USA > Ohio > Bench and bar of Ohio; a compendium of history and biography, Vol. I > Part 42
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Mr. Brown is a Republican in politics, and ever since his childhood has been faithful to the principles, and loyal to the organization of his party. He was chairman of the Lucas county Republican central committee for many years, and of the Republican county executive committee during the successive Presidential campaigns of Garfield, Blaine and Harrison. His organizations were always marked with great vigor and efficiency, and followed with unqualified success. For six years he served as a member of the board of elections of the city of Toledo. In 1890 Mr. Brown was appointed postmaster at Toledo by President Harrison, and for more than four years conducted the affairs of his office to the high approval of the department, and the entire satisfaction of his patrons. During his service as postmaster, he was fre- quently called to Washington to attend conferences involving the improvement of the service; at the request of the postmaster-general, he drafted and pre- sented to the Congressional committecs having special charge of postal mat- ters, bills for the establishment of postal savings banks, and the utilization of the telegraph and telephone for postal purposes, and contributed many articles to the public journals in support of these measures. During his term of office he was given leave of absence for three months, for the purpose of making, for the benefit of the postal department, a critical examination of modern methods for the rapid transit of mails, adopted by the post office departments of England, France and Germany. Mr. Brown has given much of his life to charitable work. In 1880, at the organization of the Toledo Humane Society, he was elected its president, and has been annually elected to that office ever since. Under his administration, the society has acquired its present extended influence. Ile was at its head in the winter of 1893-4, when it furnished daily relief to more than seven thousand suffering people, and also in the year 1896, when the society's wood yard was established, during the first winter's experi- ence of which, more than fifteen hundred transient poor men, without means, were enabled to earn comfortable lodgings, baths and meals. In 1889 he drafted and presented to the legislature a measure subsequently made a law of Ohio, which, it is believed, was the first statutory recognition ever made on the part of the State, of the right of children of criminals to participate in the earnings of their parents, while undergoing criminal punishment. Before the
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World's Humane Congress, held during the World's Fair at the city of Chi- cago in 1893, Mr. Brown delivered an address upon the subject of the duty of the State toward the families of its criminal classes, in which he maintained that all criminals should be compelled to work, and that a fair proportion of their earnings should, by the State, be paid over to their families for their education and support, thus protecting them from needless shame, pauperism and crime, which address attracted the attention of students of penal reform throughout the world. In 1890 he drafted and presented to the legislature a bill, subsequently enacted into law, "to prevent abandonment and pauperism," which measure compels parents who abandon their children, either to go to prison, or to enter into bonds in the sum of one thousand dollars for their support. This law has proved of great benefit to abandoned children through- out the State ; under its provisions the Humane Society of the city of Cincinnati alone receives more than thirteen thousand dollars annually, for the support of such children. At a meeting of the American Humane Association held at Cleveland, Ohio, in September, 1896, Mr. Brown delivered an address upon the subject of "Unwanted Children," and the heartless destruction of infant life, which together with an act drafted by him for the purpose of arresting that great evil, was by the association adopted, published and dis- tributcd to charitable societies and legislative committees throughout the United States and Canada, with the request that the suggestions of the address be enacted into law. Mr. Brown is now vice-president, and a member of the executive committee of the American Humane Association. He is, and for .more than twenty-five years has been a member of the First Congregational Church of the city of Toledo.
JOHN C. LEE, Toledo. Colonel John C. Lee, deceased, was born January 7, 1828, in Brown's township, Delaware county, Ohio. His ancestors on both sides were from the North of Ireland. His parents, Hugh Lee and Mary A. Lee, were natives of Virginia, and came to Ohio soon after their marriage, set- tling in Delaware county. The mother died in 1836, and the familly removed to the town of Delaware in 1838, where they remained until 1844, when they went to Union county, and thence in 1857, to the West, where the father pur- sued farming until his death in Missouri in 1859, at the age of sixty-one years. The educational privileges of the son began in a rude log school house, and were limited to that until the removol of the family to Delaware, Ohio, when the way was opened for his preparation for Central College, Franklin county, where he was for one year. when he went to Western Reserve College at Hudson, Ohio, in 1845, and was graduated in 1848. For two years he taught in acade- mies-one at Atwater, Portage county, and one at Tiffin. Selecting law for his profession, he entered the office of R. G. Pennington, of Tiffin, in 1850, and pursued his reading until July, 1852, when he was admitted to the Bar and became a partner of his tutor, whom he soon succeeded in the practice. Two years later N. L. Brewer began the reading of law with Mr. Lee, and upon
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admission to the Bar became a partner. In 1857 Mr. Lee was the Republican candidate for judge of the Common Pleas Court, with George E. Seney, Demo- crat, as the successful candidate. Upon the outbreak of the Rebellion in April, 1861, Mr. Lee surrendered his professional business to enter the military service of the government, enlisting in the Fifty-fifth Ohio Volunteer Infantry, of which he was at once made the major, and was promoted to its colonelcy before . reaching the field. In January, 1862, he reported his command to General Rosecrans in West Virginia. At Moorefield the regiment first met the enemy, who were defeated and the town taken. After spending the month of March as a member of a court martial at Charleston, Colonel Lee rejoined the regi- ment at Romney. By order of General R. C. Schenck he was given command of the district of the South Potomac and in May, 1862, under that officer, marched for the relief of General Milroy, at McDowell, took part in the Shenandoah campaign, and was in the battles of Freeman's Ford, White Sul- phur Springs, New Baltimore, New Market, Thoroughfare Gap, Gainesville, Chantilly, the Second Bull Run, and others, in which he bore parts which chal- lenged the approval of his superior officers. At Chancellorsville, in 1863, Colonel Lee commanded a brigade consisting of the Twenty-fifth, Fifty-fifth, Seventy-fifth and One Hundred and Seventh Ohio Regiments, which did noble service there, while the commander's prominence was indicated by his horse being shot under him. In May, 1863, in consequence of the death of a child and the serious illness of Mrs. Lee, the colonel was forced to leave the field, and his resignation was accepted May 18, 1863. During the ensuing political campaign in Ohio, Colonel Lee took an active part in support of John Brough and against C. L. Vallandigham, candidates for governor of Ohio. The con- dition of his family warranting his absence from home in the spring of 1864, he accepted the command of the One Hundred and Sixty-fourth Regiment, Ohio Volunteer Infantry, which was assigned for service chiefly about the fortifications of Washington City, where it remained with more or less activity until the aggressive movements of General Grant about Richmond compelled the abandonment of the Rebel movement against the capital. During May, June and July, of 1864, he was in command of all troops from Long Bridge to Chain Bridge in the defenses of Washington. His military service through- out was marked by a degree of intelligence, earnestness, devotion and con- sideration for his command, which from the first challenged the admiration and confidence of superiors and subordinates. In good conduct and disci- pline, his command evidenced the thoughtful care which alone could have secured to them such distinction. The reports of the Second Bull Run made special mention of Colonel Lee's efficiency in command. His regi- ment, had been sent to an advanced position of special peril, and during the fight a rebel force made a flank movement, forming a line at right angles with the Union lines, making necessary a change of front by Colonel Lee, whose command was already largely disorganized by being compelled to fall back to the main line from the advanced position to which he had been assigned. Regardless of company organization, which was lost, and under the raking
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fire of the enemy, he was able to change front successfully by battalion, instead of by companies. Such operation, under the circumstances stated, could be possible only with men well disciplined and with full confidence in their com- mander. Upon leaving the army General Lee resumed the practice of law at Tiffin. With this he was largely identified with different interests of a public nature, serving for five years as a member of the city board of education, and for seven years as chief engineer of the fire department. In 1869 he removed to Toledo, where he then formed a partnership with James M. Brown, who had been a student under him at Tiffin. This firm continued until 1882, when a son of the senior partner, Harry E. Lee, was admitted, the firm name becom- ing Lee, Brown & Lee. This arrangement continued until the retirement of the junior partner, in 1887. For a few years after becoming a voter, Mr. Lee acted with the Whigs, but from its organization he co-operated with the Re- publican party, both as a voter and in such more general methods as occa- sions have opened to him. Upon the declination by Samuel Galloway, in 1867, of a nomination as the Republican candidate for lieutenant governor, General Lee was selected for that position, and was elected, being again nominated and elected to the same place in 1869, serving for both terms with Governor R. B. Hayes. As presiding officer of the State Senate, he commanded the respect and confidence of that body, irrespective of political divisions. On the occasions of three State Republican conventions, he was called to preside over the same. In 1868 he was a delegate-at-large from Ohio to the Republican National Convention, and was a Presidential elector at large from Ohio, and president of the State Electoral College in 1872. He was appointed United States attorney for the Northern District of Ohio in 1877, his term expiring in March, 1881. His special qualities, both as a debater and orator, early made him a favorite with public assemblages of all kinds ; his power in polit- ical discussions being exceptionally great. The appreciation of his talents and character is best seen in the extent to which his services have been called in public ways. Though without church connections, he was for many years identified with Presbyterian and Congregational churches ; and while an earnest advocate of temperance, he has not acted with any temperance party. May 20, 1853, General Lee was married at Tiffin, to Miss Charlotte E. Hoff- man, a native of Germany. There were born to them three children-a daughter (now dead), and two sons, Frank A. and Henry E., both now res- idents of Toledo. General Lee died March 24, 1891, and was buried at Tif- fin, Ohio.
FRANK H. HURD, Toledo. Honorable Frank H. Hurd was a Christmas gift. He was born at Mount Vernon, Ohio, December 25, 1841, and was a son of the late Judge Rollin C. and Mary B. (Norton) Hurd. He was a studious and precocious lad, far in advance of the boys of his own age. His preliminary education had careful supervision and at seventeen he was grad- ated from Kenyon College with class honors. He studied law under the
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tutelage of his father, who had served on the Bench and was then engaged in practice. At the age of twenty-one he was admitted to the Bar and at once entered upon a brilliant career, which was terminated by his death July 10, 1896. One year after his admission to the Bar he was elected prosecuting attorney of Knox county. Three years later he was elected State senator, and in 1868, while yet under twenty-seven years of age, was appointed to codify the criminal laws of Ohio. In the execution of this commission he displayed rare talents, as indeed he did in every undertaking. The following year (1869) he removed to the city of Toledo. He had already outgrown his environment, and the thrifty, prosperous city on the lake shore and the border of the State presented a theater more adequate for the effective employment of abilities such as he possessed. He formed a partnership with Charles H. Scribner, and several years later Harvey Scribner was received into the firm, which was recognized as one of the strongest and most successful in north- western Ohio. This association was first broken by the withdrawal of Judge Charles H. Scribner upon his election to the Bench, and Mr. Hurd continued his relations with Harvey Scribner until January 1, 1894, when he formed a partnership with O. S. Brumback and Charles S. Thatcher, which was main- tained to the end of his life. Although Mr. Hurd was a great lawyer, and well known to the profession as such, his popular fame rests upon his political prominence and public service. It is a singular truth that a lawyer may possess genius and learning, keen insight and profound knowledge of the law, and may wear his life out in private practice in the courts while he remains in comparative obscurity. The contests of the forum are so quiet and its triumphs so little heralded. But when the real lawyer, with his superb equipment of learning and oratory, conscience and convictions, courage and sympathy, enters the political arena his measure is taken by his countrymen, and contemporaneous history records the estimate. All are interested in the politician's career or the statesman's achievements; few care to know the issue of a judicial proceeding. Frank Hurd was a noteworthy example of the lawyer in politics. He was little more than thirty when (1872) he was nominated as the Democratic candidate for Representative in Congress and made a creditable canvass of the district against his competitor, General Isaac R. Sherwood. He was defeated but famous when the campaign ended. Two years later he was nominated and made a successful race against the late Governor James M. Ashley, the Republican candidate. By this election he became a member of the Forty-fourth Congress. In 1876 he was the candi- date of his party for re-election, but was defeated by Governor Jacob D. Cox. In 1878 he was elected, but in 1880 he was defeated by Honorable J. M. Ritchie. In 1882 he was elected over Charles M. King, and in 1884 he was defeated by Honorable Jacob Romeiss, of Toledo, a railroad man, in whose behalf all the protective tariff and labor influences were exerted as far as possible. The election of Mr. Romeiss was unsuccessfully contested in the House of Representatives. Mr. Hurd was again nominated by his party and made his last congressional canvass before the people of the district in 1886,
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but failed of election. This record probably has no parallel in the history of State politics. Mr. Hurd was nominated for eight successive terms and elected for three alternate terms-the Forty-fourth, Forty-sixth and Forty-eighth Congresses. He was a frank, earnest, outspoken free trader ; at least he was always and under all circumstances an avowed opponent of protective tariff and the earnest, eloquent advocate of free trade. He was the great leader on the stump and in Congress in the battle for tariff reform. Years before Presi- dent Cleveland gave conspicuity to that issue by making it the topic of his third annual message to the Congress, Frank Hurd had rung all the changes on it, both in Ohio and Washington. His convictions were deep and he was always courageous in their expression. He was never in any sense a trimmer. His sails were never set to catch popular breezes. He stood for principle, whether with the majority or the minority. He was always of the people and for the people, and the advocate of right and justice in accordance with the promptings of his conscience and moral sense. As to any question of ad- ministration or public policy, whatever his heart believed and his conscience approved his lips advocated. He waited on the leadership of no man, and accepted without challenge the dictum of no party. He was himself a leader of men, an expounder of principles. He displayed the rare moral courage which finds full recompense for the failure to achieve an ambition in the con- sciousness of being right. Twenty years ago his transcendent abilities as a lawyer were recognized by Mr. Tilden in the offer of the attorney general's portfolio, contingent upon a favorable decision of the electoral commission. Frank Hurd was a broad gauge man. He lived above petty annoyances and contentions. He had capacity for large affairs. His connection with the most important controversies in the courts of the State evidence his standing in the profession. His espousal of the cause of the poor without fees evi- dences his humanity. A Roman Catholic in his own religious views, he was tolerant of the views of all men and the creeds of all churches. Some of the men who knew him best bear testimony to his noble qualities and character- istics. Mr. O. S. Brumback, his law partner, says :
" Of all the lawyers I have ever heard in court Mr. Hurd possessed the greatest ability to discriminate. Coupled with his unusual powers of logic and oratory he was, in my judgment, a lawyer without a peer. His abilities and statesmanship comprised the least part of his great nature. He was also a true philanthropist. His liberal and generous nature was only equalled by his love for his friends. A person in distress never appealed to him in vain, and he never was false to a friend. His wonderful magnetism of manner and presence was irresistible to those whose contact with him was frequent. To know him was to love him. Ever unmindful of himself and ever ready to champion the oppressed, he lavished his great ability and income in the cause of the just."
Mr. A. W. Eckert : " Mr. Hurd was certainly a great man who never realized his own greatness. He was one of the most genial, modest and sym- pathetic men I ever knew ; a man whose heart seemed to be overflowing with kindness and generosity toward his fellow men. In the course of my experi- ence at the Bar, I have met him a number of times as an opponent and also as
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an associate counsel. As an opponent I always found him fair and honest- never given to any underhanded practices. As an associate counsel he never made any one feel that he was in any way superior. He would listen with interest to any suggestion one had to offer, and never did he in an arrogant or overwise manner point out one's failings or mistakes. I never knew him even in the time when the most bitter attacks were being made upon him in the campaign to make one insulting reply or utter a word that was unfit for any one to hear. Hs was learned and eloquent, and by instinct a gentleman."
The Bee (Editorial) : "His individuality was of that peculiar magnetic personal quality which drew to him the respect, admiration and love of his fellows. And it was the same to-day, to-morrow, always. Frank, sincere, hon- est, with his daily life an open page that all might read, and upon which was recorded only deeds of love for home and country ; what wonder that the people were his friends and gave him in return fealty and devotion that few men enjoy, few inspire !"
An intimate lawyer friend says : "Probably there are less reminiscences of Mr. Hurd of a conversational character than of any other public man. He was not a story teller, and while perhaps one of the most brilliant speakers before judge and jury that Ohio has ever known, he accepted the adage that 'silence is golden.' He would listen to his friends and acquaintances a whole evening without saying anything himself. And he always impressed you as a good listener on any subject."
Another, who had watched him in the trial of a hundred cases in court, says : "He had a most peculiar mind. He would have little to do with details. I never saw him personally question a witness. He usually sat back from the table, perhaps among the spectators, listening quietly, but when his argument was made not a thread of the evidence was lost. And he carried not only the audience, but usually the judge and jury also."
Of the many testimonials wired at the time of his death only two are quoted :
Grover Cleveland: "I have just learned with sincere regret of the death of Frank IIurd. I had great admiration for his practical courage and sagacity, and I regard his death a severe loss, not only to the country, but to the party to which he belonged, since such bravery as he at all times exhibited must tend to advance the welfare of both."
William McKinley: "I am deeply pained to learn of the death of Hon- orable Frank Hurd. He was a brave, able, honest man, always having the courage of his convictions. A manly adversary and a steadfast friend. My service with him in the National House of Representatives attached me greatly to him, and there I came to know and appreciate the great qualities which distinguished him and for which he will be remembered. I deeply mourn his death and share in the sorrow felt by the people of Toledo and the State over the death of the great citizen, statesman and orator."
Mr. M. P. Murphy in Sunday Bee: "It is not because Frank HI. IIurd was a great lawyer that his death is universally mourned all over this great land ; it is not because he was a great statesman ; it is not because he was a great scholar; it is not because he was a Democrat ; it is not because he was a Catholic or a Protestant or a Mohammedan ; it is not because of anything that he achieved for himself. It is because he was a great man, in the highest and truest sense of the word ; because the cause of humanity meant more to him than the fulfillment of any selfish ambition; because, in all things, the troubles of his neighbor were of greater moment to him than his own affairs; because at all times he counted himself as nothing, when the cause of humanity
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was at stake. Such ambitions as he had were proper ones. If ever he longed for political preferment of a high order, it was because he believed that he could aid the great cause of humanity better in a high place. His superb talents were at all times at the disposal of the people, and for the people he used them. In his political life lies a great sermon, on which the youth of this age may reflect. He stood in politics for a principle which he believed to be right. Once believing that principle to be right, there was no middle ground. He must stand by it, even though it was unpopular. He could not be Frank Hurd and not be honest in his convictions and honest in his expression of them."
He never married. His home was the Boody House. One sister only, of all the members of his immediate family, is living, viz., Mrs. Robert Clark, of Mount Vernon.
ORVILLE SANFORD BRUMBACK, Toledo. Orville S. Brumback was born on a farmi near Delaware, Ohio, December 2, 1855. His father, John Sanford Brumback, belongs to an old Virginia family, whose progenitor emi- grated from Switzerland and settled in the Shenandoah Valley in 1760. His mother, whose name before marriage was Ellen Purmort, is of English-French descent and closely related to the eminent jurist, Chancellor Walworth. The family left the farm in 1860 and removed to Van Wert, Ohio, where the father engaged for some time in the business of a dry goods merchant and sub- sequently became a banker. He has long been regarded as one of the promi- nent citizens of the State. Orville was carefully and thoroughly educated. He attended the public school until sixteen years of age, after which he attended Wooster University and pursued the course of study to the end of the Sophomore year. Instead of remaining there to complete the course he pre- ferred to avail himself of the large advantages afforded in one of the old eastern colleges, and selected Princeton. Entering that time-honored institu- tion as a Junior, he soon gained high standing and maintained an excellent standard of scholarship during the two years he was there. On the merit of his scholarship and ability as a public speaker he received a place among the orators chosen to represent the class on the commencement program. He was graduated in 1877 with a class comprising one hundred and thirty members, of whom ten were selected by reason of general merit to deliver the commence- ment orations. This distinction was more marked in the case of Mr. Brum- back in consideration of the fact that his connection with the college as a student was only two years' duration and a preponderance of the students were eastern men. He received the degree of A. B. upon graduation and immediately thereafter became a student of law in the office of Honorable I. N. Alexander, of Van Wert. In the autumn of the same year he entered the law department of the University of Michigan, where he graduated as LL. B. in 1879. He was admitted to the Bar in the winter following and settled in Toledo for practice. For the first year he was an assistant in the office of Dodge & Raymond, who had a large legal business. In 1880 he opened an office on his own account, and his profession has been his chief concern from
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