USA > Indiana > Marion County > Indianapolis > Sketches of prominent citizens of 1876 : with a few of the pioneers of the city and county who have passed away > Part 45
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Prof. Cox is not only a geologist of large experience acquired by personal surveys and explorations extending over a period of more than twenty-four years, but he is likewise a practical analytical chemist, hav- ing obtained a knowledge of this important adjunct to the geologist by eight years of analytical labor in the extensive and well appointed la- boratory of Dr. David Dale Owen at New Harmony.
It is with no little pride that in looking back over the many geolog- ical opinions he has been called upon to give, some of which involved the expenditure of large sums of money, there has not been an instance where the parties who sought his professional advice could say that he had deceived them. He is in good standing with the geologists at home and abroad, and bears the reputation of being an accurate geological ob- server. Of five children, one son and four daughters, three died while infants. The third daughter married Dr. A. D. Jones, now of Newport, Kentucky, but only lived a few months to enjoy her happiness. The fourth and youngest daughter is living and grown to womanhood.
REV. JAMES COOLEY FLETCHER.
Mr. Fletcher is the eldest son of the late Calvin Fletcher, and was born in Indianapolis on the 15th of April, 1823, in the first frame building erected in the capital of Indiana; the building was constructed by James Paxton and owned by James Blake. It stood on the south side of Washington between Illinois and Tennessee streets, where is now the stove store of Robert L. McOuat. After studying in the various
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REV. JAMES COOLEY FLETCHER.
schools of the time kept by Thomas D. Gregg, Rev. W. Holliday and the elder Kemper, young Fletcher was sent to Phillips Academy, Exe- ter, New Hampshire, where he prepared for college. He then entered Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, where he graduated in 1846.
In 1847, having devoted himself to the ministry, he entered the Theological Seminary at Princeton, New Jersey ; there he studied two years under the Alexanders and Dr. Hodge. In 1849 he went to Europe, studied first at Paris, and completed his theological education at Geneva, Switzerland, under Dr. Merle d'Aubigne, the historian of the Reformation. In 1851, after several months sojourn in the United States, he went to Rio de Janeiro, the capital of Brazil, where he had been appointed chaplain of the American and Foreign Christian Union and the Seaman's Friend Society. In 1852 he was nominated United States Secretary of Legation at Rio de Janeiro, a position which he held until 1853, when he declined a re-appointment, when offered him by the Hon. William Trousdale, United States Minister Plenipotentiary to Bra- zil during the administration of President Pierce. In 1854 he returned to the United States via the Straits of Magellan and the Isthmus of Panama, having visited Chili on the way. In 1855 he returned to Bra- zil and traveled three thousand miles in that country while laboring for the distribution of the Bible. In 1856, having left Brazil on account of the health of his family, he again took up his residence in the United States, and in 1857, in connection with the Rev. Dr. Kidder, published a work entitled Brazil and the Brazilians, which has gone through no less than eight editions, being widely circulated in America, England and Brazil. In the autumn of 1857 he was elected to the chair of modern languages in Bowdoin College, Brunswick, Maine, a position once occu- pied by the poet Longfellow. This honor he declined and for a number of years was engaged in preaching and lecturing. In the years 1862- 63-64-65 and 1868 he made extensive tours in Brazil in connection with religious and philanthropic matters and succeeded in 1865 in bringing about a closer connection between Brazil and the United States. In 1869 he was appointed United States Consul to Oporto, in Portugal. He resided in Portugal four years, having entered into an engagement with the Harper Brothers, of New York, to prepare a work on Pompeii. Mr. Fletcher spent the next four years in Naples, Italy, so that he might make a study of Mount Vesuvius and Pompeii which are near that city.
In the winter and spring of 1875 Mr. Fletcher, in company with his
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brother Calvin and invalid brother Stoughton, traveled through Egypt, the Holy Land, Western Syria, Turkey in Europe and Greece. In the summer of 1877 he returned to his native place and has spent several months with his many relatives in and near Indianapolis.
Mr. Fletcher began his literary career in 1846 as a correspondent of the Providence (Rhode Island) Journal and one of the Boston dailies. It was in that year and the beginning of 1847, that he contributed to the Indiana Journal, then owned and edited by John D. Defrees, a series of articles entitled Indianapolis a Quarter of a Century Ago. He was also the first to introduce a distinct column of local items. During his first sojourn in Europe he wrote regularly for the New York Observer, in addition to writing for other journals. In thirty years of his life, be- sides writing for newspapers already named, he has at different times been a regular correspondent for the New York Evening Post, the New York Journal of Commerce, the Boston Daily Journal, the Boston Transcript and several other papers. He has also contributed occa- sionally to the North American Review, the Atlantic Monthly, Harper's Weekly, the New York Times, the Boston Watchman and Reflector, and various English journals.
His lectures have been delivered in the principal States of the Union, in the Dominion of Canada, in England, France and Portugal. Our citizens will remember his lectures in this city the past summer on Pompeii for the benefit of different benevolent institutions of the city. Mr. Fletcher has visited nearly all the renowned places of Europe and South America, and I might say the world, and has seen many wonder- ful sights of both art and nature. His thirst for knowledge no doubt impelled him to his Herculean labors. Indianapolis should feel justly proud of having in the person of her third born such a man as Mr. Fletcher. He has seen much of the world; was it "all that his fancy pictured it?"
MILES J. FLETCHER.
Mr. Fletcher was born in Indianapolis on the 18th of June, 1828, and received a common English education in his native town. He then entered Brown University, at Providence, Rhode Island, and there grad- uated in 1852. He was soon after elected professor of history and belles lettres in Asbury University at Greencastle, Indiana, and resigned that high position in 1854. In 1857 he graduated at the Dane law school, at Cambridge, and was re-elected to the professorship in the Asbury University in July of the same year.
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THOMAS B. BUCHANAN.
In 1860 he was induced to become a candidate for superintendent of public instruction on the Republican ticket and was elected over Sam- uel L. Rugg, by 1,700 majority over the balance of the ticket, which eloquently proclaimed his great popularity with the people. Mr. Fletcher's literary attainments were of the highest order ; his scholarly acquirements were patent to all Indianians, and for that reason he was selected to fill that high and honorable position. In importance that office is next to the chief executive of the State, and really requires more profound learning and ability. To take charge of the great edu- cational interests of such a State as Indiana requires talent of no ordin- ary character.
No person that ever knew Mr. Fletcher could for a moment doubt his ability to fill any position he should be called to. He was a man of a large and generous heart, and could not witness sorrow or suffering without doing something to alleviate it. By one of those inscrutible decrees of Providence he was doomed to be stricken down in the midst of his usefulness. He was killed by a railroad accident on the Evans- ville and Vincennes road, at Sullivan, Indiana, in May, 1862, while trav- eling in discharge of his public duties, and
" Sleeps the sleep that knows not breaking, Morn of toil nor night of waking."
Mr. Fletcher was the third son of the late Calvin Fletcher, and brother of that eminent lecturer, the Rev. James Cooley Fletcher, whose reputation is world-wide; he was also the brother of the late Elijah Fletcher, and of Mr. Ingram, Stephen K., Stoughton A., Jun., Calvin, Albert and Dr. Wm. B. Fletcher. His family are residents of this city. One of his sons bears the name of his grandfather, Calvin Fletcher.
THOMAS B. BUCHANAN.
Mr. Buchanan was born near Waveland, Montgomery county, Indi- ana, June 22, 1841. His father, Alexander Buchanan, removed to Montgomery county from Tennessee in the year 1828 and settled in the woods and has lived on the same spot of ground ever since. Mr. Buchanan was educated at the Waveland Collegiate Institute. In April, 1861, he entered the army as a musician for company G 11th regiment Indiana volunteer infantry and served during the first four months of the war.
Mr. Buchanan was married November 27, 1863, at St. Peter, Min-
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nesota, to a daughter of Horatio T. Wakefield, formerly a resident and prosperous merchant of Putnamville, Putnam county, Indiana. After his marriage he returned to Indiana and engaged in the drug business at Attica, Fountain county, in the winter of 1864-5, where he remained until June, 1872, when he became associated with the proprietor of the Lafayette Courier, in the conduct of that prosperous journal.
Immediately after the Independent Greenback State Convention of June, 1874, he removed to Indianapolis and took charge of the Sun, the organ of the new movement, as editor-in chief, which position he still retains. He was secretary of the first national committee of the Inde- pendent party and in that position and as editor of the Sun probably did more than any other one individual to organize and bring forward the Independent Greenback party which cut so important a figure in the State and Presidential elections of 1876, with Peter Cooper and Samuel F. Cary as its candidates. Mr. Buchanan was one of the electors at large for the State. He is a forcible and fluent public speaker, and a bold, aggressive, argumentative writer. The political movement with which he is identified owes whatever prominence and strength it has acquired to the able advocacy of its principles by the Indianapolis Sun, which ranks as one of the foremost political journals of the time.
CHRISTIAN FREDERICK SCHMIDT.
Mr. Schmidt was born in the city of Birkenfeld, Saxony, on the 23₫ of November, 1830, and there received a fair German education. In the year 1849 he emigrated to the United States and settled in Cin- cinnati, Ohio. While a resident of the latter city he was married to Miss Caroline, daughter of Mr. John Fieber, a well-known German cit- izen of that place. In 1860 he removed to Indianapolis and built the extensive brewery on McCarty street at the south end of Alabama.
Mr. Schmidt represented the seventh ward in the common council four years and no representative of that ward was ever more watchful or jealous of the rights of their constituents than the subject of this sketch; it was there the writer learned much of his true devotion to the interest of the city. The twelve years of his life while a citizen of Ind- ianapolis were exceedingly prosperous.
Mr. Schmidt died on the 3d of February, 1872, since which time his wife has successfully managed the immense business inaugurated by her husband ; part of the time she was aided by her brother, William Fieber. he died in August, 1874, leaving her, with the help of employes, the
Cet och nicht,
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JEHIEL BARNARD.
sole management. In 1875 she added about twenty thousand dollars improvement in the way of vaults, cellars, etc. An idea of her im- mense business may be formed by the fact that last year she paid out for ice between eleven and twelve thousand dollars.
Mrs. Schmidt is yet in the prime of life, being. only about forty years of age, with a healthy constitution and bids fair to double the years already attained. She is rather above the medium size, brunette complexion, and would be taken for French rather than German descent. She has but three children, all sons, two of whom she accompanied to Germany last year, where she left them to be educated; the third is living under the maternal roof. Although Mrs. Schmidt is very wealthy, owning over one square of ground, she is unostentatious and preposess- ing in her manners, and seems devoted to her business and the interest of her children.
JEHIEL BARNARD.
Prominent among the business men of Indianapolis is the gentleman whose name stands at the head of this sketch. Mr. Barnard is a native of that beautiful and prosperous inland city, Rochester, New York, and there resided until he had attained his majority. His father, the late Jehiel Barnard, of Rochester, was one of the early citizens of that city, and was the first person married within its limits. He was a relative of that eminent and distinguished lawyer and statesman of western New York, the Hon. Daniel D. Barnard, who for many years represented the Rochester district in the Congress of the United States.
In the year 1847 Jehiel Barnard removed to New York city and en- gaged in the wholesale hardware business, and there continued until his removal to Indianapolis in the fall of 1855, when he, in connection with his father-in-law (Mr. Joseph Farnsworth, formerly of Madison, Indi- ana), engaged in this city in the manufacture of railway cars, and con- tinued in that business until 1860.
Mr. Farnsworth is at this time a resident of Chicago, Illinois, having retired from active business with a large fortune, the reward of his youthful energy and industry.
Mr. Barnard was elected secretary of the Indianapolis Chamber of Commerce at its first organization in 1863, which position he held up to 1876; and it may be truthfully said that it is mainly to his personal ef- forts in its behalf that that organization has become one of the perma- nent institutions of the city. He is at this time engaged in fire insur- ance and does a large share of that business in this city.
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The first and early settlers of Indianapolis were very much preju- diced against people hailing from the eastern States, all of whom they called Yankees without regard to the locality they were from. It is mainly to Yankee enterprise, and such Yankees as Mr. Barnard, that Indianapolis is what it is to-day, one of the most prosperous cities in the Mississippi valley, and if the eastern States have any more such men to spare we will welcome them to citizenship.
Mr. Barnard is a gentleman of untiring energy and industry, just in the prime of life, with a vigorous constitution, and bids fair for many years of public usefulness, with a good address and pleasing manners, and has, since he became a citizen of Indianapolis, made many warm personal friends.
GENERAL ABEL D. STREIGHT.
General Streight was born in Wheeler, Steuben county, New York, on the 17th of June, 1829; his father was a farmer in good circumstances and was extensively known as a thorough-going, industrious and honest man, and taught the subject of this sketch habits of industry and econ- omy ; his educational advantages were confined to what was then called a common school education. At the age of seventeen Mr. Streight bought his time of his father and commenced working at the carpenter business; at the age of twenty he was an extensive contractor and builder and was known as a first class mechanic and who would com- plete a job according to contract. About the same time he engaged in the lumber business and soon gave up the trade of a carpenter and followed the former exclusively until 1857, at which time he sold out and engaged in map and book publishing.
In the spring of 1858 he emigrated to the west and made his head- quarters at Cincinnati, Ohio, and remained there until 1859, when he came to Indianapolis and continued in the publishing business until the beginning of the war. He was then authorized by Governor Morton to recruit the 5 Ist regiment of Indiana volunteers .. The first burst of en- thusiasm had passed and no bounty was offered, hence it cost much money and perseverence to induce persons to enlist. After great diffi- ties in getting the regiment made up he was commissioned colonel on the 4th of September, 1861. While in camp good discipline was main- tained and Colonel Streight was highly complimented therefor. In December, 1861, the regiment was ordered to report to General Buell at Louisville, Kentucky, and was attached to the army of the Ohio,
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GENERAL ABEL D. STREIGHT.
afterwards known as the army of the Cumberland, and the regiment participated in the marches and battles of that celebrated army up to and including the battle of Stone River. Soon after this battle Colonel Streight was selected to take command of the Provisional Brigade and to proceed by steamers down the Cumberland river to the Ohio and then up the Tennessee to Eastport, Mississippi, thence across the States of Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia, in their march destroying the re- sources of the enemy, and with orders, if possible, to break railroad communication in the rear of the rebel army. After many days of con- tinuous marching and fighting the officers and men of the whole com- mand became worn out, their ammunition exhausted, and it became necessary to surrender to overwhelming numbers in the midst of the enemy's country. Colonel Streight with what remained of the com- mand became prisoners of war, and were sent to Richmond, Virginia, and the officers confined in Libby Prison.
Colonel Streight was the object of especial hate by all rebeldom, he having led the first raid into the heart of their country, liberating slaves and destroying such property as could be of service to the enemy. The colonel was ironed and confined in the dungeon, and lived on corn bread and water for thirty days for attempting to escape. After his release from the dungeon he planned a scheme by which one hundred and nine officers escaped from that doleful prison on the 9th of February, 1864, through a tunnel from the east basement of the prison across the street to the building east of the prison. Colonel Streight and Captains Scarce and Sterling and Lieutenant-Colonel McDonald agreed to stand by each other and either get through to the Union lines or die together.
Colonel Streight had notified a Union lady in Richmond, Mrs. Abbie Green, that he would be out of Libby Prison on a certain night and was directed by her to go to a certain negro shanty. After he had safely arrived at the negro quarters, Mrs. Green was sent for and she conducted them to the home of Mr. Quarles, a good Union man, where Colonel Streight and his friends remained one week, armed with a pair of navy revolvers each. The four started at night for the Union lines. The whole country was picketed, but by avoiding roads and traveling through the woods and crossing difficult streams they reached the Rappahannock river near Tappahannock. Here they were discovered by the aid of dogs. They gave the animals their last rations in order to keep them quiet ; it was good for the dogs and they were satisfied, but it left Colo- nel Streight and his three companions destitute of everything except their revolvers, ammunition and stout and determined hearts. They
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went to a negro hnt at night and there remained next day while the negroes were with their masters hunting the Yankees. The negroes discovered a boat and helped them across the river the next night, and after twelve days and nights of great labor and suffering they reached friends on the Potomac river about ninety miles below Washington City.
Colonel Streight returned and took command of his regiment in May, 1864, then at Chattanooga, Tennessee, (the privates having been exchanged). General Steadman, then in command of that military district, tendered the command of the post to Colonel Streight, who promptly declined and requested to be assigned to active duty ; this request was granted. The rebel General Wheeler had reached the rear of the Union army and laid seige to Dalton, Georgia. Colonel Streight was sent with three brigades to relieve the garrison at that point. The battle was short and decisive, the rebels defeated. Then followed an active campaign against Wheeler's command, which was finally driven across the Tennessee river, near Florence, Alabama.
From the time of the battle with Wheeler, at Dalton, to the time he was driven across the Tennessee river, Colonel Streight had com- mand of a division of troops. Some three or four thousand in number had to be fed in a country already nearly stripped of the common ne- cessaries of life, but through a thorough system of foraging he suc- ceeded in furnishing his command with the substantials of life, and not a few of the luxuries which had been stored by the more wealthy rebels. About this time General Sherman broke camp and started on his march to the sea, and General Thomas was ordered to take charge of the rebel General Hood. Colonel Streight was assigned to the command of the first brigade of the general division of the 4th army corps. Colonel Streight says the brigade consisted of five regiments of as good troops as could be found in the army, and was assigned the post of honor in covering the rear of our army, both on the day of the battle of Frank- lin and in the movements of the army the night after that celebrated battle. At the battle of Nashville Colonel Streight's brigade did noble service and suffered the loss of over one third of its numbers in killed and wounded. Colonel Streight was promoted by President Lincoln to brig- adier general, by brevet, for gallant and meritorious services on that oc- casion. At the end of the war General Streight resumed the publish- ing business, and also engaged in the wholesale walnut lumber business, and is now, probably, the largest dealer in that kind of lumber in the United States. General Streight has been successful in securing a com- petency of this world's goods.
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GENERAL ABEL D. STREIGHT.
In politics General Streight commenced as a Republican and can- vassed his native county in the interest of General Fremont for Presi- dent in 1856, this being the first Presidential vote he ever cast ; he also was active in the interest of Abraham Lincoln in 1860. In February, 1861, when the rebels were threatening war, and the people were di- vided as to what course to pursue, General Streight wrote and published a pamphlet called The Crisis, advocating a settled purpose to maintain our government even though war should be the result. About this time, February, 1861, the Hon. Robert Dale Owen delivered an address in the hall of the House of Representatives, advocating peace and a compromise with the rebels, and no one seemed willing to advocate the cause of the government. Thus matters stood for a week, when Gen- eral Streight asked permission of the House for the use of the hall to answer Mr. Owen, which was granted, and General Streight, compara- tively a stranger, made a stirring and patriotic speech, to a crowded house, in favor of a firm, vigorous and dignified course by our govern- ment, and the duty of our citizens to preserve our institutions intact as handed down by our forefathers.
Whether the action and firm stand taken by Governor Morton, Gen- eral Streight and others at this critical period had the effect to unite the people and prepare them for the great struggle that followed, history must answer. As the time approached for Mr. Lincoln to assume the duties of President the uncertainity as to what course he would pursue caused considerable anxiety among the active thinking Republicans of the country. Representatives of the press had interviewed Mr. Lin- coln without obtaining any intimation of the course he would pursue with the States already in rebellion. Messrs. Seward, Greeley, Chase, and other leading statesmen had visited him without gaining any infor- mation on the important subject which they could or would give to the people, and finally, on the Thursday before Mr. Lincoln started for Washington, Governor Morton gave General Streight a letter of intro- duction to Mr. Lincoln. General Streight proceeded at once to Spring- field, and found the city overrun with office-seekers who were besieging Mr. Lincoln at his office and house, and on the streets, or wherever he might be found. With his usual determination General Streight deter- mined to have a private interview with the incoming President, conse- quently, he addressed a letter to Mr. Lincoln, stating that he wished a private interview, and, also, that his business was not office-seeking. This note he gave to a young colored man with instructions to give it to Mr. Lincoln in person, and in a short time the young man returned
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