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 77
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General Brooke Postley was born in New York. His mother was Margaret Fairfax, who came of the old Virginia family of that name. Receiving a thorough classical and military educa- tion, he entered upon the practice of law in New York in 1850, and since that time has been prominently identified with many important professional and business enterprises, having been a special partner in several large mercantile houses. Before the Civil War, he was interested in the State militia and in the great conflict served in the Union Army, first as Colonel of the Third Cav- alry Regiment of New York, and in 1866 as Brigadier-General of the Hussar Brigade of Cavalry that he organized. He married Agnes Kain, daughter of James Kain, of Westchester County. He is a member of the New York and the Larchmont Yacht clubs. The city home of General and Mrs. Postley is in upper Fifth Avenue.
Colonel Clarence Ashley Postley, the son of General Brooke Postley, was born in New York, February 9th, 1849. His early education was secured in private schools, where he was prepared for admission to the United States Military Academy, at West Point. Pursuing the regular course of study at West Point, he was graduated from that institution in 1870, and was assigned to the artillery branch of the army, as an officer of the Third Artillery. In 1870-72, he saw service in Florida, and then was entered as a student in the artillery school at Fortress Monroe, and graduated therefrom in 1873. From 1873 to 1878, he was at West Point, as assistant professor of mathematics. In 1883, he resigned from the service, having attained to the rank of Lieutenant of artillery in the regular army. He also served on the staff of his father, with the rank of Colonel of engineers.
Colonel Postley married Margaret Sterling, daughter of Alexander F. Sterling, of Bridgeport, Conn. The Sterlings date back to the earliest Colonial days of Connecticut, and the family has always been one of the most substantial in that Colony and State. David Sterling came from Hertfordshire, England, in 1651. Landing in Massachusetts, he settled in Charlestown, and became one of the prominent citizens of that place. His son, William Sterling, removed to Haverhill, Mass., in 1677, and came to Lyme, Conn., in 1703, being the founder of the Connecticut branch of the family. Jacob Sterling, son of William Sterling, was born in Lyme, Conn., and, later in life, was a resident of the towns of Fairfield and Stratford. His descendants have been prominent in business and public life in the Southwestern part of the State.
Colonel and Mrs. Postley have two children, Elise and Sterling Postley. Since 1886, the Postley family residence has been at the corner of East Sixty-third Street and Fifth Avenue, where Colonel Postley has one of the finest private libraries in the United States, bearing largely on the military history of this country. He is a member of the Union League, University, Manhattan, Racquet, Riding, Players, United Service and New York Athletic clubs, and the Country Club of Westchester County. He is one of the enthusiastic yachtsmen of the metropolis, having been identified with that sport for many years, and is the owner of the yacht, Colonia, that was built as an America cup defender. He is a member of nearly all the leading yacht clubs, including the American, New York, Corinthian, Larchmont and Seawanhaka-Corinthian. He is also a patron of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
460
HENRY CODMAN POTTER, D. D.
R EPRESENTATIVES of the Potter family in this country have for generations been pre- eminently distinguished in affairs of church and State. The first of the name came from England and settled in Rhode Island, where his descendants have remained to this day and have ranked among the leading men of the State. Israel R. Potter, the Revolutionary patriot who fought at Bunker Hill; the Honorable Samuel J. Potter, Governor and United States Senator from Rhode Island; Judge Platt Potter, of New York; General Joseph H. Potter; the Honorable Elisha R. Potter, Member of Congress from Rhode Island; and Captain Edward E. Potter, U. S. N., have helped, with others, to make the name illustrious in American history.
The branch of the family to which the Right Reverend Henry C. Potter, D. D., LL. D., Bishop of the Protestant Episcopal Diocese of New York, belongs, goes back to Joseph Potter, a member of the Society of Friends, who left his Rhode Island home in the latter part of the last century and came to New York State. He lived in Beekman, now La Grange, Dutchess County, and was highly esteemed as a public-spirited citizen and an influential member of the State Legis- lature. His sons and grandsons have added renown to the family name. Among the former were Bishop Alonzo Potter and Bishop Horatio Potter, both eminent in the Protestant Episcopal Church. The list of grandsons includes such names as the Honorable Clarkson N. Potter, Member of Congress; the Reverend Dr. Eliphalet N. Potter, president of Union College; Howard Potter, financier, and General Robert B. Potter.
Bishop Alonzo Potter, the first of the name to attain to high distinction in the church, was born in Beekman, July 6th, 1800, and died in San Francisco, July 4th, 1865. He was graduated from Union College in 1818, and became a professor there in 1821. With the exception of five years spent as rector of St. Paul's Church, in Boston, he remained with Union College until 1845, when he was elected to the Bishopric of Pennsylvania. He had a genius for administration, and during the twenty years of his episcopate both the material and the spiritual interests of his diocese were advanced in a way that commanded general attention. As a direct result of his labors, an Episcopal hospital was founded and richly endowed, an Episcopal academy was revived, an Episcopal divinity school was established, and thirty-five new churches were built in the City of Philadelphia alone.
Bishop Henry C. Potter, the fifth son of Bishop Alonzo Potter, was born in Schenectady, N. Y., May 25th, 1835. His mother was the daughter of President Eliphalet Nott, of Union College, and thus, on this side also, he comes of famous Colonial and Revolutionary ancestry. President Eliphalet Nott was a son of Deborah Selden, who married Stephen Nott about 1752, and who could trace her lineage to the two Governor Dudleys of Massachusetts, whose granddaughter and great- granddaughter she was. President Nott's maternal grandfather was Samuel Selden, of Connecticut, and his uncle on the same side was the famous Colonel Samuel Selden, one of the substantial and accomplished men of his generation, and a valiant Revolutionary officer who died a prisoner in New York in 1776.
After graduating from the Theological Seminary in 1857, Bishop Potter was rector in Greensburgh, Pa., and Troy, N. Y., assistant minister of Trinity Church in Boston, and rector of Grace Church in New York from 1868 to 1883. In the latter year, he became assistant to his venerable uncle, Bishop Horatio Potter, of the New York diocese, and on the death of that prelate, in 1887, he succeeded to the bishopric. His ecclesiastical work is of the most devoted, practical character, and has been productive of substantial results in building up and developing the churches and church institutions of the diocese. He has written much on religious subjects, has received the honorary degrees of A. M., D. D., and LL. D., from several American colleges, those of D. D. and LL. D. from the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, and is a member of the Century, City, Players and Aldine clubs. He married Eliza R. Jacob. His town house is in Washington Square and he has a summer home, The Gables, in Newport.
461
DALLAS BACHE PRATT
F EW American families have a more ancient or more honorable history than the Pratts. In the olden time the name was variously spelled, Pratt, Prat, Pradt, Praed, Prate and otherwise. It was a surname derived from a locality, coming originally from the Latin pratum, a meadow, and the French prairie. Originally of Normandy, the family was large and powerful in that section in the early centuries of the Christian era. The Seigneurs of Preux were among the most distinguished nobles in the tenth and eleventh centuries and thereafter. Repre- sentatives of the family came from Normandy with William the Conqueror, and the English records since that time abound in the name. They settled in the eastern and southern parts of England, where, until this day, their descendants are numerous. At all periods of English history they have borne a prominent part and were among the leaders in the Crusades and in the early wars, civil and foreign, that engaged the attention of the English people in the middle ages. The lineage of that branch of the family, from which came the ancestor of the American Pratts, can be traced back before 1400.
Two brothers, William Pratt and John Pratt, were the first of their name to come to this country. They were natives of Stevenage, Hertfordshire, England. Their father was the Reverend William Pratt, rector of Stevenage, who was born in 1562 and died in 1629, and their great- grandfather was Thomas Pratt, of Baldock, who died in 1539. The brothers came together to New England and settled in Cambridge, some time before 1632. Lieutenant William Pratt, the elder of the two, became engaged in the early religious controversies that disturbed the New England settlers, and in company with the Reverend Thomas Hooker, removed to Hartford, Conn., in 1636. In 1645, he was one of the pioneers who settled the town of Saybrook. He was a representative to the General Court from the town of Saybrook for twenty-three successive sessions from 1666 to 1678, the time of his death. He was a Lieutenant of the militia in 1661, and often a commissioner. His wife was Elizabeth Clark, daughter of John Clark, of Saybrook. Ensign John Pratt, the eldest son of Lieutenant William Pratt, was born in 1644, married Sarah Jones, daughter of Thomas Jones, of Guilford, Conn., and had eight children. He was a large landowner and a man of distinction, serving as a delegate from his town to the General Assembly several times and as a deputy in 1684, 1689 and 1691. His son, John Pratt, Jr., born in 1671, was the father of Lieutenant John Pratt, of the Revolutionary period.
The great-grandson of Lieutenant John Pratt was Linus Pratt, son of John and Abigail Pratt, who was born in 1792 and married Temperance Pratt, daughter of Ezra and Temperance Pratt, in 1813. He came to New York from Essex, Conn., soon after 1840, and spent the latter part of his life here. The Reverend Horace L. E. Pratt, son of Linus and Temperance Pratt, was the father of the subject of this sketch. He was born August 24th, 1823, and was a prominent member of the Protestant Episcopal priesthood. For several years, he was rector of St. Peter's Church, in Perth Amboy, N. J., and afterwards was located in Sacramento, Cal., and at St. Mary's Church, Staten Island. He married, in 1847, Sarah Kate Martin and had eight children, of whom Mr. Dallas Bache Pratt is the eldest. He died in March, 1897, and his widow survives him.
Mr. Dallas Bache Pratt was born February 4th, 1849, in New York. He was educated in Trinity School, and when sixteen years of age, entered the employ of the banking house of Brown Brothers & Co. There he remained for sixteen years, and then became cashier of the Bank of America. After ten years he resigned his position in the bank and became a member of the firm of Maitland, Phelps & Co., now Maitland, Coppell & Co., bankers and merchants. He has been prominent in financial and banking affairs and connected with several corporations, among them the Ohio Falls Car Manufacturing Company, of Jeffersonville, Ind. In 1881, Mr. Pratt married Minnie G. Landon, daughter of Charles G. Landon. His four children are : Katherine Griswold, Alexander Dallas, Constance and Beatrice Gordon Pratt. His city residence is in West Forty-eighth Street, and he is a member of the Metropolitan, Union League, Riding and other clubs.
462
EDWARD PRIME
N his day Nathaniel Prime, the great banker and merchant of New York City, during the early years of the present century, was rated as one of the five richest men in America. He was probably not worth over a million dollars, but the great fortunes of this generatfon were not then dreamed of. He was in the fifth generation from his American ancestor, Mark Prime, who, born in England and coming to this country, was one of the first settlers of Rowley, Mass., where he died in 1683. He was an influential citizen, owned considerable property, was an overseer in 1654, and held other town offices. Samuel Prime, the only son of Mark Prime, was born in Rowley in 1649, and died in 1683, having married in 1673, Sarah Plats, a daughter of Samuel Plats, of Rowley, who was a representative to the General Court in 1681.
Samuel Prime, who was born in Rowley, in 1675, and died in 1717, was the grandfather of Nathaniel Prime. His wife, Sarah Jewett, was descended from J. J. Jewett, who came from Bradford, York County, England. Nathaniel Prime's father was Joshua Prime, 1712-1770, whose wife was Bridget Hammond, descended from Thomas Hammond, who came from Caven- ham, Suffolk County, England. In 1757, Joshua Prime was Corporal in the troop of horse of Rowley. Born in 1768, Nathaniel Prime was the fourteenth child in his father's family of fifteen. He was settled in New York before the close of the eighteenth century, and became one of the greatest merchants and bankers of that period. The firm of which he was at the head, variously known as Prime, Ward & Sands, Prime, Ward, Sands & King, Prime, Ward & King, Prime, Ward & Co., and Prime & Co., was the first great banking house ever established in this country. The wife of Nathaniel Prime was Cornelia Sands, daughter of Comfort Sands, the first president of the Chamber of Commerce, and his first wife, Mary Dodge. Comfort Sands was descended from James Sands, who came to Plymouth, Mass., in 1658, and subsequently removed to Long Island.
The eldest son of Nathaniel Prime and his third child was Edward Prime, who was born in 1801. He was educated in a private school in Morristown, N. J., and entering his father's banking house early in life, soon became a member of the firm. When his father died in 1840, he succeeded to the banking business as the head of the firm of Prime, Ward & Co., which consisted of himself and John and Samuel Ward in 1847, and of Edward Prime and his two sons, Nathaniel and Edward Prime, Jr., from that time until it went out of existence in 1867. Mr. Prime died in 1883. He was one of the founders of the New York Eye and Ear Infirmary.
When Edward Prime died he left six children, three sons and three daughters. His wife was Anne Bard, daughter of William Bard and Catharine Cruger. His daughter, Cornelia, became the wife of August Ahrens; his son, Nathaniel, was an officer in the United States Army and died in 1885; his son, William Hoffman, died in San Antonio, Texas, in 1881; his daughter, Charlotte, married Leonard J. Wyeth, Jr., and his daughter, Mary Catharine, became the wife of James A. Scrymser. The second wife of Mr. Prime, who survived her husband and is still living, was Charlotte Hoffman, daughter of Dr. William Hoffman.
Mr. Edward Prime was the second son and third child of Edward Prime, Sr., and his wife, Anne Bard. He was born in New York, October 19th, 1833. Educated in private schools in White Plains and Poughkeepsie, he succeeded to his father's business in the banking house of Prime & Company. He is a member of the Country Club of Westchester County, the Good Government Club, and the Sons of the Revolution. He spends much time traveling in Europe. Mr. Prime has served in the Seventy-first Regiment, N. G. S. N. Y. During the Civil War he was six months at the front, being stationed near Washington. In December, 1889, he married Anne Rhodes Gilbert, daughter of Edward Francis Gilbert and Elizabeth Hall. Edward F. Gilbert was a lineal descendant of Sir Humphrey Gilbert, who was half brother of Sir Walter Raleigh. Mr. and Mrs. Prime have one daughter, Charlotte Hoffman Prime. The arms of this branch of the Prime family are: a black human leg torn off at the thigh, on a silver shield, with the motto, Virtute et Opere. The crest is an eagle's claw.
463
DAVID PROVOST
F RENCH in origin and adherents of the Huguenot cause, the ancestors of this gentleman escaped from their native country to Holland, and thence migrated to the Colony the Dutch had founded on the Hudson. The first of the name was Guillaume Provost, a Huguenot, who resided in Paris at the time of the massacre of St. Bartholomew, in 1572. His gentle birth is attested by the possession of coat armor, the heraldic devices being similar to those since borne by the successive generations of his progeny. It was Guillaume Provost's grandsons, David and Jonathan Provoost, who came to this country.
David Provoost was in the New Netherland prior to 1639, probably coming with Governor Kieft in 1638. He was an officer of the Dutch West India Company, and among other posts, held command for a time of Fort Good Hope, at Hartford, Conn., established to check the encroachments of the English, and the records show him to have been an able Lieutenant of Governor Peter Stuyvesant. In 1652, his name heads the list of the nine men who ruled New Amsterdam. In 1654, he was made the first schout or sheriff of Breucklyn, and died in 1656. His wife was Margaret Gillis. Their son, Jonathan Provoost, born here in 1651, married Catharine Van der Veen, daughter of Pieter Cornelisen Van der Veen and Eloje Tymens. Becoming a widow in 1663, the latter married the famous Captain Jacob Leisler. Johannes Provoost, the elder brother of Jonathan, was born in Holland and held the post of Secretary at Fort Orange (Albany), subsequently becoming a merchant in New York. He was a leading supporter of Leisler, in 1689, being associated with Jacob Milbourne in the commission to take charge of Fort Orange, and was among those punished by imprisonment and confiscation, when Leisler was executed by the English governor, Colonel Sloughter. David Provoost, second of the name, the great-great-grandfather of the present Mr. Provost, the son of Jonathan and Catharine Provoost, was born in New York in 1689, and married Christina Praa, daughter of Captain Peter Praa, of Bushwick. Their son, Jonathan Provoost, was born in New York in 1722, and in 1743 married Adriana Spring, and died about 1805, in Middlesex County, N. J. John Provoost, their son and the present Mr. Provost's grandfather, was long a resident of Brooklyn and married Eve Edmonton.
In tracing the genealogy of this family, it is necessary to refer to a famous representative in a collateral line, the Reverend Samuel Provoost, D.D., the first Protestant Episcopal Bishop of New York. He was fourth in descent from the first David Provoost, his father being a merchant and his mother a daughter of Hermann Bleecker. He was one of the first seven graduates from Kings, now Columbia College, In 1758. He also studied at Cambridge, England, was ordained to the ministry there in 1766, and returning, became in 1774 an assistant minister of Trinity Church. During the Revolution he espoused the patriotic cause, became rector of Trinity in 1784, and in 1786 was elected Bishop; being ordained, in company with Bishop White, of Pennsylvania, by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York at Lambeth. He resigned his bishopric, which he had adorned by his piety and learning, in 1801, and died in 1815.
David Provoost, third of the name, the father of the present Mr. David Provost, was the son of John and Eve (Edmonton) Provoost. About 1840, in common with many of the name, he changed the spelling from the old Dutch form of Provoost to Provost. He married Harriet Byron Dane, of Boston, a lady of an old New England family.
Their son, Mr. David Provost, was born at Great Neck, Long Island, in 1859; was educated at Rutgers College and the Law School of Columbia College, and is in active practice at the New York bar. In 1887, Mr. Provost married Edith Wise, born at Goshen, N. Y., daughter of James L. Wise and his wife, Isabella McDougall. Mrs. Provost's family is of English extraction and her paternal ancestors were among the earliest settlers in Portsmouth, N. H. The issue of this marriage are three children, Edith Madeleine Provost, David Lawrence Provost, and Ralph Drake Provost. Mr. Provost is a member of the Sons of the Revolution. His residence is 58 West Fifty-first Street, and his country home is at Great Neck, Long Island, on a cliff commanding a view of the Sound.
464
ROGER ATKINSON PRYOR
T HE ancient family of Bland has for many generations been celebrated in the annals of Virginia, numbering among its members many of the most famous sons of the Old Dominion. In the Revolutionary period, Colonel Theodorik Bland was a distinguished patriot, and after the war was a Member of Congress and a delegate to the Constitutional Conven- tion. He was intimately associated with all the great leaders of the period, and was a friend and counselor of Washington and Jefferson.
Judge Roger Atkinson Pryor inherits the blood not only of the Bland, but of the Randolph, Isham, Yates, Cary and Poythress families of Virginia. He was born in Dinwiddie County, in that State, July 19th, 1828, his parents being the Reverend Theodorik Bland Pryor and his wife, Lucy Atkinson. His paternal grandparents were Roger Pryor and Annie Bland, and on the maternal side, Roger Atkinson and Agnes Poythress. He was graduated from Hampden-Sydney College in 1845, and after that from the University of Virginia. After studying law, he entered upon the practice of his profession in Charlottesville, Va., but temporarily took an editorial position in 1854. In the following year President Franklin Pierce appointed him on a special mission to Greece. After his return from Europe, in 1857, he was offered the place of Minister to Persia, declining which, he was elected a Member of Congress from the district formerly represented by John Randolph, of Roanoke. Reelected to Congress in 1859, he cast his lot with his State in the South- ern Confederacy. Twice he was elected a member of the Confederate Congress, and entering the military service of the Confederacy as Colonel of a Virginia regiment, was promoted Brigadier- General for bravery at the battle of Williamsburg. He served in the engagements around Richmond and proved himself a brave soldier and a skilful commander. A misunderstanding with President Jefferson Davis led him to resign his commission, but immediataly after he reënlisted as a private soldier, serving for two years in the ranks in the great battles of the Confederate Army of Virginia. At Petersburg he was captured, imprisoned for eight months in Fort Lafayette and released on parole only twenty days before the fall of the Confederacy.
After the war he removed to New York and engaged in legal practice. He at once took a position at the head of his profession and was engaged in many notable cases, being one of the counsel in the Beecher-Tilton trial and in important elevated railroad litigation. He was counsel for Governor William Sprague of Rhode Island in the litigation relating to the Sprague estate.
Outside of his profession, he has been prominent in the counsels of the Democratic Party and in 1876 was a delegate to the Democratic National Convention at St. Louis. He has been often called upon as an orator upon public occasions. In 1877, delivered an address at Hampden-Sydney College on The Relation of Science to Religion. On Decoration Day of the same year he was the orator before the Grand Army of the Republic in Brooklyn, and among his other celebrated addresses was one before the Albany Law School. His latest published address was one made before the Virginia Bar Associaton, at White Sulphur Springs, in 1895. In 1890, he was elected to a seat on the bench of the Court of Common Pleas in the City of New York, and by the Constitution of 1894 was transferred to the Supreme Court. His term of service expires in 1905.
In 1848, Judge Pryor married Sara Agnes Rice, a lady also descended from a distinguished line of Virginia ancestors. One of her forefathers was the famous Nathaniel Bacon, the leader of what was termed Bacon's Rebellion, in 1676, against the tyranny of Governor Sir William Berkeley. Among her other ancestors were such Virginia worthies as David Rice and Samuel Blair. Mrs. Pryor's rare intellectual and social qualities have made her a helpful companion in the public career of her husband, while she has taken a leading part in philanthropic organizations and those of a social or patriotic character which interest her sex. Their son, Roger A. Pryor, Jr., is a member of the New York bar. Judge Pryor lives at 3 West Sixty-ninth Street. He is a member of the Manhattan Club, the Colonial Club, the Southern Society and the Society of the Sons of the American Revolution.
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