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 8

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

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The sons of Isaac and Mary (Ellis) Bell were John Ellis, who died in 1837; James Henry, Isaac, Mary Ellis and Edward R. Bell. James Henry Bell, who died in 1851 in Philadelphia, before he had attained the age of forty, was an accomplished civil engineer, and before he reached his majority, was chief engineer of five railroads. The only daughter of the family, Mary Ellis Bell, married Henry Farnum, of Philadelphia. The youngest son, Edward R. Bell, was educated as a civil engineer, and in 1836 was engaged on a survey for the first railroad in Ohio. In 1837-38, he was in Michigan, and was afterwards employed upon the boundary survey between the United States and Great Britain under the Ashburton treaty. He now resides in New York and has two sons, Gordon Knox and Bertrand Faugères Bell.

Isaac Bell, the third son of Isaac and Mary (Ellis) Bell, and the fourth to bear that name in America, was the head of this historic family for more than half a century and passed away, ripe in years and rich in the affection of his fellow citizens, on September 30th, 1897. Mr. Bell was born August 4th, 1815, in New York. Receiving a business training in early life, he went South in 1836 and engaged in the cotton trade. His interest in public affairs began while he was living

in Mobile, Ala. He was on the staff of the Governor of Alabama, with the rank of Captain, and was elected a member of the Alabama Legislature. In 1856, he returned to New York, and during the rest of his life made his home here. His wealth, his business training and his public spirit made him one of the prominent citizens of the metropolis, and for thirty-five years he devoted a large portion of his time to municipal affairs. He was a Democrat and a member of Tammany Hall, and his first public service was as a member of the Board of Supervisors. Afterwards he became one of the ten governors of the Almshouse, a position he held until that municipal depart- ment was succeeded by the Department of Charities and Corrections, of which he was one of the first commissioners, and the president of the board from 1860 to 1873. He was also a member of the Board of Education and Commissioner of Immigration. Largely by his efforts the Normal College was established, and for many years he was chairman of its executive committee. He was the founder of the Bellevue Medical College, and for thirty years president of its board of trustees. It was due to him that the schoolship under control of the Department of Charities and Corrections and the Department of Education was put into service.

In 1863, with Paul S. Forbes and Leonard Jerome, Mr. Bell organized the Riot Relief Fund for the police of the city, and for many years was its financial manager. Nominations for Mayor and Member of Congress were frequently offered to him, but were invariably declined. During the Civil War, he was one of the most devoted supporters of the Union cause. He was associated with William M. Evarts, Alexander T. Stewart, John Jacob Astor, William E. Dodge, Hamilton Fish and others in the organization of the Union Defense Committee of the State of New York, and became its vice-chairman and one of its most untiring officials. He was the owner of the steamships Arago and Fulton, which were used as transports during the war, and afterwards were included in the fleet of the New York & Havre Steam Packet Company, of which he was president. The Old Dominion Steamship Company was organized by him in 1866, and he was vice-president of that corporation for twenty-two years and a prominent director of the Farmers' Loan & Trust Company, while he was also actively interested in other financial institutions.

In the social world, Mr. Bell was not less conspicuous than in public affairs. At the time of his death he was the third oldest member of the Union Club, was one of the founders of the Manhattan Club, a member of other leading social organizations and of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and American Museum of Natural History. His wife, whom he married in 1844, was Adelaide Mott, daughter of the famous surgeon, the elder Dr. Valentine Mott. Mrs. Bell, who survives her husband, is descended from Adam Mott, of Hempstead, Long Island, the American pioneer of the name. She was educated in France, where she enjoyed the intimate acquaintance of members of the Orleans family. Four children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Bell. The eldest son was the Honorable Isaac Bell, who was born in New York in 1846. He had a short and successful business career, being principally engaged in the cotton trade in the years following the close of the Civil War. In 1878, he married Jeanette Bennett, daughter of James Gorden Bennett, founder of The New York Herald. In 1885, President Grover Cleveland appointed him United States Minister to the Netherlands, and in that position he acquitted himself with dignity and honor to his country. In 1888, he was a delegate to the National Democratic Convention in St. Louis. When he died, in 1889, he left three children, one son and two daughters. His son inherited the family name of Isaac. The second son of Isaac and Adelaide (Mott) Bell is Louis V. Bell, a leading member of the New York Stock Exchange, who belongs to the Metropolitan, Union, Meadow Brook Hunt, Manhattan, Riding and Seawanhaka Yacht clubs. The third son of this family is the Honorable Edward Bell, who is a member of the Stock Exchange. He married Helen A. Wilmerding, daughter of Henry A. Wilmerding; lives in Lexington Avenue, and has a country residence in Southampton, Long Island. He has been a member of the Board of Park Commissioners and also a member of the Board of Education and succeeded his father as custodian of the Riot Relief Fund. His clubs include the Metropolitan, Union, Manhattan, Democratic and Shinnecock Golf and the Downtown Association. The only daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Isaac Bell was Olivia Bell, who married James L. Barclay and died in 1894.

PERRY BELMONT

F OR more than fifty years, the late August Belmont was a conspicuous figure in the political and financial history of our country and in its social development. In the present generation, his sons inherit his force of character, and exhibit the same traits that made him famous. The family name has thus become distinctly American, though August Belmont was born, in 1816, at Alzey, in the Rhenish Palatinate, where, for several centuries, his ancestors were people of wealth, and where, at the present day, representatives of the name occupy the same position. His grandfather, A. J. Belmont, and his father, Simon Belmont, were landed proprietors, and his uncle, Joseph Florian Belmont, was a man of great influence. The latter's daughter, Anna, became the wife of the German statesman, Louis Bamberger.

Educated at first with a view to the law, August Belmont was at an early age placed in the banking house of the Rothschilds, in Frankfort, and was for a time in their Naples establishment. In 1837, he came to New York as representative of the Rothschilds, and founded the banking firm which, bearing his name, has now had an honorable history for sixty years. For the rest of his life, Mr. Belmont was a power in the American financial world, but nothing was more conspicuous in his character than his conservatism and his avoidance of speculative ventures.

He became an American citizen soon after arriving in New York, and thenceforward no native of the United States exhibited more patriotic devotion to its interests. In this he set an example to other prominent men of his day, who were inclined to hold aloof from participation in politics. Mr. Belmont, however, considered it a duty he owed to his adopted land, and became prominent in the Democratic party. The only public office he accepted was the post of Minister to the Netherlands, which he held under President Pierce. He effected important negotiations between the United States and Holland, and received the special thanks of the Department of State. From 1860 to 1872, he was chairman of the Democratic National Committee. While the Civil War was in progress, he supported the Government effectively, and visited Europe on confidential financial missions, receiving the thanks of President Lincoln for his services and advice. In another direction, August Belmont left a strong impression of his personality. Coming from the capitals of Europe and familiar with their social life, his example was most beneficial in New York, and his tastes for the letters, for art and for music, as well as for country life and gentlemanly sports, were an important part of the influence he always exerted. His love for outdoor recreation revealed to Americans the necessity of such relaxation. He was one of the first patrons of the turf in America, his interest in it being as an amusement only, and was for twenty years the president of the American Jockey Club. He married the beautiful daughter of Commodore Matthew C. Perry, U. S. N., and dying in 1890, left three sons, Perry Belmont, August Belmont, Jr., and Oliver H. P. Belmont, and a daughter, Frederika, who is Mrs. Samuel S. Howland.

On their mother's side, Mr. Belmont's children are descended from Edmund Perry, a Quaker, who came from Devonshire, England, to Sandwich, Mass. In 1676, he was fined for a "railing " written against the magistrate of Plymouth, and retired to Rhode Island. Christopher Raymond Perry, 1761-1818, the fifth in descent from Edmund, was born at Newport, R. l., and was an officer of the Continental Navy. His wife was Sarah Alexander, a native of Newry, County Down, Ireland, whom he met while a prisoner of war at that place. The five sons of Captain Perry all distinguished themselves in the navy of the United States. One daughter, Sarah Wallace Perry, married Captain George W. Rogers, U. S. N., and another, Jane Tweedy Perry, became the wife of Dr. William Butler, of the navy, and was the mother of Senator Matthew C. Butler, of South Carolina. Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry, 1785-1819, one of the sons of Captain Perry, lives in American History through his victory on Lake Erie in 1813.

Matthew Calbraith Perry, a younger brother, was born in Newport in 1794, and served in the navy during the War of 1812 under his brother. From 1833 to 1843, he was commandant at the Brooklyn Navy yard and devoted himself so assiduously to the study of his profession

that he earned the title of "Chief Educator in the United States Navy." He also advocated the adoption of steam power for men of war, and from 1838 to 1840 commanded the first steam vessel in our navy-the Fulton Il. Attaining the rank of Commodore, he commanded various squadrons and took part in the naval operations of the Mexican War. He was at the head of the American expedition to Japan, and negotiated the famous treaty of March 21st, 1854, which opened that empire to civilization. He died at New York in 1858, his services being commem- orated by a statue in Touro Park, Newport, a bust at Albany, and other memorials. His wife, Mrs. Belmont's mother, was Miss Slidell, a sister of the Honorable John Slidell, Senator from Louisiana prior to the war. He, with his fellow Confederate Commissioner to England, Mr. Mason, were the central figures in the Trent affair in 1861. Through the relationship with the Slidell family, General Ronald McKensie, U. S. A., was a cousin to the Messrs. Belmont.

In the eldest sons of August Belmont are found all the strong traits of character of the Belmonts and Perrys, determination, energy, patriotism, a keen sense of right and wrong, and fearlessness in their convictions. The Honorable Perry Belmont, the eldest son, was born in New York, December 26th, 1851, and graduated at Harvard in 1872, taking special honors in history and political economy. He then studied civil law in the University of Berlin, and, graduating from the law school of Columbia College in 1876, entered into a law partnership with Dudley Vinton and George Frelinghuysen. Mr. Belmont has been professionally engaged in important litigation before the higher courts, and, in 1880, argued, in the Supreme Court of the United States, the constitutional points in the well-known Pensacola Telegraph case, the decision of which was in favor of his clients. He is not a member of the firm of August Belmont & Co. Sharing his father's belief as to the duty of a citizen, Mr. Belmont has taken an active part in public life and lent his efforts toward the success of Democratic principles. He was elected to Congress in 1880 from the First New York District, and was re-elected three times, serving during four successive terms. He had a brilliant career in Congress and won a national reputation, opposing nefarious legislation and supporting all measures for the benefit of the people. He was a zealous advocate of tariff reform and was also prominent in constructive legislation, securing the passage of useful measures. During his last four years in Congress, he was head of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, one of the most important chairmanships. He was a forcible debator, and is also a public speaker of ability, while he has been a prominent figure in the conventions of his party. In 1882, the delegates of his own district pressed his name for the Democratic nomination for Governor of New York, an honor which he declined. In 1888, President Cleveland appointed Mr. Belmont Minister to Spain.

Among the incidents of his public life he received the Cross of Commander of the Legion of Honor from the French Government for his efforts to secure the co-operation of the United States in the last Paris International Exhibition, at a critical moment, when the monarchical governments of Europe had officially declined anything more than commercial co-operation, withholding official recognition on account of the political aspect of that exhibition, held to celebrate the triumph of the revolution of 1789, and the establishment of the French republican form of government.

August Belmont, second of the name and the second son of the family, was born in 1854, and graduated at Harvard in 1874. He was trained in business under his father's eye and in the latter's banking office, succeeding to the senior partnership in the establishment on the death of August Belmont, Sr. He has shown great ability as a financier and has carried out many large monetary transactions. He was prominently identified with the syndicate of 1895, which subscribed for a large issue of Government bonds and thus assured the ability of the Government to continue specie payments. In 1881, he married Bessie Hamilton Morgan, and has three sons, August, Jr., Raymond and Morgan. He displays a fondness for the turf as a recreation for his leisure hours, and has done much for its welfare, his position in this connection resembling that which his father occupied. He is chairman of the Jockey Club and was appointed chairman of the State Racing Commission by Governor Morton.

GEORGE HOFFMAN BEND

O N the maternal side, this gentleman's ancestors belong to the famous New York Ludlow family. He is a descendant in the seventh generation of Gabriel Ludlow, the first of that family in America, and beyond that point his lineage can be traced in clear and distinct form to some of the oldest families of nobility and landed gentry in Great Britain. On one side the family line goes back to Edward I. of England, in 1272, and his second wife, Margaret, daughter of Philip 111. of France. In the tenth generation from Edward I., Edith, the daughter of Lord Windsor, married George Ludlow, of Hill Deverhill, Wiltshire. George Ludlow was the fourth in direct descent from William Ludlow, and his son, Sir Edmund Ludlow, was the grandfather of Major- General Edmund Ludlow, of the Parliamentary Army, and one of the Judges of the court which tried and condemned Charles 1., and by his second wife, was the grandfather of Gabriel Ludlow, the first of the name, who was the father of Gabriel Ludlow, the American immigrant. The grandfather of the second Gabriel Ludlow was Thomas Ludlow, a cousin of General Ludlow.

Gabriel Ludlow, who established the family name in this country, was born at Castle Carey, England, in 1663. Coming to New York in 1694, he became one of the most successful merchants in the young metropolis of the New World, and was a man of high standing in the community. In 1697, he married Sarah Haumer, daughter of the Reverend Dr. Joseph Haumer, and had a family of thirteen children, six of whom were sons. William Ludlow, the fourth son of Gabriel Ludlow, married Mary Duncan, daughter of Captain George Duncan, and had a family of twelve children. James Ludlow, the tenth child, was born in 1750 and married, in 1781, Elizabeth Harrison, daughter of Peter and Elizabeth (Pelham) Harrison. He was graduated from Columbia College in 1768, and his second daughter, Frances Mary, married Philip Thomas, son of Philip Thomas, of Rockland, Cecil County, Va., and his wife, Sarah Margaret Weems, daughter of William Weems, of Weems Forest, Calvert County. The Thomas family of Virginia also had a remarkable Old World ancestry. Philip Thomas, of Rockland, was a descendant of John, the fourth Baron Mowbray, and his wife, Lady Elizabeth Seagrave, great-granddaughter of Edward I. of England; and a great-great-grandson of John, third Baron Mowbray, and Lady Joan Plantagenet, daughter of Henry, third Earl of Lancaster, a grandson of Henry Ill. of England.

On the paternal side, Mr. George Hoffman Bend has a distinguished American ancestry. His grandfather was the Reverend Doctor Joseph G. Bend, rector of St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Baltimore, who married a granddaughter of Mary Boudinot, sister of Elias Boudinot. This latter name was established in America by Elle Boudinot, a French Huguenot refugee. His descendant, Elias Boudinot, was a Revolutionary patriot and was president of the Continental Congress from 1779 to 1783. His only daughter married William Bradford, Attorney-General in President Washington's second cabinet.

William Bradford Bend, the son of the Reverend Dr. Bend, was the father of Mr. George Hoffman Bend. He married Catherine Ann Thomas, daughter of Philip and Frances Mary (Ludlow) Thomas. Besides Mr. George H. Bend, the children of this alliance were : William Bradford Bend, second of the name, who married Isabella Innes; their children being Isabella Hadden, who married George Edward Wood; Harold Pelham, Meredith and Mary Aspinwall Bend; Catherine Ann Bend, who married James K. Whitaker, their daughter being Marion Ludlow Whitaker, and Elizabeth Pelham Bend, who married Henry Asher Robbins, her children being Henry Pelham Robbins and Maud Robbins, who married Harry Whitney McVicker.

Mr. George Hoffman Bend is the second son of William B. and Catherine Ann (Thomas) Bend. He has long been an active member of the New York Stock Exchange and is prominent in both business and society. He married Elizabeth A. Townsend, their children being two daughters, Amy and Beatrice Bend. The family residence is in West Fifty-fourth Street. Mr. Bend is a member of the Union, Metropolitan, Union League, New York City Riding, Players, and New York Yacht clubs, and of the American Geographical Society.

CHARLES LINNEAUS BENEDICT

A MONG the prominent early settlers of Connecticut and Long Island was Thomas Benedict, from Nottinghamshire, England, who died in Norwalk, in 1685. Of his children, John Benedict, who was born in Southold, Long Island, was the ancestor of that branch of the family of which the Honorable Charles Linneaus Benedict is the prominent representative in this generation. Removing to Norwalk, John Benedict was a freeman of that place in 1670, a selectman, a deacon and a representative to the General Assembly. His wife was Phoebe Gregory, daughter of John and Sarah Gregory and a descendant of Henry Gregory, of Springfield, Mass. His son, James Benedict, 1685-1767, with several associates, purchased from the Indians the land whereon the town of Ridgefield, Conn., was established in 1708. He was an ensign and Captain in the train band, a justice of the peace, and several times a representative to the General Court. His wife was Sarah Hyatt, daughter of Thomas and Mary Hyatt.

Peter Benedict, of the third American generation and great-great-grandfather of Mr. Charles L. Benedict, was born in Ridgefield in 1714, was educated in Yale College and afterwards entered the Colonial Army. His death occurred in 1787. His second wife, the great-great-grandmother of the subject of this sketch, was Agnes H. Tyler, daughter of John Tyler, of Branford, Conn. His son, the Reverend Abner Benedict, 1740-1818, was next in line of descent of this branch of the family, graduated from Yale College in 1769, was ordained to the Congregational ministry and set- tled over the church in Middlefield, Conn. During the War of the Revolution, he was engaged in the patriot cause, taking part in the battles of White Plains, Harlem and elsewhere. After the war, he was settled in New Lebanon, North Salem and North Stamford, Conn., and Roxbury, N. Y. His wife, whom he married in 1771, was Lois Northrop, daughter of Dr. Northrop, of New Milford, Conn. His son, the Reverend Joel Tyler Benedict, 1772-1833, studied law and was admitted to the bar in Fairfield County in 1794, but afterwards entered the ministry as a Presbyterian clergy- man. In his later years, he was connected with the American Tract Society of Philadelphia. His wife was Currance Wheeler, daughter of Adin Wheeler, of Southbury, Conn.

The father of Mr. Charles L. Benedict was George Wyllys Benedict. He was born in North Stamford, Conn., in 1796, and died in Burlington, Vt., September 24th, 1871. Graduated from Williams College, he became the principal of the academy in Westfield, Mass., then was a tutor in his alma mater, principal of the Newburgh Academy in Newburgh, N. Y., and a professor in the University of Vermont. He was also secretary and treasurer of the University board of trustees, and was the proprietor and editor of The Burlington Free Press. Twice he was elected a member of the Vermont State Senate. The degree of LL. D. was conferred upon him by the University of Vermont. His first wife, the mother of Mr. Charles L. Benedict, was Eliza Dewey, daughter of Stephen and Elizabeth (Owen) Dewey, of Sheffield, Mass.

The Honorable Charles Linneaus Benedict was born in Newburgh-on-the-Hudson, in 1824. He was educated in the University of Vermont, being graduated from that institution in 1844. Taking up the study of law in the office of his uncle, Erastus C. Benedict, of New York, he was admitted to the bar and entered upon practice as a partner of his uncle. In 1865, President Abra- ham Lincoln established the United States Court of the Eastern District of New York and appointed Mr. Benedict to be Judge thereof. His career as a Judge was long and brilliant and he was recog- nized as one of the ablest, most independent and upright members of the judiciary. He resigned his position, June 19th, 1897, having occupied it for thirty-two years. The first wife of Judge Benedict, whom he married in 1856, and who died in 1858, was Rosalie Benedict, daughter of Abner Benedict. By her he had one son, George Abner Benedict. His second wife was Sarah Cromwell, daughter of Dr. William Seaman, of New York, and widow of Henry B. Cromwell, of New York. His city residence is in Fifth Avenue and his country home is Far View, Dongan Hills, Staten Island. Judge Benedict is a member of the Century Association, the New England Society and the Hamilton Club of Brooklyn.

ELIAS CORNELIUS BENEDICT

D ETAILED reference is made in another page of this volume to the origin of the Benedict family, of New England and New York, and to the circumstances connected with the emigration of its founder, Thomas Benedict, or Bennydick, as it was some- times written in his own day, who arrived at Boston in 1638. As related therein, he finally settled in Norwalk, Conn., where he was a town official and a legislator. One of his sons, James Benedict, settled in Danbury, Conn., and had a son who was the first white child born in that place.

Descendants of this and of the other sons of Thomas Benedict were pioneers in the settlement of the different parts of the present State of New York, and during the Revolution members of the family were prominent and active patriots both in the army and in civil offices of honorable character. In each successive generation of the Benedict family, the bearers of the name have been distinguished by industry, intelligence and success in practical matters, while among their number have been some who have attained eminence in public and professional life or in the higher ranks of business. In fact, while the family is not as extensive as many of those which trace their descent from Puritan worthies of the early New England type, it has produced an unusually large number of men of the highest character and corresponding standing and influence in the community, while some of its members, notably the subject of this article, have, by their energy and attention to business affairs, contributed much to the material develop- ment of the country.

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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 8

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