The Biographical encyclopaedia of Kentucky of the dead and living men of the nineteenth century, Part 93

Author: Armstrong, J. M., & company, pub
Publication date: 1878
Publisher: Cincinnati, J. M. Armstrong
Number of Pages: 946

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BIOGRAPHICAL ENCYCLOPÆDIA.

of the Board of Councilmen of that town, for several successive terms; was elected to the responsible position of mayor, conducting the affairs of the office in a manner reflecting the greatest credit upon himself. He also took an active interest in different societies relating to matters connected with his profession. He is well known as an accomplished and versatile writer, his style being ani- mated and pungent. He has on various occasions been a contributor to the public press; his articles creating great interest and causing wide-spread comment. He has contributed a considerable number of entertaining and instructive articles to the medical press of the country, and is widely known in the profession. He has also made a good reputation as a writer on religious topics; having on different occasions furnished a num- ber of spirited articles to the religious press, which attracted general attention. He was married, in 182.1, to Miss Barbara Graves, by whom he had ten children. Losing his first wife in 1848, he was remarried in 1850, to Mrs. Sheppard, née Taylor. She dying in 1871, he was again married, in 1877, to Mrs. Catherine Lawson, of Fayette County, Kentucky. He is a member of the Baptist Church, having joined in 1825. In 1830, he was mainly instrumental in organizing the Christian Church in his town, it being one of the first of that denomination established in Kentucky. He became an elder, and has taken an active part in the affairs of his Church up to the present time.

ALLARD, JUDGE BLAND, Lawyer, was born September 4, 1819, in Shelby County, Ken- tucky, and is the son of James Ballard, a re- spectable farmer of that county. He received his literary education at Shelby College, and

Hanover College, Hanover, Indiana; and, in 1839, entered upon the study of the law, in the office of Hon. James T. Morehead. In the following year, he graduated in the law department of Transylvania Uni- versity, and commenced the practice of his profession in Shelbyville. In the Winter of the same year, he re- moved to Louisville, and continued the practice of the law with great success, until 1861. In that year he re- ceived the appointment of United States District Judge, from President Lincoln, and has held the position since. He is President of the Kentucky National Bank; for fifteen years has been President of Cave Hill Cemetery Company ; was, for many years, one of the trustees of the institution for the blind; was a member of the City Council for several years ; was one of the first advocates of the present street railway system ; was one of the first and most active workers in the establishment of the Louisville Water-works; was a member of the Board of School Trustees, under the old school system of the

State; and has been one of the most enterprising, pub- lic-spirited, and valuable men of Louisville; has never engaged in politics, in any way, but from early life was an antislavery man, and always exhibited his antipathy to slave institutions by his vote, and openly as a citi- zen. He is an unassuming, unostentatious man; stood high at the bar; and, as a judge, has made an enviable reputation, being known throughout the country as one of the foremost Judges of the United States Courts. He is, in a marked degree, distinguished for the logical character of his mind; has a great fondness for mathemat- ics, establishing a rule in his mind of applying its princi- ples to every question; and hence every cause submit- ted to him, whether legal, political, religious, or moral, is brought under the test of this rule. Judge Ballard was married, in 1846, to Miss Sarah McDowell, daugh- ter of Dr. William A. McDowell, and granddaughter of Samuel McDowell, the first Marshal of the State of Kentucky, and a brother of Dr. Ephraim McDowell, one of the most distinguished of American surgeons. They have five children living-two sons and three daughters. Their son Austin is a clerk in the District Court of Louisville.

ODD, PROFESSOR JAMES B., Author and Educator, was born April 3, 1807, in Loudon County, Virginia. He received the more im- portant part of his early education at Leesburg Academy, and, while in this institution, laid the foundation of those habits of exact thought and searching investigation, which characterized him through life. Believing that no substantial benefit or lasting eminence could come of superficial attainments, his aim was to master every branch of learning he undertook to pursue. He, therefore, even in his early manhood, became distinguished for accuracy of knowl- edge, precision of thought, and transparency of language. Until the year 1841, Prof. Dodd discharged the duties of his vocation with such marked success as to become widely known throughout the South, and was called, in the above year, to the Vice-Presidency of the Centenary College, Mississippi. After four years, he was elected Vice-President, and Professor of Mathematics, Natural Philosophy, and Astronomy, in a college of the same name, at Jackson, Louisiana. After twelve months' service at the last named institution, he was appointed to the professorship of the same sciences, and to the Vice-Presidency, in Transylvania University, Lexington, Kentucky. He afterwards succeeded Dr. Henry B. Bascom as President of the University, and fulfilled all the requirements of his position, with high honor to him- self and to the State. While actively engaged in his professional duties in this institution, Prof. Dodd pre-

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pared and published a series of mathematical works of widely recognized merit. This serics consisted of Com- mon and High-school Arithmetic, Common and High- school Algebra, Geometry, Trigonometry, and Surveying. These books bore the peculiar stamp of his genius, and greatly added to his already widely extended reputation as a mathematician and a thinker. For four or five years preceding his death, Prof. Dodd lived at Greens- burg, Kentucky. After resigning his place in Transyl- vania University, he enjoyed a considerable income from the sale of his works; but the financial embarassments which occurred throughout the country, in consequence of the civil war, made it necessary for him to resort again to his profession. But, while with wonderful energy he was devoting himself to his duties, he was stricken with paralysis. During his confinement in bed, for over four years, as a paralytic, he retained unim- paired, to within a few days of his death, his wonderful energy of mind. Learning the use of his left hand, he procecded patiently in the revision of his mathematical course, and prepared several beautiful manuscripts, with a view to publication. He also left a treatise on Analyt- ical Geometry and Calculus, written several years before his death. In addition to this labor upon his scientific works, he devoted himself, while bedridden, to the more extensive cultivation of literature and languages, making, in the latter, acquisitions surprising even to himself. He died March 27, 1872. His remains were buried with distinguished honor, in the beautiful cemetery at Lexington. The secret of Prof. Dodd's great eminence in life was an indomitable will. He was a calm, steady worker, undiscouraged by difficulties, unbaffled by op- position. Though possessed of great amiability of tem- per, he was of undaunted physical and moral courage, and nothing deterred him from what he considered his duty. This great energy of purpose, united to a rare faculty of concentrativeness of mind, and, above all, to a pure love of truth, very naturally achieved for him that enviable fame which he had among the instructors and scholars of the country. His cast of mind was dis- tinctively scientific and metaphysical; and yet so quick were his sensibilities to the beautiful, so glowing his imagination, and so ample his powers of lucid and nerv- ous expression, that it was frequently said, that nature had intended him no more clearly for a mathematician than for an orator or a poet. Though somewhat re- served in demcanor towards the public, Prof. Dodd, in the society of his family and his friends, was of a bearing so sympathetic and genial and courteous, and, withal, of conversational powers so brilliant and charm- ing, that he resistlessly attracted the love of all who intimately knew him. Though broad and liberal in his theology, his reading having been too extensive for him to be otherwise, he was an orthodox Christian. For the greater portion of his life, he was a member of the

Methodist Episcopal Church, South, and a conscientious, ardent laborer in the cause of religion. His life was a mirror of moral consistency and unassuming piety; and, in the hour of death, there was no shadow to cross his vision of the eternal world. Prof. Dodd was twice mar- ried: first, to Miss Delilah Fox, daughter of Dr. Bartle- son Fox, a distinguished physician of Georgetown, Dis- trict of Columbia; and, lastly, to Miss E. J. Ralston, of Quincy, Illinois, Of the nine children of the first mar- riage, but four arrived at maturity : Martha Elizabeth, now Mrs. W. H. Ralston, of Leavenworth, Kansas ; Prof. J. W. Dodd, LL. D .; Rev. T. J. Dodd, D. D .; and V. W. Dodd; the three latter of whom have already attained eminence in their professions. Of the five children of the second marriage, two, Flora and Eliza, survive; Josephine, the eldest, having died in 1873, and the others in their infancy.

OHNSON, GEN. JILSON PAYNE, Farmer and Soldier, was born July 4, 1828, in Scott County, Kentucky; and is the son of William Johnson, who was a brother of Col. Richard M. John- son, a grandson of Col. Robert Johnson, and brother of George W. Johnson, for a time Con- federate Provisional Governor of Kentucky. His father was educated at West Point Military Academy, and was one of the leading farmers of Scott County. Jilson P. Johnson was educated liberally at Georgetown College, graduating in 1844. He soon after commenced farming, near Laconia, Arkansas, continuing with success until the breaking out of the war, in 1861. In 1857, he was elected to the Arkansas Legislature, and served one term. He was also a member of the Convention to revise the Constitution of that State; and, for several years pre- ceding the war, being a popular speaker, took an active part in the political contests of the State. He has always been a Democrat. In 1862, he entered the Con- federate army, and served in the Adjutant-General's de- partment, with the rank of major; and, in 1863, was made Assistant Inspector-General, reporting directly to the general of the army. He participated in the battles of Franklin, Corinth, Vicksburg, Perryville, Murfrees- boro, and many others of less importance, a part of the time serving on the staff of Gen. Breckinridge. He espoused the cause of the seceding States, actuated by the highest sense of honor and justice; and, serving faithfully throughout the war, was distinguished as a brave and efficient officer. He has been for several .years proprietor of the Galt House, of Louisville, the first hotel of Kentucky; and, although engaged in its management, retains his agricultural interest in Scott County, where his Summer residence is located. He is a prominent member of the Masonic fraternity; is an

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energetic, successful business man ; is of superior merit; has a wide-spread and favorable reputation; is genial and attractive in manners, and in every way well main- tains the character of his honorable old family. Gen. Johnson was married, March 1, 1849, to Miss Caddie Flournoy, daughter of Gen. Thompson B. Flournoy, of Arkansas.

COTT, GOVERNOR CHARLES, Soldier, was born in Cumberland County, Virginia. He was a soldier in a company of militia in the campaign of 1755, and was engaged at Brad- dock's defeat. He raised a company, and en- tered the army during the Revolutionary War ; became colonel of a regiment, and was with General Wayne at the storming of Stony Point. In 1785, he settled in Woodford County, Kentucky. He partici- pated in the defeat of St. Clair, in 1791, and in the same year conducted a body of horsemen against the Indian towns on the Wabash, and, in 1794, commanded part of Wayne's forces at the battle of Fallen Timbers; in 1808, he was elected Governor of Kentucky, over the brave Colonel John Allen, who fell in the battle of the river Raisin ; and administered the affairs of the State with great credit to himself and acceptably to the people. He was a man of strong natural ability ; had a limited education, and was somewhat unpolished in manners. Governor Scott died about 1820, having arrived at a very advanced age.

ORBETT, HON. THOMAS H., Tobacco Commission Merchant, was born January 8, 1830, in Hickman County, Kentucky. His father was a Virginian, and his mother a na- tive of North Carolina. His father came to the State of Kentucky in 1848; was for some years Deputy Clerk ; afterwards Clerk of his county, and, for more than forty years, Clerk of the Circuit Court of Ballard County, being a well-known and highly esteemed citizen. Thomas H. Corbett had the advan- tages of a fair, sound education ; and, in 1850, began the study of law under Judge Bigger, of Blandville, Ballard County ; was admitted to the bar, and began practicing in 1852, with great success. In 1855, was elected to the Legislature, as member from Ballard and McCracken Counties; served one term ; and, in 1860, was elected Commonwealth's Attorney of the First Judicial District, to fill the unexpired term of Col. A. P. Thompson, re- maining in this position till his sympathy with the South led the United States Government to prevent his run- ning again. In 1865, after the close of the civil war, he was again elected, as a member from the counties of Ballard and McCracken, and served ten consecutive years

in the Legislature, being several times elected without opposition. In 1873, Mr. Corbett entered the tobacco business, at Paducah, and has carried on one of the largest houses of that kind in the city, with uniform success. He is a member, in good standing, of the Ma- sonic Order. In religious sentiment and relations, he is a devoted member of the Christian Church. In 1850, he married Rebecca H., daughter of Adam Coil, of Vir- ginia, and by this happy union has five living children. Mr. Corbett is a man of easy, good-natured tempera- ment, strong in his convictions and opinions, and ever ready to utter them in plain but powerful words; rough and rather careless in manner and appearance, he is, perchance, not a little, through this same fact, a man of great popularity, attested by the honors frequently con- ferred by the franchise of his fellow-citizens. His busi- ness ability is first-class, and his standing, as such, is not excelled in the State. He is a man of the people; one in whom the people can fortunately confide.

OBERTSON, HON. GEORGE, Lawyer, and long Chief-Justice of the Court of Appeals, was born November 18, 1790, in Mercer County, Kentucky, and was the son of Alexander and Margaret Robertson, both natives of Virginia, and of Irish origin. His father was born in 1748, in Augusta County, Virginia; was a carpenter and wheelwright by trade; married in 1773; in 1779, came, with his family, to Kentucky, and settled near Harrodsburg, for a time remaining at Gordon's Station ; bought and improved a large tract of land, and became one of the most valuable among the pioneers of Ken- tucky; was a member of the first County Court of Lin- coln ( afterwards Mercer) County ; was a delegate to the Virginia Convention, in 1788, called to ratify the Fed- eral Constitution; was a member of the Virginia Legis- lature; and was the first Sheriff of Mercer County. He died August 15, 1802. His mother's maiden name was Robinson, and, besides being a great beauty, she was a woman of many noble and admirable traits. Judge Robertson, the last but one surviving member of his father's family, did not learn the alphabet until his cighth year. He was then kept under the best teachers of the day, among whom was Joshua Fry, and com- pleted a thorough education at Lancaster Academy and Transylvania University. In the Spring of 1808, he be- gan to study law with Hon. Samuel McKee, at Lancas- ter; and, in the following year, was licensed to practice, and at that early age offered his professional services at Lancaster. His first year or two brought little in his profession, but served him in the way of valuable les- sons for after-life. He became Prosecuting Attorney for Garrard County, in the course of time, and, at the age

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of twenty-five, had acquired a good practice. In 1814, he was appointed principal Assessor of the Federal Tax for his Congressional district, engaging his time chiefly in that office during the year, and first appeared as a law- yer, before the Circuit Court, in 1815. In the following year, he was elected to Congress, and made his first trip to Washington City on horseback; served on the Com- mittee of Internal Improvements, and was a member of other important committees; was re-elected, in 1818; was offered the Governorship of the new Territory of Arkansas, but declined; in 1820, initiated the present system of selling public lands; in 1821, was offered the Attorney-Generalship of Kentucky, but declined; was elected to the Legislature, from Garrard County, in 1823; was re-elected, and, during three years of that service, was Speaker of the House; in 1828, was offered the nomination for Governor by his party, but declined ; in the same year, was appointed a Judge of the Court of Appeals; and, in the following year, was made Chief- Justice; left the bench in 1843, filing his own resigna- tion, against the will of the Executive, frequently ex- pressed, and again entered with great vigor upon a large and lucrative professional business ; in 1834, became Pro- fessor of Constitutional Law, Equity, and International Law in Transylvania University; and, in the following year, settled in Lexington, where he remained for the rest of his life; in 1848, was elected to the Legislature, from Fayette County; in 1864, was elected to the Court of Appeals, from the Second District, and was again ele- vated to the position of Chief-Justice, discharging his duties, at his advanced age, with great ability and faith- fulness until 1871, when he was forced, by growing in- firmities, to retire to private life. He died May 16, 1874, at his residence in Lexington. He was a man of remarkable natural talent, and distinguished himself in every department of effort in which he was called to serve. In his profession, he made for himself an endur- ing fame; and, as a profound lawyer, probably outshone all his contemporaries in the State; and, as Chief-Jus- tice of Kentucky, rendered decisions which have become authority in law wherever the English language is spoken. He was highly honored throughout the State, and, for his great patriotism and solid worth, throughout the country; and was undoubtedly one of the most able, distinguished, and worthy men who ever flourished in Kentucky. He was a writer of great strength and beauty of diction, and wrote many papers on important law questions ; and, before the opening of the civil war, some most able productions from his pen, touching great political issues, gained extensive favor throughout the country. Judge Robertson was married, November 28, 1809, to Eleanor Bainbridge, daughter of Dr. Peter Bain- bridge, an eloquent Baptist minister, and a physician of high standing at Lancaster, Kentucky. She died January 13, 1865, leaving five children.

ADSWORTH, HON. WILLIAM HENRY, Lawyer, was born July 4, 1821, in Maysville, Kentucky. He was a schoolmate, in the Mays- ville Seminary, with President U. S. Grant, and graduated at Augusta College, in 1842; studied law in Maysville, and was admitted to the bar, in 1844; in the following year was sent to the State Sen- ate, from Mason and Lewis Counties, serving four years; was elected to Congress, in 1861, serving on the Com- mittee on Naval Affairs; was re-elected to the Thirty- eighth Congress, in 1863, and served on the Committee of Public Lands, and the Joint Committee on the Library ; was aid to Gen. Nelson, with the rank of colonel, at the battle of Ivy Mountain ; was candidate for Presiden- tial Elector on the Republican ticket, but was defeated ; was tendered the mission to Vienna by President Grant, but declined; and, in 1869, accepted the appointment of United States Commissioner, under the treaty of the previous year with Mexico. He is one of the most able lawyers of Kentucky ; he is an effective and forcible pub- lic speaker; is a man of great courage; adheres to his views with uncommon persistency, but is universally popular, beyond the ranks of his party, at the bar and in social life.

ANDERS, GEORGE NICHOLAS, Politician, son of Lewis Sanders, was born February 27, 1812, at Lexington, Kentucky, where his father then resided. While a youth, he moved with his father to Carroll County. He received a thorough education, and also inherited from both of his parents a character of great strength. His mother was the daughter of the distinguished George Nicholas. At an early age, he joined his father in his pursuits, and soon became an extensive trader in stock in this and the adjoining States; and also took, with his father, an active part in neighborhood affairs, and was one of the most liberal and enterprising men of his community. But it was mainly in politics that he ex- hibited his strongest traits; and through the part he took in the affairs of the country, and especially during the great civil war, is he best known. Politics was the theme of his life almost, yet he did not begin to display his peculiar views in that direction greatly until, in 1844, at a public meeting at Ghent, called by him and his father. Resolutions were passed in favor of Texas annexation, and for a committee to correspond with each 'of the candidates for the Presidency. Mr. Clay was the prominent Whig, and Mr. Polk the Democrat. To them, and probably to Cass and Van Buren, Mr. San- ders, who took care to be the committee, addressed strong and stirring letters. The right topic was struck in the right time and place. All the Slave States saw at once its leading importance ; so did other sections of

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the Mississippi Valley, but the extreme North took ad- verse ground. The deepest interest was felt in regard to the replies, to which anticipation had been directed by the press. They came. Mr. Polk was emphatically in favor of annexation. Mr. Clay, who received his letter, not at home, where he could have considered the matter and consulted his friends, but on a political journey at Raleigh, North Carolina, replied that, while he personally favored the scheme, yet he felt bound as a statesman and patriot to oppose it. Soon after the election of James K. Polk, he turned his attention to political affairs, and removed to New York City, where he at once took a leading place among the ablest men of the day as a manager and organizer. The ends he aimed at were not personal or selfish, but they were the ascendency of principle, the advancement of its expo- nents; and measures, within constitutional limits, of gen- eral utility. He strove for cheap, simple, and responsible government. Nothing has been known in the history of our politics like the vigor, skill, and self-control

with which individual influence was brought to bear on delegates at several of the conventions, including that

which met at Charleston. There are living hundreds of leaders who can recall the activity and sleepless

vigilance with which Mr. Sanders united his knowledge of men to his logical powers in these vital assemblies.

time in early life, a fluent speaker ; but he was a very He was not a ready writer, nor, except for a short

formidable antagonist, by his mental force, and his

geniality and talent in consultation and conversation.

His mind was a magazine of resources; nothing puz-

zled him, and his courage was never at fault. He was a Democrat of the Jeffersonian school, as his father

and grandfather had been, and favored the extreme dogmas of his party as to the rights of the States. In 1852, he established the "Democratic Review," issu- ing the first number in January, with Reily as editor, and O'Sullivan, Nelson, Corry, and others as writers; and it was issued as a monthly for the campaign year. His purpose was to bring forward young and bold ele- ments into the leadership of public affairs. But Frank-

lin Pierce was elected; and, although that President was

warmly supported and greatly admired by Jefferson

Davis, and many of the most substantial of the States

sion. The "Review" was intended to propagate dem- times, though President Pierce gave him a foreign mis- nearly up to Mr. Sanders's standard of a man for the Rights Democracy, it does not appear that he came

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The Biographical encyclopaedia of Kentucky of the dead and living men of the nineteenth century, Part 93

Author: Armstrong, J. M., & company, pub Publication date: 1878 Publisher: Cincinnati, J. M. Armstrong Number of Pages: 946

Author: Armstrong, J. M., & company, pub
Publication date: 1878
Publisher: Cincinnati, J. M. Armstrong
Number of Pages: 946