USA > Pennsylvania > Encyclopedia of genealogy and biography of the state of Pennsylvania with a compendium of history. A record of the achievements of her people in the making of a commonwealth and the founding of a nation, Volume II > Part 25
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one of the strongest associations in the world. He is a member of the Law Alumni Society of the University of Pennsylvania, the Law Asso- ciation of Philadelphia, the Sharswood Law Club. the Catholic His- torical Society, and the American Academy of Political and Social Science : until recently he belonged also to the University Club and the Mathematical Club, both of Philadelphia.
Mr. Maher was married July 1. 1877, to Bella Milsted, daughter of Stephen Milsted and Jane Neve, his wife. Mrs. Maher was born at St. Leonard. near Hastings. England. The Milsteds are an old family in Kent, the name being found in the church register of Tenterden as far back as the year 1100. Mrs. Maher died in 1899. Mr. Maher has no children, and resides in Philadelphia.
JAMES BAYNES WALKER, M.D., Ph.D.
James Baynes Walker, M.D., Ph.D., son of Thomas Robinson and Mary (Baynes) Walker, was born in Montgomery county. Pennsyl- vania. December 15. 1846. He is a descendant in the eighth generation of Lewis Walker, of Rehobeth, Wales, who came to this country in 1686, and settled in Tredyffrin township. Chester county. Pennsylvania, in the year 1700, establishing the first homestead in that locality. Mary Baynes, whose paternal ancestors were for centuries landholders in and about the city of York, England, emigrated to America with her father's family in the eighth year of her age.
James B. Walker was educated preliminarily in the public schools of Chester Valley and at the Friends' Central School in Philadelphia. He taught in a country school for two years, and then entered the Uni- versity of Pennsylvania, where he was a student from 1867 to 1872. taking his medical degree in the latter year. For three years during 33
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his college course he was a teacher in the Friends' Central School. From April. 1872. to July, 1873. he was interne at the Philadelphia Hospital. He was quiz-master in materia medica at the university from 1875 to 1877, and in obstetrics from the latter year to 1880; was out- door physician to the Northern Dispensary, and physician to the St. Mary's Street Mission Dispensary, holding both of these posts for sev- cral years. From 1876 to 1880 he was visiting obstetrician to the Phila- delphia Hospital, and for the ensuing thirteen years he was visiting physician to the same institution. Called to the faculty of the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania as professor of the principles and prac- tice of medicine in 1879. he retained that chair until 1890, and for the same period was visiting physician and lecturer on medicine to the Woman's Hospital of Philadelphia. For fifteen years he lectured upon physiology and hygiene at the Friends' Central School. At the present time he is consulting physician to the West Philadelphia Hospital for Women and Children.
Dr. Walker was one of the founders of the American Climatolog- ical Association, of which he was secretary for eleven years, and presi- dent in 1896. He is a member of the American Academy of Medicine and the Pennsylvania State Medical Association, the Philadelphia County Medical and the Northern Medical societies, the College of Physicians of Philadelphia, the Philadelphia Pediatric Society, Penn- sylvania Historical Society and the Union League Club, in which he is a member of the board of directors. He has prepared several interest- ing papers for the medical societies, including one on "Complications in Typhoid Fever." and another on "Turpentine as a Remedial Agent." In addition to his medical degree he received from the university that of Doctor of Philosophy in 1873.
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Dr. Walker married. October 2, 1873, Martha M. Abraham, of Montgomery county, Pennsylvania: they have three children : Helen Duer, Mary Baynes and James Abraham Walker.
NELSON PEREZ CORNELL.
Nelson Perez Cornell, a leading business man and public-spirited citizen of Easton, Pennsylvania, is a representative of one of the notable families founded by English ancestors who in the early years of the seventeenth century left their native land to seek a home in the Amer- ican colonies, to the upbuilding of which, as well as to the prosperity of our national life, their descendants have so largely contributed, and where the names of the emigrant forefathers are still held in honored remembrance.
Thomas Cornell ( 1) was born about 1595. in the county of Essex. England, and married Rebecca Briggs, sister of John Briggs. No other details of his life have reached us, and we have no information concerning his political opinions and religious belief, or of the part he played in the stormy and momentous period in which his lot was cast. His death took place about 1655. and his wife, who was born in 1600. died February 8. 1673.
Thomas Cornell (2), son of Thomas and Rebecca ( Briggs) Cor- nell, and founder of the American branch of the family, was born in England, and married Sarah Earl. About 1638, accompanied by his wife and children, he crossed the sea and settled in the colony of Mas- sachusetts Bay. By vote of the town meeting of Boston. held August 10, 1638, he was permitted to buy William Baulson's house, yard and garden, and to become an inhabitant. This house was situated on what is now Washington street. between Milk and Summer streets. Septem-
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ber 6. 1638, he was licensed to keep an inn until the next general court. In 1643 he sold the property, and meanwhile moved to Portsmouth, Rhode Island, where August 6, 1640, he was admitted a freeman. The same year he was made constable, and the following year ensign. He seems, however, to have possessed a migratory spirit, and we find that, in October, 1642, the local Dutch government of New Amsterdam granted him permission to reside on the island, within the limits of their jurisdiction, about eleven miles from the city. His arrival appreciably added to the numbers of the colonists, inasmuch as he was accompanied by no fewer than thirty-five families of English settlers. He made his home in what is now Westchester county, where in 1642 he was granted a tract of land on the shores of Long Island Sound. This place was then and is now known as Cornell's Neck. The death of this bold and adventurous pioneer occurred in 1673. presumably in this, his last-found home.
Stephen Cornell (3), son of Thomas and Sarah ( Earl) Cornell. was born in 1656, at Portsmouth, Rhode Island, was admitted a free- man in 1688, married Hannah Moshier, and was the father of a son, Stephen (4), who married, June 18, 1719, Ruth Pierce, and died about 1765. His son, Elijah (5), married Sarah, born January 19, 1746, in Rhode Island, daughter of Benjamin and Mehitabel Miller. The mar- riage took place December 4, 1769, and their son, Elijah (6), was born October 17, 1771, and moved to Ithaca, New York, where he carried on the pottery business. In September, 1798, he was received into the Society of Friends at the Swansea monthly meeting. He married, July 4. 1805. Eunice Barnard, born May 11, 1788. Her death occurred March 23. 1857, and her husband expired March 27, 1862, in the ninety-first year of his age. Their son, Elijah (7), was born April II, 1808. at De Ruyter. Madison county, New York, and married, Decem-
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ber 15, 1831, Betsey Ann Berdick. Their children are: Marion E., born May 17. 1833; Nelson Perez, mentioned at length hereinafter; Marie, born September 27, 1836, married Jerome M. Squire ; and Will- iam, born July 3, 1838, married Elizabeth Moore, of Easton, Pennsyl- vania.
Nelson Perez Cornell (8), son of Elijah (7) and Betsey Ann (Berdick) Cornell, was born November 23, 1834, at Ithaca, New York, where he received his education in the common schools. At the age of fourteen he began life for himself, being employed as a messenger boy by the Hon. Ezra Cornell, the founder of Cornell University, and a few years later took the position of assistant postmaster at Enfield, New York. At the end of three years he returned to Ithaca, where he was employed as clerk in a grocery store, and when, a few years later, his employers moved their business to Morristown, New Jersey, he accom- panied them. Five years after, in 1855, he was sent by the firm to take charge of a branch store which they had established at Easton, Penn- sylvania, and which had not succeeded under the management of an agent. In the hands of Mr. Cornell the enterprise soon became pros- perous, and after conducting it successfully for a number of years the firm made him the offer of an interest in the business. This he accepted, and was fully justified by the results in having done so, but after sev- eral years, thinking that an outdoor life would be more satisfactory to him, he took a position with the late James D. Mingle, to conduct a network of telegraph lines connecting New York, Philadelphia, Read- ing and Mauch Chunk. After completing this undertaking he returned to the grocery business, forming a copartnership with the late .A. Keller Michler, under the firm name of Cornell & Michler. This copartnership continued until November, 1900, when it was dissolved by the death of Mr. Michler. The business, however, is still conducted by Mr. Cornell
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under the old firm name, the prestige acquired during the long period of copartnership rendering a change of name undesirable. This firm was the first to use electricity for business purposes, putting in their store a twenty-five light dynamo, which was run by a water-motor. Later, in connection with Howard Rineck, of Easton. Mr. Cornell was instrumental in forming a company to furnish light and power to the citizens of that place. Notwithstanding many discouragements, and repeated objections, based on the ground that the enterprise would not pay for itself, they were successful. not only in forming a company, but in building a plant which was conceded to be one of the best equipped in the country. After it had been conducted for several years with satisfactory results, it was transferred to a Philadelphia syndicate.
During his long residence in Easton, Mr. Cornell has been identi- fied with a number of organizations. Shortly after his arrival he be- came connected with the Keystone Fire Company. in which he held the office until. at the outbreak of the Civil war. the company was dis- banded, a majority of its members enlisting in the army. He was a member of the National Guard, serving under Captains Stoneback, Titus and Bell, and was connected with the Easton Greys during the whole period of its existence, holding the rank of second lieutenant, and afterwards that of first lieutenant. His political principles are those promulgated and supported by the Republican party. He is a member of the Methodist Episcopal church.
Mr. Cornell married, January 12. 1859. Sarah Elizabeth Innis, of Easton, Pennsylvania. where she was born October 5. 1839, her father. Samuel Innis, being engaged in the printing business in that city. Mr. and Mrs. Cornell were the parents of one daughter: Jennie Berdick, who married. at Denver, Colorado, William Marston Williams, who was born January 12, 1859. at Scranton, Pennsylvania. The following
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children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Williams: Helen Cornell, born April 8. 1890: Nelson Cornell, born September 11, 1892; Louisa lluch- ing's, born January 30, 1897; and Alice Huchings, born January 8, 1898. On December 9. 1898, Mrs. Williams and her children sustained a severe loss by the death of the husband and father, who, on that day, passed away at his home in Easton. The married life of Mr. and Mrs. Cornell, after extending over a period of nearly forty years, was terminated by the death of the latter, who expired May 21, 1896, deeply lamented by her family, and mourned by a large circle of friends by whom she was sincerely loved and honored.
JOSIAH G. LEACH. A. M.
Josiah Granville Leach, of Philadelphia, lawyer and genealogist, is a native of New Jersey, born at Cape May Court House, July 27, 1842. His parents were Joseph S. and Sophia ( Ball) Leach.
He was educated in private schools, and was carly engaged in newspaper work. In 1862-63 he served in the Twenty-fifth Regiment New Jersey Volunteers, and made a most honorable soldierly record. He was promoted First Sergeant for gallantry in the battle of Fred- ericksburg, and was subsequently advanced in turn to the rank of ser- geant-major and lieutenant. At the expiration of his term of service he entered the Law Department of the University of Pennsylvania, from which he was graduated in 1866, and he entered upon practice in the same year. A Republican in politics, he was elected to the legislature of Pennsylvania in 1876. From 1887 to 1890 he served as commissary- general of Pennsylvania with the rank of colonel, and from 1889 to 1893 he served as appraiser of the Port of Pennsylvania.
In recent years Mr. Leach has largely declined professional en-
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gagements otherwise than in an advisory way, in order to give his attention more particularly to genealogy, in which he is a recognized authority, and he is almost constantly employed in tracing family lines and preparing elaborate genealogical volumes. Among his most promi- nent works are: "Memorials Relating to the Ancestry of ex-Vice President Levi P. Morton," 1894: "Memorials of the Reading, Howell, Yerkes, Watts, Latham and Elkins Families," 1894; "History of the Bringhurst Family, with Notes," 1901 ; all published by J. B. Lippin- cott & Company, Philadelphia : and "History of the Girard National Bank of Philadelphia."
Mr. Leach is historiographer of the Pennsylvania Historical So- ciety, and historiographer of the Pennsylvania Society, Sons of the Revolution.
HENRY GRAHAM ASHMEAD.
Henry Graham Ashmead, of Chester, Pennsylvania, is a descend- ant of John Ashmead, who was born at Cheltenham, county of Glouces- ter. England. October 14. 1648, and emigrated to Pennsylvania in 1682, accompanied by his mother. Mary Ashmead. his wife and two children.
Ashmcad and his brother-in-law, Toby Leach, had purchased from William Penn a large tract of land in what is now Cheltenham town- ship, Montgomery county, then included in Philadelphia, where they settled, giving to the township the name Cheltenham, a reminder of their old home in the motherland. John Ashmcad died there, December 21, 1688, and his wife the following day. The shock of her husband's death (the result of an accident ) was fatal to her. She was a daughter of William Currier of Cheltenham, England, where she was married, October 14, 1677:
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H.G. Ashead.
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The eldest child. John Ashmead, was born at Cheltenham, Eng- land, July 12, 1679, and when at the age of nine years, five months and ten days, on the death of his parents, the second John .\shmead became the head of the family in the new world.
This John (second) married, October 12, 1703, at Darby Meeting, Sarah Sellers, born at Darby, July 13, 1685. a daughter of Samuel Sellers, of Derbyshire. England, who settled in Upper Darby, Chester county (now Delaware), Pennsylvania, in 1682. and his wife Ann, daughter of Henry and Helen Gibbons, formerly of Pariridge, Eng- land. John Ashmead died at Germantown, October 7, 1742. To the marriage of John (second) and Sarah Sellers was born, May 12, 1706. John Ashmead (3), who on August 23, 1734, married Ann Rush, born October 25. 1716. She was the great-granddaughter of Captain John Rush, an officer in Cromwell's army, whose sword and watch are now in the museum in the old State House (Independence Hall), Phila- delphia. Ann Rush was an aunt of Dr. Benjamin Rush, the signer of the Declaration of Independence. John Ashmead (3) died July 30, 1750. His widow married Samuel Potts, and became the mother of Major James Potts, of the Revolutionary army. To the marriage of John Ashmead (3) and Aun Rush was born at Germantown, September 29, 1738. John Ashmead (4), who became a noted sea captain.
He was appointed naval constructor by the Continental Congress in 1776, and captain of the ship "Mars," the brig "Eagle," and other
NOTE .- "There is an ancient family in Spain named Ashmede, as I believe the name is spelled there, which is thought by some to be of Moorish origin. Some one had said the name possibly came from Achmet. However this may be, certain it is that a wanderer of the Germantown race of Ashmeads, it may be with this Moorish blood in his veins, found in England a bride in the Baroness Burdett Coutts."-"The Germantown Road and its Associations," in Penn. Mag. of History, vol. vi, p. 377.
The Ashmede family of Granada, Spain, as well as the branches of that family in Mexico, Brazil, and other South American countries, assert that the Ashmeads of Pennsylvania are of the same lines as themselves, and that the original emigrant 10 England was banished among the Moriscoes, expelled from Spain, by the edict of Philip III, in 1611.
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vessels of the Pennsylvania navy, 1777-82. and was engaged in action with various British privateers in 1779. In his later years Captain Ashmead, who was senior warden of the port of Philadelphia, wrote an account of his voyages and adventures between the years 1758 and 1782. which have been privately printed. Thomas Twining, in his travels in America in 1795-6. makes numerous references to the Cap- tain. in whose vessel he was a passenger from India to Philadelphia. Captain Ashmead, on January 28, 1761, married Mary Mifflin, daughter of Benjamin Mifflin, and niece of Major General Thomas Mifflin, of the Revolutionary army, and first governor of Pennsylvania. His wife died May 18. 1814, and Captain Ashmead died June 6. 1818.(*)
William Ashmead, fourth son and fifth child of Captain John and Mary Ashmead, was born April 24, 1776. When a lad of seven- teen he married Margaret Mckinley, daughter of William Mckinley. of Delaware. and of the family from which President Mckinley was descended. Her mother was Margaret Wayne, daughter of John Wayne, and granddaughter of Captain Anthony Wayne, who com- manded four troops of horse in the army of William III. at the battle of the Boyne. She and "Mad Anthony" Wayne were first cousins. To this marriage eight children were born, of whom four reached adult age; the eklest son was the distinguished Rev. William Ashmead, and the youngest was the father of Henry Graham Ashmead.
John Wayne Ashmead, son of William and Mary (Mckinley) Ashmead, was born in Philadelphia, May 16, 1806. His parents died when he was hardly more than an infant. He was reared by his three maternal aunts, and at fifteen years of age was apprenticed to Isaac Ashmead to learn painting. His inclination was for the law, and
(*) Sir Ellis Ashmead Bartlett and William Ashmead Bartlett, now Burdett- Coutts, are great-great-grandsons of Captain Jolin Ashmead.
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entering the office of Archibald Randall, afterward judge of the United States district court, he worked at his trade by day and read law by night. He was admitted to the Philadelphia bar. May 5. 1827. He was elected a member of the legislature in 1832, and was deputy attor- ney-general for Philadelphia under attorneys general George M. Dallas and Ellis Lewis. In 1849 he was appointed by President Taylor dis- trict attorney for the eastern district of Pennsylvania. and was con- tinned in the same office by President Fillmore, and held the position for one year under President Pierce. While in the discharge of his duties in that office, he conducted on behalf of the United States, in November. 1851. the noted proceedings against Castner Hanway. indicted for treason in resisting the enforcement of the fugitive slave law, which Colonel McClure, in his "Recollections," declares was the opening struggle of the Civil war.
In 1856 John W. Ashmead removed to New York, where he was engaged in a number of celebrated cases. In March. 1859. he defended James Stevens in the leading trial of arsenical poisoning in this country. In 1866 he defended Captain Richard W. Meade. tried before a naval court martial for the loss of the United States steamer "San Jacinto," on the Bahama Banks, January 1. 1865, and was counsel for James Murphy in his claim against the Republic of Chili for the seizure of the brig "Townsend Jones" and her cargo at Valparaiso, in April. 1859.
John W. Ashmead was the author of .Ashmead's "Reports of Decisions of the Court of Common Pleas of Philadelphia." He died April 7. 1868, at his country seat. Clinton Place, near Newark, New Jersey. (*)
(*) An account of John Wayne Ashmead will be found in Martin's "History of Chester." p. 440; as also in Thomson Westcott's "Rich Men of Philadelphia Forly Years Ago." a series of papers published in the Philadelphia Sunday Republic, which Westcott, who died in 1888, did not live to complete.
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John W. Ashmead married Henrietta Graham Flower, daughter of Richard and Henrietta ( Graham) Flower. November 29, 1829; she was born June 20, 1809, and died at Chester, Pennsylvania. February 20. 1879.
THE FLOWER LINE .- The Flower family first appears in the his- tory of Chester county in 1685, when William Flower, who had been one of Fenwick's colonists in New Jersey, settled at Marcus Hook. where his daughter Mary became the wife of John Flower, of the Con- necticut branch. A son of that marriage. Richard Flower, born in 1724, and who died January 25. 1763. married Hannah Grubb in 1746. Her grandfather, John Grubb, who settled at Upland, now Chester, prior to 1677. was the great-great-grandson of Henry Grubb, member of Parliament from Devizes, Wiltshire, 1571, and whose death occurred in 1581.
Richard Flower, second son of Richard and Hannah (Grubb) Flower, was born at Marcus Hook in 1759. When only a few months over sixteen. he was appointed one of the committee of correspondence for Chester county, and under the supervision of Richard Riley, his first cousin, the young man was active in collecting intelligence of the movements of the enemy in the southeastern section of the county. He was a miller by occupation, and in 1789 purchased the noted Chester Mills, where is now Upland borough, then owned by his father-in-law. Richard Flower retired from business in 1824, and died at Lamokin HIall, his plantation near Chester. August 24. 1843. He married Hen- rietta, daughter of Henry Hale Graham. September 8. 1785. She was born April 27. 1768, and died October 6. 1841. Her father, Henry Hale Graham (a nephew of George Graham, the inventor of the chronometer, for which the English nation gave his remains interment in Westminster Abbey), was born in London, England, July 1, 1731.
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llis father, William Graham, born April 25, 1692, on December 31, 1729 married Eleanor Wyatt, daughter of Zedekiah Wyatt.
Henry Hale Graham was named for his great-great-grandfather, Henry Hale, of Horton, Worcestershire, England, whose grand- daughter, Alice Hale, became the wife of George Graham and they were the grandparents of Henry Hale Graham. (*)
The latter, Henry Hale Graham, when a child of three years, came with his parents to the colony, and when eighteen he became deputy prothonotary of Chester county under Joseph Parker, and in 1765 was appointed prothonotary and deputy register-general, a position he held until 1777. November 7, 1789, he was appointed president judge of the then newly created Delaware county, and died in Philadelphia, January 24. 1790, where he was attending as a delegate the proceedings of the state constitutional convention of that year.
Judge Graham married, July 1. 1760. Abigail Pennell, half-sister of Dr. Jonas Preston (the founder of Preston Retreat, a maternity hospital in Philadelphia) ; a great-granddaughter of Robert Pennell, who settled in Middletown, Delaware county, 1685; granddaughter of Thomas Mercer, an early settler at Thornbury; a like descendant of David Williamson, who settled in Pennsylvania in 1682, and who died in 1727, while attending the session of the assembly, of which he was a member. She was also a granddaughter of Philip Yarnall, of Edge- mont, and great-great-granddaughter of John Baker, of Edgemont, where he died in 1685. He named the township for his natal place. Edgmond, Shropshire, England.
Henry Graham Ashmead, son of John Wayne and Henrietta Graham ( Flower) Aslimead, was born at Philadelphia, June 30. 1838. He was educated at the Chester Academy at West Chester, Pennsyl-
(*) For the line of Graham, see Pedigree xii, "Americans of Royal Descent."
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vania, of which the Rev. James Crowell was principal. and at the Saunders Institute, West Philadelphia. Hon. Samuel W. Pennypacker. governor of Pennsylvania, the distinguished surgeon. William W. Keen. Professor Gregory B. Keen, the curator of the Pennsylvania Historical Society, being among his fellow students.
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