USA > New York > New York City > Prominent families of New York; being an account in biographical form of individuals and families distinguished as representatives of the social, professional and civic life of New York city > Part 104
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Sir William Pepperrell, who was born in 1696, received a good education, and then went into business with his father, in conjunction with whom he achieved a handsome fortune in mercantile business and in real estate transactions. They owned over one hundred vessels. He was Chief Justice of the Common Pleas in York County, and was also a Colonel in command of the Maine Militia. Several times he was representative to the General Court at Boston, and was a member of the Council of Massachusetts in 1727, and afterwards its president. Placed in command of the expedition against Louisburg in 1745, he achieved so signal a success that he was made a baronet, the first native-born American to be thus honored by the mother country. In 1755, he was Major-General of the British Army in Maine; he afterwards became General in that army, and was acting Governor of Massachusetts, 1756-8.
Mr. Everett P. Wheeler is descended through his mother from Sir William Pepperrell, whose name he bears. His mother was Elizabeth Jarvis, daughter of Consul William Jarvis, of Boston, Mass., who, during the administrations of Presidents Jefferson and Madison, was the United States Chargé D'Affaires at Lisbon, Portugal, and introduced the merino sheep into the country. The paternal grandfather of Mr. Wheeler was John B. Wheeler, of Oxford, N. H. His father was David Everett Wheeler, who was born in Vermont, educated at Dartmouth College, and was a practicing lawyer in New York City from 1830 until the time of his death, in 1870.
Mr. Everett P. Wheeler was born in New York, March 10th, 1840. He was educated in the public schools and in the New York Free Academy, now the College of the City of New York, from which he graduated in 1856. He graduated from the law school of Harvard College in 1859 ; and was admitted to the bar in 1861, and since then has been one of the most prominent members of the legal profession in New York, having been associated with many of the most important cases before the New York and Federal courts during the last thirty years. He is the author of a work on the Modern Law of Carriers.
He has taken a very active interest in public affairs, municipal, State and National, and has been an influential adviser of public men, and foremost in the advocacy of reform principles in governmental administration. For many years he was president of the New York Free Trade Club, being a pronounced advocate of tariff reform, a cause to which he has contributed much by public addresses and otherwise. He was one of the earliest advocates of civil service reform, for sixteen years was chairman of the executive committee of the New York Civil Service Reform Association, and has represented the association in numerous litigated cases. Mayor Edson, in 1882, appointed him chairman of the supervisory board of the Civil Service for New York City, and in 1895 Mayor Strong appointed him chairman of the Board of Civil Service Commissioners. In 1894 he was a member of the Committee of Seventy.
In 1866, Mr. Wheeler married Lydia Lorraine Hodges, daughter of the Honorable Silas H. Hodges, of Washington, D. C., and a descendant of Elder William Brewster, who came over on the Mayflower. He has four children, Annie Lorraine Wheeler, David Everett Wheeler, Ethel Jarvis Wheeler, and Constance Fay Wheeler. He is a member of the Bar Association of New York City, of which he was one of the founders, and of which he has been vice-president; belongs to the City, Reform, Century, Church, and A + A clubs, is a member of the Downtown Association, the Historical Society, and the Society of Colonial Wars, and is president of the New York College of Music. His city residence is at 731 Park Avenue.
619
OBED WHEELER
M ANY of the most distinguished families of our city and State possess an ancestry, the American originators of which were among the early settlers of Long Island. This is the case with the Wheelers. Nathan Wheeler established himself on Long Island in 1705, though his immediate descendants removed in 1740 to South Dover, Dutchess County, N. Y., where the family homestead has since remained. Captain Thomas Wheeler, one of the ancestors of Mr. Obed Wheeler, was an officer in the Colonial forces during the French and Indian War and took a distinguished part in the conflicts of that epoch, dying at Hudson, N. Y., in 1755. The removal of the branch of the Wheeler family to which the subject of this article belongs from Long Island to Dutchess County was due to the marriage of Henry Wheeler to Catherine Wing, they being the grandparents of Mr. Obed Wheeler. The family of Wing was first established in this country by one of the New England Pilgrims. John Wing and his wife, Deborah Batchelder, daughter of the Reverend Stephen Batchelder, were among the incorporators of the town of Sand- wich in 1639. They arrived in this country several years earlier, and first lived in Saugus, Mass. The present generation of Wheelers consequently trace their ancestry to some of the founders of both the Province of New York and the New England Colonies. Thomas Wheeler, father of the present Mr. Wheeler, was the son of Henry and Catherine (Wing) Wheeler, and married Rhoda Ann Olney.
Mr. Obed Wheeler was born at the old seat of the family, in South Dover, Dutchess County, in 1841. He entered Yale College in 1862, but gave up his studies to serve his country in the great Civil War. Joining the army as First Lieutenant of the One Hundred and Fiftieth Regiment, New York Volunteers, he saw arduous and continued service till the close of the conflict, taking part in the battle of Gettysburg and afterwards in the campaign of the West, which culminated in Sher- man's March to the Sea. During the latter campaign, he received the brevet of Major of Volunteers for meritorious and gallant services.
Returning to civil life at the close of the war, Mr. Wheeler studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1867. He has, however, devoted his attention more particularly to financial affairs, and in 1868 became a member of the New York Stock Exchange. He has been connected with many large financial institutions and has engaged successfully in the banking business. At the same time political life has not been without its strong attractions for him, and for three terms he rep- resented his home district of Dutchess County in the New York Legislature. Mr. Wheeler's permanent residence is the family mansion in South Dover. He, however, passes a portion of his time in New York. Though taking an active part in society, he has not married. Interested in club life, he is a member of the Union League, United Service and New York Yacht clubs. He is also prominent in the Military Order of the Loyal Legion and in the Grand Army of the Republic, and is an earnest patron of art and literature.
William Bailey Wheeler, the younger son of Thomas and Rhoda A. (Olney) Wheeler, has been prominent both as a business man and sportsman. He was born in South Dover, N. Y., June 6th, 1850, and in 1868 entered Yale College, from which he was graduated with the degree of A. B. in 1872. In the succeeding year, when only twenty-three years of age, he became a member of the New York Stock Exchange and has since been in active business as a banker and broker, and is widely known in financial circles. His devotion to business has not prevented his taking a decided interest in sports, especially those of an athletic character, and he has been prominent in that connection. He married Mary Toffey, daughter of George Toffey, of Jersey City, N. J., and niece of Admiral John L. Worden, U. S. N., the hero of the fight between the Monitor and the Merrimac. Mrs. Wheeler is also a descendant of the celebrated Peter de la Noy, Mayor of New York City, 1689-1690. They have two children, a daughter, Mary, and a son, William Bailey Wheeler, Jr. William B. Wheeler is a member of the Union League, Lotos and New York Athletic clubs, and has a country residence on Quaker Hill, Dutchess County, N. Y.
620
STANFORD WHITE
J OHN WHITE, a passenger on the ship Lion in 1632, settled in Cambridge and the following year became a freeman, and in 1634-35 was a selectman of that town. He was in the migration from Massachusetts to Connecticut in 1636, and became one of the original pro- prietors of Hartford. Later on, he moved to Hadley, Mass., and was a representative to the General Court in 1664 and 1669, and died in 1683. Nathaniel White, 1629-1711, his son, remained in Connecticut and frequently represented Middletown in the General Court.
The great-grandfather of Mr. Stanford White, the Reverend Calvin White, was born in 1763 and died in 1853. He was an Episcopal clergyman and for many years rector of St. James Parish, Derby, Conn. In his later years, he became a convert to the Roman Catholic faith, but did not enter its priesthood. Richard Mansfield White, a shipping merchant of New York, was the grandfather of Mr. Stanford White. The latter's father was Richard Grant White, one of the most accomplished men of letters of his day. He was born in New York City, May 22d, 1821, and was intended for the church, but after graduating from the University of the City of New York, studied medicine and law and in 1845 was admitted to the bar. Literature had, however, more attractions for him, and he became the critic on art of The New York Courier and Inquirer in 1845, and assisted in founding The New York World in 1860, and for twenty years, 1858 to 1878, was chief of the United States Revenue Marine Bureau for the District of New York. He was the writer of the weekly letters to The London Spectator signed "A Yankee" during the Civil War, compiled an anthology of the poetry of the war, published books on the English language, on foreign travel and on Shakespearean study, the great labor of his lifetime being an annotated edition of Shakespeare's plays.
Mr. Stanford White, his son, stands in the front rank of American architects of to-day. He was born in New York City, November 9th, 1853, and was educated in private schools and under tutors, taking the degree of A. M. at the University of New York. His architectural training was in the office of Charles D. Gambrill and H. H. Richardson, and he was the chief assistant of Mr. Richardson in the construction of that artist's masterly work, Trinity Church, Boston. From 1878 to 1880, he passed his time in Europe, traveling and studying, and when he returned in 1881, formed a partnership with Charles F. McKim and William R. Mead, under the firm name of McKim, Mead & White.
Some of the most notable architecture of the country during the last fifteen years has come from Mr. White, either independently or in collaboration. Most of his work is in New York. He was the architect of the Villard House on Madison Avenue, now belonging to the Honorable Whitelaw Reid; the Madison Square Garden, the Century Club, the Metropolitan Club, the University of New York, the University of Virginia, and the Washington Arch; besides many private houses in both city and country. He has also designed the architectural features for Augustus St. Gaudens' sculptures, his most conspicuous mark in this line being the pedestals of the Farragut statue in New York City, the Chapin statue in Springfield, Mass., the Lincoln and Logan statues in Chicago, and the Adams tomb in Washington. He is an accomplished interior decorator, as his work in the Players Club, the Villard houses, the Metropolitan Club and on the altars of the Church of the Paulist Fathers and the Church of the Ascension clearly shows.
In 1884, Mr. White married Bessie Smith, a member of a family descended from Colonel Richard Smith, the original patentee of Smithtown, Long Island, among her ancestors being General Nathaniel Woodhull, who was slain at the battle of Long Island. Mr. and Mrs. White have one son, Lawrence Grant White. Mr. White is a member of the Institute of Architects and of the leading clubs, including the Metropolitan, Union, University, Grolier, Players, Century, Meadowbrook and the Adirondack League. He also belongs to many prominent artistic and literary organizations. His New York residence is in Gramercy Park, and his country home is at St. James, Long Island.
621
JAMES NORMAN DE RAPELJE WHITEHOUSE
F OR many generations, the members of the Whitehouse family were principally clergymen of the Church of England, though many bearers of the name also acquired distinction in the navy, the law, the diplomatic service, in architecture, or in various branches of art and science. The first of them to make America his home was James Whitehouse, who came to this country and established himself in New York City, in 1798. He was a native of Taunton, Somer- setshire, England; his wife, Elizabeth Christina, who accompanied him to the United States, was the daughter of a gentleman having landed estates near that place. This couple were the great- grandparents of Mr. James Norman de Rapelje Whitehouse. The most famous of their children was the eldest son, the Right Reverend Henry J. Whitehouse, born in 1803, who entered the min- istry, was famous as a preacher, and became rector of St. Thomas' Church in this city, and was subsequently consecrated as the first Protestant Episcopal Bishop of Illinois. He died in 1874, and his son, Frederick Cope Whitehouse, who graduated from Columbia College, in 1861, has devoted his life and fortune to archæology and exploration, being one of the most eminent Egyptologists of the age. His discoveries in regard to the situation of the classical Lake Moeris are well known, and his writings upon that and other subjects pertaining to ancient Egypt are of an authoritative nature.
Bishop Whitehouse's younger brother, Edward Whitehouse, was the grandfather of the subject of this sketch. He married Julia Cammann, one of the old New York family of that name. Their son, James Henry Whitehouse, born in New York, married Mary Schenck, a daughter of John Schenck and his wife, Elizabeth Remsen, both of whom represented old and highly respected Long Island families.
Mr. James Norman de Rapelje Whitehouse is the son of James Henry Whitehouse and his wife, Mary (Schenck) Whitehouse, and was born in Brooklyn, in 1858. He thus inherits the blood of a number of families of position and influence in both this country and Europe. His mother's ancestry in particular is notable as including in the number Jans Joris de Rapelje and his wife, Catelina Trico, who came to New Netherland on the ship Eendragt, or Unity, in 1623. The couple in question were famous as the parents of Sarah Rapelje, the first girl born to any of the Colonists in the new settlement. de Rapelje was a Huguenot, of La Rochelle, France, and was a leader among the persecuted Walloons of the Reformed faith, who fled to this country and established the hamlet at the Waalbought, on the Long Island shore of the East River, which now gives the name of Wallabout to that portion of the modern City of Brooklyn. Sarah de Rapelje became ancestress of the Bergen and Bogaert families, and of many of the most prominent people in Kings County. The name of Rapelje occurs with great frequency in the early annals of the New Nether- land and in those of the Province after the English occupation, often in positions of trust and public importance.
Mr. Whitehouse was mainly educated abroad, attending schools in Switzerland and Germany, and completed his training at Oxford University, England, being one of the few living New Yorkers who boast of such distinction. His travels have been very extensive, and include visits to nearly every part of the civilized world. He is engaged in the banking business in this city, and has his town residence at 5 East Seventeenth Street. His country seat is The Larches, a large mansion and grounds at Irvington-on-the-Hudson, his time being divided between his city and country residences.
It is safe to say that there is no better known figure in New York society than Mr. Whitehouse. He has been unusually active in that connection, and has been a popular member of many of the most prominent social organizations. Some years ago he, however, resigned from all his clubs, except the Union and the Calumet. He is a constant guest at the prominent functions of the higher social world, and takes part in all the sports and amusements which are patron- ized by the leading element of society.
622
WILLIAM COLLINS WHITNEY
A MONG those who came to New England in 1635 with Sir Richard Saltonstall were John Whitney, his wife, Elinor, and his son, Richard. Richard Whitney, 1660-1723, second of the name, and grandson of the pioneer, was the first of the family born in this country- He was a native of Watertown, Mass., married Elizabeth Sawtell, daughter of Jonathan Sawtell, of Groton, and had a grant of land in Stow in 1682. His son, Richard Whitney, 1694-1775, married Hannah Whitcomb, daughter of Josiah Whitcomb, of Lancaster.
General Josiah Whitney, 1731-1806, son of Richard and Hannah Whitney, was the great- great-grandfather of the Honorable William C. Whitney. His wife was Sarah Farr. In 1755, General Whitney fought against the French and Indians at Crown Point, in 1774 was in command of a militia company of Harvard, Mass., and the following year was Lieutenant-Colonel of one of the Colonial regiments. He was Brigadier-General in 1783. In civil life he was a justice of the peace, delegate to the Constitutional Convention in 1788, and a member of the Legislature, 1780-89. His son, Josiah Whitney, 1753-1837, married Anna Scollay, and served in the Continental Army.
Stephen Whitney, 1784-1852, grandfather of the Honorable William C. Whitney, was a representative from Deerfield to the Massachusetts General Court, 1834-35. His son, General James Scollay Whitney, 1811-1878, was the father of Mr. Whitney, whose mother, Laurinda Collins, was descended from Governor William Bradford, of the Plymouth Colony. A Democrat of the old school, James S. Whitney was Brigadier-General of the Second Brigade of the Massachusetts militia, in 1843, town clerk of Conway, Mass., a member of the Legislature in 1851 and 1854, sheriff of Franklin County in 1851, superintendent of the National Armory at Springfield in 1854, collector of the port of Boston in 1860, and a member of the Massachusetts Senate in 1872.
Born in Conway, Mass., in 1841, the Honorable William Collins Whitney was graduated from Yale College in 1863, and in 1865 from the Dane Law School of Harvard College, soon after beginning the practice of law in New York. He early interested himself in public affairs in New York. He was active in the campaign that elected Samuel J. Tilden for Governor, and in 1875 was elected Corporation Counsel, and in that office brought about the codification of the laws relating to New York City, which is still in use. In 1882, he resigned office in order to devote his attention to private business, but in 1885, he became a member of President Grover Cleveland's Cabinet, holding the portfolio of Secretary of the Navy. His record at the head of the Navy Depart- ment need not be dwelt upon in detail here, except to say that he proved to be one of the most efficient secretaries that the country has ever had, and that he laid the foundation of our present navy. Since 1889, he has been active in national politics, especially in the campaigns of 1892 and 1896, but has resolutely declined all political preferment.
In 1869, Mr. Whitney married Flora Payne, daughter of the late Honorable Henry B. Payne, United States Senator from Ohio. Mrs. Whitney died in 1892, leaving four children. The eldest, Harry Payne Whitney, who is a graduate from Yale University, married, in 1896, Gertrude Van- derbilt, daughter of Cornelius Vanderbilt. The eldest daughter, Pauline Whitney, married in 1895, Almeric Hugh Paget, who is by birth an Englishman, and a member of a family represented for centuries in the peerage. The two remaining children are Payne Whitney, a student at Yale, and a daughter, Dorothy Whitney. In 1896, Mr. Whitney contracted a second matrimonial alliance, his bride being Edith S. (May) Randolph, daughter of the late Dr. William May, of Baltimore, and widow of Captain Arthur Randolph, of East Court, Wiltshire, England. The city residence of Mr. and Mrs. Whitney is in upper Fifth Avenue, opposite Central Park, and their country home October Mountain, near Lenox, Mass. Mr. Whitney is a member of all the leading clubs, has been a governor of the Metropolitan, Manhattan and University clubs, is a member of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, and many other such institutions, and is one of the trustees of the Pea- body Museum of Yale University and of the American Museum of Natural History.
623
LOUIS CLAUDE WHITON
H OTTENS' List of the early Puritan emigrants to America states that Thomas Whiton sailed in 1635 with his family on the ship Elizabeth and Ann to New England. He was originally from the County of Kent, in England, and the town records of Hingham, Mass., show that members of the Whiton family and ancestors of the subject of this sketch were residents and prominent citizens of that place as early as 1646. Mr. Louis Claude Whiton, of New York, is thus a descendant of one of those who founded the famous Massachusetts Bay Colony early in the seventeenth century. Thomas Whiton, a member of the family and a lineal ancestor of the present Mr. Whiton, fought ably and bravely in the French Wars of 1755, and in the company of which he was a Lieutenant he had many of his kinsmen as companions, for the muster rolls, now existing, contain the names of eleven brothers and cousins who served with him. Twenty years or so later, at the commencement of the War of the American Revolution, his son Thomas volunteered in the so-called Lexington Alarm, when the New England Colonists took up arms against the British Crown. He served with distinction in Rhode Island during the war, and was also a member of the Committee of Safety of the town of Hanover, of which place he was long a resident.
Mr. Louis Claude Whiton's parents were Augustus S. Whiton and his wife, Caroline Ward, and he was born in Jersey City, on the 29th of December, 1857. His preparation for college was made with the aid of a private tutor. In 1878, he was graduated from the University of the City of New York, being the first honor man and also valedictorian of his class. He then entered the Columbia College Law School, from which he graduated two years later, in 1880. After his admission to the bar, Mr. Whiton traveled extensively in various parts of Europe, remaining abroad during the years 1882 and 1883. On June 10th, 1884, he married Harriet L. Bell, daughter of Charles Bell, of New York City. Three children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Whiton, Angelina, Augustus Sherrill and Louis Claude Whiton, Jr.
Mr. Whiton is now a practicing member of the bar of New York City, and he has become well and extensively known in professional circles, being identified with much litigation of a very important character, which he has conducted as counsel. His legal business constantly involves questions connected with the interests of the leading insurance companies of the city and country, and he is also active in the practice of the real estate branch of his profession. He has been a public-spirited citizen, greatly interested in the welfare of the community, and, although he has resolutely refused to accept any public office whatever, he has been prominent in politics and has taken a very active part in all the movements of late years designed to effect reform in the personnel and conduct of the municipal government of New York. All such efforts enlist his warm sympathy and practical assistance, and he has been prominently connected as an officer or member with a number of the most prominent and effective bodies and committees formed to promote such objects. Notwithstanding his manifold professional, political and social duties, he has found time and opportunity to write frequently on various legal subjects of interest for the leading law journals of the country, and he has contributed many poems and other articles to the prominent magazines and periodicals of the day.
Mr. Whiton was a First Lieutenant of the New York Hussars, now known as Troop A. He is a member of the New York Bar Association, belongs to the West Side Republican Club, the + B K Society, the Society of Colonial Wars, and to the Sons of the American Revolution, the Society of Medical Jurisprudence and the Academy of Science.
His residence in New York City is at 114 West Seventy-sixth Street; and on the Upper St. Regis Lake, in the Adirondacks, Mr. Whiton owns Camp Deerfoot, which is his summer home. The arms of the Whiton family are : A gyronny of four azure and ermine, over all a leopard's head in chief in gold, three bezants. The crest is a lion rampant beneath a helmet resting upon the shield.
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