USA > New Jersey > Burlington County > Burlington > History of Burlington and Mercer counties, New Jersey : with biographical sketches of many of their pioneers and prominent men > Part 69
USA > New Jersey > Mercer County > History of Burlington and Mercer counties, New Jersey : with biographical sketches of many of their pioneers and prominent men > Part 69
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JOHN AUGUSTUS ROEBLING, engineer, born in Pras- sia, 1806, educated in the Polytechnic School at Ber- lin, came to America and settled near Pittsburgh, Pa., in 1831, and afterwards at Trenton. He was the first to manufacture wire-rope, and the inventor of sus- pension bridges. He built several, among them one over the Ohio at Cincinnati, one over the Alleghany at Pittsburgh, one at Niagara, and commenced the one over the East River at New York. He died in 1869, and his son, Augustns Washington Roebling, has taken his place of the East River bridge. Ilis ancestors came from England. There are represen- tatives of the family residing and in business in Tren- ton.
PHILEMON DICKINSON, late prcs dent of the Tren- ton Banking Company of Trenton, was born near Trenton, Feb. 16, 1804. He was a son of Samuel Dickinson, and grandson of Gen. Philemon Diekin- son, who commanded the New Jersey militia during the Revolutionary war, and was afterwards United States senator from New Jersey. He read law with Chief Justice Ewing and Gen. Wall, and was admitted to the bar in 1826. He began to practice in Trenton, but soon abandoned it, and accepted the presidency of the Trenton Banking Company in 1832, when he was twenty-eight years old. He filled this office till 1881, when he resigned on account of age and infir- mities of body. He was an excellent officer, a cour- teons and fine-looking gentleman. He held other offices in the city and State, as president of the city water-works, commissioner of the State sinking fund, United States pension agent, and he served in the Common Council, and took interest in the gov- ernment and growth of Trenton for the last fifty years. He had literary taste and culture, and the sketch of his grandfather in Rogers' " Biographical Dictionary" was prepared by him. He died Sept. 2, 1882, at his home in Trenton, in the seventy-ninth year of his age, leaving two sons, S. Meredith Diek- inson, of Trenton, and George F. Dickinson, of Phil- adelphia, and three daughters, Mrs. Richard F. Ste- vens, Mrs. G. D. W. Vroom, and Miss Mary Diekin- son, surviving him.
1 Dr. Hall's History of Trenton.
732
HISTORY OF MERCER COUNTY, NEW JERSEY.
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES.
GEORGE SMITH GREEN.
George Smith Green is one of the oldest surviving business men of Trenton, and belongs to a family many of whose members have attained prominence as jurist«, lawyers, ministers, and scholars.
three directors from New Jersey in the Bucks County, Pa., Insurance Company, and has held this place for twenty years. The Green ancestry were Presbyterians in religious faith, and Mr. Green is a member and elder of the First Presbyterian Church at Trenton, and has served many years on its board of trustees.
His first wife, Sarah, danghter of William Kennedy and Sarah Stewart, of Warren County, whom he married in 1824, died June 26, 1843, aged thirty-nine . His paternal grandfather, George, born in 1738, married at the age of thirty-one years, Miss Anna Smith, who was born July 8, 1749, and died March 30, 1789, and about the time of his marriage removed from Ewing township and purchased some eight hun- dred aeres of land in Lawrenee township, Mercer County, upon which he resided until his decease, in 1777. Upon his death he left tour young sons,- Caleb S., Charles, James, and Richard. Of these, Caleb S. succeeded to the homestead property, where were educated at Princeton College. Riehard and James were for a time merchants in Genesee County, N. Y., where James died. Richard afterward re- turned, and was a farmer in Lawrence until his death. Charles was a teacher, and died in Lawrence. years. The Kennedy ancestry is traced to Robert Kennedy, born in the north of Ireland in 1693, who settled in Bucks County, Pa., where he had a son born in 1729. The children born of this union are Wil- liam Henry Green, D.D., LL.D., Professor of Oriental and Old Testament Theology in the Theological Semi- nary in Princeton ; Sarah Elizabeth, wife of John T. Duffield, D.D., Professor of Mathematics in Prinee- ton College; Anna Corilla, who beeame the wife of Rev. Mr. Yeoman, a Presbyterian elergyman, and he spent his life as a farmer. Charles and Richard . after his death, of Minot S. Morgan, of New York ; and Edward T. Green, a graduate of Princeton Col- lege, and prominent lawyer at Trenton. Mr. George S. Green's second wife, whom he married in 1844, and who died in 1879, was Maria, daughter of James Kennedy and Elizabeth Maxwell. of Lancaster County, Pa., and own eousin of his first wife. The only child
Caleb S. Green, father of our subjeet, was born July 2, 1770, and died Aug. 27, 1850. His wife, "of this marriage is Emma Kennedy, wife of Frederick Elizabeth Van Cleve, born Nov. 4, 1772, died Dee. ' C. Lewis, a commission merchant of New York,
20, 1836, and bore him the following children, who grew to manhood and womanhood; Jane, George Smith, John Cleve, a wealthy and influential mer- chant of New York City for many years, and a large donor to Prineeton College; Henry W., an eminent jurist, lawyer, and chief justice of the State of New Jersey ; James Oscar, Cornelia, Elizabeth, Eleanor Henrietta, Mary Lavinia Gilchrist. and Judge Caleb S. Green, a prominent member of the Trenton bar.
George Smith Green, born in Lawrence township, June 28, 1798, remained at home until twenty-three years of age, when he went to Groveville, Burlington Co., and engaged in milling and the manufacture of satinets as a partner of Churchill Houston. Mr. land-owners of the realm. Two brothers, Joseph and Green remained there until the winter of 1839-40,
EDWARD M. YARD The Yard family is of Norman origin, and the pro- genitor in England was in the army of William the Conqueror at the battle of Hastings in 1066. The creation of the Yard family coat of arms was in 1442. : . Richard Yard, a high sheriff, eounty Devon, England, , is the common ancestor of the family in New Jersey. The Yards have been from their settlement in Eng- land influential citizens, and are now among the large William Yard, emigrated to America about 1668. when he settled in Trenton, and became a member of The former settled in Philadelphia, where he be- the well-known firm of Fish, Green & Co., lumber merehants. Charles Green, one member of the firm, died a few years afterwards, and George S. Green con- tinued a successful and large business with Benjamin Fish until 1879, when Mr. Fish withdrew from the firm, and Robert W. Kennedy became a partner, under the firm-name of Green & Kennedy.
eame possessed of a large landed estate, which was entailed to his heirs in his will dated 1715: the latter settled in Trenton at the " Falls of the Delaware," and becanre a large land-owner where the site of the city of Trenton is located, as may be seen in a deed of partition (made under his will dated Feb. 12, 1742) now in the possession of Judge William S. Yard, of Trenton, dated March 22, 1749. William Yard was clerk of the court at Trenton in 1720. He left a large family of sons and daughters at his death, the eldest of whom was Joseph, who resided in Trenton, was a member of the King's Council of the State, do- nated a part of the site for the First Presbyterian Church in Trenton, of which he was the last survivor
Mr. Green has spent a life almost wholly devoted to business, and although interested in local and national politics he has never sought a place or politi- cal preferment. Many years ago he was a member of the City Council from the First Ward, and he was the first collector for Mercer County, after its erection from Hunterdon, Burlington, and Middlesex in 1838, serving for three years. He was one of the original , of the first board of trustees in 1763, and by his will
1
George & Green
1
Edith Yard
Um . Yard
733
CITY OF TRENTON.
he donated a legacy to Princeton College. His prop- erty was divided among his children by deed of par- tition. ITis two sons were Joseph and Archibald William. The former died, leaving no descendants ; the latter was in business in Trenton, and died in 1810, aged nearly eighty years, leaving nine sons and nine daughters, only one of whom. Edward, father of our subjeet, left male issue. Edward Yard. while a boy, was placed in a merchant's counting- house in Philadelphia, and took a liking to go to sea in one of his employer's vessels. On the return from his second voyage the vessel was captured by a Brit- begun. As American prisoners were not then ac- knowledged, he was made to serve on a British man-of-war for two years, and then sent to prison in England.
was an eminent physician and surgeon in the army, and died about 1845.
Capt. Edward M., only son of Edward Yard, now a resident of Trenton. is the senior representative of the family in New Jersey in direct line from the pro- genitor. He was born in Mercer County, Nov. 24. 1809, and educated principally in the academy at Lawrenceville, under the well-known teacher Rev. Isaac B. Brown. On Nov. 1, 1827, in the eighteenth year of his age, he entered the United States navy as midshipman, participated in the war with Mexico and California, and was one of the pioneers to visit ish frigate, the war of the Revolution then having : the latter country, and also served in the navy during the late civil war of 1861-65.
Having risen through the various gradations of office to commander iu 1866, he retired from the navy after having been in continuous service for a period of nearly thirty-nine years, and lives retired in the
Through the kindly aid of an aunt in Trenton who had married a British officer who resided in Trenton, city of Trenton. He married in 1852 Miss Josephine Ormeby, of Pittsburgh, Pa., who died the following year, leaving an only child, Josephine Yard. but returned home when the war broke out, young Edward Yard made his escape from prison, and sailed from London on board a British transport bound for Members of the Yard family took part in the French and Indian war and that of the Revolution, were patriotic and loyal, and their names will be found enrolled in the list of soldiers in those wars and among the founders of many of the early re- ligions and educational institutions of Trenton. New York under convoy of Admiral Digby's fleet, which arrived, however, too late to assist Cornwallis at Yorktown. He managed to escape from the vessel in the outer bay of New York, and returned to his home in Trenton after an absence of nearly seven years. Immediately after the elose of the war, in 1784, his father, Abraham Hunt, and Moore Furman, then the largest merchants of Trenton, loaded a vessel with produce, and with Edward Yard as first officer under Capt. Clunn sailed the cargo to Madeira. After his return he commanded a vessel sailing from Perth IION. WILLIAM S. YARD. Amboy for a few voyages, and afterwards from Phila- Benjamin Yard, one of the five sons of William Yard, the progenitor here, who are mentioned in the deed of partition in the preceding article, is great- grandfather of our subject, and was a gunsmith in Trenton upon the breaking out of the war of 1776, as the following receipt signed by him will show : delphia, during which time he became interested in trade between this country and San Domingo. He was in Hayti when it was sacked and burned by the insurgent negroes. In 1795 he engaged in the East India trade and sailed for Calcutta, and in 1800 he was among the first engaged in trade with Canton. He continued this trade for a few years, then became " Rec'd Trenton, July 4, 1776, of Abram Hunt, one of the commissioners for the county of Hunterdon, fifty-one pounds for twelve muskets. Aug. 19th, Rec'd fifty-four pounds thirteen shillings and six- pence for fourteen muskets. 21st Aug. Rec'd seventy- four pounds seven shillings and six pence for nine- teen muskets, and July 15, 1777, Rec'd one pound and fourteen shillings for seveuteen scabbards delivered last summer. interested in shipping until the long embargo, in 1808, when he retired, returned to New Jersey, and married Abigail, daughter of Col. Joseph Phillips, of Maidenhead, who died in 1821, leaving three chil- dren,-Edward M., Elizabeth, and Frances. He died in Trenton in 1839, aged seventy-nine years. Col. " Joseph Phillips was in the British colonial service. and was sent to Fort Pitt after its cession by France to Great Britain, in 1759. He was appointed major " BENJ. YARD." of the First Battalion in the State of New Jersey, commanded by Col. Johnson, who was killed in the The above document was found among the State papers at the capital, and presented to the subject of this sketch by the present Adjt .- Gen. William S. Stryker. battle of Long Island. Upon the military organiza- tion of the State of New Jersey, Maj. Phillips was appointed colonel of the First Regiment of Hunter- don County, which was in service during the entire One of Benjamin. Yard's nephews, Thomas, was first lieutenant of the Second Battalion in the fruit- less attempt to take Quebec by Montgomery and war. He died and was buried in the village of Maidenhead (now Lawrence), leaving two sons- Joseph and William-and several daughters. Joseph . Arnold, returned safely, and served through the war.
734
HISTORY OF MERCER COUNTY, NEW JERSEY.
In one of his letters, dated Camp Quebec. March 30, 1776, to his brother I-aae, of Trenton, he says, after referring to his hardships on account of small- pox and extreme cold : " We have two batteries, which will be opened on the 2d of April. and if they don't surrender before the 14th we shall begin the storm, then thee will hear how the matter goes. Dear brothers and friends, I am in good spirits, but how it will be in the storm I can't tell, but with the ble -- ing of God I will fight a good fight and gain all the honor possible I ean for brothers, friends. and the flower of the world, dear Trenton, the place of my nativity." Nahor, son of Benjamin, was a merchant in Trenton, married Elizabeth Biggs, March 23, 1787, and died Sept. 18, 1791, leaving one son, Joseph, and two daughters, Ann and Sarah. Joseph, born March 17, 1788, was a compositor for many years in the office of the True American in Trenton, then edited by James J. Wilson. He was a babe in the arms of his nurse when Washington passed through Trenton on his way from Mount Vernon to New York to be inaugurated as the first President of the Republic. The occasion to which we refer was when the young ladies of Tren- ton strewed his way with flowers on the scene of his victories, and of which there is graceful acknowledg- inent from the pen of Gen. Washington.
In the war of 1812 he joined the Jersey Blues, under the command of Capt. James Wilson, at that time editor of the True American. This was the first company that went from Trenton. There were three companies, and before he passed away he remarked that he only knew of one man living be-ide himself that had been in the Jersey Blues of 1812.
He was a plain, unpretending man, of warm heart and upright sentiments. His great age and kuowl- edge of Trenton, where he had spent his life, made him quite an authority on the early history of the place and the families that used to reside here. It was pleasant to hear him tell of old times, which in the memory of a young nation seem so long ago, and sweet was it to him to see his children so well estab- lished in the place of his birth, around which the affections of his heart were entwined.
He married June 4, 1815, Elizabeth Brinley, of Mon- mouth County, a daughter of Jacob Brinley, whoserved in Capt. Walton's troop light dragoons, in the Revolu- tionary war, who was born Oct. 2, 1791, and survives in 1882, well preserved in body and mind. He died Feb. 3, 1872. Their children are Nahor B., born March 12, 1816, of Galveston, Texas; Jacob S., born HON. CHARLES PERRIN SMITHI. July 24, 1818, resided in Trenton, and died in 1859; Charles Perrin Smith, the subject of this sketeh, has been a resident of Trenton for a quarter of a cen- tury. IIe was elected to represent Salem County in the State Senate, and at the expiration of his term appointed clerk of New Jersey Supreme Court, occu- pying that position during three terms of five years married Hannah Carpenter Ellet, of Salem County, N. J. At the period of his marriage he was a resident Joseph B., born July 27, 1821, of Trenton ; William Stephenson, born Nov. 2, 1823; Herbert Furman, born April 3, 1826, died at the age of thirty; George Holt, born April 23, 1829, a mechanie in Trenton ; and Jane Elizabeth, born Ang. 4, 1831, died at the age of eighteen. William Stephenson Yard, son of | each, His father. George Wishart Smith, of Virginia, Joseph and Elizabeth Yard, received the usual ad- vantages of the common school during his boyhood,
but at the age of fourteen started out in life for him- self, and for three years was a clerk in Evan Evans' grocery store in Trenton. For four years following he was an apprentice to the blacksmith's trade, and for twelve years afterwards he carried on in Trenton blacksmithing, carriage-making, and the manufacture of iron railing, which business has been continued since by his brother, Joseph B. Yard. In 1857 he was elected superintendent of the public schools of Trenton, and did efficient and acknowledged merited services as a member of the school board, as trustee and superintendent for seventeen years. At the age of eighteen he identified himself with the Greene Street Methodist Episcopal Church as a member, and has been a class-leader in that church since 1847, a period of thirty-five years, for nine years as superin- tendent of the Sunday-school, and some twenty-five years as superintendent of the Bible-class department, where he still officiates. His untiring zeal and abil- ity as a teacher have frequently been duly recognized by the school. He is the oldest surviving vice-presi- dent of the Mercer County Bible Society.
In the fall of 1860, Mr. Yard was elected on the Democratic ticket from the Second District of Tren- ton to the lower branch of the State Legislature, and served one term, where he officiated as chairman of the Committee on Education. He was again a member of the Legislature in 1877. In 1865 he was appointed judge of the Court of Common Pleas for Mercer County, and served five years, and, by re- appointment in 1878 by Governor Mcclellan, he is the present incumbent of that office. In 1872, Judge Yard was made president of the Ocean Beach Asso- ciation, of which he was one of the incorporators. He married, March 27, 1845, Mary M., daughter of Sammel and Julia Hamilton, of Lancaster, Pa., who was born June 30, 1826. Their children are Mary ;E., widow of James H. Clark, Jate proprietor of Clark's Exchange, Trenton, who died June 6, 1852; Caroline N., wife of Rev. I. V. W. Schenck, a Pres- byterian clergyman of Philadelphia; William H., teller in the Trenton Savings-Bank; Jennie F .. wife of Rev. Albert Mann, of the Methodist Philadelphia Conference ; and George B. Yard, a civil engineer at Roanoke, in the Shenandoah Valley, Virginia.
:
Charles Perrin Smith
-
.
735
CITY OF TRENTON.
of Talbot County, MId., but subsequently removed to Philadelphia, where his demise shortly occurred. It was during the temporary residence in Philadelphia that the subject of this sketch was born. His mother returned to Salem, where she continued to reside until the close of life.
Mr. Smith's paternal branch descends from the founders of the commonwealth of Virginia. They intermarried with the Calverts, Singletons, Moseleys, Dudleys, Hancocks, Lands, Scantlings, Perrins, Wish- arts, and other prominent families.
George Wishart Smith was the son of Perrin Smith and Margaret Wishart. His grandparents were Charles Smith and Margaret Perrin. The origin of the Perrins of Virginia is associated with the Huguenot colony of that State. Samuel, eldest brother of Gen. George Washington, married the widow of a Virginia Perrin.
The Wisharts were early in the colony. Margaret Wishart's brother Thomas lost his life in the army of the Revolution, and another brother, George, was captured by the enemy and never returned. Perrin Smith suffered greatly in the destruction of property by the conflagration of Norfolk, the despoiling of his plantation, and the carrying away of his negroes by the British and refugees. George Wishart Smith was an officer in the Maryland line during the war of 1812-15, and actively engaged in resisting the enemy on the shores of the Chesapeake Bay and their ad- vance upon Baltimore. He took part at the head of his command in the repulse of the enemy at St. Michael's, by which action that part of the State was relieved from further invasion.
Hannah Carpenter Ellet, mother of the subject of this sketch, on her paternal side was a direct descend- ant of Governor Thomas Lloyd and Samuel Car- penter, two of Penn's most distinguished coadjutors and intimate friends (ride " Lloyd and Carpenter Lineage," Watson's Annals, Proud's History, etc.). The former was the first President of Council and Governor for about nine years, or as long as he would serve; and the latter Treasurer of the province, mem- ber of Council, and first shipping merchant of Phil- adelphia. Watson says, "The name of Samuel Carpenter is connected with everything of a public nature in the early annals of Pennsylvania; I have seen his name at every turn in searching the records. He was the Stephen Girard of his day in wealth, and the William Sansom in the improvements he suggested and the edifices which he built. . . . IIc was one of the greatest improvers and builders in Philadelphia, and after William Penn the wealthiest man in the province."
Governor Thomas Lloyd was an eminent member of the Society of Friends, who left Wales on account of religious persecution, and, with his family, joine 1 Penn in the colonization of Pennsylvania. He was possessed of very superior attainments, and enjoyed . with the Lyceum, at that period scarcely inferior to the advantages of collegiate education at Oxford
University. His mother was Elizabeth Stanley, of the distinguished Stanley-Derby family ; and his father, Charles Lloyd, of Dolobran, a descendant of Aleth, Prince of Dyfed, and the long line of British princes, whose records, yet extant, on the column of Eliseg, date back to the middle of the sixth century (ride Burke's Genealogy, Powysland Historical Collection, etc.). Their alliance with Norman Earls, the Lords De Charletons and Powys, was through Sir Roger Kynaston, knight, and his wife, Lady Elizabeth Grey ; and with Humphrey Plantagenet, Duke of Gloucester, through his daughter Antigone, wife of Sir Henry Grey, Earl of Tankerville and Powys, and mother of Lady Elizabeth Kynaston. The Lloyds were also descended through the Greys, De Charletons, and Hollands Dukes of Kent, from Margaret, daughter of Philip Le Hardie, King of France, and queen of Edward I. of England. Their genealogy, as pre- sented in the Kynastou ( Hardwick ) pedigree, Mont- gomeryshire Historical Collection, etc. (transferred to the Lloyd and Carpenter Lineage), seems com- plete as it is unchallenged. The Lloyd of Dolobran shield of arms (1650) displays fifteen quarterings, im- paling the Stanley arms of six quarterings (ride au- totype copy in "Powysland Collection," vol. ix. page 339). The annals of the race abound with refereuces to Crusaders, knights banneret, the battle-fields of Agincourt, Poictiers, Crecy, and many other events illustrating the most brilliant chapters of English history.
Governor Thomas Lloyd's daughter Rachel mar- ried Samuel Preston, of Maryland, but who was mayor of Philadelphia in 1711. Their daughter Hannah mar- ried Samuel, eldest son of Samuel Carpenter, Penu's coadjutor. Thence through the Ellets, recently of engineering and ram-fleet fame, to Hannah Carpenter Ellet, mother of the subject of this sketch.
Hannah Carpenter Ellet's maternal branch de- scends from John Smith, Fenwick's colleague in the settlement of West Jersey, a man of large porses- sions. He is said to have also been one of Fenwick's executors. Thus the family is historically descended from the founders of three American States, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey. With this prelimi- uary reference to its origin, we will proceed to give a summary of the life of one of its descendants.
The subject of this sketch removed to Salem, N. J., at an carly age, where he became thoroughily identi- fied with the community. The considerable means inherited were placed by the executor in the Bank of Maryland at Baltimore, and in the course of a few days lost by the total failure of that institution. The tenor of his life was thereby changed, and he was thrown upon his own exertions for a livelihood. Dur- ing his minority he enjoyed the social and educational advantages of the community ; he accustomed himself to writing for the press, and was officially connected
`any institution of the kind in the State. Whatever,
736
HISTORY OF MERCER COUNTY, NEW JERSEY.
under Providence, he subsequently achieved was through indomitable zeal and self-reliance, prompted by conscientious appreciation of duty. Upon attain- ing his majority he became editor and proprietor of the National Standard, and also soon afterwards of the , ernment in the hands of the Whig party. Never was Harrisonian. Through industry and perseverance, there a victory more complete. without either financial or editorial assistance, he It was during an annual visit to the sea-shore, in 1847, that he gathered a large amount of valuable information in reference to the then exceedingly inefficient condition of the so-called life-saving ser- : vice. It was dependent upon volunteer boat crews, imperfect apparatus, and widely-scattered stations. achieved success, and liquidated the incumbrance upon his establishment. He fully participated in the enthusiasm and duties of the Harrison Presidential campaign. Among other measures he earnestly ad- vocated the policy of encouraging mannfactures in Salem, the erection of the Innatic asylum at Trenton, . Mr. Smith's statements, based upon facts thus directly the abolition of imprisonment for debt, the more obtained from practical surfmen, were published in ' New Jersey, Philadelphia, and elsewhere, and there , are reasonable grounds for the opinion that the re- newed interest and favorable action of Congress, which soon afterwards followed. was measurably pro- moted through this agency. He also, the same year (1847), wrote and published articles in favor of the construction of a railroad from Salem to Philadelphia. thorough establishment of common schools, and fur- nishing of relief and employment to the poor. He availed himself of every occasion to inculcate prin- eiples of temperance and morality. He was origin- ator and president of the Whig Association of Salem, took a prominent part in organizing the Salem Insur- ance Company, and also the Building Association (of eich of which he became a dircetor), and the first to advocate- the formation of the County Agricultural Society, of which he was the seeretary. His almost unanimous election as member of the board of free- holders, and appointment, as director, in a Democratie city, was deemed no ordinary compliment. He was captain of the National Guards, at the time the only military organization south of Trenton, and also judge-advocate of the Salem Brigade. At the period of the famine in Ireland he recommended the estab- lishment of an efficient relief committee, and fully identified himself with all efforts in achieving sub- stantial results. During the war with Mexico he ad- vocated furnishing troops and supplies to conquer an early and honorable peacc.
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