History of Cattaraugus County, New York, with Illustrations and Biographical Sketches of Some of Its Prominent Men and Pioneers, Part 89

Author: Franklin Ellis and Eugene Arns Nash
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At the close of his academic studies in 1841, he entered, as a medical student, the office of Levi Goldsborough, in the village of Waverly, N. Y. One of the prevailing characteristics of young Van Aernam was that of positive- ness, never assuming hypothetical or ambiguous conclusions, discarding as dangerous every theory not fully established by a thorough and searching investigation. As a medical student he was diligent, energetic, and practical. Select almost to exclusiveness in his associations, with a constitu- tion unimpaired by indulgence, with a mind naturally strong, improved by study and strengthened by application, and with moral principles fortified by an intuitive respect for the laws of God and man, he passed through the slippery paths of youth to dawning manhood without one blot to tarnish his reputation or his name. He attended medical lectures at Geneva College during the session of 1842-43, and soon after entered Willoughby College, Ohio, from which institution he graduated in 1845.

In the summer of 1845 he located at Burton (now Allegany), and commenced the practice of medicine; and on the 30th day of November, 1845, he married Miss Amy M. Etheridge, a lady in every particular worthy to share the honors and good fortune which have subsequently fallen to their lot. He continued in the practice of his profession at the latter place until March, 1848, when he removed to Franklinville, where he still resides. During a period of nine years, until the autumn of 1857, he devoted his time and talent to the practice of his profession, and by his fidelity and practical skill he secured an extensive patron- age and the unbounded confidence and esteem of all who came within the circle of his acquaintance. At the general election in the fall of 1857, he was elected to represent the First Assembly District of Cattaraugus County in the State Legislature, and the fidelity with which he guarded the rights and interests of his constituents has become a matter of history, and needs no repetition in this connection. At

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the close of the Legislative session in the spring of 1858, he returned to his home and again resumed the practice of his profession, with a growing popularity and a more ex- tended field of usefulness. During his whole professional career, Dr. Van Aernam has never known any distinction between the rich and the poor, the high and the low, but wherever disease or physical suffering found a lodgment he cheerfully adopted that as his field of labor, without one thought of personal consequences to himself.

As the crisis approached which was to test with such giant force the strength of American institutions, Dr. Van Aernam threw the whole energies of his mind and might for the Union intact, popular freedom, and popular rights. He labored zealously to encourage enlistments, and contributed liberally to alleviate the necessities of those who had been deprived of their natural supporters by the exigencies of the war. Under the call for troops in the summer of 1862, he was recommended to the Governor as a suitable person for the important position of regimental surgeon, and in August he was ordered to report at Jamestown, where he was examined, approved, commissioned with the rank of major, and assigned to the 154th Regiment of Infantry. On arriving at the front, in the fall, he was soon made sur- geon of brigade. In the fall of 1863 he was made medical director of the 2d division, 11th Army Corps. In March, 1864, by a consolidation of the 11th and 12th Army Corps with a large detachment of Rousseau's Kentucky troops, the 20th Army Corps was formed, and placed under the com- mand of Gen. Hooker; this meant " business," and Van Aernam went with the Army Corps. These important trusts were no sinecures, where carpet professionals perform chivalrous deeds on paper, but stern realities in camp and field, amid the din of battle and the clash of resounding arms. As an evidence of his high standing in the army, and his cool deliberation under circumstances of severe trial, he was under constant detail upon the operating staff; and there is no possible form of mutilation which the human system is capable of undergoing, that has not fallen under the personal observation of Henry Van Aernam.

He not only followed the fortunes of the army through its various marches and campaigns, but served upon the operating staff during the battles of Chancellorsville, Gettys- burg, Wauhatchie, Chattanooga, Ringgold, Rocky-Faced Ridge, Resaca, Dallas, New Hope Church, Kenesaw Moun- tain, Peach-Tree Creek, and Atlanta. Here, entirely worn out with fatigue, and unable longer to sustain the constant draught upon his physical constitution, he resigned his commission, on surgeon's certificate of disability, after an active service of more than two years, and left Atlanta, Ga., on the last hospital train, Nov. 8, 1864. Late in the fall he reached home, feeble in health, to find himself member- elect to the Thirty-ninth Congress from the Thirty-third District of New York. He was re-elected in 1866, and his official record as the people's representative has already passed into history, and the approbation of an intelligent and appreciative constituency of his Congressional career has recently been so significantly recorded that all errors and mistakes are unnecessary.

Soon after the inauguration of President Grant, in 1869, Dr. Van Aernam was nominated and confirmed as Commis-

sioner of Pensions. His keen perceptions, his intuitive knowledge of human nature, his experience in Congress and in the army, his business capacity, and his conceded professional skill, amply qualified him for the faithful and efficient discharge of the delicate and responsible duties of that position. By his suggestion many important reforms were inaugurated, and among them was the passage of an act making pensions payable quarterly instead of semi-an- nually, and an order guarding pensioners against numerous frauds perpetrated against them by unprincipled claim- agents.

Again he returned to the home of his adoption, and again he entered upon the practice of his profession, which con- tinues to the present time.

At the recent election, in the fall of 1878, he was again elected to the office of representative in our National Con- gress. The dazzling glow of most men is enhanced by the altitude they attain, through official station, above the plane of ordinary life. Not so with Henry Van Aernam. Eminent as he has been in his legislative, administra- tive, military, and professional careers, his sterling qualities appear to best advantage in the social and domestic circles, and in his daily intercourse with his fellow-men. Ever foremost in all enterprises for public good, he is liberal almost to profusion. Cool and collected, he allows no cir- cumstance to take him by surprise. Circumspect in all his deportment, his worthy example exerts a salutary influence upon all by whom he is surrounded. In the incorporation of the village, as well as in the organization and successful progress of the Cemetery Association, his far-reaching per- ceptions, and the force of his mental energy, have been fully tested and successfully applied. To portray all the sterling qualities of his versatile mind would require volumes ; suffice it to say that he is constitutionally a happy man, and by a species of diffusive contagion imparts the disease to all around him. Dr. Van Aernam and his amiable lady are happy in their domestic relations, in their associations, in their surroundings; in the companionship of their two children, the eldest, a daughter, the wife of the Hon. James D. McVey, the younger, a son, Charles D. Van Aernam, a young lawyer of sterling worth and fair prac- tice in his native village, all inmates under the same roof; and, above all, happy in the full confidence of the mercy of God and the fullness of the atonement wrought by a crucified Redeemer, they patiently wait the summons that shall bid them depart in peace.

WILLIAM FRANKLIN WEED*

was born in Darien, Conn., June 3, 1811. He was the tenth child, the fifth and youngest son of Nathan and Mary Weed, the former of whom was born Sept. 28, 1760, and the latter, Oct. 28, 1764, both of Stamford (now Darien), in the State of Connecticut. He remained at home with his parents until his fifteenth year, enjoying such advantages for an education as were afforded by the common schools of the day, but by application to study and an aptitude to ac- quire knowledge, he became quite proficient for one of his

# By Marvin Older.

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years and limited opportunities. At the age of fifteen, he went to the city of New York, and engaged in the capacity of a clerk. Here he acquired the first principles of finance and trade, and adopted those habits of exactitude which have been proverbial with him through a long, varied, and successful career. He remained in the city four years, and at the age of nineteen, returned to his native town and adopted the avocation of a farmer, which he followed for two years. In the autumn succeeding the anniversary of his twentieth birthday, he married Sarah W. Chandler, on the 14th day of November, 1831.

By this marriage he had three children,-Dexter C. Weed, born in Darien, Conn., Oct. 6, 1832, who is now an exten- sive farmer in the town of Franklinville, N. Y. ; Nathan F. Weed, of the mercantile firm of N. F. Weed & Co., born in Franklinville, N. Y., Feb. 1, 1835; M. Adelie Weed, now the wife of M. Johnson Crowley, of Randolph, N. Y., born in Franklinville, N. Y., May 26, 1841. He remained at the old homestead in Darien until the spring of 1834, when he, with his family, removed to Franklin- - ville, Cattaraugus Co., N. Y., where he arrived about the 10th of May. In July of the same year, he purchased the Conrad Mill property, which was sadly dilapidated and out of repair, involving the necessity of heavy expenditures before it could be made self-supporting, much more a profitable investment. He accordingly commenced the construction of an entire new mill upon the same dam, and a few rods distant from the old one, which was fully com- pleted in 1835. The erection and completion of the new mill demanded heavy outlays for one in his situation, and drew very largely upon his credit; this circumstance, con- nected with the financial crisis which soon followed, envi- roned him with difficulties before which a less resolute man would have yielded in utter despair. Not so with him. He carried in his moral nature the very key to success,-a singleness of purpose and a resolute determination to ac- complish the object upon which his mind was set.

He was successful; he passed the trying ordeal unharmed, where so many faltered and fell ; he at length found himself in fair sailing, in pleasant weather, gently gliding before a gale of merited prosperity.

He promptly met every payment and scrupulously re- deemed every obligation, and to achieve this one fixed pur- pose of his heart, he toiled night and day in his mill, much of the time unaided and alone, performing the labors of two ordinary men; thus he continued, the manager and proprie- tor of the mill and farm attached until the 1st of April, 1858, when he sold his property and removed to the village of Franklinville.

Here, in the spring of 1858, he entered into partnership with his son, Nathan F., in the business of dry-goods and general merchandise, under the firm-name of N. F. Weed & Co. In August, 1861, the store building with several others was entirely consumed by fire, but with his charac- teristic energy, another building was provided and active business resumed with scarcely a single day's suspension of active operations, and the same firm continues a large, safe, and reliable business to the present day.

On the 1st of January, 1867, the firm established and opened a general exchange office, which he successfully

managed for a term of six years, and until the organization of the First National Bank of Franklinville, in February, 1873. On the opening of this bank, he entered it as its president,-which honorable position he occupies at the present time.

In the organization of the Franklinville Cemetery Asso- ciation, Mr. Weed bore a prominent part, giving the measure his undivided support, and by the prestige of his name, carried the enterprise safely and successfully through the trying ordeal of incipient organization. He has held nu- merous public offices of honor and trust, being an acting justice of the peace sixteen years, and for four years repre- sented the town on the board of supervisors. On the 10th of September, 1876, he had the misfortune to lose his wife by death,-a bereavement which he sadly deplored and deeply lamented,-but being impelled by his domestic nature and an ardent love for the quiet and comfort of home life, on the 9th of October, 1877, he took Miss Ann E. Hogg, an estimable lady, to be a partaker of his joys and sorrows through the remainder of life's journey. Mr. Weed has one sister living, Mrs. Ann Richard, who resides at Norwalk, Conn., at the advanced age of eighty-seven years, and one brother, Mr. Joseph Weed, who resides in San Francisco, Cal., aged seventy-seven years. As a man Mr. Weed possesses many strong qualities of a positive character. He is thoroughly honest and scrupulously exact in his dealings with his fellow-men. Endued with an invincible energy, he allows no contingency to thwart him in the accomplishment of his designs. In his social relations, his friendships are strong and sincere. Of strong, rather than acute perceptions, and judgment ripened and matured by a long and fruitful experience, he is often consulted on matters of public interest. He views most propositions from the stand-point of " profit and loss," and probes the subject with the insinuating query, " Will it pay?" and decides the matter as the question is affirmatively or negatively an- swered. Sober, temperate, and exemplary in all his social and domestic habits, his amusements are few and simple, confined to an interchange of social gatherings with a selected few congenial friends.

Mr. Weed, now at the fast ripening age of sixty-seven years, by a life of industry, prudence, and economy, has acquired a competence, and well may it serve to mitigate the asperities of life's down grade, while the star of hope guides to a better land in the not distant hereafter.

SOLOMON CUMMINGS,*

son of John G. and Sarah (Burroughs) Cummings, was born in the town of Warren, Worcester Co., Mass., Jan. 14, 1809. He is the second in a family of four children, two of whom are now living, -himself and a sister, Mrs. Maria C. Gilbert, who resides in Warren, Mass. He inherited from his pa- rents a strong and vigorous constitution, and through the influences of wise precepts and good example, his principles became thoroughly fortified against the allurements of vices which so thickly bestrew the pathway of life with the

* By Marvin Older.

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MRS. SOLOMON CUMMINGS

SOLOMON

ON CUMMINGS

RESIDENCE OF SOLOMON CUMMINGS , FRANKLINVILLE, N. Y.

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blighted wrecks of time, and the blasted hopes of a happy hereafter.

Up to the age of seventeen years he lived with his pa- rents in their staid old New England home, and received such an education as was customary among the sons of well- to-do farmers in his native State. In the autumn of 1826 he attended the Monson Academy for half a term, and dur- ing the winter taught a district school in his native town. In the spring of 1827 he started in pursuit of his destiny, and the first locality he investigated was the city of Boston. Here he found Miss Fortune, in charge of the department allotted to aspiring young country gentlemen who sought for eminence and opulence in the fancied gayeties of city life. From here he took his departure for the residence of his uncle, the Rev. Jacob Cummings, in Stratham, in New Hampshire, where he remained and attended the Hampton Academy during one term. He then returned to Boston, where he found employment as clerk in a store, and re- mained a few months; then returned to his native town. In the spring of 1828, at the age of nineteen, he bade good-bye to friends and the place of his nativity, and soon found himself in the town of Farmersville, N. Y., and fol- lowed the business of teaching for three winters,-a business which resulted in honor to himself and a lasting benefit to his newly-found friends and acquaintances.

On the 22d of August, 1832, he was married to Mariette, eldest daughter of Jonathan and Lucretia Graves, of Far- mersville, N. Y.

The family of Mr. and Mrs. Cummings consisted of four children,-Julia A. (died June 24, 1867), Silas W., Sarah Louisa, and Mary. Those living all reside in the town of Franklinville. Mr. Cummings continued to reside in Far- mersville for a period of nearly twenty-three years, most of which time he was engaged in mercantile business with fair success, first with his father-in-law, and subsequently with his brother, I. T. Cummings (now deceased). During his residence in Farmersville he was six times elected as super- visor; and at the session of the board in 1848 he was chosen as chairman,-a delicate and responsible duty, which was ably and satisfactorily performed. He also served as a jus- tice of the peace for several terms in the town of Farmers- ville, besides discharging the duties incumbent upon various other town officers of a less pretentious character. In the spring of 1853 he removed to the village of Franklinville, and formed a copartnership with Henry S. Woodruff, in the mercantile business, under the firm-name of Cummings & Woodruff, and, as senior partner, gave the business his undivided attention until the autumn of 1865, when the firm was dissolved by the death of the junior partner, Henry S. Woodruff.

Mr. Cummings continued in the business for nearly two years, until 1867, when he sold the whole interest to D. I. Graves & Co., and retired from the turmoil and perplexities of mercantile life. As a business man, he is a decided suc- cess. Prompt and exact in all his dealings with others, he reasonably expected the same from them. Extremely wary and cautious in all his investments, he contented himself with moderate but sure gains, rather than indulge in uncer- tain speculations, where the chances of success were equally divided with those of entire failure.

He ever kept his promises within hailing distance of a well-filled exchequer, and no man can say that he ever ate the bread of idleness or feasted upon the proceeds of extor- tion. In 1861 he was elected to the office of justice of the peace for the town of Franklinville, a position which he has occupied without intermission until the present time, hav- ing acted in that capacity, in all, for a term of about thirty years. In 1862 he was appointed by Gov. Seymour as one of the senatorial district committee, to assist in raising and organizing the 112th and 154th Regiments of New York State Volunteers,-a duty which was promptly undertaken, energetically pursued, and successfully accomplished; thus thoroughly identifying himself with the popular cause of suppressing the Rebellion.

In the autumn of 1862, the Board of Supervisors of the county, at their annual session, made choice of Mr. Cum- mings as their clerk,-a position demanding a high order of talent as a business man, and approved skill as an accountant, -a duty which he faithfully performed, with credit to him- self and satisfaction to those by whom the trust was imposed.

In 1875 he represented the town of Franklinville on the Board of Supervisors.

His known capacity for business, and his thoroughly- established reputation for honesty, fidelity, and integrity, rendered him eminently qualified for the adjustment and final settlement of large estates, many of which have been confided to his care and administration. Many estates have increased in his hands, and none have depreciated in value ; and in this respect he may be regarded as the widow's and the orphan's friend.

As an agent or attorney for procuring pensions, bounties, etc., from the general government, his services have been of great value to many of his fellow-citizens, and their bus- iness could not have been confided to more trustworthy hands. As a scribe and general conveyancer, he has few equals and no superiors outside of the legal profession.

As a citizen, Mr. Cummings is moral, exemplary, social, and refined, an ardent supporter of the system of popular education, and an earnest advocate of social, literary, and moral reforms.

Ever a zealous advocate of the cause of temperance, he has lent the influence of his personal popularity to the pro- motion of the cause and the suppression of the traffic in alcoholic beverages in the village and throughout the town.

In his benevolence, he is thoroughly guarded and ex- tremely cautious. Far from being parsimonious, he gives with a cautious hand; liberal in his donations to worthy enterprises, he looks upon those of doubtful or precarious utility with unqualified disfavor ; and his keen perceptions and intuitive knowledge of human nature render him proof against frequent mistakes.

His powers of imitation are good, personating individual characteristics with the skill of an adept. Fond of rational fun, he relishes a good joke, and occasionally indulges in sallies of wit and lively repartee. Severe in his criticisms, caustic in his sarcasm, he is nevertheless liberal and pro- fuse in awarding the meed of praise to the worthy and deserving. As a man, he is a gentleman, free from any and all of the contaminating influences that so frequently sur- round those in easy circumstances.

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Mr. Cummings and his amiable wife, quietly sheltered beneath the ample roof of their spacious residence, look back upon the varied scenes of the busy past without re- morse or regret, protected from want in the future by a modest competence, the result of a virtuous, busy, and well- spent life. Happy in their domestic relations, happy in the affection of their children, happy in the confidence and esteem of their neighbors, and, above all, happy in a con- fiding trust in the mercies of God and the efficacy of the atonement through His Son, hand in hand they peacefully journey on down the slope of time towards the sunset of life; and when death shall sever the link that binds matter to mind, and opens the gate between time and eternity, may they enter in to go no more out forever !

AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MARVIN OLDER .*

I was born (80 says the record) in the town of Middle- town, in the county of Delaware, and State of New York, on the 22d day of August, 1810. A few days subsequent to this event, which has ever been of such vast importance to me, a gentleman from Delhi, one who has since been well known to the country, and especially in Western New

MARVIN OLDER.

York (the Hon. Dudley Marvin), called at the residence of my parents, and, taking in the situation at a glance, suggested that the frail embryo of humanity lying before him should be christened Marvin. The suggestion was adopted by unanimous consent, and, ever since I became eligible to roll-call, I have answered to that inharmonious name, sometimes with pleasure, sometimes with sorrow, and sometimes with dread, as varying circumstances by which I was surrounded gave rise to these different emo- tions. Having " paddled my own canoe" thus far down life's shifting current, I here cast aside all false delicacy and present myself before the indulgent reader in the capacity of a story-teller, craving your forbearance while I "blow my own bugle." I was the sixth son and the eighth entry in point of chronology in the long list which

numbered sixteen, nine boys and seven girls, the offspring of William and Hannah Older, all of whom reached full maturity, and acted well their part on the theatre of pass- ing events. Of the nine boys, I alone remain to remember the many virtues of those gone before. Of the girls, three survive, and are pleasantly situated in the far West.

In 1815, when I was five years of age, my parents, with their family, removed to Onondaga County, where they remained three years. There nothing pertinent to this narrative transpired, save that I invariably stood at the head of my class in the district school, from the fact that there were but two in the class, and one of them, at least, was lamentably under-witted. On the 16th day of July, 1818, at the age of eight years, I, with a number of other kindred household appendages, was unloaded from an emi- grant wagon by the side of a welling spring, in the midst of an unbroken forest and growing herbage, on the north- east corner of lot 25, township 5, range 4, of the Holland Land Company's Purchase. This location was then in the original town of Ischua, which at that date comprised nearly the entire north half of the county Cattaraugus. It is now within the limits of the town of Farmersville, one and a half miles northeast of the village of Franklinville, and is known by the ungeographical name of " Older Hill." Here, with one school-house in the whole county,-a library consisting of a Bible and psalm-book, Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, Young's Night Thoughts, Hervey's Meditations, an antiquated duodecimo dictionary (author unknown), its first few pages containing a condensed synopsis of English grammar in its most obscure and repulsive form, Dwight's Geography, Dilworth's and Daboll's Arithmetics, the American Preceptor, Webster's Spelling-book, and for romance and novelty, Asop's Fables, Robinson Crusoe, and Charlotte Temple,-the struggle for intellectual manhood commenced.

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History of Cattaraugus County, New York, with Illustrations and Biographical Sketches of Some of Its Prominent Men and Pioneers, Part 89

Author: Franklin Ellis and Eugene Arns Nash Publication date: Publisher: Number of Pages:

Author: Franklin Ellis and Eugene Arns Nash
Publication date:
Publisher:
Number of Pages: