USA > Pennsylvania > Cumberland County > Biographical and Portrait Cyclopedia of the Nineteenth Congressional District, Pennsylvania > Part 24
USA > Pennsylvania > Adams County > Biographical and Portrait Cyclopedia of the Nineteenth Congressional District, Pennsylvania > Part 24
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writes, December 29th, that four names from Pennsylvania are under considera- tion, viz: Harmer for Postmaster Gen- eral and for Attorney General, Armstrong. McVeagh and Brewster. Then stating some facts, he adds: "Now do you keep that open until after the Senatorship is done for. D. Cameron is now with Garfield-that I know-do not have it from me, but it is so. Mr. Garfield may slip into some promise with him now. That should not be, and you can prevent that. Mr. Blaine can prevent that-do so! Should the Senatorship be a failure then the Attorney Generalship will be open, etc., etc. Verily you are a man of deeds. To-day's Times (McClure's) contains just such a letter from Washington as you said you would have written. Thanks!" On January 2nd, 1881, he says: "If the com- mission for a Senatorship and for the At- torney Generalship laid side by side on my table now, I would be puzzled which to pick up. The Attorney Generalship has such temptations for a lawyer, and I feel I would not like the contention of Senatorial life." January 4th, 1881, he writes: "I have no friend I trust more fully than I do you. Your generous offer to help me and your constant current of unbroken useful- ness have prompted me to impose too much on you. Your wisdom and knowl- edge of men will guide you."* * * At bot- tom I fear it is any one but Brewster. It looks so. Do you keep watch on this. I may be mistaken * * * but I put great faith in your ability to collect unexpected strength for me from the Grow and other sources outside of all that combination which has been professing to help my pro- motion. Jannary 17th, 1881: "You gave me great and comforting consolation on ac- count of your talk with Mr. Blaine. * * * We should see each other. That is all that Mr. Garfield and Mr. Blaine want as
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evidence of the real state of things. Let us shape ourselves for the cordial support of this administration and the restoration of honest party rule obeying public opinion in the State." January 22d, 1881: "If you have that proposed talk with Mr. Blaine and can present the subject of the Attorney Generalship as you proposed to do, it will gratify me more than all of the Senator- ships that can be proposed. You may make that a success-indeed I think you can and will, for Pennsylvania must and ought to be remembered." Feb. 9th, '81, he writes: "Each day developes the wisdom of your line of action and I am happy that I have conformed to it. If I am chosen I will owe it to your prudent advise. *
* I write to you for I must talk to some one on this subject and keep silent to the rest of the world. I would by far rather be Attorney General. It would just suit my turn of mind and be the crowning of my career as a lawyer." Later (18th of February, 1881) he reiterates: "For my part I would-yes, by far, be the Attorney General. That is the place to rule in. Urge that, urge that, and we will win. I never can repay you for your anxiety and your efforts. I fear that as the city is late and the time short that my chance is short too. I hope not, for by all the gods at once I would rather have that than to be President or Senator." In May he says, "I think it is very import- ant that we should see each other. I wish we may act in harmony and concert and desire to confer with you before I act at all. You should put Mr. Blaine on his guard as to this, *
* So Mr. Conkling has strutted off. Bah! out of all this will come a boiling cauldron. Mr, Mahone and his "pragmatic sanction" is broken. "God disposes when man only proposes." Alas! there did come, if not the boiling cauldron, the assassin's bullet; but we have quoted enough from these letters which throw a
lurid side-light upon the times, to indicate the close personal and political relationship of Mr. Bosler to Mr. Brewster, who did be- come Attorney General, winning that much coveted prize in the President's cabinet, and as we believe, principally, against the machinations of others, through the influ- ence of his friend.
In 1882, Mr. Bosler was nominated by the Republicans in the 32d District, em- bracing the counties of Cumberland and Adams, for State Senator, as against Sam- uel Wagner, the Democratic candidate. The district had 1800 Democratic majority, which he reduced to 130. The contest was therefore a very close one, Mr. Bosler run- ning sofar ahead of the ticket-some 1600- that on the face of the returns he was only beaten by a small majority. He at once announced his intention of contesting his opponent's claim to the certificate of elec- tion, and the case was taken into court. Here he adduced evidence showing fraud at the polls, but there was not sufficient to overcome the returned majority for Mr. Wagner.
His whole life shows, that, like the king- maker, Warwick, he cared more for the po- litical preferment of his friends than he did for his own success in this one personal at- tempt in politics. With his large influence, his extensive acquaintance with public men, and wide knowledge of public affairs, he may, and we believe he did, see public is- sues and interests which would have been greatly conserved by his election. Who knows? We know acts, but he who would pass a final judgment upon the motives of his fellow man usurps the attributes of the Almighty.
The dark curtain upon his life was soon to fall, beyond which no mortal sees. He died in his office, on the beautiful grounds of his residence, on Monday afternoon, De- cember 17th, 1883. He had arrived home,
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only a few days previously, from a business trip to Philadelphia and Washington, and was stricken down, in the prime of life, by the hand of death, in the form of apoplexy. As his friend "Gath" has pathetically said: "A boy's heart below his shoulders and a man's head above them, he wore himself out smiling, and hardly knew that he was tired; but the active brain, submerged in its own blood told the tale of a fellow sufferer with all who push beyond the plainest limi- tations of existence, and proved that the real martyrs of life are often not those who fail, but those who succeed."
There is little else to tell. In 1883 he at- tended, with some friends, the centenary anniversary of Dickinson College, in which he had been a student when a boy, and, at a meeting of the trustees, with his usual gen- erosity, he subscribed ten thousand dollars to the endowment of a Prof. McClintock chair. He died before this was carried into execution, and his widow added unto this more than seven fold, the result of which is seen in the splendid "James W. Bosler Memorial Hall." which will stand for cen- turies as a monument to his memory.
His sudden death was a shock to the community, to which he had shown himself so public spirited a friend and citizen, and drew forth the warmest expressions of sym- pathy from the widest business and political circles. To some of these we have alluded. Kindly words of regret and sympathy came from Hon. Chas. B. Lore, James G. Blaine, Hon. Stephen B. Elkins, Thos. Beayer, of Danville, Jacob Lome, of Maryland, Enoch Pratt, of Baltimore library fame, and from others of this class.
We have only space to add a tribute by H. J. Ramsdell, the well known Washing- ton correspondent, which he wrote to the "Philadelphia Press" at this time. It is as follows:
To the Editor of the Press:
Sir: I returned last night from the fun- eral of a man who was loved by all his neighbors, high and low, and whose death I shall never cease to mourn. Friendship is a word used most thoughtlessly. Ordinar- ily it does not mean anything. As long as one man can be of use to another, friend- ship is a pleasant word; as long as one man can amuse another they are friends as the world goes. But when ill-luck or adver- sity comes, the common friendship of men is blown away by the first wind. James W. Bosler, of Carlisle, died last Monday, and was buried in the beautiful village of his birth on Thursday. Such universal mourn- ing I never saw. On the day of the funer- al the picturesque park in which his magni- ficent house is situated was thronged with people, rich and poor, high and low, men, women, children. In the house were the re- latives of the deceased and the distinguished persons who came to pay the only tribute they could pay to the man they loved. I have no wish to parade their names. A choking sensation was felt in every throat when Mr. Blaine burst into tears as he looked at the face of his dead friend. It was the saddest scene I ever saw. A thousand persons said when his name was mentioned: "He was the best friend I ever had."
In this city it is much the same: "Poor Bosler," "Dear Old Bosler," are heard everywhere. He never said an ungentle word in his life, and he never did a mean thing. I could fill The Press with the noble things he has done. He was one of the very few greatly successful men in the world who did not lose his heart. He was several times a millionaire, if reports are true, and yet his manners, his dress, and habits were as simple as the humblest man in his employ.
By his marriage to Helen Beltzhoover Mr. Bosler left five children, four of whom
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are living, namely, Frank C., born May Ist, 1869, graduated from Harvard College in the class of 1894; Mary Eliza; De Witt Clin- ton, born April 25th, 1873, graduated from Harvard College, class of 1897; and Helen Louise Bosler.
He was one of the incorporators of the Independent National Bank, of Philadel- phia, and a director until the time of his death. At the time of his death he was President of the Palo Blanco Cattle Com- pany, of New Mexico, and of the Carlisle Manufacturing Company, and he was a director of the Carlisle Deposit Bank and of the Gas and Water Company of his na- tive borough. No man, says a local obitu- ary, "was more generally beloved in a com- munity than was Mr. Bosler in Carlisle, for his benevolence was as broad as his means were great. With a strong intelligence and remarkable judgement he united great kindness of heart."
He was a man of deeds. Whatever he promised he kept. His word was his bond, and this was in great things and small. But he held not this exactitude of others if pov- erty or adverse circumstances prevented of its keeping; he aided, and with a careless grace those who were thus circumstanced, sympathizing rather with the weaknesses of human nature than, Shylock-like, demand- ing the fulfillment of his bond.
A word in closing this somewhat lengthy sketch! For the dead, if they have been successful in life (and only, often, as the world regards "success") there is apt to be too much eulogy and for those who fail or are criminal, perchance, too much blame. Obituaries and tombstones often lie, so that, with Charles Lamb, we sometimes wonder where the bad are buried. Human judgment fails and justice errs, and to hold the balances at all seems to be an almost sacriligious act, against that divine precept of the Christian Master, "Judge not that
ye be not judged." In this deeper sense, as we interpret it, we put no finger upon the question of the religious belief of the sub- ject of this sketch. We believe that men are wider than are creeds. While in heart- felt sympathy with the church of his ances- tors and a trustee of the Second Presbyter- ian church of Carlisle, we are inclined to be- lieve that he never became an active mem- ber of it, (although financially a strong sup- porter of it) because, perhaps unconsciously he inclined to a belief in the axiom we have expressed. He was, we would suppose from his character, too modest of his own merits to do so without strong conviction, and, possibly like so many others, would rather remain without the pale of that "sa- cred circle" than be in it with the chance of his own conscience accusing hin of being a hypocrite. Few men were less sceptical than he. Of religion we never heard him speak-we do not think it was his nature to do so-but of humanity he was full, and of charity to his fellow man.
E DWARD McPHERSON, LL. D., a distinguished citizen of Get- tysburg, Pennsylvania, is a descendant in the fourth generation of Robert and Janet McPherson, who settled on Marsh creek, Adams county, (then Lancaster) in the year 1738. Robert McPherson died in 1749 and his wife in 1769.
Col. Robert McPherson, his great-grand- father, was educated at the academy located at New London, Chester county, Pennsyl- vania, and was for thirty years an active and influential citizen and filled many im- portant positions in York county. He was auditor in 1755 and 1767; commissioner in 1756; sheriff in 1762 and assemblyman in 1765 to 1767 and 1781 to 1784. He was a member for York county of the provincial conference of committees which met in Carpenter's Hall, Philadelphia, June 18,
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1776, and was also a member of the Con- stitutional Convention which in July, 1776, formulated the first Constitution of the State of Pennsylvania. He was captain in Gen. Forbes' expedition to reduce Fort Duquesne in 1758 and served as colonel in the Revolutionary army and after the ex- piration of his term as an assistant com- missary of supplies. His wife was Agnes Miller, of the Cumberland Valley, by whom he had nine children, six daughters and three sons. Of the former two died in in- fancy. Janet married David Grier, of York; Mary married Alexander Russell, Esq., of Gettysburg; Agnes married Dr. Andrew McDowell, of Chambersburg, and Elizabeth married James Riddle, of Cham- bersburg. The eldest son, William mar- ried, first, Mary Carrick, of Maryland, and after her death Sarah Reynolds, of Ship- pensburg, Pennsylvania. Robert died un- married and John married Sarah Smith, of Frederick, Maryland. Col. Robert was one of the chartered trustees of Dickinson College. He died in 1789.
Lieutenant William McPherson, grand- father of Edward, served honorably in the Revolutionary war, having been a lieuten. ant in 1776 in Miles Rifle Regiment, and was captured by the enemy at tlie battle of Long Island and kept a prisoner of war for nearly two years. On his return to civic life he discharged many public trusts, and for nine years represented York county in the Legislature as the special champion of the bill for the creation of Adams county, which division was made in 1800. He died in Gettysburg August 2, 1832, in his sev- enty-fifth year.
John B. McPherson, grandson of Col. Robert McPherson, a son of Lieutenant William McPherson, by Mary Carrick, of Frederick county, Maryland, and father of Edward, was born near Gettysburg, No- vember 15, 1789, on the farm on which his
great-grandfather settled in 1738. He died in Gettysburg, January 4, 1858. John B. McPherson lost his mother when quite young and spent several of his earlier years with his grandfather, Capt. Samuel Car- rick, of the neighborhood of Emittsburg, Maryland. He subsequently returned to his home, where he spent his youth. He received a fair education at the academies of Gettysburg and York, subsequently spent several years of his life in Frederick City, Maryland, with his uncle, Col. John McPherson, and for a year was a clerk in the Branch bank located in that place. He was married in Frederick, April 5, 1810, to Catharine, daughter of Godfrey Lenhart, Esq., and grand-daughter of Yost Har- bach (now spelled Harbaugh), all of York county. Early in 1814 he removed to Gettysburg with a view to entering the mercantile business, but on the 26th of May, of that year, was elected cashier of the bank of Gettysburg, then recently char- tered and organized. He continued in that position until his death, a period of nearly forty-four years. He had superior busi- ness ability and courteous manners, com- bined with strength of character and a high sense of personal and official honor. He participated actively in municipal and county affairs and filled many posts of trust. He was a highly intelligent and well read man, a patron and efficient friend of Pennsylvania College, of whose board of trustees he was president at the time of his death. His widow survived him about one year. They left several children. A grand son, Dr. J. McPherson Scott, has twice represented his native county of Washing- ton, Maryland, in the Legislature, is a phy- sician of high standing and was a district delegate to the Republican National Con- vention of 1884.
Hon. Edward McPherson, youngest son of John B. and Catharine McPherson, was
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born in Gettysburg, July 31, 1830, and was educated at the public schools of that bor- ough, and at Pennsylvania College, gradu- ating from the latter as valedictorian of his class in 1848. He early developed a taste for politics and journalism, but at the re- quest of his father began the study of law with Hon. Thaddeus Stevens, at Lancas- ter, which, however, he abandoned on ac- count of failing health and for several win- ters was employed at Harrisburg as a re- porter of legislative proceedings and a cor- respondent of the Philadelphia North American and other newspapers. In the campaign of 1851 he edited in the interests of the Whig party the Harrisburg Daily American, and in the fall of that year he took charge of the Lancaster Independent Whig which he edited until January, 1854. In the spring of 1853, he started the Inland Daily, the first daily paper published at Lancaster. His health proved unequal to such exacting labors and he relinquished them as stated, except for brief periods at Pittsburg, in 1855, and at Philadelphia from the Fall of 1878 to the Spring of 1880, since which time he has not had active connection with the press. The first im- portant public service rendered by Mr. McPherson was the preparation of a series of letters, ten in number, which were printed in the Philadelphia Evening Bulle- tin in the year 1857 and afterward in pam- phlet form, their object being to prove the soundness of the financial policy which de- manded the sale by the State of its main line of public improvements. The letters analyzed the reports of the canal commis- sioners for a series of years, proved the falsity of conclusions drawn from them, and demonstrated the folly of State ownership and management. The letters were never answered, and they formed the text from which were drawn the arguments in favor of the sale which was accomplished in 1858.
The next year he prepared a like series on the sale of the branches of the State canal which had a like reception. Both series of letters were published anonymously, but were signed "Adams," after his native county. In 1856 he published an address on "The Growth of Individualism," which was delivered before the alumni of his alma mater, of whose board of trustees he had been for years an active member. Another was published in 1858 on the "Christian Principle, Its Influence Upon Govern- ment," and still another in 1859, on "The Family in its Relations to the State," both of which were delivered before the Y. M. C. A., of Gettysburg. In 1863 he delivered an address before the literary societies of Dickinson College, on the subject "Know Thyself," personally and nationally con- sidered. In 1858 Mr. McPherson was elected to the 36th Congress from the 16th district of Pennsylvania, then embracing the counties of Adams, Franklin, Fulton, Bedford and Juniata, and was re-elected in 1860. In 1862 he was defeated in the political re-action of that date, the district having been meanwhile changed by the substitution of Somerset county for Juniata. Upon the completion of his Congressional term of service he was appointed in 1863, by President Lincoln, upon Secretary Chase's recommendation, Deputy Com- missioner of Internal Revenue, in which position he served until December, 1863, when he was chosen Clerk of the House of Representatives for the 38th Congress, which office he continued to hold during the 39th, 40th, 4Ist, 42d and 43d Con- gresses, again in the 47th Congress, and again in the 51st Congress, being the long- est continuous service and the longest ser- vice in that post of any similar official from the beginning of the government. During the administration of President Hayes he served as chief of the Bureau of Engraving
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of the Treasury Department for 18 months, during which time he re-organized and re- formed its administration and obtained from Congress an appropriation of $325,- ooo for the erection of its present fire-proof building in Washington city. The entire cost of it was met out of one year's appro- priations made for the bureau and an equal amount was left unexpended in the treas .. ury. During his service in Congress the principal speeches of Mr. McPherson were on "Disorganization and Disunion," deliv- ered February 4, 1860, in review of the two months' contest over the election of a Speaker in the 36th Congress; "The Dis- union Conspiracy," delivered January 23, 1861, in examination of the secession move- ment and the arguments made in justifica- tion of it; "The Rebellion; Our Relations and Duties," delivered February 14, 1862, in general discussion of the war; "The Ad- ministration of Abraham Lincoln and Its Assailants," delivered June 5, 1862. During and since his incumbency of the clerkship he published "A Political History of the United States During the Rebellion," ex- tending from the Presidential election of 1860 to April 12, 1865, the date of Linc- oln's death; "A Political History of the United States During the Period of Re- construction," extending from 1865 to 1870; "Hand Book of Politics for 1870 and 1872;" Hand Book of Politics for 1872 and 1874; also similar hand books at intervals of two years up and including 1894. These latter volumes are editorial compilations of the political records of men and parties during that eventful period, and have re- ceived a high place in the confidence of all parties for completeness, fairness and ac- curacy. During the Summer and Fall of 1861 our subject served as a volunteer aide on the staff of Gen. McCall, commanding the Pennsylvania Reserves, with a view of studying the wants and organization of the
army, and to fit himself for intelligent leg- islative action on those subjects. In the 37th Congress he was a member of the mil -- itary committee of the House and took an active part in legislation respecting the army. He also served as chairman of the committee on the library and as regent of the Smithsonian Institute. He was sec- retary of the People's State Committee of Pennsylvania in 1857; was a member of the Republican National Committee from 1860 to 1864; was frequently a delegate to State conventions ; was a representative delegate to the Republican National convention of 1876, and was permanent president of that body. He actively participated in politics for many years and had been during five campaigns the secretary of the Republican Congressional committee. In 1867 the de- gree I.L. D. was conferred upon him by Pennsylvania College. Mr. McPherson was married November 12, 1862, to Miss Annie D., daughter of John S. Crawford, Esq., of Gettysburg, and grand daughter, on her father's side, of Dr. William Craw- ford, a native of Scotland, who settled near Gettysburg about 1786, and who for eight years represented that district in Congress, and on her mother's side, of Rev. Dr. Wil- liam Paxton, who for nearly fifty years served with distinction and ability Lower Marsh Creek Presbyterian church. To this union were born five children, four sons and one daughter, whose names are as fol- lows: John B., William L., Norman C., Donald P., and Annie D. McPherson.
John B. McPherson, Esq., was born on October 7, 1863. He received his prelimi- nary education in the private schools of Gettysburg and entered Pennsylvania Col- lege in the year 1879, from which he was graduated in 1883. He subsequently be- came a student at the University of Penn- sylvania, from whose law department he was graduated in the class of 1888. After
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graduation he returned to his native place and became editor of the Star and Sentinel, a position which he held from that time until 1896. In the latter year he sold his interest to Guyon H. Buehler, Esq., and re- tired from journalism. He immediately associated himself with his brother, Donald P. McPherson, under the firm name of Mc- Pherson & McPherson, in the practice of law. In 1896 he was elected vice president of the Gettysburg National Bank and a trustee of Pennsylvania College.
Donald P. McPherson is a graduate of Pennsylvania College, class of 1889, and of Harvard Law school, class of 1895. Like their father before them, the McPhersons are loyal Republicans and take an active interest in the politics of their county and State.
T HE SMALL FAMILY. Among the most prominent and distinguished families of Southern Pennsylvania this fam- ily must be accorded a high place, both in point of business success and social posi- tion. The business interests of the Small family largely centre around the well known firm of P. A. & S. Small, the origi- nal members of which were Philip A., and Samuel Small, both of whom are now de- ceased.
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