USA > Ohio > The biographical cyclopaedia and portrait gallery with an historical sketch of the state of Ohio. Volume II > Part 59
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74
seemed to threaten consumption. He then returned to the East, and entered a theological seminary, to prepare for the Presbyterian ministry, where he continued for three years, a faithful and diligent student. He became well versed in the religious controversies of the day, and being himself ultra- ortliodox, he indulged in a disposition to argue with those who differed with him. He was attentive to his duties, and associated in good designs and efforts with the best men in the seminary. About the close of his second year, having for some time considered the subject, he decided to go on a mission to the heathen; and having previously corresponded with the United Foreign Missionary Society, he went to New York, met the managers, and was, August 27th, 1821, ap- pointed to the Columbia River, on the Pacific coast. Being a candidate under the care of the Presbytery of New Bruns- wick, they agreed, in view of his going on a mission, to license him January 29th, 1822; and on the ensuing Sabbath he preached in the Associate Reformed (later Scots') Church, of Philadelphia. About the first of April following, owing to the obstacles to any foreign mission to the Columbia River, he was released from his engagements to the missionary society. Having preached to acceptance in the vacant Church of Doylestown, Pennsylvania, and much religious in- terest commencing there under his labors, he was employed to supply the pulpit during vacation. Through his labors the membership of the Church was trebled in numbers. During the summer he had several invitations to settle on the eastern shore of Maryland and other places, but next to a foreign mission his heart turned toward the West, and for this . he obtained two commissions-to the Wabash Valley, and the (then) Upper Missouri, the first of which only was fulfilled. In view of these labors he was ordained by his presbytery, October 2d, 1822, at Cranberry, and the same day started for the West. On reaching the Wabash he at once com- menced to establish a circuit on both sides of the river, as far up as there were any settlements. He labored most assiduously and successfully until the next spring, preaching at every settlement he could reach-generally in private houses or school houses-almost every day, often twice a day, at different points. One week he preached thirteen times at ten places, and rode more than one hundred and fifty miles. But his strength could not stand the fatigue and hardships, and he sank under it exhausted, though greatly encouraged by revivals in several settlements. He organized several Churches, two of them in Parke County, In- diana, calling him as pastor, promising him a salary of three hundred dollars, part in produce. He proposed to accept it, and settle in the woods ; and with that view went to the land office and entered seventy acres of land, on which he made a contract to have a log-cabin erected for his dwelling. In April he started to go East to get his dis -. mission, and return as soon as possible. On his way, with an elder bearing the call, he went to Charlestown, to the meeting of the Presbytery of Louisville, which then em- braced all of Indiana. Here he met with the sad tidings of his father's death, which ultimately changed all these plans. The call, which passed the presbytery and was transmitted to New Jersey, was afterward returned to the people, and he never saw them again. He slowly pursued his journey to Pittsburg, where he met letters directing him to come home. At the earnest solicitation of friends he accepted an invita- tion to preach two Sabbaths at Steubenville, Ohio, the Church then being recently vacant, and the result was a call, which
-
0
O.smith Bragt Pul Lo
Alphonso Saft
515
BIOGRAPHICAL CYCLOPÆDIA AND PORTRAIT GALLERY.
met him at the presbytery in New Jersey, to the pastorate of that Church, offering him five hundred dollars a year, which he accepted, returning to them the latter part of August, and October 21st, 1823, he was installed by the Pres- bytery of Steubenville. In the spring of 1824 he was ap- pointed by his presbytery to attend the General Assembly, in Philadelphia. June 30th, of that year he was married to Lydia R. Moore, of Bridgeport, Pennsylvania, who died on the 28th June, 1825, three days after giving birth to a child, the only one she ever had, and which died six weeks after its mother. He married a second time November 6th, 1827, his second wife being Hetty Elizabeth Davis, of Maysville, Kentucky. In the spring of 1820, with the co-operation and assistance of his wife, a lady of rare educational acquire- ments, he established a female school. The idea of starting this school had its conception in the mind of Mrs. Beatty. Its growth and success were phenomenal from its inception, and its graduates are numbered by thousands, and represent every State in the Union. As time progressed the labor in- volved in its management became more arduous and exact- ing, not only in consequence of the increased size of the institution, but by reason, as well, of the increasing infirmity of its founders. Hence, after nearly a half century's labor in the cause of education, they were content to resign it to other hands whose ability and fitness to perpetuate its usefulness had been abundantly attested. In 1840 the col- lege of Washington, Pennsylvania, conferred upon Dr. Beatty the degree of Doctor of Divinity, and twenty years later that of Doctor of Laws. An ardent theological partisan, Dr. Beatty early took very decided and active part in the controversies which agitated, and finally divided, the Pres- byterian Church. He was a member of the General Assem- bly the year of division. The part which Dr. Beatty took in the reunion of the Presbyterian Churches was one of the most important of his life. He was present at St. Louis, though not a member of the Assembly which inaugurated the proposition for reunion. Most unexpectedly to him, he was announced as a member of the Committee of Fifteen, and being next to Dr. Krebs, who was afterward incapacitated from acting, he thereby became convener of the committee. When called to act as chairman a very great responsibility seemed to devolve upon him, which was increased when the two committees came together, as he was also chosen chair- man of the Joint Committee of Thirty. Before the con- ferences closed he was convinced that no principle would be sacrificed by union, and therefore advocated it .. Dr. Beatty was a member of most of the boards of the Church, and was several times urged to take places in their administration. He was on the Committee to Revise the Discipline ; chair- man of the Committee to Examine into the Board of Publi- cations; the Reconstruction Committee ; and that of the boards. He was a constant attendant of the judicatories of the Church; was moderator of the Synod of Pittsburg, in 1839; of that of Wheeling, in 1842; and of Cleveland, in 1870-1. He was thirteen times a member of the General Assembly, and nearly thirty times present at its meetings. He was a member of the first Union Convention, called in Pittsburg, and elected to preside; also a member of the great Philadelphia Union Convention, of which he was chosen first vice-president. He was among the first directors of the Western Theological Seminary, and for several years was president of the board ; also a trustee, and for nearly ten years a lecturer there. For a number of years prior to
his death Dr. Beatty refused to receive any compensation for preaching. To his other qualities of mind was added a genius for financiering, and he managed his affairs with such consummate skill that he was enabled to amass a consider- able fortune, which he bequeathed largely to educational and benevolent purposes. In regard to Dr. Beatty's personal characteristics, they were somewhat paradoxical in their re- lation. Thus, while an eminent teacher of religion, con- scientious in his endeavors, he sometimes failed to observe the minutiæ in the line of Christian courtesy. A just man -- from his own stand-point-he only enjoyed the distinction in a relative degree among his fellow-men. Christian for- bearance in matters of small concern was not a trait of Dr. Beatty's character. On the contrary, he was harsh and despotic with those about him, often unnecessarily wounding the feelings of his friends and associates. These idiosyncrasies,. however, served to show, by contrast, his great qualities of mind and heart. If in some minor things he was amenable to criticism and censure there were others, great and noble, which distinguished him above his fellow- citizens.
TAFT, ALPHONSO, LL. D., jurist, of Cincinnati, was born at Townsend, Vermont, November 5th, 1810. He . was the only son of Peter Rawson Taft and Sylvia (Howard) Taft. His grandparents, on both sides, emigrated to Vermont from Worcester County, Massachusetts. His ancestors were originally from England, where one of them, Edward Raw- son, who came to New England in 1636, was a man of edu- cation and social standing, and was for thirty-five years secretary of the province of Massachusetts. The father, Peter Rawson Taft, was reared a farmer, but afterward studied and practiced law, served many years in the Vermont Legislature, and was Judge of the Probate and County Courts of Windham County, Vermont. The subject of this sketch was also brought up a farmer, and until he was sixteen years old only attended the neighboring country schools. Stimulated with a desire for larger opportunities of education, he taught school for several successive winters in order to pay the expenses of tuition at Amherst Academy, during each following spring, returning to and working upon his father's farm each intervening summer. After this hard work he was able to enter Yale College in his nineteenth year, and graduated from that institution in the class of 1833, with high honor. For two years after graduation he taught in the High School, at Ellington, Connecticut. He then accepted a tutorship at Yale, which he held for two years. During this stay in New Haven he attended the Yale Law School, and graduated therefrom in 1838, and was admitted to the bar of Connecticut at that time. Determined to make his home in the growing West, he visited a number of the Western towns, and finally settled in Cincinnati, in 1839, where he entered upon the practice of his profession. An entire stranger, without influential friends, Mr. Taft's early career, like that of many other lawyers, was trying, but success came to him in good time. During a practice of over twenty- five years he was engaged in some of the largest and most important cases ever before the courts of Ohio, or in the Supreme Court of the United States. One of the most im- portant cases of his long legal life was the suit brought in the Circuit Court of the United States to set aside the will of Charles McMicken, in which Mr. McMicken devised a property of half a million dollars to the city of Cincinnati, to
27-B
516
·
BIOGRAPHICAL CYCLOPÆDIA AND PORTRAIT GALLERY.
found a university for the free education of the youth of the city of his adoption. Mr. Taft was retained by the executors to defend the will. The case was argued before Mr. Justice McLean, in the Circuit Court, and the will was sustained. It was then carried to the Supreme Court of the United States, where Hon. Thomas Ewing appeared in behalf of the con- testants. The legal aspects of the case bear some resem- blance to that of the famous Girard College will case, in which Mr. Binney and Mr. Webster appeared. The printed brief prepared by Mr. Taft for the argument of this case was a complete compendium of the law on the subject of re- ligious and eleemosynary trusts in wills, and reviewed all of the decisions of the English and American courts, from the statute of the 43d Elizabeth to the present time. It also con- tained a full commentary upon all the statutes relating to this branch of the law. After a most elaborate argument the case was submitted to the court, and by them decided in favor of the validity of the will founding the University of Cincinnati. The opinion of the court was delivered by Mr. Justice McLean, in which he paid a very high compliment to Mr. Taft's brief and argument. The decision of the court followed substantially the argument of Mr. Taft. Another important case in which Judge Taft was engaged as coun- sel, in the last years of his practice, was the suit brought to test the constitutionality of the bill authorizing the issuance, by the city of Cincinnati, of two million dollars in bonds, for the completion of the Cincinnati Southern Railroad. Judge Taft was retained by the trustees of the Southern Road to defend the constitutionality of the bill. The case was argued before the General Term of the Superior Court of Cincinnati, Judge Yaple presiding. The constitutionality of the act was sustained by this Court, and its judgment affirmed by the Supreme Court of Ohio. No one can esti- mate the importance of the result of this suit, because by it it was possible to complete the Southern Road, from the rent of which the city has been able so materially to reduce the taxes of its citizens. In his career at the bar Judge Taft has had associated with him in partnership the late Judge Thomas M. Key (who first entered Mr. Taft's office as a law student in 1842), Hon. William M. Dickson, Hon. P. Mallon, Hon. Aaron F. Perry, and Hon. George R. Sage. Mr. Perry was formerly his classmate in the Yale Law School. During Mr. Taft's earlier residence in Cincinnati he served several years as a member of the City Council, and was active in efforts for the ad- vancement of city improvements, and especially the building of railroads. He was the champion, in the City Council, of the Annexation party, so-called, which finally carried through the proposition to extend the city limits north from Liberty Street
one mile, to what is now known as McMillan Street. On the 22d of January, 1850, he delivered, before the Mer- cantile Library Association, a lecture entitled "Cincinnati and her Railroads," in which he showed the great importance to the city of railroads radiating in every direction. In the light of recent events, this lecture seems almost a prophetic utterance. He was one of the prominent incorporators of the Ohio and Mississippi Railroad, and acted as its counsel for a number of years. He was one of the first Board of Trustees of the Marietta and Cincinnati Railroad, and was energetic in carrying that railroad through in spite of the many difficulties which it met in its building. His theory was that Baltimore, Cincinnati and St. Louis being nearly on the same parallel of latitude, should be joined by railroads which should form a main avenue of communication between
the East and the West, and he has lived to see the Baltimore and Ohio system carry out his theory. Mr. Taft was also for many years a director in the Little Miami Road. Judge Taft was always an earnest supporter of the proposition that the city should build the Cincinnati Southern Railway. His connection with the project has been varied. As one of the Judges of the Superior Court, the question of the validity of the act under which the first ten millions of bonds were issued to build the road was presented to him. He delivered the opinion of the court, sustaining the constitutionality of the act. As a member of that court he took part in the appointment of the first Board of Trustees of the Southern Road. After retiring from the bench he was himself ap- pointed a trustee of that road, in 1875, to succeed W. W. Scarborough, Esq., resigned. Resigning on being called into the cabinet, on his return he was retained as counsel to defend the two million act, so-called, as above stated, which finally completed the road. He was the originator and pro- jector of the first street railroad connecting the beautiful hill suburbs of Cincinnati with the city itself. He was the first president of the Mount Auburn Street Railroad, from which sprang the incline-plane system, and the extensive system of suburban street railroads, which are now such a feature of the city, and which have done so much to bring pleasant property within easy distance of the smoky city. Mr. Taft and his first wife were very prominent in the founding of the House of Refuge, and Mr. Taft delivered the opening address upon the completion of that institution, which has saved many waifs from sin and misery for useful lives. Mr. Taft has long been interested in politics, but not until 1856 did he take a prominent part. In that year he was a member of the convention which nominated John C. Fremont for Presi- dent, and in which the Republican party was born. In the same year Mr. Taft became a candidate .for Congress, in the First Ohio District, against George H. Pendleton, by whom he was defeated. In 1864 Judge Taft was appointed to fill a vacancy in the Superior Court of Cincinnati, but declined the ap- pointment. In 1865, however, he was again appointed a Judge of the Superior Court of Cincinnati, to fill a vacancy caused by the resignation of Judge George Hoadly, which appointment he accepted. At the next spring election he was elected to that position by popular vote, and in 1869 was re-elected, having the rare honor, at that time, of receiving the unanimous vote of both political parties. In 1873 he resigned his seat upon the bench, and resumed the practice of his profession, in partnership with his two sons, Charles and Peter. Judge Taft's career on the bench was characterized by the most unwearied industry and the greatest care in arriving at his decisions. The most noted case, perhaps, which came before Judge Taft while on the bench, and which has since gained a national reputation, was the suit brought to enjoin the School Board of Cincinnati from striking out of the rules governing the public schools that clause which provided for the reading of the Bible in the opening exercises of the school. In this case the Superior Court Judges Storer and Hagans, constituting a majority, granted the injunction. Judge Taft delivered a dissenting opinion, in which he held: First, that the School Board had the power to strike out this clause from the rules; and second, that it was proper that such rule should be stricken out, because the King James Version of the Bible was not accepted by the large Roman Catholic population as the true Bible, and be- cause the New Testament taught doctrines disbelieved in by
517
BIOGRAPHICAL CYCLOPÆDIA AND PORTRAIT GALLERY.
the Jewish part of the population. The Judge held that the Constitution of the State did not recognize the Christian re- ligion any more than it recognized the religions of any of the other citizens of the State, not Christians. The case was carried to the Supreme Court of Ohio, which unanimously reversed the judgment of the court below, and sustained Judge Taft in his dissenting opinion, following substantially his course of reasoning in so doing. The opinion of Judge Taft in the Bible case, while it increased his reputation as a judge, has been used twice in his political career as an argu- ment against his nomination for Governor, on the Republican ticket. In 1875 he was a candidate before the Ohio Repub- lican Convention, which nominated Rutherford B. Hayes for Governor, and again in 1879, he was a candidate against Charles Foster, and was defeated in the convention by seven votes. On each occasion the Bible decision of Judge Taft, though confirmed unanimously by the Supreme Court, was the one argument why he should not be nominated, because, it was said, that however just his decision, and according to law, it would prejudice against him a number of Republicans who differed from him on the question of the Bible in the public schools. On the 7th of March, 1876, President Grant called Judge Taft into his cabinet, as Secretary of War, to succeed General Belknap, resigned. Judge Taft re-
mained Secretary of War but three months, and was then transferred to the office of Attorney-general of the United States, as a successor of Judge Edwards Pierpont, a position much more suited to his taste, in which he continued until the close of President Grant's administration. Returning to Cincinnati, in 1877, he resumed the practice of the law, forming a partnership with Major H. P. Lloyd, of that city, which continued for five years. In April, 1882, Judge Taft was appointed, by President Arthur, United States Minister to Austria, and has since resided at Vienna, with his wife and daughter. One of the strongest features of Judge Taft's long and useful life of seventy-two years has been his devo- tion to education and the educational interests of the country. By the hardest work and strictest economy he was able to go through, and graduate from, Yale College, and from the Yale Law School, and since that time has reared five sons, each one of whom has graduated from Yale-the youngest in June, 1883. Judge Taft himself received the degree of LL. D. from his Alma Mater, in 1867, in which year his second son, Peter, graduated with the highest standing ever attained in the academical department of that institution, up to that time. Judge Taft was one of the trustees of the Woodward Fund, and for more than a decade of years was a prominent member of the Union Board of High Schools. As a lawyer he defended the embryo University of Cincin- nati in the McMicken will case ; when that relation ceased, he still retained his interest, and was in the first Board of Trustees appointed by the City Council, participated in the organization of the institution, and after an interval of three or four years was again elected to the board and became its president, which office he resigned upon his appointment to Vienna. In 1873, when in the corporation of Yale College, the six Senators of Connecticut who had held places in that body, yielded to six members to be chosen from the body of the Alumni of the college, Judge Taft was elected to a seat in the corporation of his Alma Mater, held the seat for three years, and was re-elected for another six, at the end of which time he declined to be a candidate for re-election, because of his appointment to a foreign mission. Judge Taft has
been a man of studious habits, and is thoroughly well versed in general literature. He is an admirable Latin scholar, and has retained his familiarity with the classics throughout his busy legal career. He has also had special interest in the study of astronomy. His life and character well fill out Horace's description of a man : " Teres atque rotundus." Judge Taft married his first wife, Miss Fannie Phelps, of Townsend, Vermont, in 1841. In 1852 this lady died, leav- ing two sons, Charles Phelps and Peter Rawson Taft. In 1854 he married Miss Louise M. Torrey, of Millbury, Massa- chusetts, by whom he has four children-William H., Henry W., Horace D, and Fannie Louise. Charles Phelps Taft was born, at Cincinnati, December 21st, 1843; graduated at Yale in 1864, and at the Columbia Law School, New York, in 1866. He served in the Ohio Legislature in 1872 and 1873, and was defeated as a Republican candidate for Congress in the Oc- tober election of 1872. He married a daughter of David Sinton, December 4th, 1873. Peter R. Taft, lawyer, the second son, graduated at Yale in 1867. Charles and Peter spent three years after graduation completing their education in Europe, entering upon the active practice of the law with their father in 1872. Peter married in December, 1876, Tillie, daughter of W. P. Hulbert, Esq., of Cincinnati. The third son, William H., graduated at Yale in 1878, and at the Cin- cinnati Law School in 1880. He served for one year as Assistant Prosecuting Attorney of Hamilton County, and in February, 1882, was appointed by the President Collector of Internal Revenue for the First District of Ohio, which position he resigned January Ist, 1883, to enter the practice of the law with his father's former partner, Major H. P. Lloyd. The fourth son, Henry W. Taft, graduated at Yale in 1880, and at the Columbia Law School in 1882. He is a practicing lawyer in the City of New York. Horace D. Taft graduated from Yale in June, 1883. Fannie Louise, only daughter, after re- ceiving a thorough education in Cincinnati, is now completing her studies in Paris, France.
ENGLISH, LORENZO, attorney-at-law, Columbus, Ohio, is the son of John English and Laura (Sweet) English. He was born in Herkimer County, New York, May 22d, 1819, upon his father's farm, where he remained until he was eighteen years of age, and received only the advan- tages of such an education as the common schools of his native county afforded. In 1837 the family removed by wagon, then the usual mode of traveling by those seeking homes in the West, to Ohio, and finally located at Mount Vernon, in Knox County. Our subject was one of the fam- ily then, and he proved a useful member, not only performing his full share of toil incident to a long and tedious journey, but also in adapting himself readily to any kind of labor common in a new country, and continuing so to do for the period of two years. In the fall of 1839 he entered Oberlin College as a student, and pushed his way through by hard study during term time, and by hard work in any honorable vocation which first presented itself during vacations, and was graduated with honor, in August, 1843. He came to Columbus in September of the same year, and commenced the study of the law, under Edwards Pierrepont, afterward Attorney-general of the United States. He completed his studies in 1845, and was admitted to the bar in that year by the Supreme Court, at Mount Vernon, Knox County. He immediately thereafter commenced the practice of the law, in Columbus. Mr. English was well qualified for success in
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.