USA > Pennsylvania > Luzerne County > Wilkes-Barre > A history of Wilkes-Barre, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania : from its first beginnings to the present time, including chapters of newly-discovered early Wyoming Valley history, together with many biographical sketches and much genealogical material. Volume V > Part 49
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Perhaps it would be well, before going into the life of Judge Halsey himself, to give an account of this family, which is of English origin and has been settled in America for almost three hundred years. The fam- ily in England is of considerable antiquity, and it has been conjectured that the Alsis mentioned in the "Domes- day Book" are the original members of it. In the time of William the Conqueror (1066 to 1087) the Alsis pos- sessed land in half the counties of his realm, and had representatives in each of the three great classes into which landed proprietors were divided by the compilers of the "Domesday Book." But it was several centuries after the Conqueror's time that the first indisputably genuine member of the family is known to have lived in England. This was John Hals, a man of considerable wealth and repute, who lived in the reign of Edward III (1327 to 1377). He belonged originally in Corn- wall, and built in the adjoining County of Devon the ancient mansion of Kenedon, mentioned by Burke in his "Landed Gentry." Kenedon is contemporary with the great hall of William Rufus, otherwise known as West- minster Hall, of London, and with Windsor Castle. The reign of Edward is noted as having been a time of luxury and extravagant living. Many of the present architectural monuments of England belong to that reign. The passing of sumptuary laws became necessary. John Hals was one of the English judges of Common Pleas ; and his second son, Robert or John by name, who added "e" to the spelling, making it "Halse," was educated at Exeter College, Oxford, and became successively provost of Oriel, proctor of Oriel, prebendary of St. Paul's, and Bishop of Litchfield and Coventry. This Robert or John Halse was present at the battle of Blore- heath in the War of the Roses, and escorted from that field to Eccleshall, Margaret of Anjou, the queen of the imbecile Henry VI. Bishop Halse was eminent for promoting none but the best of his clergy; he died in 1490 and was buried in Lichfield Cathedral, and his consecration took place in St. Clement's Church, Coven- try. One of the direct descendants of John Hals returned to Cornwall in 1600, and purchased the estate of Fenton- gollon. In more recent years, in England, Hertfordshire contains, probably, the best-known representatives of the family; there Gaddesdon Place, near Hemel Hempstead, was granted to William Halsey (or Hawse) by Henry VIII, and William's great-grandson became Sir John Halsey. Thomas Halsey, in 1738, was high sheriff of Hertfordshire, as was also Charles Halsey at a later period. Frederick Halsey, who died in 1763, took part in England's continental wars in the middle of the eighteenth century ; was commissary general of the allied army in Germany, and afterward aide-de-camp to the hereditary Prince of Wolfenbuttle, and died at Hesse Darmstadt. His arms were: Argent on a pile sable, three griffins' heads erased of the first. His crest was a dexter hand proper sleeved gules cuffed argent, hold- ing small griffin's claw erased, or. His motto: Nescit vor missa reverti. The crest of John Hals was a griffin sejant wings, endorsed or.
The first Halsey to arrive in America from England, and the progenitor of Gaius Leonard Halsey, was Thomas Halsey, who settled at Lynn, Massachusetts, as early as 1637, and who came from Hertfordshire; he was a farmer, had one hundred acres of land at Lynn, where he lived during a period of intense religious agitation ;
he was one of eight young Englishmen who in 1640 bought a ship and, with Governor Winthrop's permis- sion, set sail for Long Island with a view to settling there, landed in Cow Bay, what is now North Hemp- stead, and bought from James Forrett, Lord Sterling's agent, a tract of land eight miles square, for the English claim to which they paid four bushels of Indian corn while to the Indians they gave clothing and other articles of civilized life; but soon afterward they were driven from their newly acquired land by the Dutch, who laid claim forcibly to it as a part of their New Amsterdam, whereupon Thomas Halsey and his companions sailed for a harbor eighty miles to the east, which, in memory of the English town from which they had sailed to America, they called Southampton ; and from the agree- ment that they drew up it might be fancied that these settlers believed they were founding an independent com- monwealth. Thomas Halsey, who spent the rest of his days at Southampton, was also noted in Connecticut his- tory, having done much toward establishing the system of jurisprudence in that State. His first wife was murd- ered by two Indians, who were promptly captured and executed; this was the only Indian murder committed in the Southampton colony. A man of strong will and forcefulness of character, he was censured in 1646 for "hindering the quiet proceedings of the court, and caus- ing them to lose their time by his wilful obstinacy." Thomas Halsey's will was probated in New York City in 1679. He left three sons and one daughter. Most of the Halseys now living in the United States are descended from this stock, many of them never having left South- ampton; New York and Brooklyn have seen a few, while others have settled in New Jersey, and Tompkins County, New York State, has a village named Halseyville. One of the Southampton daughters was married to a Conk- ling, from whom is descended Roscoe Conkling.
From Thomas the line of Gaius Leonard Halsey is descended through his son, Thomas, Thomas's son, Jere- miah, Jeremiah's son, Jeremiah, the second Jeremiah's son Matthew, Matthew's son Matthew, the second' Mat- thew's son Gaius, Gaius's son Richard Church, and Rich- ard Church's son Gaius Leonard. The Thomases ended their days at Southampton; Jeremiah, the second Thomas's son, removed to Bridgehampton; and the sec- ond Matthew probably settled at Easthampton. It is recorded of the second Matthew that in a very severe winter he skated across New York Bay and the Kill von Kull, thence up Newark Bay to Newark City, where he visited the woman who became his wife. He was a soldier in the Revolutionary War, and while serving in Connecticut captured thirteen Hessians. For this exploit he was rewarded hy the government with a vast amount of depreciated Continental currency, the worthlessness of which embittered his later days. After the war and after the birth of his children, he emigrated to Spring- field, Otsego County, New York, and thence to Howard, Steuben County, where he lived to be more than ninety years old. Matthew Halsey's wife's maiden name was Leonard, and she became the mother of three children who reached maturity. Matthew's third child was Gaius, born May 4, 1793, who studied medicine, drifted away from Howard, settled at Bainbridge and then at Kort- right Centre, Delaware County, where he spent the rest of his life, reared his family, and is buried; Gaius's middle name, which he never used, was Leonard, and the name Gaius Leonard he gave to one of his sons. When Gaius Halsey died, however, all his children left Kortright, never to return. His opinion of his first wife, Mary Church, is indicated by the reverent epitaph that he placed on her tombstone in Kortright Centre: "Beneath this stone rests all that was mortal of Mrs. Mary Halsey, wife of Dr. Gaius Halsey, who departed this life July 26, 1830, aged 35 years. May her infant children, arrived at more mature years, ou visiting this spot, pledge their vows to Heaven to honor her memory by imitating her virtues." To Gaius Halsey four children were born : Richard Church, of whom further; Gaius Leonard, born in 1819, Nelson Gaylord, and Lavantia.
Richard Church Halsey, father of the subject of this sketch, born in Bainbridge, New York, in 1817, studied medicine with his father and was graduated from a med- ical college in New York City. He was a surgeon in the Union Army in the Civil War, lived first at White Haven, but later went to Nesquehoning for four or five years before returning to White Haven to stay; he died in February, 1904, at the age of eighty-six years; he mar- ried Anna Sprowl, a member of the Society of Friends and a native of Kennett, Chester County, Pennsylvania, ·who lived for the greater part of her life in White Haven, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, where she died
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in 1896. Richard Church and Anna ( Sprowl) Halsey had two children, Gaius Leonard, of further mention, and Lavantia Harriet.
Gaius Leonard Halsey, of whom this is a record, was born July 12, 1845, at Nesquehoning, Carbon County, Pennsylvania, son of Richard Church and Anna (Sprow1) Halsey, but the family soon went to White Haven, Luzerne County, to live; and it was in this region of the State that Mr. Halsey won an outstanding place in community life as judge. He studied at the Wilkes-Barre Academy, the Clinton (New York) Liberal Institute, and Tufts College, Medford, Massachusetts, from which he was graduated in 1867. He chose Tufts College because Professor Dearborn, who had been in- structor and personal friend to him at the Clinton Liberal Institute, had been called to a professorship at Tufts. In a part of the year 1866, prior to his graduation from Tufts, he taught school at Canton, Massachusetts, and after graduation continued this work for one year at White Haven, Pennsylvania. In 1868 he went to Wash- ington, District of Columbia, where, during the winter of 1868-69 he was a reporter on the Washington "Post," although he subsequently left this position to become a stenographer for Senator Oliver P. Morton and Generai John A. Logan. In 1870 he was a stenographer for the "Legislative Record" at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. In 1870 and 1871 he was assistant sergeant-at-arms in the House of Representatives of Pennsylvania, and in 1871 and 1872 was a transcribing clerk in the House. In the meantime, he had been reading law at Wilkes-Barre, with Lyman Hakes and Charles E. Rice, ex-President Judge of the Superior Court of Pennsylvania, and was admitted to the Luzerne County Bar on September 9, 1872. In the course of his life at Wilkes-Barre he prac- ticed in this city, where he was one of the leaders of the bar, and served many mining companies and corporations, having been attorney for the Lehigh Valley Railroad and the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company up to the time when he retired from active practice. During the period of his practice, he was a member of the Luzerne Law and Library Association, as well as one of a com- mittee of three known as the board of censors, while he was also for many years chairman of the board of examiners for admission to the several courts of his county.
His judgeship began in 1898, when the death of the Hon. Lyman H. Bennett, Judge of the Court of Common Pleas of Luzerne County, created a vacancy in that court. To fill this position,. Governor Daniel Hastings chose Mr. Halsey. A contemporary newspaper said :
Mr. Halsey's appointment to the important and hon- orable position Is a choice than which no better could have been made from the Luzerne bar, which the newly made Judge has graced and honored for a quarter of a century. The selection is a wise one inasmuch as Judge Halsey is eminently fitted for the judiciary, pos- sessing in a high degree the qualities that will make an impartial, upright and learned judge. In the pro- fesslon of the law he took a prominent position while yet young at the bar, and his splendid powers as a counsellor and advocate soon brought him to the very forepart of his profession. Personally Judge Halsey is genial and good-natured, his nature liberal, sincere and open. In every way his appointment will prove thoroughly satisfactory to the legal profession and to the public.
Judge Halsey's handling of his official duties, to be sure, measured up to the opinion of this newspaper writer; and in the fall of 1898 he was nominated by both the Republican and Democratic parties for the office of Judge of the Court of Common Pleas, and was unanimously elected by the citizens of Luzerne County at a general election for a period of ten years. Throughout his judgeship he then served with distinction and a most commendable sense of fairness and justice.
In addition to his work as judge, Mr. Halsey was a member of the Free and Accepted Masons, in which he was affiliated with Landmark Lodge, No. 442. He was a founder of the White Haven Savings Bank, one of the original incorporafors of the First National Bank of Nanticoke, and in the White Haven institution was a director for thirty-nine years and its president for four- teen years. In the Nanticoke bank he was a director from the time of its incorporation until his death. So great was his contribution to these financial institutions that, when he died, they both passed resolutions com- mending his activities in their behalf and paying high tribute to Judge Halsey's qualities as a man and public- spirited citizen.
Judge Halsey married, April 7, 1882, Sarah Elizabeth . LeVan, of White Haven, Pennsylvania, daughter of John W. LeVan. By this marriage there were five children :
Anna Catherine, of Wilkes-Barre; John Richard, died in 1918; Ruth Alice; Joseph Gaius; and Mrs. W. H. Wurts, of Paterson, New Jersey. Of these, Ruth Alice is the wife of A. R. Freeman, and lives in Evanston, Illinois ; and Joseph Gaius Halsey resides in Williams- port, Pennsylvania. Judge Halsey also has, at the time of writing (1929), six grandchildren : Children of Mrs. W. H. Wurts, John Halsey and Louise; children of Joseph G. Halsey, Jacqueline, and Frances Melanie, and John Richardson, child of Mrs. A. R. Freeman, John Collins. Judge Halsey was also survived by a sister, Harriet L. Halsey, of Wilkes-Barre.
The death of Judge Gaius Leonard Halsey, which came on February 16, 1911, at his Wilkes-Barre home, brought forth numerous expressions of sorrow and of the loss that befell the community in his passing. Many were the printed eulogies that praised his work as law- yer and judge, while the private messages that were sent to his family were too great in number to mention. Court was adjourned for the remainder of the week, and the 'flag on the Court House was at half-mast; members of the bench and bar held a special meeting for the purpose of . taking fitting action. Perhaps the best tribute for purposes of quotation was that paid by the Hon. George S. Ferris, President Judge of Luzerne County, who said in part :
Accustomed as we have grown to be of recent years to the inroads of death, it will, nevertheless, be hard for us to think of the bench and bar of this county without the commanding figure of Judge Halsey. He was admitted as an attorney of our courts in the same year as I was, and thus belonged to the same group of lawyers-the men of the seventies.
As a judge, his high personal character, his inherent, natural love of justice, his abhorrence of shams and of everything that smacked of dishonesty, his unbending devotion to duty, freedom from blas and capacity for hard work, invited, and when necessary compelled the respect of all with whom he had to do.
As a citizen, as lawyer, as judge, Gaius L. Halsey was one whose place in this community will be difficult indeed to fill, and one whose name should be written with the names of those to whose character and life work fathers direct the attention of their sons.
WOODWARD LEAVENWORTH-The family of Leavenworth of which Woodward Leavenworth, banker, financier and outstandingly substantial citizen of Wilkes- Barre, was a member, was founded in its American branch from England between 1664 and 1680. In Eng- land prior to that period members of the family had attained to rank as personages of consequence, for they held a coat of arms, and this coat of arms was pre- served by their descendants. The progenitor of the American line was Thomas Leavenworth, of Woodbury, in the Connecticut colony, who was born in England and died in Woodbury, August 3, 1683. His wife, Grace, survived him, and it is supposed that she died in 1715; his brother, John, also born in England and an immigrant to this country, lived for a time in Woodbury, then re- moved to Stratford, Connecticut, where he died, in 1702. Thomas and Grace Leavenworth had three children : Thomas, John, and a daughter whose name has been lost. This son, Thomas, may have been born in England, or he may have been born in Woodbury. He was a physi- cian, a man of property, and a deacon. He married, in Stratford, in 1698 or thereabouts. Mary Jenkins, daugh- ter of David Jenkins and his wife, Grace. They resided for several years in Ripton, and had children; and of these eleven children was one who like his father and grandfather bore the name Thomas. Now this Thomas was born in Stratford, he lived for a time in Ripton, engaged in trade as a tanner, and was the first of the family ever to locate in Pennsylvania; he came to Wyo- ming, Pennsylvania, set up in tanning in the valley, and in 1778 was routed from business and home by Indians, who applied the torch to his possessions. Theretofore he had failed as tanner in Connecticut, but he returned, nevertheless, with his family, subsisting on the long march on berries and other wild foods, and died in Oxford, Connecticut, after 1795. He married (first) Betty Davis, and (second), in 1758, Rhoda Olds. There were born in all to both marriages ten children, and of these was Gideon, third child by the first marriage, who lived in Watertown, later in Hampden, and while young removed to the Susquehanna Valley, Pennsylvania, but re- turned to his native State in after years, and died in Watertown, June 7, 1833. Gideon was a millwright and gifted as a business man ; moreover, it was he who wrote the "Leavenworth Genealogy," published in 1873, or rather the work published half a century after his demise was a revision of his original draft. He married Mary Cole, daughter of Thomas Cole, of Watertown, and
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had three children. Of them was Jared, second son and child, born March 8, 1780, and died in Albany, New York, May 30, 1829. Jared was a contractor in public works, was prominently identified with the construction of the Erie Canal in New York State, and with the Delaware and Chesapeake Canal, the latter a Pennsy]- vania project. Until the time of his death he was a resident in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and was there well known as contractor. He married (first), in 1800, Mary Osborn, who died in 1812, and (second) Jane Strope, daughter of Sebastian and Lydia ( Van Valken- burg) Strope. Children of these unions were seven, and of them was Franklin Jared, youngest child of the second marriage, born January 24, 1827.
Franklin Jared Leavenworth was educated in the old Towanda Academy, and in 1843 came to Wilkes-Barre. He read the law and was admitted to the bar in 1848, and thereafter practiced three years in Wilkes-Barre; but commerce beckoned him with promise of greater material reward, and he became variously interested in coal, real estate and merchandise, devoting his direction to these allied pursuits so long as he engaged in active operations. In 1853 he removed to Scranton, was for several years connected with the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western Railroad Company, and the Lackawanna & Bloomsburg Railroad, and in 1859 went to New York City, where he was in the office of the comptroller and city chamberlain until 1863, when he engaged in banking. Soon afterward he returned to Pennsylvania, first to Philadelphia, and thence to Wilkes-Barre, and here he died, August 31, 1909 .. For about thirty-five years he was vestryman and treasurer of St. Stephen's Episcopal Church, and long a director and vice-president of the Peoples' Bank of Wilkes-Barre. Franklin Jared Leaven- worth married (first), June 1, 1848, Harriet C. Steele, born in Hanover, Pennsylvania, March 27, 1827, died without issue July 25, 1849; and married (second), No- vember 6. 1852, Annie Woodward, born in Washington County, Kentucky, August 5, 1829, daughter of the Rev. Enos Woodward and his wife, Sarah (Murphy) Wood- ward. To the second marriage were born children : Woodward, of whom further; Jane, Enos, Franklin, and Annie.
Woodward Leavenworth, eldest son of Franklin Jared and Annie ( Woodward) Leavenworth, and of the sixth generation from the first Thomas Leavenworth, progeni- tor of the family in America, was born in Scranton, Pennsylvania, November 22, 1853, and died in Wilkes- Barre, May 26, 1913. He received his academic education in the private schools of Scranton, and in Brooklyn, Philadelphia and Wilkes-Barre. At the age of fourteen years he entered the First National Bank of Scranton, to learn the banking business; then, after two years dur- ing which he held various positions, entered the Second National Bank of Wilkes-Barre as assistant cashier, and two years thereafter became engaged with his father in the business of coal and real estate. This connection en- dured one year, after which he was employed as confiden- tial clerk with Conyngham & Company, shippers of coal, remaining as such two years. When the Lehigh & Wilkes-Barre Coal Company was formed by Charles Parrish, Mr. Leavenworth became his private secretary and took charge of the real estate department; and at the same time he acted as secretary and treasurer of the Hazard Manufacturing Company, which latter connection continued sixteen years. In company with William H. and John N. Conyngham, sons of William L. Conyngham, he founded the Pennsylvania Supply Company, with him- self as senior partner; and this association maintained until February 29, 1904. Mr. Leavenworth assisted in formation of the Red Ash Coal Company, in 1881, served as director, secretary, later as secretary and treasurer, and upon the death of. George H. Parrish, in 1898, was elected vice-president. Later, in 1903, upon the death of M. B. Williams, he was named president of the company, and retained that office until his death. He was a direc- tor of the Wilkes-Barre Deposit and Savings Bank from 1887 until his last year of life, in 1903 was elected its vice-president, and in 1909 its president. At one time he was a director of the Anthracite Savings Bank, and in addition to his other large interests managed a number of estates, as trustee, much to the benefit of the trusts, for they increased considerably under his direction. Fraternally Mr. Leavenworth held strong affiliations. As a member of the Free and Accepted Masons he took a . deep interest in all workings of the order, and was on the committee appointed to devise plans for the building of Irem Temple for the Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. He held thirty-two degrees of the Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite and was selected to
receive the thirty-third and highest American degree; but the selection came too late. He was treasurer of the Wyoming Valley Homeopathic Hospital, a life member of the Wyoming Historical and Geological Society, and member of the Westmoreland and Wyoming Valley coun- try clubs.
Woodward Leavenworth was united in marriage, March 13, 1878, with Ida Cornelia Miller, daughter of Garrick Mallery and Jane Wilcox (Starck) Miller, of Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania. She was ever kindly, sympathetic and helpful to Mr. Leavenworth during his lifetime, and is a woman of great charm and refinement, in every sense a lady, a devoted wife and mother., She is today (1929) a great-grandmother. Of this union be- tween Woodward Leavenworth and Ida Cornelia Miller were born three children: 1. Alice, who became the wife of Frederick Perry Boynton, of Highland Park, Illinois, and they are the parents of five children : Elizabeth Wat- son, Helen Leavenworth, Woodward Leavenworth, Frederick Perry, and Mallery Miller. Of these five chil- dren the first-born, Elizabeth Watson, became the wife of George H. Thornton, of Ardmore, Pennsylvania and they have two children: Emilie Hillyard, and Frederick Perry Boynton Thornton, great-grandchildren of Wood- ward Leavenworth and Ida Cornelia ( Miller) Leaven- worth; and the second-born, Helen Leavenworth, married Mortimer Jerome Adler, of New York City. 2. Helen Leavenworth, graduate of Vassar College, in Pough- keepsie, class of 1905, and wife of Benjamin C. Sloat, of New York City. 3. Woodward, Jr., born February I, 1890, and died February 7, 1905.
The sympathies of Woodward Leavenworth were wide and deep, and the call of the needy appealed to him with force. As one instance in point: The annual dinner which for years he gave to the newsboys of Wilkes- Barre, so quietly in his office as benefactor that it was not known at the time by the boys who was responsible. He was a devoted worker in the causes of the Young Men's Christian Association. In memoriam to his only son, Woodward, Jr., whose untimely death occurred at the age of fifteen years, he donated the swimming pool in the association's building in Wilkes-Barre; and in 1913 the association had this to say of Mr. Leavenworth, from its board of directors:
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