USA > Pennsylvania > Luzerne County > Families of the Wyoming Valley: biographical, genealogical and historical. Sketches of the bench and bar of Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, vol. I > Part 33
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utation. He was always ready. He was rigorously impartial. The public had a live and trusty representative in the Quarter Sessions, and while the law or the facts were never strained to convict the accused for the glory of the prosecution, the wrong- doer who had not escaped the guantlet of the grand jury room was made to realize that the law could not be offended or public rights or individual liberties infringed with impunity within his jurisdiction. He never promised more than he felt that he could fully prove, and seldom proved less than he had promised. There was never any rant or straining for dramatic effect in his presentation or summing up of a case. His pleas were calm, dignified, incisive, and without any waste words. The duties of the office were performed, in short, with such becoming earnestness and fidelity as is seldom equaled and never excelled. In such a position and thus discharging his trust he made ene- mies, of course, but they were of the sort whose enmity begets for its object the friendship of better men. When in 1879, there- fore, he was nominated for additional law judge, the people had come to have great faith in him, knowing that his comparative youth was set off by a soberness of mood and maturity of judg- ment far in advance of his years. He was chosen, as stated, in the three-handed contest that followed, and with the retirement of Judge Harding in 1879 became the president judge of the dis- trict. According to the census of 1880, Luzerne is, excluding Philadelphia, the third largest county in the state, the other two being Allegheny and Lancaster. Owing to the greater rapidity of growth in mining than in agricultural communities, Luzerne is to-day, in all probability, the next largest after Allegheny. Its present population of probably one hundred and sixty thousand souls, the mixed nationalities of which that population is made up, and the vast mining and other property interests located within its borders give its courts and judicial proceedings an im- portance which reaches out beyond its limits, and is, relatively to those of its sister counties, very great. In no county are questions of greater variety likely to arise for judicial abitra- ment, and in few, if any, is there as frequent call for original authoritative determination of the meaning of the unwritten and statutory law. The responsibilities here involved are assuredly
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a safe test of the capacity of the man, or men, upon whose shoulders they are foisted. Judge Rice has acquitted himself of them with remarkable success, displaying a legal acumen and nicety of logical discrimination, the best proof of the sufficiency of which is the frequency with which it has found endorsement in the higher tribunal ; or rather, the unfrequency of the occa- sions upon which it has failed of securing such approval. Few, if any, of our local judiciary have a higher standing in the Supreme Court. Few, if any, are more frequently quoted; none are more uniformly patient and conscientious in their researches, or wiser or more courageous in determination. If it be Judge Rice's ambition to rise still higher in the scale of judicial promo- tion, there are a multitude of good reasons upon which to base the belief that it may be gratified. Personally Judge Rice is all that constitutes a good citizen and delightful companion. He takes as active an interest in all public affairs as is becoming in one in his position, and his counsel in matters outside the law is held in high esteem by friends and neighbors, and in the various associations, religious or otherwise, with which he is connected. His bearing is rather reserved, but that is a surface indication only. Beneath it is a generous and captivating affability. He has read extensively, and when " off duty " enjoys general con- versation, which his native wit and acquired intelligence never fail to pleasantly enliven. He is a keen reader of men-a fact of which the writer has seen signal illustration upon more than one occasion-and that capacity, besides adding to his efficiency on the bench, enables him to always accommodate himself appro- priately to the company in which he is placed. He is a studious man and loves his home, and his books and his family engage the greater part of the intervals between the sessions of court. The purity of his private life and the unbending integrity and supe- rior achievements of his public career have enlisted the respect and admiration of all who know him.
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BENJAMIN FORD DORRANCE.
BENJAMIN FORD DORRANCE.
Benjamin Ford Dorrance was born in Kingston township, Lu- zerne county, Pennsylvania, August 14, 1846. He is a descendant of Rev. Samuel Dorrance, "a Scotch Presbyterian lately arrived from Ireland, a graduate of Glasgow university, licensed to preach in 1711 by the Presbytery of Dumbarton, and bringing with him satisfactory testimonials of his ministerial character and standing from several associations in Scotland and Ireland."-History of Windham County, Conn., 248. The first account we have of the Dorrance family in America tells us that on April 17, 1723, the people of Voluntown, Conn., gave Rev. Samuel Dorrance a call to preach the gospel, at a salary of "£60 per year for the present, and $50 in such species suitable to promote his building and settling." On the same day a number of persons, "as a special token of their love and goodness," presented Mr. Dorrance with "five thousand shingles, three pounds money in shingle nails, five pounds in work, three pounds in boards and plank, two hun- dred clapboards, breaking up two acres of land, a cow and calf," etc. This Voluntown church was the first, and long the only, Presbyterian church in Connecticut. Letters were sent to the ministers in New London, Canterbury, Preston, Plainfield, and Killingly inviting them to join in the ordination of Mr. Dor- rance, October 23, 1723. Up to this date the proceedings of town and people had been marked by entire harmony and unan- imity, but on the day appointed for ordination a violent opposition was manifested. Various conflicting elements were working among the people. A large number of new inhabitants had arrived during the summer. Mr. Dorrance had been accompa- nied to New England by several families of Scotch-Irish Presby- terians who had followed him to Voluntown and settled there, buying lands in various localities. The advent of these foreigners, though men of good position and excellent character, was looked upon with great suspicion by the older settlers. The adoption of the Westminster Confession by the new church caused imme-
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diate outbreak and rebellion. The council met according to appointment-the Revs. Lord, Coit, Estabrook, and Fisk-and were proceeding regularly to business, when to their amazement a number of people appeared, determined to obstruct the ordination of Mr. Dorrance, and " in a riotous, disorderly, and unchristian way " presented the subjoined remonstrance :
" We, whose names are underwritten, do agree that one of our New England people may be settled in Voluntown to preach the gospel to us, and will oblige ourselves to pay him yearly, and will be satisfied, honored gentlemen, that you choose one for us to prevent unwholesome inhabitants, for we are afraid popery and heresy will be brought into the land; therefore we protest against settling Mr. Dorrance, because he is a stranger, and we are informed he came out of Ireland, and we do observe that since he has been in town that the Irish do flock into town, and we are informed that the Irish are not wholesome inhabitants ; and upon this account we are against settling Mr. Dorrance, for we are not such persons as you take us to be, but desire the gos- pel to bē preached by one of our own, and not by a stranger, for we cannot receive any benefit for neither soul nor body, and we would pray him to withdraw himself from us."
The council passed the day in hearing the opposers, and the second day achieved the following result: "We esteem the objections offered by the defending party against Mr. Dorrance's ordination invalid. We judge the people's call of Mr. Dorrance not sufficient," etc. On December 23, 1723, he was duly or- dained. Beside him his brothers George and John, and John jun., were then found on the church rolls. Time soon wrought a change, so that the Rev. Mr. Dorrance was no longer "a stranger" among his people. He is found in the ministry at Voluntown in the year 1760, and at that time his salary had risen to the res- pectable sum of 6300. He died November 12, 1775, at the age of ninety years. Those of the Dorrance family who came to Wyoming were John and George, sons of Rev. Samuel Dor- rance. John was never married. He was the defendant in the celebrated test case for the title to lands at Wyoming, between the Pennamites and Yankees, known as Van Horne's lessee v. Dorrance, reported in 2 Dallas, 304, on which ex-Gov- ernor Hoyt has published a very elaborate and learned brief, reviewing, not only all the questions at issue between the parties,
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but their conduct during its progress. George Dorrance was born March 4, 1736, and was slain July 4, 1778. He was a lieutenant-colonel of the militia at Wyoming. In 1777 he led a scouting party up the river consisting of eighty men, to disperse or capture a settlement of Indians and Tories on the Wyalusing. Having accomplished the object, an unseasonable snow storm detained them beyond their expected time, and they suffered extremely from cold and hunger. By Colonel Dorrance's order rafts were made of the huts from which the enemy had been driven, and the whole of the company were safely wafted down to Forty Fort. On July 3, 1778, he went out of Forty Fort with that little band of heroes who thought to drive their insolent invaders from the valley. He commanded the left wing under Colonel Denison. His coolness in the midst of the fight when one of his men gave way, is shown by the firm command, in- stantly obeyed, "Stand up to your work, sir." He was severely wounded on the field of battle, while gallantly riding along the broken lines and laboring to restore the men to order and posi- tion. He was the only one of the wounded who was saved from death on the field or at the hellish orgies of the succeeding night. His feeble condition on the next day making him a burden to his captors, they slew him and divided his garments and arms among them. He was twice married. By his first wife he had two daughters. By his second wife he had three sons: Robert, who served in the independent company of Captain Ransom until the close of the war, afterwards in the western army, and was in the battle resulting in St. Clair's defeat, where he was killed, November 4, 1791 ; Gersham, who went back to his old home at Voluntown; Benjamin, who was born in 1767. Eliza- beth, the second wife of Colonel Dorrance, married Ensign Jabez Fish, who was in the battle at Wyoming and escaped. Benjamin Dorrance was one of the most popular men of his day. In ISor he was elected sheriff of Luzerne county. Soon after his term ex- pired he was elected one of the commissioners of the county. He was a member of the legislature of Pennsylvania during the years 1808, 1809, 1810, 1812, 1814, 1819, 1820, and 1830. He was also the first president of the Wyoming bank, of this city. An obit- uary notice of Mr. Dorrance is here appended : "Colonel Ben-
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BENJAMIN FORD DORRANCE.
jamin Dorrance is no more. The place on earth that once knew him shall know him no more forever. On Thursday, August 24, 1837, while conversing cheerfully at his own house with a member of his family, he was seized with an apoplectic fit ; he fell, and in a moment the vital spark was extinct. There are few, indeed, whose departure could have occasioned so deep a void, so wide a chasm in society. Universally known, every where respected and beloved, not by his relations alone, but by a numerous circle of friends, the bereavement is deeply felt.
Colonel Dorrance was about seventy years old. He was born in Plainfield, state of Connecticut, in 1767, and came to Wyoming when quite a lad, with his father's family. In the Indian battle his father, Lieutenant-colonel George Dorrance, who was third in command, standing next to Butler and Denison, was slain. The day after when Forty Fort was surrendered, the subject of this notice was in the fortification, and used to describe with graphic clearness the entry of the British at one gate and the Indians at the other. Colonel Dorrance was a man of sterling good sense, remarkably pleasing in his manners, eminently hos- pitable, liberal and benevolent. No man enjoyed society and the good things of this life with a higher relish than Colonel Dorrance, yet using them as subservient, and never allow- ing pleasure to mislead from the moral path, or to interfere with health or business. If asked who, for the last half century, has been the happiest man in the county, the county, I think, would say Colonel Dorrance. Yet he was careful, active, intelligent, and shrewd in business-a strict economist-and was abundantly blessed with this world's goods. In fine, Colonel Dorrance was an extraordinary man; mingling in his character the pleasant and the useful, liberal expenditures with fair and steady acquisi- tion, sweetening labor with enjoyment, and heightening pleasure by a prompt and energetic devotion to business; and throughout life popular without envy, without an enemy, and never yielding his independence or integrity. Honor and affection to his mem- ory." The wife of Colonel Benjamin Dorrance was Nancy Ann, daughter of Jedediah and Martha (Clark) Buckingham. Mr. Buckingham was a descendant of Thomas Buckingham, a Puri- tan settler and ancestor of all of the American Buckinghams, and
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was one of the company to which Eaton and Hopkins, two London merchants, and the two ministers, Davenport and Prud- den, belonged. They sailed from London in the two ships the Hector and the -. Thomas Nash, the ancestor of Charles Dorrance Foster, was in the same company. They arrived at Boston June 26, 1637, and on March 30, 1638, the company sailed for Quinnipack, now New Haven. Here we find the name of Thomas Buckingham under the head of " Names of Planters and Division of Land according to Estate and Heads in Families," from which it appears that he had four persons in his family. Thomas Buckingham removed to Milford in the autumn of 1639. He was one of the company, of which Peter Prudden was the pastor, who first settled that town. The church was organized at New Haven August 22, 1639, and Thomas Buckingham was one of the seven pillars of which it was composed. Rev. Thomas Buckingham was the youngest child of Thomas Buckingham, of Milford, the Puritan settler, and was born in 1646. He was mar- ried in Hartford and preached in Wethersfield in 1664, when but eighteen years of age. He was one of the founders and fellows of Yale college from 1700 to his decease, and a strong supporter of its interests. He evidently held a high rank among the cler- gymen of the time, and was one of the leaders in all efforts for the prosperity and extension of the church, and was one of the moderators of that famous synod which convened at Saybrook and formed the platform for the government of the churches, in 1708. He was ordained and installed pastor of the church in Saybrook in 1670, and continued in that relation until his death, April 1, 1709.
Thomas Buckingham, son of Rev. Thomas and Hester (Hos- mer) Buckingham, was born September 29, 1670. He was a prominent man in town affairs, being appointed to many import- ant offices of trust, and was also a prominent member of the church and a landholder in Lebanon. He died September 12, I739. Thomas Buckingham, son of Thomas and Margaret (Griswold) Buckingham, was born January 24, 1693. He was a sea-faring man, and died December 13, 1760. Jedediah Buck- ingham, son of Thomas and Mary (Parker) Buckingham, was born January 20, 1727, at Saybrook. He settled in Columbia,
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BENJAMIN FORD DORRANCE.
where he died July 9. 1809. He married Martha Clark, of Leb- anon, Conn. Hon. William A. Buckingham, for eight years governor of Connecticut, and more recently a senator of the United States from Connecticut, is of the same family. Benja- min Dorrance left two sons surviving him. Rev. John Dorrance, who was born February 28, 1800, and died April 1, 1861. He was pastor of the Franklin street Presbyterian church, of Wilkes-Barre, Pa., where he labored with marked success for twenty-eight years. His daughter, Emily Augusta, is the wife of Alexander Farnham, of the Luzerne county bar. Another daughter, Margaret Stella, is the wife of George Murray Rey- nolds, of this city. Colonel Charles Dorrance, the other son of Benjamin Dorrance, was born January 4, 1805, and has lived on the old homestead farm of the family, which has lost none of its attractiveness or value, but which has been largely added to in extent, taste, and value since it passed into his hands. His home has ever been the abode of a large and generous hospitality, dis- pensed with all the grace and dignity befitting his surroundings. He has ever been a farmer, and, commencing his active business life with a liberal education, has kept up that intercourse with his fellow men and given that attention to the affairs of the day which bring out his genial and warm-hearted nature and add a charm to his society. The Dorrance farm has long been the model farm of the valley, and the colonel, farming for pleasure as well as profit, has succeeded in acquiring both results from his labors. He has never sought official position, except, possi- bly, that of captain of the Wyoming volunteers, from which he rose through the various grades to the rank of colonel, which title he has enjoyed for forty years. It was a youthful fancy that led him into military life, awakened by fireside tales of the early days of Wyoming, in which were recounted the gallant deeds of his ancestor. Yet the colonel's life has not been barren of official honors. When the Luzerne County Agricultural Society was organized in 1858, by unanimous choice he was elected president of the society, which position he filled with honor and dignity for ten years, and its success during that period was largely due to his uniform courtesy and his superior skill of disposing of knotty subjects, as well as in the management of the business
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BENJAMIN FORD DORRANCE.
affairs of the society. He was, in conjunction with the late A. C. Laning, appointed by the late Judge Conynghamn, as his last official act, a commissioner of the Luzerne county prison, which position he held for a succession of years. He was chosen and acted as president of the board during his entire official term. When the patriotic citizens met to effect an organization for the proper commemoration of the one hundredth anniversary of the battle and massacre of Wyoming, Colonel Dorrance was, without a dissenting voice or thought, made the president of that organi- zation. How well, and with what grace and liberality he-per- formed the duties of that position, and how largely his means and his hospitalities were taxed to meet the requirements of the great occasion, is attested by all. It is a singular coincidence that the father should have been the first president of the Wyon :- ing bank, and that after the lapse of more than half a century his son should now hold the same trust. Time and space will not permit us to name all the positions of trust and honor he has been called upon to fill in an active life of three score years. Whatever they may have been, he has filled them all with hon- esty and fidelity, and now, at the age of nearly four score years, he enjoys the reputation of an honest and honorable man, in whom dwell all the sweet and tender elements of humanity, which, as occasion has offered, have welled out to the comforting and blessing of all who have come in contact with him. Blest in his family, blest in his store, and blest in all his surroundings, long may he live to enjoy the blessings of a well spent life, which has diffused its sweet savor on all who have enjoyed the pleasure of kindly intercourse with him. Colonel Dorrance married August 28, 1845, Susan E., daughter of the late James Ford, of Law- renceville, Pa. He was a native of Perth Amboy, N. J., and came to Pennsylvania about the year 1800. He settled in Lawrence- ville, and was a member of the legislature of Pennsylvania from Tioga county for two years, and a representative in congress from his district from 1829 to 1833. His life was honorably interwoven with the history of his state. He died at Lawrence- ville in August, 1859, aged seventy -six years. The wife of Mr. Ford was Maria Lindsley, a daughter of Judge Eleazer Lindsley, of Lindsley, Steuben county, N. Y. He was a son of Colonet
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BENJAMIN FORD DORRANCE.
Eleazer Lindsley, a hero in the war of the revolution, who left his home near Morristown, N. J., after the war and purchased a township of six miles square in Steuben county, N. Y., which was named after him. He was the first representative in the leg- islature from Steuben county. He removed there with his family, but lived but a short time, and his was the first death in Lindsley. He was buried with a ring upon his finger, the gift of his personal friend in the revolution, General La Fayette. Col- onel Dorrance has a family of five children living, four sons and a daughter, Annie Buckingham, who is the wife of Sheldon Reynolds, of the Luzerne county bar. Benjamin Ford Dorrance, eldest son of Colonel Charles Dorrance, was educated at the Luzerne institute, at Wyoming, Pa., and at Princeton college, graduating in the class of 1868. He studied law with Andrew T. McClintock, and was admitted to the bar of Luzerne county August 20, 1870. Mr. Dorrance is a democrat in politics and a Presbyterian in religious belief. He married May 22, 1872, Ruth Woodhull Strong, a daughter of Schuyler Strong, a prominent lawyer and leading citizen of the state of New York. Mr. and Mrs. Dorrance have a family of three children, Anne, Frances, and Ruth Dorrance. Mr. Strong was a graduate of Union college, at Schenectady, while under the presidency of Dr. Nott, and from the time of his admission to the bar took a position second to none in his profession. He practiced in the courts of New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, and Virginia. On August 20, 1823, he was appointed quartermaster of the Ninety-Sixth regiment of infantry of the state of New York. He died September 13, 1845, while yet a young man, at Springfield, Ill.
The Strong family originated in Shropshire, England. One of the family married an heiress of Griffith, of the county of Caernarvon, Wales. Of this line was Richard Strong, born at Caernarvon in 1561. In the year 1590 he moved to Taunton, Somersetshire, England, and died there in 1613. He left a son, John, aged eight years, and a daughter, Eleanor. John, born at Taunton in 1605, moved to Plymouth, and thence, by the ship Mary and John, in 1629, for New England, which place he reached May 30, 1630. He assisted in founding the town of Dorchester, Mass. In 1638 he removed to Taunton, Mass., re-
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maining there until 1645. He was a deputy thence to the gen- eral court in 1641, 1643, and 1644, this being the legislative body of the Plymouth colony. He moved in 1645 to Windsor, Conn., and thence in 1659 to Northampton, Mass. of which he was one of the first and most active founders, as he had previously been of Dorchester, Hingham, Taunton, and Windsor. He was chosen and ordained ruling elder of the church at Northampton in 1663. He married in 1630 his second wife -- his first having died as soon as she had arrived in America -- Abigail Ford, of Dor- chester, Mass., daughter of Thomas Ford, who also emigrated in the Mary and John. He lived with his second wife fifty-eight years, and died April 14, 1699, aged ninety-four years, leaving eighteen children. Mrs. Strong died in 1688, aged eighty years. Thomas Ford, her father, was a man of prominence in the early colony, and was a deputy to the general court from 1637 to 1640. The descendants of Elder John Strong have numbered over, thirty thousand persons, among these are four hundred college graduates, over thirty college professors, as many authors, four governors, over thirty judges, over thirty members of the United States congress, sixty officers of the revolutionary army, and one hundred members of state legislatures. Among these are Gover- nors Strong, of Massachusetts, Haight, of California, and Hunt, of New York; ex-Justice William Strong, of the United States Su- preme Court; Captain Nathan Hale and General Elijah Chapman, of the revolutionary army; Professors Dana, Whitney, and Good- rich, of Yale; Newberry and Dwight, of Columbia; Robinson, of Union Theological seminary, etc. Rev. Horace E. Hayden, of this city, is descended from Elder John Strong in two lines, through his son, Lieutenant Return Strong, and his daughter, Elizabeth Strong. Theodore Strong, of Pittston, brother of Judge Strong, is also a descendant of John Strong. Schuyler Strong was the son of Selah and Ruth ( Woodhull) Strong, who was the son of Major Nathaniel and Amy (Brewster) Strong, who was the son of Selah and Hannah (Woodhull) Strong, who was the son of Selah and Abigail (Terry) Strong, who was the son of Thomas and Rachel (Holton) Strong, who was the son of Thomas and Mary (Hewett) Strong, and who was the son of Elder John and Abigail (Ford) Strong, the first settler.
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