USA > New York > Suffolk County > Portrait and biographical record of Suffolk county (Long Island) New York, Pt. 2 > Part 35
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In 1861 our subject removed to Gardiner's Is- land and made that place his home until 1881. when through sickness he moved to East Hamp- ton, where he died January 5, 1882. He had rep- resented his district in the State Assembly and was of a quiet, retiring nature and an old-style gentleman, respected and honored by all who knew him. His wife, Mary Gardiner, was the daughter of Jonathan Thompson, of New York City. Her brother, David Thompson, was late President of the New York Life and Trust Com- pany for a number of years until he resigned on account of advancing age. The wife of our sub- ject lived until August 5, 1887, when she was called to her final rest.
David Johnson Gardiner, the eldest son of our subject and the eleventh of the family who have owned the island, was born March 1, 1840, in the house where he now lives, and which, as we have referred to above, was built by Col. Abraham Gardiner in 1745. David J. is interested in vari- ous enterprises of importance, and, being strictly lionorable and conscientious in the discharge of his various duties, possesses the confidence and respect of those who know him, but, having no taste for public life, has declined official positions. He is a lover of fine animals and has on his es-
tate a number of fine horses, also a herd of valu- able Guernsey cattle. During his earlier years he asked nothing better than to ride behind some of these fiery animals, but he is now content to see them driven by those who make it their business. He also has on his place a number of full-blooded buffaloes, some of which were secured from the farm of Buffalo Jones, of Nebraska, and from the far West.
H ENRY HUNTTING was born in South- old, Suffolk County, May 6, 1818. His ancestors of the same family name form a long line of worthy people. The earliest of the family in this country was John Huntting, who in September, 1638, came from England and set- tled at Dedham, Mass., where he died April 12. 1682.
The latter's son, who bore the same name, was a resident of the same place. His wife was Eliza- beth Payne, who belonged to a prominent family of that beautiful Norfolk County town on the Charles River, thirteen miles from Boston. In this town their son Nathaniel was born on the 15th of November, 1675. When he was eighteen years of age the young man was graduated at Harvard College, after which he gave three years to preparation for the ministry of the gospel. In September, 1696, before he was twenty-one years of age, he succeeded the famous and reverend Thomas James, the earliest pastor of East Hamp- ton, as the minister of that large and important Puritan town. He was a diligent and faithful pas- tor; an orderly, energetic and capable man of affairs; a prosperous farmer, and a studious and accurate scholar. His sermons are written in pure and vigorous style, and are full of biblical teaching and practical application thereof. His writings are doubtless among the best existing sources of knowledge in respect to the condition of the East End of Long Island during the first half of the last century. He continued his pas- toral care until September, 1746, just fifty years after he began to preach to the people of East Hampton. His wife was Mary Green. They had
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ten children, and gave the Huntting name a good start on Long Island and beyond it. Two of their sons, Nathaniel and Jonathan, became min- isters. Nathaniel was graduated at Harvard Col- lege in 1722; Jonathan at Yale College in 1735.
The wife of the second Nathaniel was Mary Hedges. One of their sons was William, whose wife was Puah Osborne. Of this Huntting and Osborne marriage came the Rev. Jonathan Hunt- ting, of Southold. He was born at East Hamp- ton in 1778, and died at Southold, December 30, 1850. In 1804 he was graduated at Yale College, and then became a student of theology under the pastor of East Hampton, Rev. Lynian Beecher, and the Southampton pastor, Rev. David S. Bogart. He began to preach in the First Church of Southold in 1806, and on the 20th of August, 1807, the Presbytery of Long Island ordained him as the pastor thereof. A few years later Julia Sayre, of Southampton, became his wife. Four sons were born to them. The first, William, was graduated at Amherst College in 1835, and at the Princeton Theological Seminary in 1839; was ordained by the Presbytery of Long Island in 1842, at Greenport, and died there in 1891, aged eighty-one years. His next younger brother, Jonathan W. Huntting, became prominent in the . county as teacher, merchant, Postmaster, Town Clerk, Justice of the Peace, School Commissioner, and the efficient promoter of many public inter- ests. He died, January 9, 1890, in the seventy- eighth year of his age. Edward, third son of the same parents, succeeded his father in the home- stead. He was a leading Elder in the church for many years, a man of bright and active intellect, of wide and systematic intelligence, and both fluent and eloquent in speech. He died, Novem- ber 13, 1882, in his seventieth year.
The fourth son, Henry, like his brothers, shared in the priceless inheritance of Payne, Green, Hedges, Osborne and Sayre, as well as Huntting blood. He was called, in his early manhood, by his fellow townsmen to the office of Justice of the Peace and Town Auditor. Having a good English and mathematical education, with su- perior intellectual endowments, and having lived all his life in a remarkably intelligent family, he
quickly and thoroughly qualified himself for the best performance of the duties of his office. He was re-elected for successive terms until he had served his fellow citizens in this way for twenty- five years, and until his imperative duties in other and more responsible offices constrained him to resign the place for which he was eminently well fitted and in which for a quarter of a century he had rendered most effective and valuable pub- lic service. How his high character and judicious work were appreciated by his fellow citizens may be indicated by the fact that for a long series of years he received a higher number of votes than were cast at the same time for any other man elected to any office in Southold town. For many years he was the presiding officer at the annual town meeting. The subjects presented to the meeting for consideration and decision were often many and various. The motions made were not unfrequently pressed with urgency and excitement, but there never was, it is believed, an appeal from Mr. Huntting's ruling on any question of order or method of proceeding. There was rarely or never an appeal from his judgment as a justice to any higher court, however many judicial cases were decided by him. For many years he was a Judge of the Court of Sessions of Suffolk County. Here his intelligence, up- rightness and soundness of mind had great weight with the eminent and learned judges who were associated with him on the judicial bench. It is a very uncommon thing for so large a pro- portion of the decisions of any judge, in any court, for nearly a generation of men, to pass unchallenged or to be confirmed on appeal by the higher court, as clearly marked and highly honored the decisions of Henry Huntting. It attests the knowledge, carefulness, probity and wisdom of the man. The assiduousness of his at- tention, the exactitude of his information, the clearness, force and precision of his thinking, his impartiality and the utmost rectitude and su- premacy of his conscience made his determination of a case the end of it, almost or quite invariably. Thus, by six successive elections in his native town, he was kept in this office from 1851 to 1875, and as long as he would accept it.
PORTRAIT AND BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD.
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When the Southold Savings Bank was organ- ized in 1858, Mr. Huntting was elected one of its Trustees and its Secretary and Treasurer. No person acquainted with the affairs of this bank has ever failed to see that his possession of these offices and his performance of their requirements, were the chief causes of the public's perfect con- fidence in it; of its notable prosperity, and of its honorable place among the foremost institutions of this kind in the whole state of New York. He gave his days and his nights to its usefulness and ever increasing business, week after week, month upon month, year succeeding year, rest- ing on the Sabbath according to the command- ment and never dreaming of taking any other vacations. He has been heard to say, with the utmost seriousness, that it is no light charge to take care of other people's money. He always cherished this sentiment and acted accordingly. So the deposits under his hand rose, in the small village of Southold, from nothing to more than a million and a half of dollars above all that had been withdrawn.
Mr. Huntting continued to perform all the work of his responsible trust until it grew to an amount beyond the possible achievement of any one man. The Trustees had for years offered him an as- sistant, and eventually he accepted the aid of his competent nephew, Henry Howard Huntting, in whose favor he resigned his offices of Secretary and Treasurer in 1891, and who continues to direct the work on essentially the same lines that have been wisely and prosperously pursned from the early years of the bank. The Trustees re- peatedly proposed to increase the salary of Henry Huntting, but he never faltered in his opposition to the proceeding to the extent of the desires of the Board, and, undoubtedly, of the depositors also, who very properly wished to see a part of the rapidly accumulating surplus of the bank become the well earned property of the man who had done so much to promote their own interests. When at length the new building of the bank was completed, and a new stage of its career opened before the institution, Mr. Huntting in- sisted on laying down the burden of responsibil- ity and care and toil which he had unceasingly
borne for a third of a century. His determination in the matter could not be resisted. The Trustees were constrained, though with painful reluctance. to accept his resignation of the offices of Secre- tary and Treasurer. The Board proposed to give him an emeritus position with a salary, in view of the priceless influence of his life and character, and the inadequate compensation which he had for many years received for his work. But le absolutely refused to consent to the proposed ar- rangement, and insisted upon an entire separation of himself from the offices which he had so long and so worthily held. He agreed, however, to continue to give information to the Board, and thus by his name and knowledge and skill, to promote the interests of the hundreds or thou- sands of depositors whose money is entrusted to the care and use of the bank for their own advantage and profit. He is almost the only sur- vivor of the original Board of Trustees.
In 1867 Mr. Huntting took the leading part in the expense and the responsibility of building the Southold Academy. The deeds for the pur- chase of its grounds were drawn with his pen, and all the legal documents which determined its ownership, and its state and conditions, are the fruits of his studious consideration and his knowledge of jurisprudence, acquired by many years of investigation and practice in these mat- ters. He continued his fostering care of the acad- emy throughout nearly a quarter of a century: gave to the young people who pursued their studies under its teachers the benefit of his ex- ample and ceaseless concern for their welfare. and bestowed on them through his support of the institution pecuniary aid to the amount of several thousands of dollars. The trees that adorn its grounds are the planting of his own hands, and the beanty which grew there year by year is mainly the product of his taste, his generosity and his toil. He,cherished the academy as the wise and worthy father cherishes the son of his love. .. Many of its graduates are in places of emi- nence and honor.
In 1863 Henry Huntting accepted the office of Secretary and Treasurer of the First Church of Southold. His reverend father had been its pas-
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tor from 1807 to 1828, and had often ministered to it for more than twenty years thereafter. Henry Huntting had attended its public worship during all the years that he could remember. In the musical part of this worship he had taken a vocal part throughout the period of his manhood. He entered heartily into the performance of the Treasurer's duties, and during his administration of the office, for nearly thirty years, the value of the church property was more than doubled. One hundred per cent would not equal the additional size and value of the parsonage and the cemetery, the chapel and the sheds, and the lots on which they stand, were acquired and the pay- ments therefor fully made: the academy was built and endowed by the Martha Adams fund. to the extent of twelve to fifteen scholarships: the church building was in many ways improved and beautified. In these forward movements he took a chief part. During his treasurership he made it sure that the pastor of the church should never wait even a day at the end of a quarter of tlie year for the payment of that quarter's salary. What a change in the experience of many a pastor if the church which he serves had such a treasurer !
Henry Huntting is the son of Christian pa- rents. He had lived all his life in a Christian household, and all his brothers had long been active members of the church when, in the year 1860, he entered the full communion of the church in whose membership his birth and baptism had given him a place. He no sooner made this public confession of his Christian faith than he manifested the good fruits of this new relation and Christian progress. He disclosed his deeper and more earnest religious devotion. his new spir- itual experiences, in many ways. He began to teach the Holy Scriptures to a class of voung persons in the church every Sunday; he took a prominent and most effective part in the devo- tional services of the congregation, and in mani- fold and productive forms of Christian activity and usefulness, he proved the richness and spir- itnality of his religious life. He soon yielded to the desire of the church that he should be or- clained a Ruling Elder. How wisely and how
efficiently, and with what devotion and fruitful- ness he performed the duties of the office for twenty years, until increasing age caused him to resign it, those best know who were most closely associated with him, and who had the rich privi- lege and great happiness of possessing his confi- dence and his cordial regard in a high degree. The benefactions proceeding from his heart through his purse have been thoughtfully be- stowed through many agencies in his own neigh- borhood: in all parts of the United States, and in various foreign lands. Apart from special gifts, silently and privately made to needy per- sons within the wide range of his own acquaint- ance, perhaps his chief charities have been in the promotion of sound education and the be- stowment of pure, wholesome and Christian lit- erature. In these ways his influence has been spread abroad far and near. Every generous and judicious enterprise for the public welfare has sought not vainly in him a substantial supporter.
It is too early to set forth at every point even a summary of his upright and fruitful life. He has been eager and alert to serve men; to promote their welfare; to raise the tone and standard of living, but he has never sought the public ap- plause. He has been no trimmer. He has been open and outspoken. He has permitted no one to search for his position. Every one has known that he is always found at the very point where his well-taught conscience places him. He has been strength to the weak and courage to the icarful and faltering in the path of righteousness.
T ITUS CONKLIN, a retired farmer, living at Huntington Bay, was born in Brooklyn, May 11, 1834, and is a son of Titus and Rebecca (Beers) Conklin. He is one of six chil- dren, of whom Lucinda B. and our subject alone survive. Hi, father was a native of Cold Spring. and was born in the year 1792. Early in life lie was a scafaring man, but tiring of the arduous duties incident to such a carver, he later went to Brooklyn, where he opened a lumber yard,
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it being the second ever operated in the "City of Churches." In 1838 he disposed of his lumber business, and, removing to Huntington Bay, lo- cated where our subject now lives. There he spent the balance of his life, his death occurring in 1850. He was a stanch and trusty fellow-citizen and was sincerely mourned by all who knew him. In business matters his untiring efforts were re- warded by a grateful measure of success.
The subject of this sketch received his educa- tion in the common schools of the locality. He was early familiarized with the pleasures and du- ties of the routine of farm life. His father died when he was but sixteen years of age, and much responsibility fell upon his young shoulders. At the age of twenty-one he was given entire control of the home farmn, and since that time has con- ducted it, with the exception of about two years spent in New York City, when he filled a clerical position with Nathan T. Beers. This locality is dear to Mr. Conklin, made so by associations, for liere his life has practically been spent. He is well known and well liked among the people, and has been very successful in conducting his chosen work. He has never married, and his sister pre- sides over the household.
A NSEL BARNUM GILDERSLEEVE. President of the Huntington Lumber & Coal Company, was born at Northport, town of Huntington, June 30, 1840. His father, Thomas W. Gildersleeve, was born January 20, 1812, on the old homestead near Northport. that had been in the family for more than one hun- dred and fifty years. In his earlier life he fol- lowed farming. but later came to Huntington, where he spent the remainder of his days. March 13. 1834. he married Frances B. Griffith, who was born at Crab Meadow, near Northport. June 4. 1808. They were members of the Methodist Church, and their home was regarded as head- quarters for friends of their faith for a wide circle around. Her father, whose name was Epenetus Griffith, had the distinction of going up the Ilud-
son River on Robert Fulton's first steamboat on its first trip up the river. Aside from this, we have but little information of the Griffith family. The father of our subject died March 25, 1887, and his mother September 6, 1893, in her eighty-sixth year.
The paternal grandfather of our subject, Jona- than Gildersleeve, was born July 24, 1788, on the old homestead, and was united in marriage May 17, 1806, with Deborah Rogers, who was born May 16, 1785, and died August 27, 1834. Hc passed away November 21, 1851. The subject of this sketch was the only son of his parents, and had an only sister, Mary Cornelia, who was born July 15, 1836, and married Thomas B. Young. their home being in Brooklyn. Mr. Gildersleeve grew to manhood at Northport, and received his education in the schools of that place and Hunt- ington. At the age of seventeen he entered the store of Sammis & Gould in Huntington, and there he remained for seven years, when he formed a partnership with Philip Pearsall, the present Clerk of the town, and engaged in mer- cantile business at Cold Spring Harbor. He formed a partnership with Daniel L. Baylis in 1867 and opened a mercantile business that con- tinued until 1889, when Mr. Baylis and himself organized the Huntington Lumber & Coal Company, he being made President and his part- ner Treasurer, so that we may speak of Mr. Gilder- sleeve as being in business continually with Mr. Baylis since 1867.
By his own exertions and strict attention to business and fair dealings with all his customers, our subject has built up a large trade. He is also interested in various other enterprises of the place, being one of the stockholders in the Steam- boat Company, the Huntington Street Railroad and the Huntington Water Works. In politics he is a stanch Republican, and while his party has run him for various offices, he has never been a politician, being content to devote his whole time to his business interests. For six years he was a member of the School Board and during part of the time he served as President of the Board.
Mr. Gildersleeve was married, October 12, 1865, to Sarah J. Patten, a native of New York 1
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City, and an accomplished lady. Her father, Thomas Patten, was born in Boston, where he was a prominent politician and also quite a church man. They have an interesting family, of whom Thomas Y., the oldest, was born Oeto- ber 10, 1868. He is a photographer in Hunting- ton, and was married, October 10, 1894, to Al- berta S. Hall. Lawrence M. was born December 31, 1873, and is now a elerk in the store of H. S. & J. M. Brush & Co., of Huntington. Charlotte F. was born September 28, 1876, and Caroline M. December 26, 1881. Wilbur G. died in in- fancy, and Ansel, Jr., died when about eight years old. Our subject is a member of the Second Presbyterian Church, and was for a number of years one of its Trustees. He stands high in Masonry, having been for twenty-seven years a member of the order, and for twelve years Secre- tary of the lodge, and at the present time is Senior Warden. He and his family occupy one of the finest homes in Huntington, which is situated on an eminence, giving a fine view of the surround- ing country.
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J EREMIAH L. DAYTON was born on the farm where he now lives December 27, 1818, and is the son of Jeremiah and the grandson of Jeremiah Dayton. His father mar- ried Sarah Baker, and they became the parents of four children, of whom our subject was third, the others being Henry, Phoebe (deceased) and Abram.
Jeremiah Dayton, the father of our subject, was reared on the farm and received such educa- tional advantages as the times afforded. When about twenty-five he engaged to drive the stage from East Hampton to New York and continued in this work for about four years, also carried one mail each way every week. He died when about eighty-four. His wife died at the age of seventy- two and her remains are buried at East Hampton.
The subject of this sketch married Miss Mary Parsons, and they have one child, Mary R., who was born in 1870 and makes her home at the old family homestead. Mrs. Dayton died in 1879.
Mr. Dayton learned the shoemaker's trade, but he has never worked at this business to any great extent. He early took charge of the farm as his father began to fail in strength and has continued steadily in its management and development, now owning about one hundred acres of land, which is in the main very valuable. He also has valuable landed interests in the village of Ama- gansett.
Mr. Dayton has the common school education of his time, but has kept in touch with the world. His entire life has been spent on the farm, yet he is well aware of what is going on in the ocean of humanity around him. He is a Republican in his political sympathies and in religious views is a member of the Presbyterian Church.
H ENRY S. MOTT, President of the Bank of Northport, who is quite extensively en- gaged in the real estate and insurance business, was born in the village of Northport. March 25, 1855. the second in a family of four children born to James S. and Mary (Suydam) Mott. The father of our subject was born in Centerport, but his younger days were spent in Bridgeport, Conn., he coming to this place when a young man. He was engaged in the coasting trade on Long Island Sound and up the Hudson River, and was very successful in his business. His death occurred February 5, 1891. In polities he was a Republican, and both he and his wife were members of the Methodist Protestant Church, in which religious body they were earn- est workers. Mrs. Mott was a native of Center- port, and died November 18, 1887, at the age of sixty-two years.
Mr. Mott, the subject of this sketch, remained at home until about fifteen years old, and at- tended the public school. He was then sent to Brooklyn, where he was in school for three years, and when ready to do for himself, found an opening as clerk in the office of John P. Stock- ton, Jr., a real estate and insurance agent. After remaining in the latter's employment for some
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two years, he was clerk in a coal yard for a year and a-half. This was followed by a two years' engagement as clerk in a New York grocery store, when he came to this village and formed a partnership with A. C. Tillotson in a general mer- cantile business, which was very successfully con- ducted until 1891, a real estate and insurance of- fice having been associated with the store. At that time our subject organized a private bank, which became a state bank May 1, 1893, with Mr. Mott as its first President.
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