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 31

Author: Weeks, Lyman Horace, ed
Publication date: 1897
Publisher: New York, The Historical company
Number of Pages: 650

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Professor Doremus married Estelle E. Skidmore, daughter of Captain Hubbard Skidmore, and a descendant of the famous Captain John Underhill, of the Colonial period. Mrs. Doremus was, for several years, regent of the New York Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution and is now one of the honorary vice-presidents of the National Society of that organization. The children of this marriage are: Charles Avery, Thomas Cornelius, Robert Ogden, Fordyce Barker, Estelle Emma, Austin Flint, Clarence Seward and Arthur Lispenard Doremus. The eldest son, Charles Avery Doremus, born in 1851, graduated in 1870 from the College of the City of New York, and studied at Leipsic and Heidelberg, taking the degree of A. M. and Ph. D. at the latter university. From 1877 to 1882, he was professor of chemistry in the Medical Department of the University of Buffalo, and received the honorary degree of M. D. He was afterwards adjunct professor of chemistry in Bellevue Hospital Medical College, and assistant professor in the College of the City of New York, and represented the United States Government at the International Congress of Applied Chemistry at Paris in 1896. He has devoted much of his attention to original research, and is an expert authority upon chemistry in connection with patent and other litigation. In 1880, he married Elizabeth Johnson Ward, of Newport, Ky., their surviving child being Katherine Ward Doremus.

IS6

ORLANDO PORTER DORMAN

T WO famous Colonial families of New England are represented in the person of Mr. Orlando Porter Dorman. His first paternal American ancestor was Thomas Dorman, a native of England, who came to Boston when a young man and was a freeman of Ipswich in 1636, afterwards becoming one of the founders of the town of Boxford, Mass. The father of Mr. Dorman was Orlin C. Dorman, a lineal descendant from Thomas Dorman. He was a prominent citizen of Connecticut, held many important positions in connection with the Legislature of that Common- wealth, and was also an active member of the militia. The paternal grandfather of Mr. Dorman was Amos Dorman, who was a citizen of considerable prominence and a large real estate owner in Ellington, Conn.

The mother of Mr. Dorman was Juliana Doane, of Tolland, Conn. Through her, his ancestry goes back to Normandy in the tenth century. One branch of the family went from Nor- mandy to Germany, where they were made barons and exercised the rights of nobility for many generations. They were at one time deprived of their titles, which, however, were restored upon the accession of another dynasty to the throne. John Doane, the pioneer American ancestor of Mr. Dorman's mother, was one of the famous Puritans of Plymouth. He came to the Plymouth Colony in the ship Charity in 1621, and, in 1632, was chosen an assistant, being a member of the first body of that character of which there is any record, and was associated with William Bradford, Miles Standish, John Howland, John Alden, Stephen Hopkins and William Gilson. A resident of Eastham after 1644, and one of the first seven proprietors of that town, he was an assistant, 1649-50, and a deputy in 1659, and frequently in later years. When he went to Eastham, he was forty-nine years of age and he died in 1707 at the age of one hundred and ten. His property in Eastham consisted of some two hundred acres of land, and the boundaries he marked with stone posts cut with his initials, which have remained standing to this day. The descendants of John Doane have been numerous in the eastern part of Massachusetts and in Connecticut in every gen- eration since their ancestor established the family there.

Mr. Orlando P. Dorman was born in Ellington, Conn., February 3d, 1828. Receiving an academic education, he entered upon business life when he was nineteen years old, going into a dry goods store in Hartford. There he obtained a thorough business training, and after five years came to New York, where he was associated with the late William H. Lee as a partner in the firm of Lee, Case & Co. and William H. Lee & Co., having charge of the foreign business of the house. After he had retired from that business, he organized the Gilbert Manufacturing Company, which was incorporated in 1881, and of which he has since been the president. He is recognized as one of the foremost American manufacturers in the particular line of trade to which he has devoted himself.

Although he takes a deep interest in public affairs and is a thoroughly patriotic American, Mr. Dorman has never engaged in public life. He has, however, devoted much of his time and a generous share of his wealth to the cause of charity and education. He has been specially interested in educating young men for the ministry, several members of that profession having been enabled to secure their theological training through his beneficence. Senior warden of the Church of the Heavenly Rest, and also of the Church of the Holy Spirit, he has been active in the field of Christian work, and has been especially interested in the particular charities that are promoted by those two church organizations. The wife of Mr. Dorman, whom he married in 1850, was Delia Anna Taylor, of Hartford. The city home of Mr. and Mrs. Dorman is at Seventy- sixth Street and West End Avenue. They also have a country seat, Auvergne, at Riverdale-on- Hudson. They have had two children, a son and a daughter. The son, Harry H., graduated from St. Paul's School, in Garden City, Long Island, at the age of seventeen and is now in business with his father. He married, in 1893, Florence Page, of New York. Mr. Dorman's daughter, Anna Belle, married, in 1894, Franklin H. Smith, Jr., of New York.

187

WILLIAM PROCTOR DOUGLAS

A NCESTORS of Mr. William Proctor Douglas were of the great Scottish family of that name, of high rank and imperishable renown. That branch of the family to which Mr. Douglas belongs has been settled in this country for a hundred years. Its members were large land owners in Scotland, but disposed of their possessions there and emigrated to this country in the early years of the present century. George Douglas, the father of Mr. William Proctor Douglas, was born in Scotland in 1792. Coming to the United States early in life, he was one of the leading merchants of his generation. The house of George Douglas & Co., which he founded, did an East India commission business not excelled in extent and importance by any of their rivals in the city, and had an enviable commercial renown even in Europe.

George Douglas was an intense Democrat, and his firm was one of the few business estab- lishments in New York that sided with President Andrew Jackson in the warfare of that executive against the United States Bank. In the Presidential campaign of 1844, he was a Democratic elector at large for the ticket headed by James K. Polk. He was a staunch temperance man throughout his life and carried his temperance principles so far that he refused to receive consignments of brandy and wine sent to his firm, which was the first establishment in the city to take such action.

The Douglas city residence was at 55 Broadway, in a house built by Mr. Douglas when lower Broadway and Battery place were the fashionable residence localities of the city. After that he lived in Park Place, and then in West Fourteenth Street. Later in life, he bought the famous Van Zandt estate, at what is now called Douglaston, Long Island, and thenceforth made that his family residence. This place, on the east side of Flushing Bay, was formerly part of the Weekes farm. Wynant Van Zandt, the New York merchant and alderman, 1789-1804, bought the land in 1813 and built there the residence, which is still standing and which has been for nearly three quarters of a century the home of the Douglas family. The wife of George Douglas was a daughter of Dr. Maxwell, a celebrated physician of Scotland. Dr. Maxwell died in Scotland, and after his death his wife and three daughters came to the United States and made their home in New York. The daughters were handsome women of distinguished character. One of them married James Scott Aspinwall and another became the wife of a member of the Rogers family of Long Island.

Mr. William Proctor Douglas was born in New York in 1842, and was educated in Edin- burgh, Scotland. He inherited from his father the estate at Douglaston, Little Neck Bay, compris- ing nearly three hundred acres, where he has made his home. His only business pursuit has been in caring for the estate and the corporate investments which his father left to the family. He is a large stockholder in several of the leading banks of New York. Mr. Douglas' interests in gentle- manly sports have made him famous the world over. He has been particularly known for his untiring efforts in promotion of yachting and for his activity in measures for the defense of the America Cup against its British challengers. One of the first yachts that sailed in defense of the America Cup, the Sappho, which defeated the Livonia, in 1871, was owned by him. In later years, he was part owner of the Priscilla, built for a cup defender. He is a member of the New York Yacht, New York Athletic, Racquet, Carteret Gun, Seawanhaka-Corinthian Yacht, Douglas- ton Yacht, Westminster Kennel, Rockaway Hunt, Meadow Brook Hunt and Coaching clubs, the Country Club of Westchester County and other organizations of similar character. He is also a member of the Metropolitan, Tuxedo and Union clubs. The Metropolitan Museum of Art and the New York Academy of Design have him enrolled among their patrons. He is also a member of several European clubs, among them the Austrian Yacht Club.

In 1879, Mr. Douglas married Adelaide L. Townsend, daughter of Effingham Townsend, of the old Long Island family of that name. Two children have been born of this alliance, Edith Sybil and James Gordon Douglas. The city residence of the Douglas family is in West Fifty-seventh Street, near Fifth Avenue.

188

ANDREW ELLICOTT DOUGLASS

I N the latter part of the seventeenth century, members of one branch of the Douglass family were settled in Bergen County, N. J. They were of Scotch origin, descended from the great Scottish family whose name they bore. David Douglass, the ancestor of Mr. Andrew Ellicott Douglass, was a resident of Hanover Neck, where he was born about 1715 and died about 1765. His second wife, whom he married in 1755, was Esther Reed. Deacon Nathaniel Douglass, his son, was the grandfather of the subject of this sketch. Born in Hanover Neck in 1760, part of his lifetime he was a resident of Pompton, N. J., and for many years was a member of the firm of Vanderpoel & Douglass, leather manufacturers, of Newark. In 1813, he removed to Caldwell, N. J., and resided there the rest of his life, dying in 1824. His wife was Sarah, daughter of David Bates. She was born in 1762 and died in 1816.

Major David Bates Douglass, son of Nathaniel Douglass and father of Mr. Andrew Ellicott Douglass, was born in Pompton, N. J., in 1790 and died in 1849. He was graduated from Yale College in 1813 and received the degree of M. A. in 1816. Commissioned a Second Lieutenant of Engineers in the United States Army in 1813, he was first ordered to West Point, and during the Niagara campaign of 1814 saw service at the front, being promoted to be First Lieutenant, and then Brevet Captain the same year. In 1819, he was made Captain of Engineers. In January, 1815, he was appointed assistant professor of natural philosophy at West Point, and the same year was detailed to examine and report upon the defenses of Narragansett Bay, New London Harbor, Saybrook and New Haven. In 1817, he made a study of the eastern entrance of Long Island Sound, with a view to its fortification, and in 1819 was United States Astronomical Surveyor. In 1820, he joined the North West Expedition as civil and military engineer and astronomer, and the same year succeeded his father-in-law, Andrew Ellicott, as professor of mathematics at West Point, becoming professor of engineering in the same institution three years after. Resigning from the Government service in 1831, Major Douglas became professor of natural philosophy and afterwards professor of architecture and engineering in New York University; from 1840 to 1844 was president of Kenyon College, and was professor of mathematics in Geneva College 1848-49. Yale College gave him the degree of LL. D. in 1841. He died in October, 1849. He married Ann Eliza Ellicott, daughter of Andrew Ellicott, the distinguished surveyor and mathematician. In 1786, Andrew Ellicott was a member of the American Philosophical Society, and made the surveys of the City of Washington as it now stands. During the latter years of his life, he was professor of mathematics at West Point, where he died in 1820.

Mr. Andrew Ellicott Douglass was born at West Point, November 18th, 1819. He was educated in private schools and graduated from Kenyon College in 1838. After a successful business career of thirty-seven years, he retired and has since devoted himself to the study of American archeology, traveling extensively and making many original explorations, especially along the Southern coast of the United States. He is a member of the leading scientific associations in this country and in Europe, belongs to the Century Association and the Church Club, and is the author of many essays, principally on archaeological subjects. His collections relating to American archeology are among the most valuable in their particular line that have ever been made.

In 1847, Mr. Douglass married Sarah Cortelyou Cornell, daughter of George Lecky Cornell and his wife, Isabella Woodbridge Sheldon, daughter of Charles Sheldon, of Hartford, Conn. Mr. and Mrs. Douglass have but one child, a daughter, Isabel Douglass, who in 1876 married Charles Boyd Curtis, of New York, well known as an author on art matters. They have four children, Ellicott Douglass, Charles Boyd, Isabel Woodbridge and Ronald Eliot Curtis. Mrs. Curtis is corresponding secretary of the Society of Colonial Dames of the State of New York, and president of the Woman's Auxiliary for Domestic Missions of the Diocese of New York. The Douglass and Curtis family residence in New York is in East Fifty-fourth Street, and their country home is Locustwood, on Milton Point, in Rye, Westchester County.

189

WILLIAM DOWD

G UILFORD is one of the Connecticut towns that were founded by Colonists from England who came to America under the leadership of a Puritan clergyman. In this case, the pastor was the Reverend Henry Whitfield, who arrived with his flock in 1639. He remained in Guilford for some years, but finally returned to England and died there in 1650. Among the number who accompanied him to the New World was Henry Dowd, who died in Guilford in 1668 and left several children, the most noteworthy of whom was Thomas Dowd, of East Guilford. Born in England, Thomas Dowd came to this country with his father as a member of the Whitfield Colony. He rose to be a man of mark in the Colony, and died in 1713. In the next generation, Thomas Dowd, second of the name, was born at East Guilford in 1684, and died in 1711. He was a resident of Killingworth, now Madison, Conn., and lived and died in the old homestead, which was standing until a few years ago. The wife of the second Thomas Dowd was Silence Evarts, who belonged to the family from which the Honorable William M. Evarts is descended.

Joseph Dowd, grandson of the second Thomas Dowd, was born in Killingworth in 1744 and died there in 1809. He married, in 1768, Mary Blatchley, whose ancestors were among the Mayflower Pilgrims in 1620. Joseph and Mary (Blatchley) Dowd were the grandparents of Mr. William Dowd. The father of Mr. Dowd was Joseph Dowd, who was born in Madison, Conn., in 1773, and died in Stafford, N. Y., in 1854. He was a landowner and merchant and the owner of several ships trading with the West Indies. His third wife, whom he married in 1820, and who was the mother of Mr. William Dowd, was Polly Dutton, daughter of Deacon Joseph Dutton and his wife, Priscilla Stuart, of Royalston, Vt. Priscilla Stuart was born in Scot- land and was a daughter of Sir Elkanah Stuart, who was disowned by his family for marrying a lady of French Huguenot parentage.

Mr. William Dowd was born in Batavia, N. Y., August 30th, 1824. Receiving a common school education, he went into business when he was twenty years of age and came to New York. His first situation was with the firm of Lyman Cook & Co. In two years he became a junior member of the concern under the firm name of Cook, Dowd & Baker, afterwards changed to Dowd, Baker & Whitman, when he became head of the house. In 1874, Mr. Dowd became president of the Bank of North America, retaining that position until his final retirement from all business cares, a few years ago. In 1878, he was chairman of the Clearing House Association and was reelected the following year. For twenty-one years he was chairman of the finance committee of the Importers' & Traders' Insurance Company. He was president of the Hannibal & St. Joseph Railroad from 1877 to 1883, and was connected with other important enterprises.

Actively interested in municipal affairs, Mr. Dowd was appointed a member of the Board of Education, and held that position for ten years. He was for four years chairman of the committee on finance of the board and several years chairman of the committee on colored schools. He was also chairman of the executive committee of the trustees of the College of the City of New York. In 1880, he was the Republican candidate for Mayor of New York and, from 1883 to 1888, was a member of the Aqueduct Commission.

In 1851, Mr. Dowd married Maria Eliza Merrill, who was born in Clinton, Conn., in 1824 and is of Puritan descent. They have had five children. The eldest son is William B. Dowd. Colonel Heman Dowd, the second son, is a graduate of West Point, commanded the Eighth Regiment, N. G. S. N. Y., and is assistant cashier of the National Bank of North America. He married Miss Loveland. Joseph Dowd, the third son, is a merchant, engaged in the woolen busi- ness in this city. The youngest son is George M. Dowd, and the only daughter of the family is Mary E. Dowd. Mr. Dowd is a member of the Union League Club and the New England Society, being treasurer of the latter, and a patron of the American Museum of Natural History and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

190

MRS. JOSEPH W. DREXEL

B EFORE her marriage, Mrs. Joseph W. Drexel was Lucy Wharton. She comes of distin- guished Pennsylvania lineage, being the daughter of Thomas Lloyd Wharton, of Phila- delphia, 1799-1869, and his wife, Sarah Ann Smith, daughter of Richard Rodman Smith. Her grandfather was Kearny Wharton, of Philadelphia, 1765-1848, a president of the Common Council of Philadelphia and one of the most influential citizens of the Quaker City; his wife was Maria Saltar, daughter of John and Elizabeth (Gordon) Saltar.

The great-grandfather of Mrs. Drexel was Thomas Wharton, Jr., 1735-1778. He was presi- dent of the Supreme Executive Council of Pennsylvania in 1777 and was otherwise conspicuous in public life. Thomas Wharton, Jr., was the grandson of Thomas Wharton, who was the son of Richard Wharton, of Westmorelandshire, England, and came to this country in the latter part of the seventeenth century. The elder Thomas Wharton belonged to the Society of Friends and was a member of the Council of the City of Philadelphia. His wife was Rachel Thomas, a native of Wales. His death occurred in Philadelphia in 1718 and his widow survived him for twenty-nine years, dying in 1747. The great-grandmother of Mrs. Drexel, whom Thomas Wharton, Jr., mar- ried in 1762, was Susannah Lloyd, daughter of Thomas Lloyd, of Philadelphia, who died in 1754, and his wife, Susannah (Kearny) Owen, daughter of Philip Kearny, of Philadelphia, and widow of Dr. Edward Owen. Thomas Lloyd was the son of Thomas Lloyd and a grandson of Thomas Lloyd, the first Deputy Governor of Pennsylvania and president of the Provincial Council, 1684-88 and 1690-93. The mother of Susannah Kearny was Rebecca Britton, daughter of Lionel Britton. Through the Lloyd branch of her ancestry, Mrs. Drexel goes back in fourteen generations from the first Thomas Lloyd to Edward I., King of England, by his first wife, the Princess Eleanor, daughter of Ferdinand, King of Castile. Among her royal ancestors from King Edward are the Princess Joan d'Arce; Gilbert de Clare, a descendant of King Alfred, the Great; Lady Eleanor Holland, a descendant of Henry I., King of France, and his wife, Anne of Russia; Sir John de Grey, Earl of Tankerville, a descendant of King Henry Ill., of England; and Lady Antigone Plantagenet, a descendant of King Henry IV., of England.

Joseph W. Drexel, who married Lucy Wharton in 1865, was one of the noted American bankers of the last generation. He was born in Philadelphia in 1831. His father, Francis M. Drexel, was a native of Austria and an accomplished artist, who practiced his profession in Phila- delphia until 1840, when he entered the banking business, taking into partnership, eventually, his three sons. After being connected with his father's banking institution for several years, Joseph W. Drexel went to Chicago and established himself in business there. Upon his father's death, he returned to Philadelphia and in 1871, in association with Junius S. Morgan, established the banking house of Drexel, Morgan & Co. in New York. He was also the head of the house of Drexel, Harjes & Co., of Paris, and had a large interest in The Philadelphia Public Ledger.

After 1876, Mr. Drexel lived in retirement from active business until his death, in 1888. Greatly interested in artistic and musical affairs, he was one of the most active supporters of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, president of the Philharmonic Society and director of the Metropolitan Opera House, and a trustee of the Bartholdi Statue Fund. He made many generous contributions of paintings and other interesting art objects to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and bequeathed his valuable musical library to the Lenox Library.

Mrs. Drexel has four daughters. Her eldest daughter, Katharine Drexel, married Dr. Charles Bingham Penrose, of Philadelphia. Lucy Drexel is the wife of Eric B. Dahlgren, son of Admiral Dahlgren. Elizabeth Drexel is the wife of John Vinton Dahlgren, also a son of Admiral Dahlgren. The youngest daughter is Josephine Wharton Drexel. Mrs. Drexel lives in Madison Avenue and is interested in art and book collecting. She owns one of the most valuable collections of rare books and manuscripts in the United States. Her summer residence is Penn Rhyn, a family place, on the Delaware River, Bucks County, Pa.

191

ARTHUR DUANE

O NE of the prominent lawyers of Philadelphia in the first years of the present century, who also held a high position in national politics, was the Honorable William John Duane. He was born in 1780 in Ireland, where his father, who was an American, was then

living. He learned the printer's trade, but studied law and became a leader of the Philadelphia bar. Among his clients was the famous merchant and philanthropist, Stephen Girard, whose confidential friend and adviser he became. He drew the will by which Mr. Girard bequeathed the bulk of his fortune to found the college for orphan youths which bears his name. This instrument was fiercely assailed in the courts but was never broken, and Mr. Duane was one of the first trustees of the college. Entering into public life, he was several times a member of the Legisla- ture of Pennsylvania. President Andrew Jackson invited him into his Cabinet as Secretary of the Treasury, but in 1833 deprived him of his portfolio because he refused to carry out the wishes of the President in the famous controversy with the United States Bank. Mr. Duane was an author of repute, publishing several books, among them The Law of Nations Investigated.

The father of the Honorable William John Duane was William Duane, 1760-1835, who was prominent in politics and journalism in the early days of our National Government. Early in life, he left the United States and went to Ireland, where he became a printer and editor. In 1784, he went to India and was proprietor of a newspaper there, from which he realized a fortune. Falling, however, into disfavor with the East India Company's officials, his property was confiscated and he was summarily sent back to England. He established The General Advertiser, in London, which was afterwards merged in The London Times, and in 1795 returned to the United States, becoming editor of The Philadelphia Aurora, the organ of the Republican or Anti-Federalist party. President Jefferson appointed him Lieutenant-Colonel in 1805, and he was an Adjutant-General in the War of 1812. In 1822, he went to South America, as a representative of the creditors of Columbia and other newly established republics there. He was the author of many valuable books, among them, A Visit to Columbia, and The Mississippi Question. He also compiled and edited several important works of reference, among them, A Military Dictionary, The American Military Library, and An Epitome of the Arts and Sciences.

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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 31

Author: Weeks, Lyman Horace, ed Publication date: 1897 Publisher: New York, The Historical company Number of Pages: 650

Author: Weeks, Lyman Horace, ed
Publication date: 1897
Publisher: New York, The Historical company
Number of Pages: 650