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 48
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The Bevan family descended from English Quakers, who came to Pennsylvania in the early days of the Province. Matthew L. Bevan was a merchant of the highest standing in the East India trade. As was the custom of those days, he owned his own ships and personally made several voyages to China. He took a prominent and active part in benevolent and religious work in Philadelphia, and was one of the foremost laymen of the Presbyterian Church in America. In politics, also, he was an influential factor and a friend and adviser of the foremost men of his time. His intimacy with Henry Clay was especially close, and, accompanied by his daughters, he made the long and then wearying journey across the mountains from Philadelphia to Kentucky, for the purpose of visiting the statesman at his home at Ashland. Without having held public office, Matthew L. Bevan rendered many important services to his State and country. The most notable of these was the winding up of the Bank of the United States on the expiration of its charter in 1835. At a critical juncture, President Jackson selected him as the associate of Albert Gallatin in that task, which, owing largely to his financial knowledge and the confidence reposed in him by the business community, was accomplished with complete success.
Dr. George Bevan Hope accordingly takes his middle name from his maternal ancestry. He was born at Princeton, N. J., in 1847, and graduated from the college in the class of 1869. Adopting the medical profession, he pursued his studies in this city at Bellevue Medical College, graduating in 1876, followed by a residence abroad of several years, during which he took a post-graduate course at the famous medical schools of Vienna and Paris. In his profession, Dr. Hope has devoted himself to a specialty-the throat-upon which he is one of the foremost authorities, and holds professorships in the Post-Graduate Medical School in this city, as well as in the medical faculty at the University of Vermont, at Burlington. His published writings have been confined to professional subjects, and have appeared in the leading medical periodicals of the country.
Dr. Hope has a wide circle of personal friends in New York society. He is unmarried, and is a member of the Union League Club, his residence being at 34 West Fifty-first Street.
28S
WILLIAM BUTLER HORNBLOWER
J OSIAH HORNBLOWER, an eminent English civil engineer, was born in 1729. At the request of Colonel John Schuyler, he came to the United States in 1753, and settled near Belleville, N. J., where he erected the first stationary engine known in this country. He managed the copper mines of Belleville for several years and served as a Captain in the French and Indian wars. In the Revolution, he was an uncompromising patriot and was Speaker of the Lower House of the New Jersey Legislature in 1780. His activity in devising and promoting important measures to advance the interests of the patriot cause excited the special ire of the British, who unsuc- cessfully tried to kidnap him. In 1781, he was elected to the upper branch of the Legislature, where he remained until 1784, when he was selected to represent the Colony in the Continental Congress. In 1790, he was appointed Judge of the Court of Common Pleas in Essex County, N. J., and continued on the bench for many years.
The son of Josiah Hornblower was Joseph C. Hornblower, 1777-1864, who was admitted to the bar in 1803. He was a Presidential elector in 1820, and voted for James Monroe; was elected Chief Justice of the State of New Jersey in 1832, and reelected in 1839; was a member of the Constitutional Convention in 1844; was appointed Professor of Law in Princeton College in 1847; was a vice-president of the First National Republican Convention, in 1856; was president of the Electoral College of New Jersey in 1860, voting for Lincoln and Hamlin; was one of the original members of the American Bible Society and president of the New Jersey Historical Society. The Reverend William Henry Hornblower, 1820-1883, son of Judge Hornblower, was a prominent Presbyterian divine. He was educated in Princeton College, was engaged in missionary work for five years, was pastor of the First Presbyterian Church in Paterson, N. J., for twenty-seven years, and a professor in the Theological Seminary in Allegheny, Pa., for twelve years. He married Matilda Butler, of Suffield, Conn., whose ancestry runs back to the Puritans. Of this union came two sons and one daughter.
Mr. William Butler Hornblower, the second son, was born in 1851. He was prepared for college in the collegiate school of Professor George P. Quackenbos, matriculating at Princeton in 1867, at the age of sixteen, and being graduated four years later. For two years he devoted himself to literary studies, but in 1873 entered Columbia Law School and was graduated in 1875. Entering upon the practice of law, he connected himself with the firm of Carter & Eaton, of New York, retaining that professional association until 1888, when he founded the firm of Hornblower & Byrne, which subsequently became Hornblower, Byrne & Taylor. Since 1880, Mr. Hornblower has been counsel for the New York Life Insurance Company. He has been very successful in bankruptcy cases, of which, at one time, he made a specialty. In the famous Grant & Ward case, he was counsel for the receiver. He was also successful in several important tontine insurance cases that he tried for the New York Life Insurance Company. For several years past he has had a large practice in the United States Courts, and among other important cases there he appeared in the Virginia bond controversy, and the railroad bond litigation of the City of New Orleans.
A Democrat of independent proclivities, he has exercised a considerable influence in con- temporaneous political movements in the State of New York. He has been frequently mentioned for public office, and in 1893 was nominated by President Cleveland to be a Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. His fitness for the place was generally conceded, but his independence in politics had placed him in opposition to some of the leaders of his party, and the Senate refused to confirm the nomination. In 1882, Mr. Hornblower married Susan C. Sandford, of New Haven, Conn., who was descended from several of the old Puritan families of New England. Mrs. Horn- blower died in 1886, leaving three children. He married, in 1894, Emily (Sandford) Nelson, widow of Lieutenant Colonel A. D. Nelson, of the United States Army, and a sister of his first wife. He lives in upper Madison Avenue, and his summer home is Penrhyn, Southampton, Long Island. He belongs to the Metropolitan and other leading clubs and social organizations.
289
HARRY LAWRENCE HORTON
B ARNABAS HORTON, the first American ancestor of the family to which Mr. Harry Lawrence Horton belongs, came of an ancient English family. Robert De Horton appears in the old records as the master of the Manor of Horton in the thirteenth century. Other members of the family also had a manor house in Great Horton. William Horton, of Frith House, Barksland, who was descended from Robert De Horton, married Elizabeth Hanson, daughter of Thomas Hanson, of Toothill. His son, Joseph Horton, who was born about 1578 and settled in Mousley, Leicestershire, was the father of Barnabas Horton.
Tradition says that Barnabas Horton came to this country in the ship Swallow, that was commanded by one of his relatives, Captain Jeremy Horton. He was born in 1600, and emigrated to the New World in 1633 or soon after, landing in Massachusetts. Before 1640, he removed to New Haven, Conn., and afterwards formed one of the company that crossed to the eastern end of Long Island, and settled the town of Southold, being one of the patentees of that place. He was a constable in 1656 and 1659, a deputy to the General Court of the Connecticut Colony, 1654-64, a freeman of the Colony in 1662, and a magistrate of the town of Southold from 1664 until the time of his death, in 1680. Joseph Horton, son of Barnabas Horton, who was born in England, came to this country with his parents when an infant. Brought up in the town of Southold, he removed to Rye, Westchester County, N. Y., in 1664, was a freeman of the Connecticut Colony in 1662, a selectman of Rye in 1671, a justice of the peace in 1678, and a Lieutenant and then Captain of the militia. His wife was Jane Budd, daughter of John Budd, one of the thirteen original settlers of Southold.
In successive generations from Joseph Horton, the ancestors of Mr. Harry Lawrence Horton were: David Horton, who was born in Rye in 1664, and his wife, Esther King; John Horton, who was born in White Plains in 1696, and his wife, Elizabeth Lee; Richard Horton, who was born in White Plains and married Jemima Wright; Elijah Horton, who was born in Peekskill in 1739 and died in Bradford County, Pa., in 1821, and his wife, Jemima Currie; Elijah M. Horton, who was born in Peekskill in 1768 and died in Sheshequin, Pa., in 1835, and his wife, Abigail Bullard; and William Bullard Horton, who was born in Sheshequin, in 1807, and died in 1867, and his wife, Melinda Blackman, daughter of Colonel Franklin Blackman and Sybil Beardsley.
Mr. Harry Lawrence Horton was born in Sheshequin, Bradford County, P.a., January 17th, 1832. Having received a sound education in the schools of his native place, he entered upon mercantile life in Horn Brook, Pa., at the age of seventeen. After that, he traveled extensively throughout the West, and then settled in Milwaukee, Wis., and engaged in the produce commis- sion business in 1856. For nine years he remained in Milwaukee, and was a successful man of affairs. Then coming to New York in 1865, he established the banking house of H. L. Horton & Co., of which he has been the senior member for more than thirty years. He has spent con- siderable time abroad in the business interests of his house, and has also traveled extensively for pleasure. He is a member of the New York Stock Exchange and the Produce Exchange, as well as of the Chicago Board of Trade and other similar business organizations.
Mr. Horton married Sarah S. Patten, of New York, and has two daughters, Blanche and Grace Horton. The city residence of the family is in West Fifty-seventh Street, and they have a summer home at Monmouth Beach, N. J. For many years, Mr. Horton resided at New Brighton, Staten Island, and was president of the Board of Trustees of that town for three years. One of the most enterprising and most public-spirited citizens of New Brighton, he was chiefly instrumental in promoting the Staten Island Water Supply Company and the Rapid Transit Company. He contributes generously in support of charity, and is an intelligent patron of art and literature. He is a member of the Manhattan, Union League, Lawyers', New York Athletic and Riding clubs.
290
ALFRED CORNELIUS HOWLAND
O N another page will be found the full and detailed account of the ancestry of the Howland family, descended from John Howland, the Mayflower Pilgrim, and Elizabeth Tilley, his wife. The branch to which attention is now directed is represented in New York not only by Judge Henry E. Howland, but by his younger brother, the distinguished artist whose name heads the present article. The father of these gentlemen, Aaron Prentiss Howland, was a respected citizen of Walpole, N. H., and an architect. In connection with his profession he was also a builder, and both designed and built many of the principal churches and other edifices of the large towns of New Hampshire and Vermont. He was also prominent in local affairs, and in addition to his own distinguished descent was connected by marriage with families of prominence.
Mr. Alfred Cornelius Howland is the younger son of Aaron Prentiss and Huldah (Burke) Howland, his birth having taken place in 1838 at Walpole, N. H. His artistic talent was displayed at an early age, and after preliminary study in this country, he became a pupil at the Academy of Dusseldorf, Germany, under Professor Andreas Müller, and afterwards in the private studio of Professor Flamm, followed by a course of several years under the celebrated artist, Emil Lambinet, at Paris. He first exhibited in the Academy of Design in 1865, and was elected an Associate of the National Academy in 1876, and a member of that body in 1882. Mr. Howland is also a member of the Century and Salmagundi clubs, and of the Artist Fund Society, of the National Academy of Design, and of other leading professional bodies of New York. Many of his pictures are included in the collections of the most noted lovers of art, among whom may be named Governor George Peabody Wetmore, the late George I. Seney, Chauncey M. Depew, the Honorable William M. Evarts, Charles C. Beaman, William H. Fuller and Thomas B. Clarke. His large picture of the historic Yale Fence was presented by Mr. Depew to Yale College, and is now one of the chief features of the new gymnasium. The Fourth of July Parade, belonging to Mr. Fuller, was exhibited at the World's Fair in Chicago. Mr. Howland has also exhibited in Paris and Munich. The Layton Art Gallery, at Milwaukee, contains his genre picture, entitled Driving a Bargain.
By his marriage, which took place in 1871, Mr. Howland became connected with a New York family of old descent and high position, his bride being Clara Ward, daughter of the late Oliver Delancey Ward, a distinguished merchant of this city, and a descendant of the Delancey family so famous in the early history of the Province of New York, his own name recalling the celebrated Chief Justice Oliver Delancey, in many respects the most eminent man in the entire Colonial history of the Province of New York. Andrew Ward, the founder of Mrs. Howland's family in America, belonged to an ancient race settled at Goilston and Homesfield, Suffolk, England, and was descended from William de la Ward, who flourished in 1154-89. He came to Massachusetts in 1630, accompanied the first settlers to Connecticut, was elected a magistrate in 1636, and became a resident of Fairfield in 1649.
His grandson, Edmund Ward, removed to Eastchester, N. Y., and was a member of the Colonial Assembly in the early part of the eighteenth century. Mrs. Howland's grandfather, named like her father, Oliver Delancey Ward, owned Ward's Island, in the East River, where he had his summer residence until the island was purchased by the city. The Ward homestead still defies age and weather, and is used as the residence of the chaplain of the island, which forms part of the municipal charities. On the side of her mother, Emily Potter Ward, Mrs. Howland is also a descendant of Edward Winslow, who came to Plymouth in the Mayflower, and among her other collateral ancestors were Governor John Winthrop and John Hancock. Mr. and Mrs. Alfred C. Howland's children are Winthrop Prentiss Howland, born in 1873, and Alice Ward Howland, born 1878. Mr. Howland's studio is at 318 West Fifty-seventh Street, New York, and he also has one in his summer house, The Rooftree, at Williamstown, Mass., where he passes a considerable portion of each year.
291
GARDINER GREENE HOWLAND
T HE first American ancestor of the Howland family was the celebrated Puritan leader, John Howland, who came from England on the Mayflower and settled in Plymouth. He was early a freeman of Plymouth, an assessor in 1633, and a selectman in 1666. For six years, between 1652 and 1666, he was a deputy to the General Court, and was also a member of the Governor's Council. His wife was Elizabeth Tilley. He died in 1673. Joseph Howland, son of the pioneer, was also a man of importance in Plymouth, where he was Lieutenant of the militia in 1679. His wife was Elizabeth'Southworth, daughter of Thomas and Elizabeth (Reynor) Southworth. In the two following generations the ancestors of that branch of the family which is here under consideration were Nathaniel Howland and his son Nathaniel. The elder Nathaniel, 1671-1746, had for his first wife Martha Cole, daughter of James Cole, and for his second wife Abigail Churchill, daughter of Eleazer and Mary Churchill. The second Nathaniel was the son of the first wife, and was born in Plymouth in 1705 and died in 1766. His second wife, whom he married in 1739, and who was the mother of Joseph Howland, next in the line of descent, was Abigail Burt, daughter of the Reverend John Burt, who was killed at Bristol, R. I., by the British in 1775.
Joseph Howland, the grandfather of Mr. Gardiner Greene Howland, was born in Boston in 1749, became one of the great merchants in the West India trade and died in 1836. Settling in Norwich, Conn., he engaged in business and, about the beginning of the century, removed to New York, the firm of Joseph Howland & Son becoming one of the largest shipowners of that time. In 1808-31 he was president of the Highland Turnpike Company, afterwards merged in the Hudson River Railroad Company. His wife was Lydia Bill, daughter of Ephraim Bill, of Norwich, Conn.
Gardiner Greene Howland, the father of Mr. Gardiner Greene Howland, was one of the great merchants of New York in the last generation. He was born in 1787 and soon after he had become of age, was intrusted with the management of many of his father's business affairs. After- wards, with a younger brother as a partner, the firm of G. G. & S. Howland became one of the most successful importing houses in New York in the first quarter of the present century. He was a director of the Old Bank of New York and was connected with insurance and other financial institutions. One of the greatest enterprises of his life was the construction of the Hudson River Railroad, in which company he was for a long time a director. Mr. Howland was twice married, first to Louisa Edgar, daughter of William Edgar, and second to Louisa Meredith, daughter of Jonathan Meredith, of Baltimore. By his first wife he had five children, William Edgar, Annabella Edgar, Abbie Woolsey, Robert Shaw and Maria Louisa Howland. By his second wife he had six children, Rebecca Brien, who married James Roosevelt; Meredith, who married Adelaide Torrence; Gardiner Greene, Joanna Dorr, who" married Irving Grinnell; Emma Meredith, and Samuel Shaw Howland.
Mr. Gardiner Greene Howland, the second son of his father's second wife, was born in New York in 1834. For many years he has been the general manager of The New York Herald. His wife, whom he married in 1856 and who died in 1897, was Mary Grafton Dulany, and he has four children, Gardiner Greene, Jr., Dulany, Meredith and Maud Howland, who married, in 1889, Percy R. Pyne, son of Percy R. Pyne and Albertina Taylor. The city residence of the family is in East Thirty-fifth Street, and they also have a home in the old Bennett mansion, on Washington Heights. Mr. Howland is a member of the Metropolitan, Union, Lawyers', Racquet and New York Yacht clubs.
Samuel Shaw Howland, the youngest son, was born in New York, August 28th, 1849. He married Frederika Belmont, daughter of August Belmont, Sr. The city residence of Mr. and Mrs. Howland is in West Eighteenth Street. Their country home is Belwood, Mt. Morris, N. Y., and they also spend much time in Washington, D. C., where Mr. Howland has important professional and social connections. Mr. Howland is a member of the Metropolitan and Union clubs of New York, the Philadelphia Club of Philadelphia and the Metropolitan Club of Washington.
292
HENRY ELIAS HOWLAND
A MONG the Pilgrims on the Mayflower who signed the compact that served as a constitution for the first political community in North America, was John Howland, who became the ancestor of a family of worth and substantial qualities. He shared the rigors of the landing and first winter of the Plymouth settlement, was a leader of the Colony's military and exploring expeditions and furnished a touch of romance to its history, since his marriage was one of the first the Pilgrims celebrated in their New England home, his wife being Elizabeth Tilley, who had also been a passenger on the Mayflower. He lived to a ripe old age and was the last survivor of the entire number of those who came over to the New World on that remarkable voy- age. John and Elizabeth Howland, the Pilgrim couple, had a large family, and their descendants, both of the same name and through females, are numerous. One of their great-grandchildren was the Reverend John Howland, who graduated at Harvard College in 1741 and became a distinguished preacher. For nearly sixty years he occupied the pulpit of the Congregational Church in the town of Carver, Mass. Branches of the family were established in New Hamp- shire and New York at an early date, and the old-time merchants of this city, G. G. Howland and Samuel S. Howland, derived their descent from the same source.
Judge Henry E. Howland comes of the New Hampshire branch of this notable family. His father, Aaron Prentiss Howland, was a direct descendant in the sixth generation from John Howland, the Pilgrim of the Mayflower, and was a grandson of the Reverend John Howland above referred to. His mother, whose maiden name was Huldah Burke, came also of a distinguished family of that section of the country. She was a near relative of the eminent New Hampshire politician and Congressman, Edmund Burke, who, among other offices, was Commissioner of Patents under the administrations of Presidents Pierce and Buchanan.
Mr. Henry E. Howland, the elder son of this marriage, having been born at Walpole, N. H., in 1835, was educated at the Kimball Union Academy in Meriden, N. H., entered Yale College and was graduated in the class of 1854. He then took a course in the Harvard College Law School and in 1857 received the degree of LL. B. He was admitted to practice in 1857 and made New York his home; and has since then practiced here, except for a period in 1873, when Gov- ernor John A. Dix appointed him to the bench of the Marine Court to fill an unexpired term. He served in the Twenty-Second Regiment of the National Guard of the State for seven years, and he was a Captain in that command while it was mustered in the United States service in 1862 and 1863. Judge Howland has been active in the Republican party and was an alderman of the city in 1875 and 1876. In 1880, he was appointed by Mayor Cooper, president of the Municipal Department of Taxes. In 1884, he was his party's candidate for Judge of the Court of Common Pleas, and received a similar nomination in 1887 for the bench of the Supreme Court. Judge Howland has been for some years a member of the Corporation of Yale University. He is president of the Society for the Relief of the Destitute Blind, and also president of the Board of the Manhattan State Hospital of this city.
In 1865, he married Louise Miller, daughter of Jonathan and Sarah R. Miller, and granddaughter of Edmund Blunt, the famous mathematician and author of Blunt's Coast Pilot. Six children were born to them, Mary M., Charles P., Katharine E., John, Julia Bryant and Frances L., of whom three survive; none, however, are married.
As a speaker, either in court, at political meetings, or on social occasions, Judge Howland has a widespread reputation. He is governor-general of the National Society of Mayflower Descendants and governor of the New York Society, president of the Jekyl Island Club, secretary of the Century Association, president of the Meadow Club of Southampton, and one of the council of the University Club. His other club affiliations include membership in the Metropolitan, Union League, Players, Republican and Shinnecock Hills Golf clubs, as well as the Bar Association. His city residence is 14 West Ninth Street, and his country home is at Southampton, Long Island.
293
ALFRED MILLER HOYT
R EPRESENTATIVES of the Old New England family of Hoyt have been prominent in New York for the last four generations. All of them have come from the same parent stock, though their lines of descent in most instances separated several generations ago. The subject of this sketch is descended from the first Simon Hoyte, who came to Massa- chusetts from England in 1628 and afterwards was one of the first settlers in Connecticut, being a resident of Windsor, Fairfield, Stamford and other towns. His son, Walter Hoyt, the ancestor of the branch of the family now under consideration, was one of the first settlers of Norwalk, a selectman of the town, deputy to the General Court, and Sergeant of the militia. The line of descent thence is through Deacon Zerubbabel Hoyt, 1650-1727 ; Joseph Hoyt, 1676- 1708; and James Hoyt, 1708-1774, who married Hannah Goold.
Colonel Jesse Hoyt, the son of James Hoyt and his wife, Hannah, was the grandfather of Mr. Alfred M. Hoyt. He was born in Norvralk, Conn., in 1744 and lived in Norwalk, Oyster Bay and Huntington, Long Island, and Weymouth and Annapolis, Nova Scotia, dying in Annapolis in 1822. He was a prosperous landowner and Colonel of the militia. In 1764, he married Mary Raymond. James Moody Hoyt, the son of Colonel Jesse Hoyt, was born in Weymouth, Nova Scotia, in 1789. When about seventeen years of age, he came to New York, where he was engaged in business. During the latter part of his life, he made his home in Norwalk, Conn., and there his death occurred in 1854. In 1814, he married Mary Nesbitt, daughter of Dr. Samuel Nesbitt, a native of Scotland. She survived him until 1867.
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