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 51

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

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Edwin Hyde and his wife, Elizabeth Alvina, had a family of nine sons. Augustus Lord Hyde, the eldest, was born in 1835 ; the second son, Ralph Mead Hyde, was born in 1837, and died in 1839 ; the third, also named Ralph Mead, was born in 1839; Edwin Francis Hyde was born in 1842 ; Frederick Erastus Hyde was born in 1844; Clarence Melville Hyde was born in 1846; Edmund Janes Hyde was born in 1848, and died in 1849 ; Herbert Morti- mer Hyde was born in 1850; and Samuel Mead Hyde was born in 1853. Several of this family have been prominent in New York. Augustus L. Hyde, the eldest son, married Miss St. John, lives in East Eighteenth Street, and has one son and one daughter. Ralph Mead Hyde is a member of the New England Society and the Union League Club. Frederick Erastus Hyde is a well-known physician, residing in West Fifty-third Street, and is a member of the Metropolitan Club. Clarence Melville Hyde is a graduate of Columbia College, a lawyer and a member of the Metropolitan Club, and married a Miss Babbitt.

Mr. Edwin Francis Hyde, the third surviving son of this interesting family, has been prominent in financial circles. He is now vice-president of the Central Trust Company, of New York. He married Marie E. Brown, daughter of Albert N. Brown, and lives at 835 Fifth Avenue. He is a member of the Bar Association, the Century Association, the Downtown Association, the American Geographical Society, and the New England Society, the Metropolitan, City, Lawyers', Union League, Riding and Presbyterian clubs, and is a patron of the Metroplitan Museum of Art. He is interested in the progress of orchestral music, and has been for ten years president of the Philharmonic Society of New York. He is a member of many benevo- lent and scientific societies, and is an elder and trustee of the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church.

306

HENRY BALDWIN HYDE

S EVERAL families bearing the name of Hyde have been settled in this country since the Colonial period, and can trace their origin to undoubted English ancestry. It is not certain, however, that they have all had a common progenitor, at least so far as researches in modern historical times have revealed. Among the first Hydes to come to this country was Samuel Hyde, who was settled in Newtown (Cambridge), Mass., in 1640. About the same time, his brother Jonathan arrived. Humphrey Hyde came to Fairfield, Conn., in 1665. John Hyde immigrated in 1750, and went to Richmond, Va., where many of his descendants have been people of importance. William Hyde, the ancestor of the subject of this sketch, undoubtedly belonged to the same family as Samuel and Jonathan Hyde, who were in Massachusetts in 1640. He came of a worthy English family, and in England was among the followers of the Reverend Thomas Hooker, immigrating to this country as one of the band of Colonists which that eminent divine brought over in 1633. First he settled in Newtown, Mass., where he lived for a few years. But when the Reverend Mr. Hooker organized that famous migration that resulted in the settlement of the Hartford Colony in 1636, William Hyde accompanied him.

In Hartford, William Hyde took up a considerable section of land, and became one of the leading men of the new settlement. He prospered in worldly affairs, and had much to do with the management of the Colony. Upon the monument in the old cemetery of Hartford, Conn., his name appears among those of the original settlers. The land which he owned remained in the possession of his descendants for several generations. When the town of Saybrook was established, he removed to that place, and afterwards was one of the pioneers engaged in the first settlement of the town of Norwich. Samuel Hyde, son of William Hyde, the pioneer, was born in Hartford, about 1637. He removed to Norwich in 1660, where he was engaged in farming, and where he died in 1677. His wife, whom he married in 1659, was Jane Lee, of East Saybrook, daughter of Thomas Lee.

The son of Samuel Hyde and his wife, Jane Lee, was Thomas Hyde, who was born in Norwich in 1673, the fourth son in his father's family, was a farmer, and died in 1755. Mary Backus, his wife, was a daughter of Stephen Backus and Sarah Gardner, who belonged to the first company of settlers in Norwich. In the next generation, Abner Hyde, who was born in Norwich in 1706, the third son of Thomas Hyde, married Jerusha Huntington, daughter of Captain James Huntington and his wife, Priscilla Miller. Jerusha Huntington was a granddaughter of the pioneers, Deacon Simon Huntington and Sarah Clark, of Norwich. Abner Hyde and his wife settled at West Farms, Norwich, Conn., where she died in 1733. His second wife, the ancestress of the subject of this sketch, was Mehitable Smith, second daughter of Captain Obadiah Smith and Martha Abel. The paternal grandfather of Mehitable Smith was Edward Smith, of New London. Her mother was the second daughter of Joshua Abel, one of the first settlers of Norwich.

Asa Hyde, the great-grandfather of Mr. Henry Baldwin Hyde, was born in Norwich in 1742, and died in 1812. His wife was Lucy Rowland. Mr. Hyde's grandfather was Wilkes Hyde, of Catskill, N. Y., where he died in 1856, and his grandmother was Sarah Hazen, daughter of Jacob Hazen, of Franklin, Conn .; his father was Henry Hazen Hyde, born in Catskill, N. Y. in 1805, and his mother was Lucy Baldwin Beach, who was born in 1807, and died in 1846, daughter of the Reverend James Beach and Hannah C. Baldwin, of Winsted, Conn.

Mr. Henry Baldwin Hyde, the second son in his father's family, was born February 5th, 1844. He has been connected with the insurance business during the greater part of his life, and is now president of the Equitable Life Assurance Society. He married Anna Fitch, lives in East Fortieth Street, and has a son, James Hazen Hyde, who is a student in Harvard University. He belongs to the Union, Union League, Lawyers', South Side Sportsmen's, Riding and West- minster Kennel clubs, and the American Geographical Society, and is a patron of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

307

J. E. HINDON HYDE

O NE of the band of Colonists brought over to America by the Reverend Thomas Hooker, William Hyde, the ancestor of Mr. J. E. Hindon Hyde, is first recorded in Hartford, Conn., in 1636. For a short time before going to Hartford he lived in Boston and vicinity, and subsequently settled in Norwich, in which place he died in 1681. He was one of the original proprietors of Norwich in 1660 and frequently a selectman of that town. Samuel Hyde, of Norwich, son of William Hyde, was born in Hartford about 1637 and died in Norwich about 1677, having gone to that place with his father. He was a prosperous man and married Jane Lee, daughter of Thomas Lee, of Lynn, England, who sailed from England in 1641, but died on the voyage, his widow and children settling in Saybrook. John Hyde, of Norwich, who was born in 1667 and died in 1727, succeeded to the estate of his father, Samuel. He married, in 1698, his second cousin, Experience Abel, daughter of Caleb and Margaret (Post) Abel.

In the next generation, James Hyde, of Norwich, was born in 1707 and became the great-great-grandfather of Mr. J. E. Hindon Hyde. He was a leading shipmaster and one of the influential men in Norwich, where he lived throughout his life. In 1743, he married his third cousin, Sarah Marshall, daughter of Abijah Marshall. He died in 1793, preceded by his wife in 1773, leaving a family of six children. Both he and his wife are buried in the old cemetery in Norwich. Ebenezer Hyde, in the following generation, was born in Norwich in 1748 and died there in 1816. His first wife, whom he married in 1752, and who became the great-grand- mother of the present Mr. Hyde, was Chloe Ellsworth, daughter of Daniel and Mary Ellsworth, of Ellington, Conn. He married, second, in 1747, Phoebe Huntington, daughter of Peter Huntington, and third, in 1799, Elizabeth Peck. By his first wife he had two sons, the youngest of whom, John Ellsworth Hyde, was born in Norwich in 1781 and became one of the leading importers and wholesale merchants in New York City during the first half of the present century. His wife was Maria Little, daughter of Jonathan Little, of Lebanon, Conn., who was his third consin. He died in New York in 1844.

The father of Mr. J. E. Hindon Hyde was John James Hyde, son of John E. Hyde. He was born in New York in 1818 and died in St. Servan, France, in 1889. He succeeded to his father's business as importer and was one of the foremost merchants in his line of business about the middle of the present century. He married Maria L. Card, daughter of William Card. Her father was a wealty grain merchant, and at one time owned one of the largest fleets of vessels that plied upon the Hudson River. When John J. Hyde died, he left two sons and two daughters.

The elder son of this family, Mr. J. E. Hindon Hyde, was born in New York, April 13th, 1856, and was graduated from 'Columbia College in 1876, and from the Columbia Law School, with the degree of LL. B., in 1878. He lives in West Eleventh Street and is a member of the Metropolitan Club. In 1889, he married Ellen Elizabeth Hulings Williams, daughter of Goodwin G. Williams, of Baltimore, a member of one of the oldest families on the eastern shore of Virginia. The first ancestors of this historic Williams family were settled in Virginia in the earliest Colonial period. Mr. and Mrs. Hyde have one daughter, Helen Elizabeth Williams Hyde, and one son, John James Hindon Hyde.

The younger son of John James Hyde is William H. Hyde. He was born in New York in 1858. He married Mary Boyd Potter, daughter of the Right Reverend Henry Codman Potter, Bishop of New York. Mr. and Mrs. Hyde have a daughter, Sylvia Hyde. The sisters of Mr. Hyde are C. Emily Hyde and Eva M. (Hyde) Chase, wife of Leslie Chase. His widowed mother and her unmarried daughter live in Waverly Place when in New York, but in late years they have spent considerable time at their European residence in St. Servan, France.

308

GEORGE LANDON INGRAHAM

O NE of the most eminent and most wealthy merchants of New York, in the closing years of the eighteenth century, was Daniel Phoenix, whose name is also conspicuous on the roll of those who served the city in an official capacity. He was the first City Treasurer and Chamberlain, being appointed to office in 1789, and held the position for twenty years. Daniel Phoenix was the son of Alexander Phoenix, who was born in 1726. His great- grandfather was Alexander Phoenix, who came to New York in 1640, and who was a younger son of Sir John Fenwick, head of a distinguished Northumbrian family.

Daniel Phoenix was born about 1737 and died in 1812. He was twice married; first to Elizabeth Treadwell and afterwards to Elizabeth Platt, and had a large family of children. The Reverend Alexander Phoenix, 1777-1863, who graduated from Columbia College in 1794, became pastor of the Congregational Church at Chicopee, Mass., and died in New York, was the only one of the sons who left male descendants. Rebecca Phoenix, one of the daughters of Daniel Phoenix, married Eliphalet Williams, of Northampton, Mass., and another daughter, Jennette Phoenix, married Richard Riker, the famous District Attorney and Recorder, of New York. The remaining daughter, Elizabeth Phoenix, married Nathaniel Ingraham, and was the mother of Judge Daniel P. Ingraham, and the grandmother of the subject of this sketch.

The Honorable Daniel Phoenix Ingraham, who was named after his maternal grandfather, was born in New York, April 22d, 1800, and died December 12th, 1881. He was educated in a private school in Morristown, N. J., and at the age of thirteen entered Columbia College, from which institution he was graduated in 1817. He then began the study of law in the office of his uncle, the Honorable Richard Riker, Recorder of New York City. Admitted to practice in due course, he was for many years one of the best known lawyers in the city. For a time, he was interested in politics and in 1835 was an assistant alderman from the Twelfth Ward, being elected an alder- man the following year, and again in 1837. In 1838, Governor Marcy appointed him a Judge of the Court of Common Pleas, to fill a vacancy on the bench, and in the election of 1843, he was elected to that place for a full term.

Ten years later, he was chosen Chief Justice of the Court, which position he held until 1858. In 1857, he was elected to succeed Judge Mitchell, as a Justice of the Supreme Court, and was reelected in 1865. In 1870, upon the reorganization of the Judiciary under the State Consti- tution, adopted in 1869, Governor John T. Hoffman appointed him Presiding Justice of the Supreme Court for the First Department, and while holding that position many important cases came before him. For many years Judge Ingraham belonged to the New York Historical Society and the Amer- ican Geographical Society. He was a member of the Reformed Dutch Church for fifty years and one of the elders of the Collegiate Dutch Society of New York. He married Mary Landon, daughter of George Landon, of Guilford, Conn.

The Honorable George Landon Ingraham is the second son of Judge Daniel Phoenix Ingra- ham. He is a native of New York, born August Ist, 1847. In 1869, he was graduated from the Columbia College Law School, and admitted to practice in the same year. After successfully pursuing his profession before the courts of New York for some years, he was, in 1882, elected a Judge of the Superior Court of this city. In 1887, he was designated by the Governor to sit in the Supreme Court, and upon the death of Judge Brady of that court, in 1891, was appointed to the vacancy. In the following November, Judge Ingraham was nominated and elected a Justice of the Supreme Court, which position he now holds. When the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court was organized, in 1895, he was designated by Governor Morton as one of the justices of that court in the First Department. Judge Ingraham married Miss Lent, and has one son, Phoenix Ingraham. He is a member of the Metropolitan, Manhattan, New York Yacht and New York Athletic clubs. Arthur Ingraham, the youngest son of the late Judge Daniel P. Ingraham and brother of Judge George L. Ingraham, was graduated from Columbia College in 1870.

309

HUGH MARTIN INMAN

S OUTHERN interests and the Southern element are naturally of the greatest importance in New York. Mr. Inman's father, the late John Hamilton Inman, was a New Yorker by adoption for over twenty-five years, and was identified in every way with this city. Throughout the whole country he was known as having taken an exceptionally prominent part in inaugurating and shaping the marvelous advance which Southern commerce and industry have displayed in the past two quarters of a century.

Born in Jefferson County, Tenn., in 1844, the outbreak of the war between the States found John H. Inman a youth of seventeen. Prior to this, he had already shown his business ability, and his first employment was as a clerk in a bank, of which one of his uncles was president, in a Georgia town, becoming assistant cashier. The great convulsion interrupted his financial education and career, and he entered the army of the Confederate States; the next four years of his life being spent in military service in the First Regiment of Tennessee Cavalry, which terminated only with the disbandment of the Southern forces. Under these circumstances, and without capital save his ability and force of character, he came to New York in the autumn of 1865, almost at the conclusion of the hostilities between the States, and began a commercial career of uninterrupted success. He chose the cotton business as his field, making his start at the foot of the ladder of commercial life. Mr. Inman's early struggles were, however, not of long duration. He was soon in independent circumstances, and before many years he had established the firm of which he was the head till his death, in 1896, and which became the leading house of its kind and, financially, one of the strongest in New York.

Success of this kind has not been uncommon in the metropolis. Each generation of New York merchants can show similar instances. The exceptional and striking feature in the late John H. Inman's life is in the fact that he was one of the very first to appreciate the possibilities which the mineral wealth and other undeveloped resources of his native section afforded, and that his efforts were successfully employed in bringing to it the capital which has diversified Southern industries and developed its latent powers. As a necessary incident to this, he was closely identified with Southern railroad and other industrial interests, but in all directions his influence was potent in shaping the destiny of the New South.

While not a politician in the ordinary sense, John H. Inman took an active and beneficial interest in public affairs, and was the trusted adviser of many of the leading public men, both in New York and throughout the various Southern States. He consistently refused many tenders of public office, but accepted a position on the Rapid Transit Commission, which laborious post he filled with marked wisdom and ability from the time the commission was first established to the date of his lamented death. His tastes were eminently domestic and he joined only two clubs, the Manhattan and Metropolitan. The handsome family residence at 874 Fifth Avenue, one of the most costly and finished in all its features in the entire Lenox Hill district, was completed under his personal supervision only a short time before his decease. He was deeply interested in many forms of religious and philanthropic work, and was unostentatious and eminently practical in his many benefactions of a private character. He was almost from the time he first resided in New York a member of the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church, of which Dr. John Hall is pastor. In 1870, the late Mr. Inman married Margaret Mckinney Coffin, of Tennessee. Their children were six in number: Hugh Martin Inman, John Hamilton Inman, Jr., Frederick Clark Inman and Charles Chade Inman, and Lucy and Nannie Coffin Inman.

Mr. Hugh Martin Inman, the eldest son and now the head of the family, graduated at the Sheffield Scientific School of Yale University in the class of 1896. The death of his father called him at an early age to the responsibilities and cares which the vast interests of such an estate involve, and to this task he devotes his energies. Mr. Inman is a member of the Metropolitan and St. Anthony clubs.

310

JOHN BUSTEED IRELAND

T HE family of Ireland traces its descent to Sir John de Ireland, one of the followers of William the Conqueror, at the battle of Hastings. In the course of time his descendants became established in the southern part of Ireland, William Ireland, having married, about 1630, Margaret Decourcy, only sister of Almericus Decourcy, Earl of Kinsdale. John Ireland, born at Dundannon, Black Rock, County Cork, came to America and, marrying Judith Lawrence, of Newtown, Long Island, became the father of John Lawrence Ireland, of New York.

John L. Ireland, after graduating from Columbia College, married Mary Floyd, born at Mastic, Suffolk County, N. Y., a granddaughter of General William Floyd, one of the most famous New York Revolutionary patriots, and for a few years subsequently resided in Steuben County, N. Y., on an estate inherited from the family of his mother, and there Mr. John B. Ireland was born. His early days were, however, spent in New York, his father having returned to this city, where he was for many years a prominent figure in society. Mr. Ireland graduated from the University of the City of New York, and was admitted to the bar, but has not for many years engaged in the active practice of his profession.

In addition to direct descent from a race distinguished in the history of the British Islands, Mr. Ireland descends on the maternal side, from both his mother and grandmother, from ancestors of the highest consequence in the Colonial history of New York, and conspicuous in the foundation of the State. His great-grandfather, Mayor Jonathan Lawrence, was a member of the Provincial Congress of 1775-87, and took an active and patriotic part in the proceedings which attached New York to the cause of the other Colonies. After the Revolution, he was a member of the first Senate of the State of New York, representing Long Island in that body. Another great-grand- father of the subject of this sketch was General William Floyd, an active patriot of the Revolutionary period, a member of the Continental Congress from 1774 to 1783, and a signer of the Declaration of Independence.

In 1863, Mr. John B. Ireland married Adelia Duane Pell, born in the City of New York, the daughter of Robert Livingston Pell. Mrs. Ireland's family is also of Revolutionary extraction. Her great-great-grandfather was the celebrated Robert Livingston, the last lord of the manor of Livingston, a leading patriot in the revolt against England. One of her great-grandfathers was Colonel Robert Troup, who was conspicuous in the battles of Long Island, Stillwater and Saratoga, and who, after the war, was a leader of the New York bar. On the paternal side, her great- grandfather was Judge James Duane, a member of the Provincial Congress from 1774 to 1784, a member of the New York Senate, Mayor of New York, 1784-1789, and the first Judge of the United States District Court in New York. The Robert Livingston Pell place, a large estate at Esopus, belongs to Mrs. Ireland, who inherited it from her father. There are seven children of this union, John Decourcy, Robert Livingston, Marie Louisa, Augustus Floyd, Adelia Avena, Laura Duane and James Duane Ireland.

Among the historical and artistic treasures in Mr. Ireland's possession are a portrait of Lafayette, presented by its subject to Miss Duane, daughter of Judge James Duane, and a portrait of Alexander Hamilton, also a gift to Colonel Troup, who was Hamilton's college companion and friend. The town residence of the Ireland family is 15 East Forty-seventh Street, and, in addition to the Pell estate at Esopus, Mr. Ireland owns two handsome residences on Long Island, one Rosedale, at Brookhaven, built by his father, the late John L. Ireland, which includes three hundred acres of ground, and another small place of fifty acres at West Islip. Mr. Ireland's club is the conservative Union. He is also a member of the Sons of the Revolution and St. Nicholas Society, and of the Church Club of New York. As a young man, he remained abroad six years, explored every country of Europe and the Levant, and extended his journey to India, in which country he spent two years, returning to Europe by way of the Cape of Good Hope. The journal of this tour was published in 1860, under the title of Wall Street to Cashmere.

311

ADRIAN ISELIN

I SAAC Iselin, father of Mr. Adrian Iselin, was a prominent and successful merchant of New York in the early part of the present century. For a time he was engaged in business by himself, but after the War of 1812 was associated with Henry C. de Rham, under the firm name of de Rham, Iselin & Moore. While on a visit to Europe, in 1837, he was accidentally drowned, near Geneva. His wife was the youngest daughter of the junior partner of the well-known mercantile house of Rossier & Roulet.

Mr. Adrian Iselin, who was born in New York, is one of the sons that survived Isaac Iselin and his wife. For many years during his early business career he was engaged in importing with his brother, William Iselin, being one of the most successful merchants of New York in the middle of the century. After retiring from the importing trade, he established the banking house of Adrian Iselin & Co., but has been entirely out of active business since 1883. In 1845, he married Eleanora O'Donnell, daughter of Columbus O'Donnell, of Baltimore. Her father was at the head of one of the foremost families of that city, and was a leading financier of Maryland, being connected with the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad and other important corporations. Mr. and Mrs. Iselin cele- brated their golden wedding in December, 1895. Mrs. Iselin's death occurred November 27th, 1897.

Adrian Iselin, Jr., the eldest son of Mr. and Mrs. Iselin, married Miss Caylus. He is at the head of the banking house of Adrian Iselin & Co., and is a member of the Metropolitan, Union, Knickerbocker, Riding and New York Yacht clubs and the Century Association. His residence is in East Twenty-sixth Street. William E. Iselin, the second son, was graduated from Columbia College in 1869, married Alice Rogers Jones and is engaged in the wholesale dry goods business. He lives in upper Fifth Avenue and at Quaker Ridge Farm, New Rochelle, and is a member of the Metropolitan, Tuxedo, Union, Knickerbocker, Rockaway Hunt, New York Yacht, Riding and other clubs. Columbus O'Donnell Iselin, the third son, is associated in the banking business with his brother. He married Edith Jones and lives in West Fifty-second Street. He is a member of the Metropolitan, Union, Knickerbocker, New York Yacht and Riding clubs and other social organiza- tions. C. Oliver Iselin, the youngest son, is the noted yachtsman, who has been especially before the public of late years as one of the owners of the Vigilant and the Defender. He graduated from Columbia College in the class of 1877, and is a member of the Union, Tuxedo, Knickerbocker, Reform, Riding, New York Yacht and Larchmont Yacht clubs. He has been twice married. His first wife was a daughter of William Garner, who was drowned on the yacht Mohawk in New York Harbor, in 1876. His present wife was Hope Goddard, daughter of Colonel William Goddard, of Providence, R. I. His home is All View, in New Rochelle.

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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 51

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