USA > New York > Warren County > Queensbury > History and biography of Washington county and the town of Queensbury, New York > Part 41
USA > New York > Washington County > History and biography of Washington county and the town of Queensbury, New York > Part 41
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After this he entered St. John's college in New York city, from which he was graduated in 1883, receiving the degree of A. B. In 1885 the college only conferred three honorary
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degrees, that of A. M. on him and his brother, Edward C., and that of LL. D. on Gen. Winfield S. Hancock. Leaving college he took up the study of jurisprudence and en- tered the Columbia college law school, from which he was graduated in the class of 1885, with the degree of LL. B. For the next five years he engaged in general reading, served as a justice of the peace, and did con- siderable practicing. At the end of that time, in 1890, he was placed at the head of the land department of New York, in the attorney gen- eral's office. The year before he was ap- pointed chairman of the democratie county committee. He discharged successfully all the duties of these different positions with prompt- ness and with satisfaction to the State authori- ties and the public, but at the end of two years resigned in order to enter upon the full and active practice of his profession in the courts of record of this State. In 1892 he was appointed corporation counsel of Fort Ed- ward, and has since resided there. He is a member of the State bar association, and has obtained prominent standing among the young and progressive lawyers of New York.
Mr. O'Brien is a democrat in politics, and a Catholic in religious belief and church mem- bership. He has always retained a deep in- terest in collegiate life and progress, and in 1884 served as chairman of the executive com- mittee of the Cleveland and Hendricks demo- cratic club of Columbia university of New York, representing its four schools, medicine, arts, law and mines.
The O'Brien family was prominent in the early history of Ireland, and Peter O'Brien (grandfather) came from the " Emerald Isle " to Essex county, this State, and afterward re- moved to Fort Edward, where he died. He was a democrat and Catholic in politics and religion, while for an occupation he chiefly followed farming. He wedded Mary Milligan, and their children were: Patrick, Michael, James, Mary Shaw, Bridget Ryan, Julia Deg- nan, and James. Patrick O'Brien (father)
was educated in the national schools of Ire- land, where he was a school-mate of Monsig- nor (Bishop) Burke of Albany. He came about 1854 to Fort Edward, where he was in the paper-making and lumber business for some time, and conducted the O'Brien hotel. He was a democrat and Catholic, and after coming to Fort Edward held many of the im- portant civil and educational positions of the village. He was a prominent leader in the projected Fenian invasion of Canada from New York. He died in 1888, at the age of fifty-seven years. Mr. O'Brien married Alice Smith, who died November 25, 1892, aged fifty-two years.
To their union were born twelve children : Edward C., a lawyer of New York city, and secretary of rapid transit commission ; Mich- ael H. (subject), James E., New York city ; Dr. Frank P., of Albany ; Charles P., and Thomas, at home ; Mary, a teacher in the pub- lic schools ; Alice, professor of elocution and English literature in Plattsburg State Normal school ; Angeline, a sister in a Convent ; Cath- arine, who died in infancy ; Anna, librarian of Plattsburg State Normal school, and a daugh- ter that died in infancy.
J AMES ELLIS, an old and time-honored citizen of the village of Cambridge, was born in the same village, Washington county, New York, January 16, 1816, and is a son of Spencer Ellis and Mary Viall, his wife. Spen- cer Ellis was a native of Providence, Rhode Island, and was born October 24, 1777. Re- ceiving a very good common school education, he, after leaving school, learned the trade of comb maker in Providence, and in a few years migrated to this village where he worked at his trade for a number of years. In 1837 he went to New York city, where he was employed to work on the aqueducts, remaining there but a short time, drawing his pay for his labor and was never again heard of. The supposition among the members of his family was, that he
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was either killed or drowned. He was a sol- dier in the war of 1812, his widow receiving a warrant for one hundred sixty acres of gov- ernment land for his services. Politically he was a Jacksonian democrat. On December 8, 1812, he wedded Mary, a daughter of Na- thaniel Viall, who was a farmer, formerly lived at Dorset, Vermont. To their union were born six sons and two daughters: Bennett V. (dead), James, Thomas, Horace F. (killed in the battle of the Wilderness, June 17, 1863), Alexander (dead), William B. (residing at Cambridge), Ada Eliza (wife of Jeremiah Haskins of this village), and Mary A., widow of the late Mason Prentice, of the same place. Mary Viall Ellis was a native of Vermont, born November 1, 1787, died in Cambridge August 7, 1858, and was at the time of her death a consistent member of the Presby- ยท terian church.
The Ellis family is of English origin. The founders of the American branch of the family were the grandfather of the subject of this sketch and his brother, who came from Eng- land and settled in Rhode Island. The grand- father had three sons: Reuben, Silas and Spencer, the latter the father of James Ellis.
James Ellis received his education in the common schools of his native village, after- ward learned the trade of carpenter and joiner, following that business for thirty years, but from twenty to twenty-five years of -that time however, he did considerable contracting and building. A great many of the handsome structures of this beautiful village are the pro- duct of his handiwork. During his active business career he employed regularly from ten to fifteen men. For a few years Mr. El- lis was foreman in the lumber yard of M. D. Hubbard, deceased, of this village; since leav- ing his employ, he has devoted the most of his time in settling estates and loaning money. In the palmy days of the old State militia, Mr. Ellis was first lieutenent of a Cam- bridge company, known as the Flood-Wood company in that day. In political opinion he
has been a life long democrat, believing that the principles of that party are the chief corner stone of a representative form of government. He has held all the most important town of- fices ; served two terms as supervisor ; president and trustee of the village; also has been as- sessor of the village. For over fifty years he has been a leading and official member of the Presbyterian church, filling the offices of trus- tee, elder and deacon.
On November 12, 1843, was united in mar- riage to Laura A., a daughter of Joshua Burt, a farmer of near Ridgefield, Connecticut.
H ON. GODFREY R. MARTINE,
M. D., of Glens Falls, is one of the most successful and most favorably known physi- cians of northern New York. He is a son of the late James J. Martine, formerly of Troy New York, but latterly of Caldwell, Warren county, where he died in 1888, aged eighty- nine years.
Dr. Martine, the only survivor of six broth- ers who entered the war of the rebellion, was born in the city of Troy, New York, on the 27th of April, 1837, coming to Warren county at the age of eight years. He received his early education principally at the Warrensburg aca- demy, where he pursued special studies under different instructors, among whom, and who afterward became prominent in politics and war, was Gen. O. E. Babcock, Grant's secre- tary of war, and who accompanied that gen- eral in his trip around the world and wrote his life. Dr. Martine subsequently pursued a Latin course under the direction of Rev. R. C. Clapp, of Chestertown, and attended the Normal school at Albany, where he received a teacher's State certificate. He afterward taught in several of the towns of Warren county, and later, several terms as principal of Warrensburg academy. On leaving here he entered the medical department of the uni- versity of Vermont, and was graduated from there with the degree of M. D. in 1862.
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Immediately after leaving college he re- turned to Warren county and began the prac- tice of medicine at Warrensburg ; later remov- ing to Johnsburg, where he practiced until 1882, when he came to Glens Falls, where lie has secured a wide field of practice. On the 9th of September, 1869, Dr. Martine wedded Miss Mary E. McDonald Woodward, of War- rensburg. They have one child, a son, Byron A., who was born April 8, 1883.
Dr. Martine is a democrat in his political opinion. He represented the town of Johns- burg on the board of supervisors from 1866 to 1870, inclusive, and has also held the offices of health officer and coroner. In the fall of 1869 he was elected to the State assembly, which position, with his excellent acquirements and integrity, enabled him to discharge the duties of that important trust to the perfect satisfac- tion of his constituents. The popularity and magnificence of the Blue mountain lake region is almost solely due to the energetic efforts of Dr. Martine in beautifying and giving to it the present enviable reputation as one of the favorable mountain retreats. In 1875, when that section was an unknown wilderness, he purchased the site and erected the Blue moun- tain lake house, a splendidly located hotel, accommodating with its surrounding cottages four hundred guests. Roads were opened and this famous region has become one of the most popular summer resorts in the great Adirondack wilderness. It is an acknowledged fact that Dr. Martine's perseverance and faith in this enterprise were the means of saving the Adirondack railroad from an early decline. The lasting benefits thus conferred upon the people of that section and the public generally can hardly be properly estimated.
Dr. Martine is a fellow of the New York State Medical association, and one of its original members ; is president of the Warren County Medical society, a member of the American Medical association, and of the World's Medical congress, to which he was elected delegate ; has served five years as sec-
retary of the United States pension board of examining surgeons at Glens Falls. He estab- lished, in 1885, with Dr. Lemon Thomson, jr., the Glens Falls hospital. He is a working member and one of the originators of the Glens Falls lyceum, and one of its ex-presi- dents ; a trustee of the Crandall Free library, and of the Glens Falls academy ; is one of the original stockholders of the Glens Falls Sum- mer school ; one of the originators and a direc- tor of the Glens Falls board of trade ; one of the first contributors and sustaining members of the Glens Falls Young Men's Christian association. He is a life member of the Amer- ican Peace society, and has been for forty-five years a member of the Methodist Episcopal church.
He is an active, energetic, public-spirited gentleman, a large-hearted and progressive citizen, one whom no community can afford to lose. It has been said that the doctor has actually earned and given away more money than any man in northern New York, his motto being " There is something in life bet- ter than the hoarding of riches." Dr. Mar- tine's medical labors, with an exception of a short term of service as a volunteer physician in the hospital at Annapolis, Maryland, during the war of the rebellion, have been confined to Warren county and its surroundings, and his career throughout has been crowned with suc- cess.and honorable distinction.
SOLON C. MASON, one of the well known and successful business men of Granville, and a member of the grocery firm of Temple & Mason, is a son of Linus R. and Clarissa (Barbour) Mason, and was born April 14, 1849, in the town of Granville, Wash- ington county, New York. The Masons are of Scotch extraction, and are numbered among the earliest settlers of Washington county, where their energy, industry and thrift have done much toward the development and up- building of the agricultural interests. Truman
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Mason, paternal grandfather of Solon C. Ma- son, was born in this county in 1778. After attaining manhood he engaged in farming, and in 1819 purchased and moved onto a farm in the town of Granville, where he passed the remainder of his days, dying in 1869, at the advanced age of eighty-one years. He mar- ried Esther Parker, and reared a family of eight children, one of his sons being the father of Solon C., who was born at Fort Ann in 1815, and when only four years of age was brought by his parents into the town of Gran- ville, where he grew to manhood and received such education as was afforded by the com- mon schools of that early day. Here he has resided ever since, engaged in farming and stock raising, and has become prosperous and well-to-do. In religious faith he is a Baptist, and in politics an ardent republican, with whig antecedents. He has been elected to, and acceptably filled, a number of the town offices, and is a man highly estcemed by his neigh- bors and all who know him. He married Clarissa Barbour, a native of the town of Granville. To them was born a family of four children.
Mrs. Mason is a member of the same church as her husband, and is now in the seventy- eighth year of her age.
Solon C. Mason was reared on the old Ma- son homestead, in the town of Granville, and obtained an education in the excellent public schools provided by the State. He remained on the farm until his twenty-second year, when he entered a steam mill at Fort Ann, and was employed there for the space of a year and a half. After leaving the mill he taught district school for some eighteen months, and while thus employed learned telegraphy. In 1875 he entered the employ of the Eastern Railroad company, as station agent and telegraph oper- ator, at Chelsea, Massachusetts, where he re- mained for a period of six years. By the end of that time his health had become so poor that he was compelled to resign, and he then returned to Granville. In 1883 he formed a
partnership with Abraham Temple, under the firm name of Temple & Mason, and they en - gaged in the grocery business in this village. Being popular gentlemen, of agrecable man- ners, and inclined to give strict and careful attention to their business, the new firm soon acquired considerable prestige and built up a profitable trade, which they have ever since conducted. They have a neat and carefully arranged store, and keep at all times a large and varied stock of everything connected with the grocery business.
On December 1, 1870, Mr. Mason was mar- ried to Ellen Vail, a daughter of Edwin Vail, of the village of Granville. In politics Mr. Mason is a prohibitionist, though formerly identified with the Republican party. He is a member and trustee of the Baptist church of Granville, in which he has also served as chorister for a number of years.
JOSEPH MILLER, a retired carriage builder of Greenwich, is a member of an old family, who originally came from France. Anthony Miller came from that country early in the eighteenth century and located at Que- bec, Canada, and in a short time afterward removed to Montreal, where he owned and resided upon a farm for a while, when he re- moved to Point Oliver, where he lived up to the time of his death; being a farmer the most of his life, and a man of considerable literary attainments. He was a member of the Catholic church, as was also his wife, and one of his brothers was a Catholic priest. He was in the war of 1812, and fought with Napo- leon in his European wars. On his voyage to this country, he formed the acquaintance of a Miss Duffy, who was of Holland birth, and whom he afterward married, and then settled in Montreal. His wife lived to the remark- able age of one hundred and seven years. They had ten children, three sons : Anthony; Peter, and Luther; and seven daughters. The grandfather of the subject of this sketch,
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Anthony Miller, died at the age of eighty-six years.
Joseph Miller was born September 3, 1816, . in the district of Montreal, Canada ; received his education in the ordinary schools of that country, and later became proficient in French and Latin. After leaving school he became a dry goods clerk in a general mercantile estab- lishment, where he remained until during the Canadian rebellion, and then he came to the United States. During this war he acted as messenger for the officers of the army, which was a responsible position as well as risky and dangerous. He went on duty in this capacity October 16, 1837, and being pursued by the Loyalists, he escaped and crossed the line to Saint Albans, Vermont, and on November 12, 1840, he located in the vil- lage of Greenwich, and found employment with J. Fisher, with whom he remained for one year. He subsequently worked on farms for awhile, when he, with his brother Frank, engaged in the carriage manufactory in Green- wich, and after completing his trade here, he branched out extensively in this line, employ- ing twenty men in the wood, blacksmith, paint- ing and trimming departments. For many. years he carried on one of the largest carriage manufacturing businesses in the county, and continued it up to five years ago, when, in November, 1889, he rented his plant, but he is still more or less interested in the business affairs. The plant occupies a large three story building, and is well and favorably known throughout that section of the county. Mr. Miller is a republican in his political opinion and has always been an active partisan in the success of his party's principles, and has filled many of the town offices. For the past twenty- one years he has been a member and is one of the organizers of the fire department of Green- wich, of which he has served as captain. He filled the office of trustee of the village two terms, and has been commissioner of high- ways and school trustee. He is one of the charter members of the Ashley Masonic Lodge,
No. 584, being one of the original nine men- bers who founded it; and is also a member of the Methodist Episcopal church.
On December 6, 1845, Mr. Miller was united in marriage to Susan Shaw, and has four chil- dren : George F., who resides in North Ad- ams, Massachusetts, where he is one of the leading insurance men of the place, married Della Adams, and is to some extent interested in the railroad business. He was born Janu- ary 16, 1847 ; Lewis, died in infancy; Mary L., wife of S. B. Welock, a merchant of Green- wich : and Frederick, who died at the age of two.years. Mrs. Miller died April 6, 1875, in the forty-eighth year of her age, having been born April 5, 1827. Mr. Miller married for his second wife, on May 29, 1875, Anna M., a daughter of Patrick Silk, a native of Ireland. She came to this country in 1870. To his second marriage Mr. Miller has two children: Burton Allison and Joseph Ransom.
B ENJAMIN F. OTTARSON, who, for many years was an active and prominent business man of Granville, but now practically retired, was born in Pawlet, Rutland county, Vermont, May 17, 1816. His education was received in the district schools of his day, and after leaving- school he went to learn the trade . of tailoring with John Hughes, of Cambridge, with whom he remained five years. In 1840 he returned to the village of Granville, where in the same year he started up in business in the same line for himself, which he carried on very successfully until 1864. In 1861 he re- ceived the appointment of postmaster of the village, and with the exception of three years under Johnson's administration, he most ac- ceptably filled this office until 1889; in that year he retired from the postoffice after a serv- ice of a quarter of a century. In politics he is a stanch republican, and for twenty years served his village in the office of town clerk. Mr. Ottarson is a member of the Masonic fra- ternity, and is the oldest member of Granville
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Lodge, No. 50, and was at one time identified with the Sons of Temperance, Rechabites and Good Templars of his village, the latter three of which have all come and passed away.
Benjamin F. Ottarson was united in mar- riage on October 31, 1843, with Nancy F., daughter of James Richardson, a cabinet maker, of Poultney, Vermont, and Mary Fisher, his wife. Mr. Ottarson is a cousin of Frank Ottarson, who was one of Greeley's as- sistant editors on the Tribune, and afterward editor of the City News of New York city.
Benjamin F. Ottarson was a son of John and Margaret (Mahar) Ottarson. John Ottar- son was born in Londonderry, Vermont, in 1784. He was a carpenter and joiner by trade, and followed it all his life. In April, 1820, he came to Granville, and died in 1828 in the same house now occupied by the subject of this sketch. He was a member of the State militia of Vermont, also of the Washingtonian Benevolent society and the Congregational church. In political opinion he was a federal- ist. He wedded Margaret, a daughter of James Mahar, who was a native of Ireland, but left that country at the age of sixteen years to keep from being forced to serve in the English army, and came to the United States, locating in what was then known as Middletown, now Portland, Connecticut. To John Ottarson and Margaret Mahar was born but one child, Benjamin F. Mrs. Margaret Ottarson died in this village in 1865, at the age of seventy-five years, and was a member of the Methodist church. B. F. Ottarson's death occurred, July 4, 1894, aged seventy-eight years.
A' DAM ARMSTRONG, Jr., a promi- nent member of the Warren county bar, was born at Johnsburg, Warren county, New York, April 26, 1841, and is a son of Adam and Anna (Williams) Armstrong. Adam Arm- strong, sr., was a native of County Ferman- agh, Ireland, where he was born in 1801, and in the year 1809 he with his parents emigrated 19
to this country, locating at Johnsburg, where Adam, sr., resided up to his death in 1888, in the eighty-seventh year of his age. During his whole life he was engaged in farming and lumbering ; was a member of the Methodist Episcopal church and a democrat in his po- litical tenets. His father was John Armstrong, born in County Fermanagh, and became an early settler in the vicinity of Johnsburg, where he resided from 1809, engaged in farming, up to his death. He was of Scotch-Irish extrac- tion. Adam Armstrong, sr., wedded Anna Williams, who was a native of Connecticut, a member of the Methodist Episcopal church, and died in 1878, having been born in 1808.
Adam Armstrong, jr., grew up in his native town, where he attended school and subse- quently went to Albany, where he took a course at the Albany Law school. He then returned to Glens Falls, where he entered the law office of Judge Brown in 1862, where he remained as a student at law until his admission to the bar in 1869. Here he practiced law very successfully until 1872, when he removed to the village of Chester, where he continued to practice up to 1888, when he returned to Glens Falls, where he has remained ever since. He owns a fine law library, and has a steadily grow- ing practice.
In 1869 Mr. Armstrong was married to Kate, a daughter of Nathaniel and Hanorah (Gilmore) Stackpole, of Williamstown, Massachuetts. To their marriage has been born one child, a son, Louis, who after leaving the Union school and Glens Falls academy, was graduated from the law department of the university of Ann Ar- bor, Michigan, in 1892, and in the same year was admitted to practice law. He was born August 12, 1870, and is now in business with his father.
Adam Armstrong, jr., is a member of Senate Lodge, Free and Accepted Masons, of Ches- tertown Lodge, Independent Order of Odd Fel- lows, of Improved Order of Red Men, and is a stanch democrat. From 1871 to 1874, Mr. Armstrong served as school commissioner of
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his county ; and also from 1881 to 1884. Was village clerk in 1890, having once filled the same office previous to his removal to Ches- tertown. In 1861 Mr. Armstrong was enroll- ing officer of the State militia for the towns of Johnsburg, Thurman and Stony Creek, and is at present president of the board of health of the village of Glens Falls.
A HIRA ELDRIDGE, a plumber and highly respected citizen of Cambridge, is a son of Ahira and Polly Rice, his wife, and was born in the town of Salem, Washington county, New York, April 11, 1823. Ahira Eldridge (father) was a native of the State of Connecticut, and was born in the year 1794. While yet a young man he migrated to Wash- ington county and located in the town of White Creek, where, for some years afterward, he was engaged in the manufacture of combs, commanding quite an extensive traffic in that line. Later he turned his attention to farm- ing, first owning a small tract, but kept adding additional tracts until his farm numbered two hundred and forty acres. When the British were making threatening invasions into the State, during the war of 1812, he started to join his countrymen, and to participate in the battle of Plattsburg, but before he arrived there the battle had ended. He became a leading member of the Presbyterian church, and served as elder for twenty years. His wife was Polly Rice, a daughter of Roswell Rice, of the town of White Creek. They were the parents of three sons and one daugh- ter : Ahira, Mary (dead), wife of Jehial Baker, of White Creek ; William, still living, born in 1835; and one not named. Ahira El- dridge, sr., died in 1879, and his wife in 1870, who was born in 1798.
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