USA > Indiana > Indiana and Indianans : a history of aboriginal and territorial Indiana and the century of statehood, Volume V > Part 44
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JAMES E. TAGGART, president of the Jef- ferson Township Public Library Board, is
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one of the oldest members of the Clark County bar from the point of continuous service, having begun practice at Jeffer- sonville thirty-four years ago.
Mr. Taggart was born at Charlestown, Clark County, July 1, 1858. His grand- father, James Taggart, and his great-grand- father, Samuel Taggart, were both born at Colerain, Ireland. The family came to America and settled in Southern Indiana in 1817, a year after Indiana became a state. James Taggart was born in 1799, and became a pioneer physician at Charles- town. He also followed farming. He died at Charlestown, Indiana, in 1879. His first wife was Alethea Childs. She died in Kentucky soon after the birth of her only son, Samuel C. For his second wife he married Miss Welch, and by that union had two children : Ann, who married Col- onel Samuel W. Simondson, an officer in the Union army during the Civil war, and Mary Ellen, who is unmarried and lives at New Albany, Indiana. Doctor Taggart married for his third wife Miss Bare. The children of that union were six in number. Amanda, wife of Samuel Brown, a mer- chant at Columbus, Kansas; Albert, a merchant who died at Wichita, Kansas: Alice M., wife of Dr. D. L. Field. one of the veteran physicians of Jeffersonville ; Willie John, a retired physician and sur- geon at New Albany ; James C., publisher of a newspaper at Dallas, Texas; and Mar- ens. who is in the abstract business in Kansas.
Samuel C. Taggart, father of James E., was born in Clark County, Kentucky, in 1828. His father moved to Clark County, Indiana, about 1833, and here he grew up and married. He graduated A. B. from Hanover College, Indiana, and took his degree in medicine from the Louisville Medical College. He was in regular prac- tice at Charlestown until 1880, and from 1880 to 1884 served as clerk of the Cir- cuit Court. He then lived retired four years, and from 1888 to 1895 was presi- dent of the First National Bank of Jeffer- sonville. He died at Charlestown. Indiana, February 2, 1901. Dr. Samuel C. Taggart was a stanch republican and a very ac- tive member of the Presbyterian Church. He married Cynthia E. McCampbell. She was born near Charlestown, Indiana, in 1833, and died there in 1895. There were
three children : Charles, who died in in- fancy ; James Edward; and Alethea Jane, who died at Charlestown in 1916, wife of Charles E. Lewis, now in the insurance business at Charlestown.
James Edward Taggart received his carly education in the public schools of Charlestown, and in 1879 graduated Bach- elor of Science from his father's alma ma- ter, Hanover College. He is a member of the Phi Delta Theta college fraternity. From 1880 to 1884 Mr. Taggart served as deputy clerk of the Circuit Court under his father. In 1885 he graduated LL. B. from the Union College of Law at Chicago, and entering upon the practice of law at Jeffersonville July 1st of the same year. Since then he has steadily maintained high prestige as an attorney, with a large gen- eral practice. Mr. Taggart is a member of the Presbyterian Church, an elder of the church, and clerk of its session. He is a republican, and in many ways has been actively identified with the community life of his home eity.
September 24, 1885, at Jeffersonville, Mr. Taggart married Miss Nettie B. Wines- burg. Her father, John P. Winesburg, was born in West Virginia in 1822 and came to Southern Indiana during the forties. For many years he was a merchant at Jef- fersonville, where he died in December, 1902. John P. Winesburg married Mag- dalena Kesserman. She was born in Switz- erland in 1828 and died at Jeffersonville in Angust, 1901.
Mr. and Mrs. Taggart have two children : Jennie W., a graduate of the Jeffersonville High School, lives at home. Samuel Clar- ence, also a graduate of the high school, is in the government service. employed at the government depot at Jeffersonville.
JEFFERSONVILLE TOWNSHIP PUBLIC LI- BRARY. One of the institutions of which Jeffersonville is most proud is its hand- some public library. As its name indi- cates, it is in a sense a continuation of one of the old township libraries established and maintained under the provisions of one of the older laws on the statute books of the state. However, in that condition it was of comparatively little benefit to the community which it was supposed to serve.
The present library is largely due to the individual efforts of Miss Hannah Zulnaf,
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a public spirited woman who was ably as- sisted by the women's literary clubs of the city. The movement was begun in 1887, and in a few months $1,200 had been raised. The culmination of the movement was delayed because of a technicality in the state law. This had to be surmounted by special legislation. On December 1, 1900, about 1,400 volumes and other prop- erty of the old Township Library were transferred to the new association, known as the Jeffersonville Township Public Li- brary, and from that date the institution of today may be said to have existed.
At the organization of the library in its present form Bertha F. Poindexter was chosen librarian, and has worked earnestly for its upbuilding. Miss Poindexter is a native of Jeffersonville, was educated in the public schools, and also attended Bor- den' Academy and the Library School at Indianapolis. The library was originally located over the Citizens National Bank, but in January, 1905, it occupied the new building in Warder Park. This is one of the handsomest library buildings of the state, and is constructed of Bedford stone in the style of the Italian Renaissance. The library contains 10,000 vohunes, classified according to the Dewey Decimal System, and from the first the volumes have been accessible to the public on the "open shelf" plan, except the volumes of fiction.
Miss Poindexter is a member of the Methodist Church and a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution. She is a member of an American family long distinguished for patriotism and all those valuable qualities of citizenship now so much emphasized. She is a daughter of Gabriel and Mary F. (Willey) Poindex- ter. In the maternal line she is descended from Barzillai Willey, who fought as a sol- dier in the Revolution with a Connecticut regiment. His son, John F. Willey, was born in June, 1809, where the City of Cin- cinnati now stands. The following year the family removed to Clark County, In- diana, coming down the Ohio in flat boats and landing at Jeffersonville.
The Poindexters came from Lonisa County, Virginia, a year or two before the Willeys. The Poindexters were for many generations in the Old Dominion. Clevias S. Poindexter was with a Virginia regi- ment in the Revolutionary war. Gabriel
Poindexter and wife had nine children : Fountain W., who was cashier of the Citi- zens National Bank of Jeffersonville and died in 1902; Charles Edgar, whose career is sketched in more detail in following par- agraphs ; Harry C., a lawyer, former judge of the City Court of Jeffersonville and now superintendent of the Government Depot at Jeffersonville ; Miss Bertha F .; Mary A., who died in 1907, wife of Dr. E. L. Elrod, a physician and surgeon at Henryville, In- diana, now deceased; Frank C., a letter carrier at Indianapolis; and three other children that died in infancy.
Charles Edgar Poindexter, president of the Citizens Trust Company of Jefferson- ville, had his first business training after leaving school in the Adams Express Com- pany at Jeffersonville. During eight years he was for a greater part of the time agent for the company. For six years he was connected with the Louisville and Cincin- nati Mail Boat Line, part of the time as cashier and agent at Louisville. Then for eight years he was freight agent for the Pennsylvania Railroad at Jeffersonville, and in 1893 entered the Citizens National Bank at Jeffersonville as cashier. He has remained with that institution continu- ously during its present existence as the Citizens Trust Company, and in all posi- tions, including that of president, has served the institution well, and its pros- perity is largely a reflection of his per- sonal oversight and direction.
In 1884 Mr. Poindexter married Ophelia Read, of Port Fulton. Her father, John F. Read, was born at Washington in Dav- iess County, Indiana, October 4, 1822, was educated at Hanover College, and studied law with the noted Humphrey Marshall, of the same family as Chief Justice Marshall. He distinguished himself as a lawyer. He was also a member of the Legislature one term, and for eight years was in tho United States Land Office at Jeffersonville. At one time he served as president of the Ford Plate Glass Company at Jefferson- ville, and as president of the Citizens Na- tional Bank. In 1840 Mr. Read married Eliza Keigwin, who died in 1852, the mother of one child. Mr. Read married in 1855 Eliza Pratt. She became the mother of nine children, Mrs. Charles E. Poindex- ter being the oldest.
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Charles E. Poindexter has one son, James Edgar, now cashier of the Citizens Trust Company. Mr. Poindexter is affiliated with Clark Lodge No. 40, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, with the Royal Arch Chapter No. 66, and Commandery No. 27, Knights Templar. He is a member of the Presbyterian Church.
WILLIAM H. ENGLISH. Politically the high tide of the power and prestige of William Hayden English came during the tremendously vital decade of the '50s, when the destiny of the nation, as it is again to- day, was in the hands of the democratic party. William H. English during those years was an acknowledged leader of the Indiana democracy, and undoubtedly one of the strongest and clearest minds among the "Northern Democrats" in the Na- tional Congress of those years. Only those familiar with the history of that decade can understand and appreciate this phase of the career of William H. English. In the recollections of older men of the pres- ent generation his fame chiefly rests upon the fact that late in life he was drawn from his quiet business activities at In- dianapolis and made a candidate for vice president of the United States. In a busi- ness way William H. English was for many years a prominent banker of Indianapolis, and his fortune was so used in the up- building of the city that various monu- ments to his business enterprise are mat- ters of daily familiar association with the life of the people.
The breadth and variety of his interests and achievements can be best understood. from a straightforward narrative of his career. But first something should be said concerning his honorable ancestry, and particularly of his parents.
His great-great-grandfather was James English, a son of Thomas English. James came to America about 1700, locating near Laurel, Delaware. The line of de- scent is carried through his son James, the latter's son Elisha English to Elisha Gale, who was the father of William H. English. Elisha English was a native of Delaware and married Sarah Wharton, a native of the same state and a daughter of Capt. Revel Wharton, who commanded an Amer- ican privateer during the Revolution, was captured in action, and died on board an English prison ship. Elisha and Sarah
Wharton English removed to Kentucky in 1792, and in 1830, late in life, went to Greene County, Illinois, where they lived among their children. They died in ad- vanced age, after a married companionship of more than fifty years. All their fourteen children grew up and married and had chil- dren of their own before this venerable couple died, at which time their descend- ants numbered about 200.
The founder of the family in Indiana was Maj. Elisha Gale English, who was born in Kentucky and removed to Scott County, Indiana, in 1818. He located there only a few years after the Indian massacre known as the Pigeon Roost massacre. He had an important part in the making of the early history of Indiana, and his name was known and respected over a wide terri- tory. He was especially prominent in the formation of the early laws and institutions of the state. His residence was always in Scott County, though the closing years of his life were spent in Indianapolis with his son William H., where he died November 14, 1874. He was for several terms sheriff of Scott County and for nearly a score of years had an almost continuous service as a member of either the Indiana House of Representatives or the Senate. He was also at one time United States marshal for the District of Indiana.
Major English married Mahala Eastin. She was a native of Kentucky, one of the seventeen children of Lieut. Philip and Sarah (Smith) Eastin. Her ancestry is a notable one. She was a direct descend- ant of Louis DuBois, the Huguenot paten- tee and colonist of the Kingston and New Palz districts in the State of New York. Another ancestor was Jost Hite, who estab- lished the first settlement west of the Blue Ridge Mountains in Virginia, where he re- ceived from King George II a grant of more than 100,000 acres of land upon which he located his colony of fellow Ger- man emigrants from the province of Alsace. Of this branch of the family Wil- liam H. English was in the fifth generation from Col. John Hite, who served as an officer in the Colonial forces prior to the Revolution. After the Declaration of In- . dependence he became a member of the first Board of Justices of Frederick County, Virginia, and administered the oath of al- legiance to the other members. Lieut. Philip Eastin, father of Mahala Eastin, was
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an officer in the Fourth and Eighth Vir- ginia Regiments in the Revolution, serving until the end of the war. His wife's father, Capt. Charles Smith, saw service as an offi- cer under George Washington, then a colo- nel, in the French and Indian wars, and was severely wounded at the battle of Great Meadows.
To be well born has always been "ac- counted a blessing, and that was the first distinction of William Hayden English. At his father's home near Lexington, Scott County, Indiana, he first saw the light of day August 27, 1822. The development of his early character was formulated by many influences, perhaps least of which were the primitive district schools he at- tended. Still more important were the rugged ideals upheld at home by his hon- ored father and gentle minded mother, and the various men of prominence in that sec- tion of Indiana whom as a boy he heard discuss the various questions of the day, Besides the public schools he attended for three years Hanover College. After leav- ing college he acquired a few law books, and showed such powers of concentrated study and assimilation that at the age of eighteen he proved himself eligible under the .strict examination then required and was admitted to the bar with the privilege of practicing in the Circuit Court. Soon afterward he applied to the Supreme Court for examination, and was admitted to practice before that tribunal. While the law did not become a permanent profession, it is said that "he possessed a mind noted for its logie and clearness of reason, and his marked success at the bar could not but have been assured had he chosen to remain in that profession." For a short time he was associated in his profession with the famous Joseph G. Marshall. His ambitions were always in the line of politics. For four years he filled a position in a depart- ment at Washington, and that practically marked his divorce from law practice. Be- fore he was of age he was chosen a delegate from Scott County to the Democratic State Convention which nominated Gen. T. A. Howard for governor. He rode to the capi- tal city on horseback. When Tyler became president Mr. English was made postmas- ter of his home town of Lexington, then the county seat of Scott County. In 1843 ·he was chosen principal clerk of the Lower House of the Legislature. At the end of
the session he precipitated himself with all the vigor and enthusiasm of his youth into the presidential campaign in which Henry Clay and James K. Polk were the rival candidates. He took the stump in behalf of Polk, and after the latter's election was appointed to a position in the treasury de- partment at Washington. In 1848 he proved a vigorous opponent of General Taylor, and on the day before the latter's inauguration as president sent to President Polk a vigorous letter of resignation which was copied by the press all over the coun- try. Among the delegates to the Demo- cratie National Convention of 1848 were the father of Mr. English, his uncle, Revel W. English, and two other uncles. It was in that convention he met Samuel J. Tilden, that being the beginning of a friendship which existed until the death of Mr. Til- den. While clerk of the claims committee in the United States Senate in 1850 Mr. English listened to the famous speeches made by Webster, Benton, Calhoun, Cass and Clay, speeches that have become clas- sies in American political oratory.
In the Constitutional Convention of October, 1850, Mr. English was elected sec- retary, and later was delegated to supervise the publication of the Constitution, the Journals and Addresses. All these activi- ties and experiences came to him before he was thirty years of age. In 1851 his native county sent him to the State Legislature, and he thus served during the first session after the adoption of the new constitution and enjoyed many of the heaviest responsi- bilities and honors in connection with the program of legislation which was made necessary by the new constitution. He was nominated for speaker of the House, being defeated by nine votes by John W. Davis, a former speaker of the National House of Representatives and later a minister to China. In a short time a disagreement arose between the speaker and the House, resulting in the resignation of Mr. Davis, and Mr. English was chosen his successor. It is said that during the term of three months as speaker not a single appeal was taken from his decisions.
William H. English was elected to Con- gress from his Indiana district in October, 1852. Thus his service as a national legis- lator began with the administration of President Pierce. Of the Thirty-third Con- gress, which ended in 1854, Mr. English
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was the last survivor of the two senators and eleven members of the House constitut- ing the Indiana delegation. It was during that session that the famous Kansas-Ne- braska bill was introduced into the House. Mr. English was a member of the commit- tee on territories, to which this bill was re- ferred. He drew up the minority report, and it is said that the amendments which he advocated led to important modifications of the bill as it was finally adopted. At that time Mr. English was a pronounced champion of the popular sovereignty idea, which has been so prominently associated with the name of Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois. The issue of slavery was involved in practically every measure that came before Congress during that and following sessions. The position of Mr. English in this respect was marked by a studied conservatism, so that he probably found favor neither with the radical aboli- tionists nor with the fire eaters from the South. His attitude can best be expressed in his own words found in the Congres- sional Record of that period: "I am a native of a free state and have no love for the institution of slavery. Aside from the moral question involved I regard it as an injury to the state where it exists, and if it were proposed to introduce it where I reside I would resist it to the last ex- tremity." Those familiar with the history of the period will recall the storm of abuse which fell upon the champions of the Kansas-Nebraska bill. Mr. English was one of the three representatives from a free state who secured re-election as cham- pions of that bill. Furthermore, at that time he was one of the most determined op- ponents of the Know Nothing issue and party in American politics, and is credited with having done as much as any other in- dividual in the nation to bring about the downfall of that element or faction. At the close of his second term Mr. English did not become a candidate for renomina- tion, but in the District Convention, after a long drawn-out contest, was given a unan- imous nomination for a third term, and he was re-elected by a larger majority than ever before. At the beginning of his third term he was made chairman of the com- mittee on postoffices and post roads. Dur- ing this term the Kansas question was the most acute interest before Congress, and here again Mr. English's attitude was that
of the moderate and conservative democrat. He consistently opposed the admission of Kansas under the LeCompton Constitu- tion unless it were adopted by a fair and full vote of the people, as it had not been when first submitted. Mr. English was author of the bill known in Kansas and national history as the "English Bill," which provided for the resubmission of the LeCompton Constitution to a fair and full vote of the people of that territory. When that vote was taken under the law the con- stitution was decisively defeated.
Political careers were made and unmade with astonishing rapidity in the decade before the Civil war, and it is indicative of the confidence felt in Mr. English's char- acter and abilities that he was re-elected for a fourth term, and was in continuous service from 1853 until practically the outbreak of the Civil war. He was also while at Washington a regent of the Smith- sonian Institute for eight years, had much to do with controlling the finances of the institution, and rendered many other valu- able services. President Buchanan also of- fered him high honors of appointive posi- tion, which he declined. Similar favors were also tendered him later by President Johnson and declined.
In 1860 Mr. English was a member of the National Campaign Committee of the democratic party. Though not a delegate, he attended the National Convention at Charleston, South Carolina, where he used every possible means at his command to reconcile the opposing elements of the North and South. Concerning this period of his career another biographer has said : "His efforts, however, as well as all efforts of all peacemakers in those troublous times were unavailing and the distinguished In- dianan returned to Washington sadly de- pressed at heart. While in this state of feeling he made a memorable speech in Congress touching the existing state of af- fairs. In it he predicted that the rank and file of the democratic party would never forgive, and asserted that it ought never to forgive, those who had heedlessly precipitated that state of affairs upon the country. He denounced secession from the beginning and exerted every possible measure to induce Southern members to abandon it. Speaking for his own constit- uents in Indiana he asserted that they would "march under the flag and keep step
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to the music of the Union." Seeing only a bloody conflict ahead at this time, he de- termined to retire from active participa- tion as an official, and in conformity with his expressed wishes his successor, who was a close personal friend, was chosen in his stead. He took no active part in the war, but was at all times a firm and consistent supporter of the Union cause. He was offered command of a regiment by Gover- nor Morton, but declined. He was a dele- gate to the Democratic State Convention in 1861. He supported Gen. George B. McClellan for president in 1864, and was one of the most powerful friends of Sam- uel J. Tilden in the presidential campaign of 1876. Later he served a term as chair- man of the Democratic State Central Com- mittee. In June, 1880, from what amounted to practically political retire- ment, Mr. English was called by his unani- mons nomination for vice president of the United States. The official notification of his nomination was delivered to him at the home of Gen. Winfield Scott Hancock, the presidential nominee, on July 13, and on the 30th of the month he accepted the nomi- nation in a vigorous letter that formed the keynote of the campaign. It was the com- bination of the names Hancock and English during the presidential campaign of that year that brought Mr. English his widest political fame outside of his native state.
Long before he undertook the respon- sibilities of this campaign Mr. English had become one of the foremost business men and financiers of Indianapolis. A capacity for the effective handling of business and financial affairs distinguished him from his early manhood forward. His business life was characterized by absolute standards of honesty, and he exacted from himself the same systematic and careful efficiency which he demanded of others. He was one of the men who brought about the organi- zation and incorporation of th First Na- tional Bank of Indianapolis in 1863. Soon afterward his business interests caused him to remove from Scott County to Indian- anolis. He was president of the First Na- tional Bank fourteen years, and during that time its capital stock was increased to a million dollars. He also served as presi- dent of the Indianapolis Clearing House Association and the Indianapolis Banking Association, and acquired a controlling interest in the local street railroad system.
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