveland, Ohio, and was there graduated in the spring of 1846. He immediately opened an office in Aurora, then a place of about five hundred inhabitants, and soon became favorably known, building up a large practice. In July, 1862, he received a commission from Governor Morton as assistant surgeon of the 19th Indiana Regiment, First Division, First Army Corps of the Army of the Potomac, known as the Iron Brigade. He was with the regiment continuously until Lee's surrender, and was in all its en- gagements from the second Bull Run until the close at Appomattox. In May, 1865, he was promoted to the position of surgeon to the 146th Indiana Volunteers, but was finally discharged in September, 1865. In 1864 he was much of the time in the field hospital, and was then engaged until the close of the war. In the spring of 1866 he reopened his office at Aurora, beginning

practice anew. He soon regained his former business, and has ever since resided there, being recognized as an able and efficient physician and surgeon. He has always avoided politics, in the general acceptation of the term, taking the part of a good citizen only. He votes the Republican ticket. He feels a lively interest in the ad- vancement of his Church, and in education and moral and intellectual training. He united with the Presby- terian Church when about eighteen, and after removing to Aurora joined there the Church of that denomina- tion. In 1848 he was elected an elder. He has repre- sented the Church in its higher courts, the State Assem- bly and General Assembly. He is looked upon as one of its stanch supports. The Doctor has enriched his mind by travel, observation, and careful reading, and takes a position among the best informed men in Au- rora. He was married, October 25, 1847, to Miss Julia P. Loring, of Rising Sun, where she was born Novem- ber 24, 1824. Her father was a farmer, and one of the early settlers of Ohio County, but was originally from near Boston, Massachusetts. They had eight children born to them, three of whom survive. The oldest, Mat- thias L., received his classical education at Wabash Col- lege, Crawfordsville, Indiana, and his theological course at the Union Theological Seminary, New York City. He is now pastor of the Reformed Church at Astoria, Long Island. The two youngest, Thomas H. and Mary, are still living at home. He was one of the organizers of the Dearborn County Medical Society, and became a member of the State Medical Society in 1851.

EW, JEPTHA DUDLEY, member of Congress from the Fourth District in Indiana, was born at Vernon, Jennings County, Indiana, November 28, A. D. 1830. He is descended from Revolution- ary stock, his grandfather, Jethro New, having served in the War of Independence. Jethro New was a na- tive of Delaware and settled in Gallatin County, Ken- tucky, early in life, and in 1822 removed to Jennings County, Indiana, now the home of his distinguished grandson. Ile was the father of twelve children, of whom Hickman, the father of the subject of the pres- ent sketch, was the youngest. Hickman New now lives at Vernon, at the advanced age of seventy-three years, and is well preserved, both physically and mentally. He is a cabinet-maker by trade, and is also a well- known and highly respected minister of the Christian Church. He was one of the pioneer members and min- isters of the Christian Church in Southern Indiana, and by his industry and application to books, together with talent of a high order as a speaker and reasoner, soon took front rank as an advocate and resolute defender of the faith of that Church. Having experienced the

REPRESENTATIVE MEN OF INDIANA.

[4th Dist.

want of a liberal education himself, he determined that his children should have all the educational advantages his means would afford. Jeptha D. New was educated at the Vernon Seminary and at Bethany College, Vir- ginia, an institution founded by the celebrated Alexan- der Campbell, one of the ablest theologians and deba- ters of the nineteenth century. While preparing for college, Judge New-he is now known by that title --- assisted his father much of the time by working in the cabinet shop, and he did so much of this kind of work that he became a good workman at that trade. He left college in 1850, and for the next two years was en- gaged in school teaching and reading law. Subse- quently, he studied law for a time in the office of the Hon. Horatio C. Newcomb, at Indianapolis, but his preparation for the practice of his profession was mainly in the office of Lucius Bingham, Esq., of Vernon, at that time an eminent member of the legal profession. In the summer of 1856 Judge New and the Hon. Thomas W. Woollen, attorney-general of Indiana, formed a partnership for the practice of the law, and opened an office at Franklin, Indiana. That fall he was nominated by the Democracy of that circuit for prosecutor, but the Republican majority was so large that it could not be overcome. In the spring of 1857 he returned to Ver- non and opened a law office there. The same spring, on the 5th of April, he was married to Miss Sallie But- ler, who had been a pupil of his in the first school taught by him after leaving college. Their marriage has proved to be a most happy one, and they have re- sided at Vernon ever since, with the exception of a few months' residence in Minnesota in the fall of 1860 and spring of 1861. In 1862 he was elected district pros- ecuting attorney, and served as such until the fall of 1864, when he was elected Common Pleas Judge, and served out the term of four years, but declined a re- election. In the summer of 1874 he was nominated for Congress by the Democracy of his district and elected. The nomination was not sought by him, on the con- trary he declined it in a card published throughout the district, and he also protested against making the race while the convention was in session which nominated him. Notwithstanding this he was conscripted into the service. In politics he had always been a Democrat and a very active worker in his party's cause, but was not inclined to accept political office. Jennings County presented him as a candidate for the congressional nomination in 1860, but he declined to stand. When nominated in 1874, he had a majority of seven hundred to overcome, but he was elected by a majority of thir- teen hundred. There were eight counties in the dis- trict, all of which had always been reliably Republi- can except two. He carried every county except Ohio County, where he was beaten five votes. He was the first, and is thus far the only, Democratic candidate for

Congress who has carried Jennings and Jefferson Coun- ties. In 1876 he was unanimously renominated for Con- gress, but declined. In 1878 he was urged to accept the nomination, and did so. He was elected after the hottest congressional contest ever known in Indiana in an off year. One hundred and thirty-two more votes were polled for the candidates for Congress in that district than had been cast at the presidential election two years before. His majority was four hun- dred and ninety-one, although the same counties gave the Republican state ticket a majority. Judge New's remarkable vote testified to his popularity in a district he had before ably represented. In the Forty-fourth Congress he was on the Committee on War Claims; he was also on the special committee to investigate the real estate pool in the District of Columbia, and the indebt- edness of Jay Cooke & Co. to the government, out of which grew the celebrated Hallet-Kilbourn contempt case, which is now in the Supreme Court of the United States. He took the lead on behalf of the committee, and argued the whole question fully in the House. The New York World at the time editorially noticed the argument of Judge New in these words:

" Judge New has added greatly to an already good reputation in his career in Congress, and distinguished himself especially by his able legal argument on the question of the jurisdiction of the House over Kilbourn. His thorough exposition of an intricate legal problem was much admired."

In the same Congress Judge New was one of a spe- cial committee sent to New Orleans to examine into the conduct and management of the Federal offices there. He prepared and submitted to Congress the committee's report. After the presidential election of 1876, he was one of the committee of fifteen sent to Louisiana to investigate the election there. After reaching New Orleans the committee was subdivided, and Judge New was made chairman of the committee that went into the parishes in which the notorious Weber and Jim Anderson reigned. When the finding of the Electoral Commission was made as to Louisiana, he was one of the six members of the House selected by the Democratic members to argue the objections filed to that finding. Before the close of that session he discussed the Louisi- ana election of 1876 at length, and with much force and ability. In the present-the Forty-sixth Congress-he is a member of the Judiciary Committee and of the Commit- tee on Expenditures in the Department of Justice. He is also chairman of the special committee raised to investi- gate the charges preferred against Mr. Seward, our Min- ister to China. He was on the special committee sent to Cincinnati last summer to investigate the congressional elections in that city. The Indiana Morgan raid claims have received special attention from him, and he was mainly instrumental in having them transferred from the

Western Biegt Pub Co

Andlun Davison

REPRESENTATIVE MEN OF INDIANA.

4th Dist.]

office of the Adjutant-general of Indiana to the War Department, at Washington, just in time to save them from being barred by the statute of limitation. At the long session of the Forty-sixth Congress, he took active part in the preparation and advocacy of a bill amend- ing existing laws as to the jurisdiction of the Federal courts, which has passed the House. The foregoing is a brief outline of Judge New's public career. It has been creditable to him and his state. No member of Congress from Indiana has ever taken higher rank in the same time. He has been a hard worker from boy- hood-in the cabinet-shop, in the school-room, in his law office, on the bench, and in Congress. His indus- try, pluck, and perseverance, added to natural talent of a high order, together with a thorough education, have won for him a front place among the public men of the state, and will, if he lives, push him still further ahead. As a public speaker he is accurate, logical, and fluent.

- He has on two occasions been spoken of quite promi- nently for Governor, and it is among the probabilities of the future that he will live to occupy that exalted position. Judge New's home is a most pleasant one. He has three children-Mary, Willard, and Burt. He has a sister and brother. The former is Mrs. Emily Branham, of Princeton, Indiana; the latter, George W. New, of the hardware firm of Vajen & New, Indian- apolis. His mother, whose maiden name was Smyra Ann Smitha, died in 1879, at the age of seventy years. She was a good wife and mother, and was distinguished for her Christian walk, calmness, fortitude, and strength of mind. Mr. New has been successful in accumulating property by the practice of his profession, and also by outside ventures. He has the faculty of discerning what business is profitable and what is not. His habits are unexceptionable. He uses no spirituous liquors or intoxicating drinks of any kind, and is the very pic- ture of robust health, physically and mentally. He is five feet eleven inches high, florid complexion, black hair and beard, and weighs two hundred and thirty- eight pounds. Such is Jeptha D. New, one of the self- made and rising men of Indiana.

AVISON, ANDREW, of Greensburg, was a native of Pennsylvania, from whence he emigrated to In- & diana in 1825. He became an active member of the bar, and was elected in 1853 one of the Judges of the Supreme Court of the state. Six years after concluding his term of service, in 1865, he died. We can furnish no better summary of his life and charac- ter than to give the proceedings of the Greensburg bar on this occasion. After the object of the meeting was stated resolutions were presented by a committee, and B. W. Wilson, who was the most intimate with the de-

ceased, was requested to give a short biographical sketch of Judge Davison. Mr. Wilson proceeded as follows :

" Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen : Andrew Davison was educated at Jefferson College, at Cannonsburg, Pennsylvania, and studied law at Chambersburg with Hon. Thomas H. Crawford. In the spring of 1825, at the age of twenty-four years, he was at his father's house in Franklin County, Pennsylvania, a graduate of the above-named institution, and had license to practice law; but, with a delicate physical organization and health much impaired, from this home and its endear- ments, where he was born September 15, 18co, he de- termined to go, with the double purpose of recruiting his health and seeking a place to commence the prac- tice of his chosen profession. On horseback he passed through Western Pennsylvania, Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee, touching at Cincinnati, Covington, Nash- ville, and other points. Towards the close of the sea- son, in which only, at that time, was traveling practi- cable, especially in Indiana, he recrossed the Ohio, and passed into Indiana by by-ways, blazed tracks, and what were then called highways, through dense forests, with here and there the cabin of a backwoodsman. He was pleased with the novelty of the scene, enticed by the pioneers' hopes, energy, and hospitality, and believed that the future would develop the wealth of soil that every-where existed.

" In the fall of 1825, after traveling a distance of about one thousand miles, he ' put up' at Greensburg at its best hotel, a log-house-two rooms down, two up-stairs, and a kitchen-kept then by Thomas Hen- dricks. Greensburg then existed only to a slight ex- tent on the records of the county. There were a few small houses, but the broad face of the county was covered by almost unbroken forests. The land where the town (now city) now stands, was then covered almost entirely with forest stumps, underbrush, and fallen timber, heaped and tangled together in pro- miscuous confusion. And here the inexperienced youth, in feeble health, with no friends and little money, de- termined to remain and commence in earnest the battle of life. Soon he accommodated himself to the new and, to him, strange people and circumstances, shared with those about him in their amusements and hospi- talities, in their pleasures and sorrows, in their energies and hopes, and became a part of those who were 'all in all' to each other then, and friends true and sincere for life. Of these, here and there one still survives- the many are gone.

"On the twenty-sixth day of September, 1825, on the records of the Decatur Circuit Court, Benjamin F. Morris presiding, is found the following: 'On motion of W. A. Bullock, Andrew Davison, Esq., is admitted to practice as an attorney and counselor at law in this court, who produced his license, aud was duly sworn.' Business gradually came until he attained the first rank in his profession, with such rivals as James T. Brown, Caleb B. Smith, George H. Dunn, and others. He was eminently a careful practitioner, and, being in a circuit where there were but few books except the elementary works, he, like his associates, had to depend upon prin- ciples and precedents rather than authorities; I Black- ford was not published then, nor till 1830; 2 Blackford not until 1834; and 3 Blackford unti! 1836, and so on. In practice he was a great laborer. His clients never failed to receive faithful and unflinching efforts, and his skill none who ever met him as a lawyer would be dis-

REPRESENTATIVE MEN OF INDIANA.

[4th Dist.

posed to question. His greatest power was in his mas- terly use of general principles, and unerringly he applied them to the given particular case. His pleadings were formal, terse, and accurate, and rarely trammeled the pleader on the trial, but often worked the overthrow of his adversary. His battles were fought with an array of principles and precedents; and with great skill and sleepless vigilance he marshaled his forces, and woe be- tide the luckless adversary who had left an unguarded point on his line, for there the attack would surely be made, and when least expected.

"On the third day of January, 1853, he became, by election, one of the Judges of the Supreme Court of Indiana, and continued in office until the third day of January, 1865 -- a term of twelve years-having been re- elected in the fall of 1858. His first reported opinion is found in 3 Indiana, 371 ; and his last, 23 Indiana, 63. Of his opinions, published in twenty-one volumes of our reports, nothing need be said to his professional breth- ren. These opinions will stand, an enduring monument, imperishable as our literature and laws, long after he and all who know him have passed to the land of silence and dust.

"Judge Davison's fame rests mainly on his profes- sional life; but this did not bring to view the best elements of his real nature. These could only be ap- proached when disputation was ended, and the harmo- nies established that existed at his home and with his friends.

" On the fifteenth day of April, 1839, Andrew Davi- son and Mrs. Eliza Test were married, and she, with one son, survives him, to deeply mourn the loss of a most devoted husband and father. In his home the manner of the disputant was laid aside, and he appeared only in that genial and sincere character that sought the good of all around him and the injury of none.

" On retiring from the Supreme Bench, Judge Davi- son returned to his home and retired from all active business of a public character. He put in order his own private business, which had been accumulating through all these years of professional toil. Yet he never ceased from labor. His reading went on; took, as it always had, a very wide range; and now he had time and means to gratify his inclinations in that regard. Poetry and fiction, history and philosophy, and laws both hu- man and divine, were in turn, and as inclination directed, earnestly read. His memory, always retentive, never failed him. To the last week of his life he was inter- ested in all matters of importance transpiring at home and abroad. Modesty, a marked feature of his nature, and even disgust of any thing savoring of ostentation, prevented all display of the accumulation of knowledge he had acquired, retained, and added to, even to the closing scenes of his life. In all his private relations Judge Davison was courteous and kind; his friendships closed only with his life. Patient in great suffering, he advanced to the conclusion of his life calmly and delib- erately, heard the waves that were bearing him over dashing against the untried shore. The final summons came, and at noon, on the fourth day of February, 1871, he died. Andrew Davison is gone, his complete record is finished. Its pages are before that Judge in whose decisions there is no error, and whose judgments are tempered with that mercy that 'endureth forever.'"

The following was the response of Judge Worden :

"Gentlemen of the Bar: It affords me great pleas- ure to have an opportunity, in responding on behalf

of the court to your resolutions and memorial, to speak briefly of the eminent, just, and pure man who has passed away. It was my fortune to occupy a seat on this bench with Judge Davison for the period of seven years-from January, 1858, to January, 1865- and therefore I had the opportunity of knowing him well, both as a jurist and as a man. A purer or more spotless man never graced the judicial ermine. He was never known, from any motive whatever, whether of personal friendship, partisan considerations, or otherwise, to swerve in the slightest degree from an upright and fearless discharge of his duty as a member of this court, and the administration of the law as he found it to ex- ist. He administered what he believed to be the law without considering where the blow would fall, or who would be injured or benefited thereby. In this respect he may well be ranked with a Mansfield or a Marshall, a Kent or a Story. As a jurist, while he was thor- oughly read in all the departments of law and equity, his mind, intuitively, and as if peculiarly formed for that purpose by nature, seized upon the broad and compre- hensive principles of the common law as the distinctive field in which he delighted to revel, exploring the depths of its foundations, and tracing the entire fabric of its structure. He was, indeed, an eminent common law lawyer, while he was well versed in every depart- ment of jurisprudence.

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 39

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