USA > Indiana > Encyclopedia of biography of Indiana > Part 11
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couple, together with their first-born, Au- gustus G. Carnahan, moved to Dayton. Here they remained for two years, then removed and settled as pioneers in Tip- pecanoe county, Indiana, La Fayette be- ing the place chosen in which to found their home. In this town Mr. Carnahan entered into a general merchandising business, which he followed for some- thing like twenty years. The latter part of his life, although passed in La Fayette, was spent in retirement from the activi- ties of commercial life. His death oc- curred on January 1, 1873. In this home in La Fayette William Lane Carnahan was born on the 5th of March, 1837, and here he spent his childhood and early youth, attending the schools of his native city and preparing for college. In due time he entered the State University at Bloomington, but not to complete the prescribed course. After a year of col- legiate work he left the university, and early in the winter of 1856-7 he set out for Nebraska in quest of the possible fortune that still lures ambitious young men westward. The next three years were spent in the above-named State, for the most part in Dakota county and the city of Omaha, his time being divided between the two occupations of general merchandising and clerking in the land office. In 1860 he returned to Indiana and became engaged in the retail shoe business at Delphi, and two years later found him back in the familiar haunts of La Fayette, where he connected him- self with the boot and shoe concern of
W. L. Carnahan
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BIOGRAPHY OF INDIANA.
Carnahan, Earl & Co. as traveling sales- man, in which capacity he served for eighteen months. He was then taken into the firm, which continued operations under the name of Carnahan Brothers & Co., he continuing his services on the road in the interests of the wholesale trade. After seven years spent in this way he severed his connections with the firm and early in 1872 went to Fort Wayne and there established the wholesale boot and shoe business with which he was closely identified during the rest of his life. The first style of the house was Carnahan, Skinner & Co. This name was succeeded in 1875 by that of Carnahan, Hanna & Co., which in turn gave place to the sim- ple style of Carnahan & Co., Emmet H. McDonald becoming at this time associ- ated with the house. Still another change occurred in the establishing of the W. L. Carnahan Company, under which title the business was incorporated in 1894. The officers of the company were William L. Carnahan, president; Robert H. Carnahan, vice president, and W. E. Hood, secretary and treasurer, the loca- tion of the concern being at 13 West Jefferson Street, whither its predecessor had removed two years previously. After the incorporation of the new firm the business expanded rapidly, until the W. L. Carnahan Company had become one of the largest and most prosperons of its line in the State. The evolution of so flourishing a commercial honse is essen- tially conducive of benefit to the town in which it is located, and doubly so
when the man or men from which the enterprise draws its chief vital force are earnestly in league with the spirit of ad- vancement and high business ethics. Thus lofty and progressive was the un- wavering attitude of Mr. Carnahan throughout the twenty-five years of his residence in Fort Wayne. The weal of his home city ever found in him a strong and faithful promoter; yet a wise con- servatism tempered his zeal for public improvements, his fine balance and keen insight enabling him to discern with un- erring judgment an ephemeral element in any newly projected scheme. And he was respected and loved not only for what he did, but for what he was as well. His frank integrity and friendly courtesy of manner constantly won to him the regard and warm affection of his associates, whether in business, so- cial or private life, while his character found its crown in the reverential aspi- rations of sincere piety. He was for many years a devoted member and com- municant of the Trinity Episcopal church of Fort Wayne, always taking a leading part in the conduct of church affairs and contributing money generous- ly to all objects which appealed to him as meritorious. In religious as in secular enterprise, however, he was always gov- erned by a discriminating and far-sighted judgment. Among the institutions of his city substantially favored by his patron- age may be mentioned the Young Men's Christian Association, which found in him a constant and helpful friend. Mr.
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Carnahan never took an active part in politics, yet few politicians can justly claim so fervent a love of their country or so lively an interest in all that makes for its welfare. This spirit of patriotism early engendered, was fostering during his soldier days in the Civil War, when he belonged to the Seventy-sixth Regi- ment of Indiana Volunteers. Mr. Carna- han was married in 1864 to Miss Clara L. Hanna, daughter of the late James Bayliss Hanna of Fort Wayne, and granddaughter of Judge Samuel Hanna, who was born in Scott county, Kentucky, in 1797, but who came to Fort Wayne when that city was merely a trading post of the Indians and toiled as a pioneer for its settlement and advancement. His whole subsequent life was spent in Fort Wayne, and at the time of his death, in 1866, he was still taking an active part in the business affairs of the city. In 1894, during a trip to the Atlantic coast, Mr. Carnahan contracted la grippe, from the effects of which he was permanently invalided, and three years later, on the 26th of June, 1897, he passed out of this life, sincerely and deeply lamented by a host of friends and acquaintances in both Fort Wayne and La Fayette. Of few men who have entered the mystery of the beyond can it so truly be said: In all the varied walks of his life he fulfilled to the last iota the trusts divinely imposed upon him as man and citizen. The fam- ily left by Mr. Carnahan consists of his widow and four children. His son, Rob- ert Hanna Carnahan, has succeeded to
the responsibilities of his father's place in The W. L. Carnahan Company. The three daughters are respectively Louise, wife of Dr. Nelson L. Deming, of Fort Wayne, and Misses Clara and Virginia Carnahan.
AUGUSTUS G. CARNAHAN.
Augustus Gaston Carnahan, president of the La Fayette Savings Bank, has been a resident of that city for sixty-five years. His great-grandfather, William Carna- han, was a native of County Antrim, Ire- land, born of Protestant Scotch-Irish parentage and emigrated to America in 1765, settling in Lancaster county, Penn- sylvania. He was a soldier in the Revo- lutionary war and while serving in the army his son Robert, the grandfather of our subject, was born June 7, 1777. In 1795 Robert Carnahan removed from Pennsylvania to Ohio and located on a farm in Hamilton county, about twelve miles from the site of Cincinnati. He remained on the farm and cultivated it until the time of his death in 1845. The old homestead is still in possession of the family. James G. Carnahan, son of Robert, was born on the farm near the village of Mount Pleasant, December 31, 1807, and remained there until he reached his twentieth year, when he left home to engage in mercantile business in the village of Venice, in the neighborhood of his home. He married Margaret, daugh- ter of Robert and Rachael (Bailey)
Ulicamahou.
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Brown, a native of Hamilton county, in 1828, and the eldest child born of this union was Augustus Gaston Carnahan, the subject of this biography, who was born November 21, 1829. The family re- moved to Dayton, Ohio, in 1831, and thence to La Fayette two years later, when Augustus was under four years of age. His father formed a copartnership with Mr. John Taylor, who was his broth- er-in-law, and the father of Colonel W. C. L. Taylor, at present the Circuit Judge of Tippecanoe county, under the firm name of Taylor & Carnahan, for the busi- ness of general merchandising; this firm continued until 1839. In 1842 Mr. Carna- han resumed mercantile pursuits, which he carried on until 1854. From that date until his death, January 1, 1873, he was not engaged in mercantile life. Augustus attended school in La Fayette until his fif- teenth year, when he began business life by securing employment in a general store. Here he remained three years, then attended Tippecanoe County Semi- nary one school year, after which he en- tered and was graduated from Bartlett's Commercial College, Cincinnati. This seemed sufficient to qualify him to begin the active duties of a business life, where experience is the most effective school for the practical acquirements essential to success in the broad field of affairs. Before re-entering mercantile life Mr. Carnahan took a position for one season as second clerk on the steamer "Sam Walker" of Lonisville, commanded by Captain Grey, plying mostly on the Ohio
river. He then entered the employ of Carnahan & Earl, a firm engaged in general merchandising at La Fayette, of which his father was the senior and the late Adams Earl the junior partner. The partnership of the above-named firm end- ed in the summer of 1851 by Mr. Carna- han purchasing the interest of Mr. Earl and associating with him Augustus under the firm name of J. G. Carnahan & Son, this firm continuing until the spring of 1854. After an interval of a few months Augustus engaged in the re- tail boot and shoe business, taking charge of a stock of goods for the execu- tor of an estate. By the exercise of strict economy and careful management he was able to purchase this stock at the end of two years and continued the retail boot and shoe business until the spring of 1864. In 1861, in connection with the late Adams Earl and William H. Hatcher, he opened a separate honse for the wholesale trade in boots and shoes in the firm name of Carnahan, Earl & Co. (Messrs. Earl & Hatcher being then en- gaged in the wholesale grocery trade). This copartnership expired by limitation in 1864, at which time Mr. Carnahan sold ont his retail business, purchased the in- terest of his wholesale partners, and, continuing the business, associated with him his brother, William L. Carnahan, and Mr. David Murphy, under the firm name of A. G. Carnahan & Co. In 1872 Mr. Carnahan purchased the interest of his brother, William L., thereafter con- tinuing with Mr. Murphy withont change
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of the firm until 1878, when he sold his interest to Mr. Murphy and William Com- stock and retired permanently from the business of a merchant. Mr. Carnahan had already other interests in La Fayette, having become a stockholder in the Bank of the State of Indiana soon after its or- ganization by the late Moses Fowler. He was also elected a director in its suc- cessor, the National State Bank, and held the position continuously until the ex- piration of its charter in 1885. In 1877 Mr. Carnahan was elected a trustee of La Fayette Savings Bank and in 1889 he was elected president, and since that date has been re-elected annually. This insti- tution was organized in 1869 and its his- tory has been one of unexampled pros- perity. The late Jolin Purdue, founder of Purdue University, was its first presi- dent. Mr. Carnahan is the fourth. In the year 1888 Mr. Carnahan was elected a trustee of Greenbush Cemetery Associa- tion and has been under yearly re-elec- tions, president of the board for eight years. In 1894 Mr. Carnahan became a stockholder in the W. L. Carnahan Boot & Shoe Company, of Fort Wayne, and was elected vice president of the com- pany in 1897. On the 17th of January, 1854, Mr. Carnahan was married to Miss Sarah C. Robinson, daughter of Thomas and Eleanor (Hueston) Robinson. Mr. Robinson was a native of England, com- ing to America while yet a boy, with his father, who established the first manu- factory of glass in Pittsburg, Pennsyl- vania. Of this marriage two children were
born, Eleanor Margaret, who is now the wife of David Linn Ross of La Fayette, and Edward James, who married Jessie Vermilya, daughter of the late E. M. and Marietta V. Talbot. He died at the age of twenty-eight years. Mr. Carnahan has been a Republican since the organiza- tion of the party, but has never been a candidate for any political office. He is a communicant of the Protestant Episco- pal church and was a vestryman for over thirty years.
EDWIN P. HAMMOND.
Edwin P. Hammond was born at Brookville, Indiana, November 26, 1835. His father, Nathaniel Hammond, was a native of Vermont, and his mother, Han- nah H. Sering, was a native of Ohio. Both of them had settled in Brookville prior to their marriage. The family con- tinued to live there until Edwin was four- teen years of age and then removed to Columbus, Indiana. So much of his edu- cation as was acquired in a school house was obtained in the common schools of Brookville and Columbus. In his nine- teenth year he started out to invest in some productive industry or profession. the capital with which nature had en- dowed him and the training of home and school had rendered more available. He went to Indianapolis, where for one year he performed the service of clerk in a general retail store. At twenty he began the study of law in the office of his elder
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half-brother, Abram A. Hammond, subse- quently Governor, and Thomas H. Nel- son, who afterwards held important diplomatic positions and won fame as a political orator. After reading one year as a preliminary preparation he passed the required examination and entered the senior law class of Asbury University, now DePauw, and was graduated in 1858, receiving the degree of Bachelor of Laws. Mr. Hammond was now almost twenty- three years of age and well qualified by reading and study for a general practice of the law. Forty years ago, more than at the present time, it was supposed to be necessary for a young attorney to lo- cate in a secluded spot, where the inhab- itauts were few and a lawyer was a cu- riosity, where the "squire", or justice of the peace, was The Great Mogul of the neighborhood and the session of court was the principal public entertainment of the year. So this young man, whose childhood was passed in a classic old town and who in early manhood was fa- miliar with the gayeties of the State's capital, had the nerve to banish himself to the wild prairie of Jasper county. He settled in the unpolished hamlet of Rens- selaer, thirty miles and more than fifteen years away from a railroad. The rude hand of man had done little to mar or improve the primitive wildness. The country was roomy and wide open. With- out influential acquaintance, or any rec- ommendation save his own modest worth, he waited and worked and grew up with the country. Far into the spring and
summer nights he listened to the vespers trilled by the frogs of a neighboring pond in a chorus whose melody was frequently broken by the bass notes of a green old croaker, and he was awake for the matin of the meadow-lark, which, like himself, was trying to make the wild prairie trib- utary to a rather lonesome existence. At first the infrequent visits of clients left him much time for reading and reflection, and all of the time was sedulously im- proved. In this way the young, inexpe- rienced lawyer was, perhaps unconscious- ly, building the broad substructure that sustained the high reputation of the judge of later years. He was patient withal, accepting the business of such clients as employed him and caring for their interests with perfect fidelity for moderate fees. He was self-supporting because he circumscribed his wants to the measure of his income. His practice grew with his acquaintance, until he knew all the taxpayers of the county and had more than one lawyer's share of their office business and litigation. The open- ing of the rebellion found him well estab- lished and confident of the future, but the first call of President Lincoln for volun- teers appealed to his patriotism and he enlisted for three months. He was eleet- ed first lieutenant of Company G, Ninth Regiment Indiana Volunteers, of which Robert H. Milroy, who soon afterwards, as General Milroy, won distinction in the West Virginia campaign, was captain. At the close of the period covered by his first enlistment he resumed the practice
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of law. His subsequent military service, honorable in all respects, is briefly sketched: In August, 1862, he assisted in raising Company A of the Eighty-sev- enth Indiana Volunteers and was elected and commissioned its captain. March 22, 1863, he rose to the rank of major, and November 21, of the same year to that of lieutenant-colonel. He remained con- tinnously at the front except a short time in 1863-4, when home recruiting volun- teers. On September 19 and 20, 1863, he participated in the battle of Chicka- mauga. In this battle his regiment went into action with 363 men and lost, in killed and wounded, 199, more than one- half its number. During the last year of the war he commanded his regiment, em- bracing one hundred days of incessant fighting from Chattanooga to Atlanta. He marched with Sherman to the sea and back through the Carolinas to Washing- ton. At the close of the war, upon the recommendation of his brigade, division and corps commanders, he was brevetted colonel in the United States Volunteers "for gallant and meritorious service dur- ing the war," as his commission reads. When the war was over he returned to his home in Rensselaer, and while gath- ering up the lost threads of his practice soon found his business largely increased. He was appointed in March, 1873, by Governor Hendricks to the office of Judge of the Thirtieth Judicial Circuit and was chosen at the next election to succeed himself. In 1878 he was re-elected with- out opposition and served until May,
1883, when Governor Porter appointed him Judge of the Supreme Court of the State vice Judge Woods, who was ap- pointed to the United States District Court. Nominated as the Republican candidate in 1884, he suffered defeat with the party and retired January 5, 1885, when his successor qualified. For the next five years he was in active practice with his son-in-law, Wm. B. Austin of Rensselaer, the firm being Hammond & Austin, with a larger and more valuable clientage. In 1890 he was again elected to the Circuit Bench, but resigned in An- gust, 1892, in order to form a partner- ship with Charles B. and William V. Stuart at La Fayette under the style of Stuart Brothers & Hammond. The only political office ever held by Judge Han- mond was representative in the State Legislature for the counties of Jasper, Stark and Pulaski. In June, 1892, Wa- bash College conferred on him the degree of LL. D., an honor worthily bestowed on account of his lawyer-like qualities and eminent service as a jurist. He married Miss Mary V. Spitler and has five chil- dren: Louise, wife of William B. Austin, of Rensselaer; Angela, wife of Edward A. Horner, of Leadville, Colorado; Edwin P., Jr., who is a graduate of the State University at Bloomington and of the Law Department of the same university. class of 1897; he is now a member of the firm of Stuart Bros. & Hammond; Jean, and Nina V. The writer of this biography has known Judge Hammond for about thirty years and is acquainted with
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Wm. H. Levering
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some of his characteristics. One of them is his modesty, amounting al- most to diffidence. He is singularly free from self-assertion, but is entirely capable of maintaining his rights under all circumstances. His geniality of man- ner is the natural expression of a gener- ous disposition. His urbanity is only the overflow of the deep well of human kind- ness and human sympathy, which make friendship valuable and fidelity a matter of course. He holds the confidence and esteem of the bar for his ability and his integrity. As judge of the trial court he was above the influences of partisanship or prejudice; was careful in construing the law, courteous and impartial in his treatment of the bar. As a member of the Supreme Court he was patient in the examination of all questions raised, clear and accurate in his judgment. His writ- ten opinions are not more remarkable for adequate and intelligent grasp of the subject matter involved than for com- pact, logical and perspicuous expression.
WILLIAM H. LEVERING.
In the old Chronicles of Croyland. which are accredited to Inglefus, secre- tary to William the Conqueror, it is af- firmed that in the year 870 a town in Cambridgeshire, England, was named Leverington, while in later English rec- ords-about 1316-appears the name of Levering as having emanated from that ancient town. In the "Levering Family
History and Genealogy," compiled by Colonel John Levering, is found an un- broken line of generation back to Rosier Levering, who, early in the seventeenth century, dwelt in the town of Ely, in Cambridgeshire. In 1685 a virile branch from this venerable family tree was graft- ed into American history in the person of Wigard Levering, from whom William H. is removed by six generations. Emni- grating from Gemen, province of West- phalia, Germany, to Philadelphia, he first purchased fifty acres of land in German township, now Germantown; then in 1691, bought a tract of five hundred acres between the Wissahickon creek and the Schuylkill river, embracing the whole of Manayunk, now a populous manufactur- ing section of Philadelphia, and a por- tion of Fairmount park. John Levering. the grandfather of our subject, was a na- tive of Roxboro, Philadelphia, and dur- ing the war of the Revolution was a com- missioned officer, being repeatedly pro- moted until he attained to the rank of major. His wife, nee Hannah Howell, was descended from the family of which Isaac Watts, "the immortal hymnolo- gist," was an unmarried member. Wil- liam Hagy Levering was born April 19, 1826, at Ardmore, near Philadelphia. His parents were Abraham and Catherine Hagy Levering, his father being a farmer and stock raiser, and by trade a butcher, with a market in the city. William at- tended public school at Ardmore until about fifteen then, together with his twin brother John, went to work in his
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father's market in Philadelphia. He also assisted with the farming, working with a will at whatever came in his way. In capacity for hard work he was like his father. Like him, also, he proved to be in the winning of universal respect and affection. He learned to handle tools skilfully, not to become a carpenter, but for the pleasure and convenience of mas- tering their use, and so thorough became. his knowledge along this line that he was later in life enabled to draw the plans for his residence and superintend its con- struction. In 1847 his father, with other members of the family, removed to a farm on the banks of the Schuylkill, opposite Manayunk, while he continued to reside in Ardmore until 1851, when he came West, having been preceded thither by his brother John. He located in La Fay- ette, Indiana, and, although inexperi- enced as a merchant, he established him- self in that vocation on the south side of the Square with a stock of hats, caps and ladies' furs, purchased from the Philadel- phia fırın of C. H. Garden (his brother- in-law) & Co. His was the pioneer "one- price store" of the State, and his busi- ness policy was ridiculed as a too radical departure from the good old custom of dickering over prices, at that time preva- lent throughout the West. But he con- fidently adhered to his methods and proved their success. He continued in the business for about five years, then sold out to his brother Abraham, by whom it is still carried on. He next en- tered into partnership with his twin
brother in the three-fold industry of real estate, civil engineering and fire insur- ance, he representing the Etna Insur- ance Company of Hartford, Connecticut. In 1868 he dissolved the partnership, dis- posing of his interest to his brother, by whom it is still conducted in the same place. The Ætna Company had, in 1857, originated State agencies, and William Levering became their first State agent in Indiana. During the previous year he had availed himself of a chance oppor- tunity to learn double-entry bookkeeping of a man who had come to La Fay- ette in search of pupils in that branch. His project for forming a class failed, but Mr. Levering agreed to take the course by correspondence. He kept his word, ap- plying himself to the study with his cus- tomary zeal and became a master of ac- counts, unaware of the extent to which this accomplishment was soon to serve him. In a single year with the Etna Company he showed so great an adapta- bility to the work that it was decided to send him out as an adjuster of claims. In this capacity he was steadily pro- moted, and his services were soon too val- uable to be monopolized by any one com- pany. Later on, indeed, he frequently represented several companies at once in fire-loss claims. Demands came from all quarters of the country for him to as- sume the management of cases in litiga- tion, and in the United States courts he distinguished himself at once for his tact and his justice. Where mere financial difference was the issue involved its ad-
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