USA > Pennsylvania > The Biographical encyclopedia of Pennsylvania of the nineteenth century. Pt. 1 > Part 30
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E SCHWEINITZ, LEWIS DAVID, Clergyman and Botanist, was born at Bethlehem, Pennsyl- vania, February 13th, 1780, and was the son of John Christian Alexander de Schweinitz, and of Dorothea, by birth Baroness de Waterville and grand-daughter of Count Nicholas Lewis de Zinzendorf. IIe received a thorough education at the Moravian school, Nazareth Hall, and in the Moravian Theological Seminary at Niesky, Prussia. He went to Europe to complete his education in 1798, and remained there in the service of the Moravian Church and pursuing his botanical studies until 1812. While in Germany, in 1805, in conjunction with the late Bishop de Albertini, he published, at Leipzig, his first botanical work, entitled, Conspectus Fungorum Lusatic Superioris. He was, in 1812, appointed a member of the Executive Ecclesiastical Board of the Southern Province of the American Church, and returned to America that year, after his marriage with Louisa Amelia le Doux. He settled at Salem, North Carolina, where he wrote a work entitled, Systematic Ar- rangement, etc., of the Cryptogamous Plants of North
America, which was published at Raleigh in 1821; and also Synopsis Fungorum Caroline Superioris, published at Leipzig by Dr. Schwaegrichen. In 1822, he was appointed to a seat in the Executive Ecclesiastical Board of the Northern Province of the American Moravian Church, when he removed to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. While there he wrote a number of botanical works, the most im- portant of which are : Monograph of the Linncan Genus Viola, Philadelphia, 1822; Analytical Table of the Genus Carex, Philadelphia, 1823; Monograph of the Genus Carex, New York, 1825; and Synopsis Fungorum in America Boreali, his most valuable contributions to botani- cal science. He was a member of several associations of scholars and men of science in America, Germany and France. The University of Kiel, in Denmark, conferred upon him the honorary degree of Doctor of Philosophy, and Dr ... Elliot named for him a genus of newly-discovered plants, the Schweinitzia Odorata. In addition to his botanical studies, to which he devoted himself from boy- hood, he was a diligent student of philosophy and theology, an eloquent preacher, and one of the most influential and distinguished divines of the Moravian Church. He died at Bethlehem, February 8th, 1834. Ontside of the Mora- viań connection, he will be chiefly remembered and es- teemed for his' valuable contributions to botanical science. His herbarium, which at the time was one of the largest private collections in the United States, he devised to the Academy of Natural Sciences, at Philadelphia. He added nearly fourteen hundred new species to the stores of botani- cal knowledge, and of these more than twelve hundred were 'of North American fungi, previously little known or studied.
ILBUR, ELISHIA PACKER, Banker, was born at Mystic, Connecticut, January 31st, 1833, and is a son of Henry Wilbur, and Eveline, sister of Judge Asa Packer, of Pennsylvania. When he was six years old, his father removed to the Lehigh Valley and connected his fortunes with those of his illustrious kinsman. After completing his studies at a common school, he was furnished employment by Judge Packer at the Nesquehoning Mines, where he retained a responsible position until 1851, when he was sent to school for five months at Woodbridge Hall, Perth Amboy, New Jersey. He then returned to the employ- ment of his uncle in Mauch Chunk, where he remained until 1856. During this period he assisted H. N. Sayre, civil engineer, in surveying the route of the Lehigh Valley Railroad, and after this kept the accounts of Judge Packer, disbursing all the funds required to contractors and others connected with the enterprise. In 1856, he was sent by his uncle to Philadelphia, where he entered the office of E. A. Packer & Co. Two years later, he married Stella M. Abbott, of Bethlehem, and removed to that place,
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where, in 1870, he opened the banking house of E. P. Wilbur & Co. Since 1858 he has had the entire charge of Judge Packer's varied and extensive financial operations, and has been his confidential secretary. The extent and variety of these transactions, and the admirable manner in which they have been managed, furnish sufficient proof of his comprehensive intellect and thorough business capacity. He has also found time to serve as Treasurer and Manager of the Franklin Coal Company, President of the South Bethlehem Gas and Water Company, Burgess of South Bethlehem, and Treasurer and Secretary of the Northamp- ton Iron Company, in which he is a large owner. Ile is heavily interested in coal and iron mines and timber lands, and is engaged with a son of Judge Packer in developing the resources of Bradford county. He is also a director in several large iron and coal companies, and a Trustee of Lehigh University. His reputation for financial ability and integrity is so extended that he has probably been made the custodian of more important trusts than any other per- son of his age in his section of the country. His enter- prises have been characterized by boldness, originality and remarkable success. .
INNEY, HORACE, Jr., Lawyer, born in Phila- delphia, January 21st, 1809, was the eldest son of the eminent Ilon. Horace Binney. Having received the elements of a classical education in his native city, he entered Yale College, where he graduated in 1828 with the highest honors. Ile then commenced the study of law in the office of his father, and was in due time admitted to the bar. Ilis tastes fitted him less for the position of a pleader than that of a counsellor, in which capacity he was judicious and accurate. Hence his really profound acquaintance with legal principles secured him rather the confidence of those who consulted him, than the plaudits of the public, too often the triumphs of mere superficial display. Nor were his hours passed merely in professional pursuits. Deeply interested in classical and modern literature, he cultivated a singularly correct taste in style and thought. The accu- racy of his knowledge of Greek was finely displayed on one occasion when he pronounced a Greek ode, ostensibly the production of the early Eolian poet Alcaus, to be modern, pointing out with great acumen where it differed from classical Greek. It proved afterwards that it had been written by an Oxford scholar on a wager that no one in that famed university was sufficiently familiar with the style of the carly Greek poets to detect the counterfeit. Through such critical studies of classical models his own style was formed. Their strong and simple language taught him a profound dislike for that mode of presenting a subject which is rhetorical or sensational, and this senti- ment is strongly impressed on what few productions he has left behind. Naturally, his appreciation of a finished edu-
cation was correspondingly high. As a Trustee of the Protestant Episcopal Academy, a post he filled for nearly forty years, and as a Trustee of the University of Pennsyl- vania, he unceasingly insisted upon the value of classical studies in every scheme of liberal culture. Although of a retiring and reflective nature, when the rioters of 1844 had to be met by armed resistance, he did not hesitate to assume the uncongenial duties of a captain of a volunteer company. At the outbreak of the Rebellion, he gave his whole influ- ence .to the Union cause. He was one of the founders of the Union League, of Philadelphia, and identified with its history and progress, endeavoring by all means in his power to maintain a public opinion in sympathy with the Government. But his activity did not stop here. He helped to build that great monument of American civiliza- tion, the United States Christian Commission, and was con- spicuous in shaping its policy so as to secure the harmonious cooperation of the army officials. The branch association of Philadelphia chose him for its President, and under his wise leadership vast supplies were collected and forwarded to the suffering soldiers. In his religious opinions, he was a conservative member of the Protestant Episcopal Church, and he had studied its principles and history with a close- ness rarely found even in those who make it a subject of special attention. Inside the Christian faith he looked for the only possible cheering future of the race, and had little hope for it beyond the pale of those teachings. He held numerous positions of trust and honor in its conventions and in the congregation of which he was a member. Its principles he carried into the daily transactions of his life, and lived and died as one knowing well whereon his hopes were founded. Ilis life, it has been said by one who knew him long and well, was nurtured and strengthened " by the two great principles out of which all true excellence springs, Trust in God, and Devotion to Duty." His death occurred, in consequence of a paralytic stroke, February 3d, 1870; though his illness was of short duration, no one can doubt he was fully prepared to meet it. He left a widow-the daughter of the late William Johnson, of New York, the eminent reporter-and seven children.
OLLE, REV. SYLVESTER, Clergyman, was born in Northampton county, Pennsylvania, March Ist, 1816, his father being John F. Syl- vester, and his mother Sabina W., daughter of Judge Henry. He was educated at Nazareth Hall, and in the collegiate and theological semi- naries of the Moravian Church. After graduating, he married Sarah Caroline, daughter of Jacob Rice, merchant, of Bethlehem. In 1829, he was ordained a deacon in his church, and was placed in charge of a congregation at Scholnock, near Nazareth, where he remained until 1831, when he removed to Gradenhatten, Ohio, famous for an
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Indian massacre in 1772. He had sole charge of the Mo- ¡ school when quite young, and, like others similarly placed ravian congregation at this point until 1849, when he was appointed Inspector, or Principal, of a seminary for young ladies at Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. His energy and busi- ness ability were immediately made manifest in an in- creased attendance and invigorated finances of the school. He also reorganized the course of study, and introduced some of the best native and European teachers. A west wing was added to the building, and soon after a similar addition was required for the east side. The Souvenir, published under his direction, and compiled by William W. Rechel, gave a complete history of the seminary, and of the county in which it was situated, with a catalogue of the teachers and pupils of the institution from its foundation. He remained in this position until 1861, when he was suc- ceeded by his brother, Francis, who still continues at the head of this progressive educational institution. In 1860, he was chosen Director of the Executive Board of the Moravian Church, and still remains its Treasurer and Financial Agent, having control of its home and foreign missionaries. Since 1867, he has been President of its Society for the Propagation of the Gospel among the Heathen, the oldest missionary organization in this country. He is an earnest Christian, and has fully sustained the reputation of his distinguished family as one of the most energetic and efficient workers in the Moravian connection. His biography and that of his church, since his connection with it, are inseparably connected, and, so long as the Moravian denomination endures, his name will not be forgotten.
EBSTER, DAVID, Lawyer, was born in Phila- delphia, on March 31st, 1823. He received his rudimentary education at the Philadelphia " Mo- del School," conducted by John L. Reese, a well-known teacher, now deceased, under the Lancasterian system, which was borrowed from England but abandoned in this country after some fifteen or twenty years of trial. It took its name from Joseph Lancaster, an English educational reformer, belonging to the Society of Friends; but the system itself had been ori- ginally introduced into England from India by Dr. Bell. The principle on which it was founded was, mutual instruc- tion. However much the method of both public and pri- vate instruction may have been improved since, there can be no doubt of the fact, that those who were early trained under the Lancasterian system in the " Model School " of Philadelphia, as it was called, acquired, if not a complete education, at least the ground work of it; and laid in their minds the sure foundations of a greater development. They were, moreover, carly schooled to habits of thought and study, and imbued with a spirit of emulation that always locked forward to high aims and good fruits. Like a good many other boys, David Webster was obliged to leave
and attending the same school, he has since, by dint of his own exertions and that self-training which very early in life became with him a necessity, won success in the pro- fession of the law and acquired an enviable distinction. Daniel Dougherty, of the Philadelphia bar, was one of his school fellows. Before he was sixteen years old, he was placed with Samuel H. Perkins, of the Philadelphia bar, then in full practice, as office boy. There must have been much promise in the boy, or that gentleman would not have at once adopted him as his own, nor would mere smartness have sufficed for so rigid a disciplinarian. There must have been a frankness that abhorred cunning,-a morality founded upon virtue, and a love of truth and honesty early stamped on his character, to win the confi. dence of such a preceptor. A year had hardly elapsed before his employer sent for his father, and proposed to take the boy into his office under indentures of apprentice- ship, for the study of the law, until he should attain the age of twenty-one years. Probably no one ever came to the bar of Philadelphia in such a manner. Usually the student enters a lawyer's office to study the science of the law for a course either of two or three years, paying his preceptor a certain sum for the novitiate. In England, attorneys and conveyancers take apprentices, not students. Those who aspire to become barristers are entered at the Inns of Court, and there complete their education. The articles of inden- ture in question are so novel as connected with the study of the law here in Philadelphia, that they properly find a place here. They are as follows :
"Articles of agreement made and entered into at the city of Philadelphia, this first day of April, A. D. one thousand eight hundred and thirty-nine, between Thomas Webster for himself and his son David Webster, of the one part, and Samuel H. Perkins, of the other part. The said Thomas Webster covenants and agrees to and with the said Samuel, that his said son, David Webster, shall faithfully serve the said Samuel 11. Perkins as a clerk in his office till he arrives at the age of twenty-one years, which will be on the thirty-first day of March, A. D. one thousand eight hun- dred and forty-four, and shall, during all that time, faith- fully and to the best of his ability perform all such reason- able services connected with the profession and business of the said Samuel as shall be required of him. And during all that time, he, the said Thomas, will furnish and provide the said David with all necessary and suitable clothing, board, lodging, washing and nursing. In consideration of the above, the said Samuel covenants and agrees to pay to the said Thomas the sum of one hundred and fifty dollars per annum for the first two years, and two hundred dollars per annum for the last three years for the said David, in quarterly or monthly payments, either to the said Thomas or the said David, the receipts of either of them sufficient. And also within that time to give the said David sufficient knowledge of the principles and practice of the law to qualify him for admission to the bar of the State. In wit- ness whereof," etc.
These covenants were faithfully kept by both parties. The said Thomas Webster, on his part, did "furnish and
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provide the said David with all necessary and suitable which, since then, under the elective system, has been named the District Attorneyship. No surprise could have been greater to the recipient, since he had never thought of such an honor, much less applied for it. He accepted it with many misgivings as to his ability to fulfil the duties. At the end of six months, his chief, owing to certain politi- cal differences with Governor Shunk, resigned his office, when Hon. Benjamin Champneys, of Lancaster, since de- ceased, was appointed Attorney General in his stead. On December 24th, 1846, he continued his predecessor's de- puty in office by appointing him anew. After that he prosecuted the Pleas of the Commonwealth for the further period of eighteen months. He then left the position along with Attorney General Champneys, who was succeeded by the Hon, James Cooper, with William B. Reed as deputy. After leaving these duties, it would have been natural for him, having for a period of two years been prominently before the public, in the prosecution of criminals both great and small, to acquire a lucrative practice on the other side in the Court of Quarter Sessions, But such was not the case. He at once became actively engaged in the courts of civil jurisdiction, and the many cases, which are reported in the books, in which he has been Counsel, will afford some idea of the extent of his practice and its important and lucrative character. His first case before the Supreme Court was argued at the December Term, 1850, Greaner vs. Mullen, reported in 3 Harris, 200; his last reported case, December Term, 1870, Howard Express Company 's. Wile, 14 P. F. Smith, 201. In this latter case, which was a reversal of the decision of the District Court, the Supreme Court affirmed all the points made by him in his argument, and broadly laid down the law, that the doctrine of a scin- tilla of evidence being sufficient to leave a case to the jury, was exploded; and that, where a verdict is contrary to the charge of the court on a question of law, it must be set aside, whether it be the second or second hundredth time it has been rendered. Under resolutions passed on the 19th of April, 1858, the Governor of Pennsylvania was authorized to appoint three commissioners " to collect all acts and statutes relating to the penal laws of the Common- wealth, to arrange the same systematically under proper titles, divisions and sections; to suggest to the Legislature any contradictions, omissions, defects and imperfections which may appear in the statutes to be revised, and the mode in which the same may be reconciled, supplied, im- proved and amended ; to designate such acts or statutes as ouglit to be repealed, and to prepare and submit to the Legislature new acts and statutes, as such repeal may render advisable or necessary." These were duties of the most exalted and onerous character. To be faithfully performed, it required the selection of commissioners who could bring to their high office a long experience in the criminal justice of the Commonwealth, and a familiarity with its various penal laws. Especially did it require of them, not learning clothing, board, lodging, washing and nursing." And the said Samuel H. Perkins did, on his part, during the five years of his apprenticeship, " give the said David sufficient knowledge of the principles and practice of the law to qualify him for admission to the bar of the State," While yet a student in this office, he became the editor of the Pennsylvania Law Journal, and continued to be its editor during the years 1844, '45 and '46. An article from his pen, in volume three, written before his admission to the bar, on the Bankrupt Law of 1841, attracted much atten- tion at the time. During the year 1844, in association with H. E. Wallace, he established the Legal Intelligencer, a weekly paper still continued by that gentleman. He was admitted to the bar on April 3d, 1844. The Board of Ex- aminers, before which he passed, had before them, at the same time, Alexander Henry, Jr., afterwards mayor of the city of Philadelphia. In the list of those who came to the bar in the year 1844, will be found the names, Fred- erick W. S. Grayson, William E. Lehman, F. Carroll Brewster, Henry C. Townsend, William Henry Rawle and Craig Biddle. Three days after his admission to the bar, he tried his first case before a jury in the Court of Common Pleas, and won it for the defence. It had been kept for him by his friend, the late J. Altamont Phillips. His debut was a marked success, as it gave him an opportunity to show his taet and ability. Ile at once acquired a practice, which increased daily. Before reaching his majority, he had become pretty well known to a large circle of friends and acquaintances, by joining literary and debating societies and students' law schools, and by often speaking in public. He was, moreover, a young and active member of the Democratic party, and a frequent attendant in the evenings at the Democratic Reading Room. All these methods were but the development of the Lancasterian system of education-mutual instruction, emulation and competition. A young lawyer, in the first instance, gets practice through the friends whom he has made, and from the confidence which his habits of life and his talents have inspired in them. It was so in his case; for he gained a fine livelihood for himself from the day he was admitted to the bar. He was at that early period appointed Solicitor for the Adams' Express Company at a small salary; that company, like himself, having then just started in its career. This office he has held, with increasing emoluments, to the present time-a period of twenty-nine years. Going forward suc- cessfully as a lawyer, and becoming well known as a poli- tician and as a speaker, at the end of two years after his admission to the bar, he received the distinction of ap- pointment to the office of Deputy Attorney General for the City and County of Philadelphia. On June 23d, 1846, llon. John M. Read, now Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, was appointed Attorney General, and on the receipt of his commission, he walked directly to David Webster's office and tendered }.im the position, [ merely, but a power of analysis and condensation, in order
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to bring into form, meaning and system, the vast body of | in which he had but recently taken up his temporary resi- criminal law, passed in the shape of separate statutes, from dence. Ile was married in the year 1849, to Mary Ancora, daughter of Peter Ancora, an Italian who established hin- self in the early part of the present century as a teacher of drawing in Philadelphia ; and has had two children, one of them a daughter, married to Lieutenant Dominick Lynch, Jr., of the United States Army. It is not the least interesting incident in his life, that the dwelling house across whose threshold he first entered as an office boy be- came his own property a few years after he had been ad- mitted to practice. It was there that he made his home, and established his office, and it was there, too, that his children were born. the organization of the government down to the time of codification. Under these resolutions, Governor William F. Packer appointed three commissioners : Hon. Edward King, who had been for upwards of twenty years President Judge of the Court of Common Pleas and Court of Oyer and Terminer, of Philadelphia; Hon. John C. Knox, who had filled successively the offices of Deputy Attorney Gen- eral, member of the Legislature, President Judge of the Common Pleas of the Clearfield District, and Associate Judge of the Supreme Court of the State, and who, at the time of his appointment, was Attorney General of the State; also David Webster. After these appointments had been made, on November 15th, 1858, he formed a law co-part- 00 nership with Attorney General Knox, and by that means they were able to be constantly together, at work at their practice, and at work on the revision of the penal laws of the Commonwealth. The revision of these laws was chiefly committed to the Hon. Edward King. The "Code" may be said to be his crowning labor and monument. This may be recorded without any disparagement to his coadju- tors. Indeed, although rendering valuable aid, they would be first to accord to Edward King the credit which marks the labor, learning and wisdom of that body of penal law and system of practice. It was reported by the commission and adopted unanimously by the Legislature, as the Act of 31st of March, 1860. As a work of codification, it will compare with any labor of the kind in any State or country. Said the venerable Eli K. Price, at the meeting of the Bar of Philadelphia, held on May 9th, 1873, to testify their re- spect to the memory of Hon. Edward King, who had died the preceding day : " He became a great criminal Judge, and when, after his retirement from the bench, he and Judge Knox and Mr. David Webster were appointed Com- missioners to revise and form the Criminal Code of the State, the latter, after due consultations, wisely placed the pen in his hands to write out the code, which stands to-day a legal monument to his name, and their united wisdom." Judge Knox continued to be Attorney General until the expiration of the term of Governor Packer, January, 1861 ; but the law partnership alluded to lasted under the firm name of Knox & Webster until the year 1867, when, suffer- ing from impaired health, Judge Knox retired from business altogether. Since then David Webster has continued his practice alone with great success. Of his political record, but little can be added. Politics, in early life, were a help to him, but he never made them a means or a pursuit. He did, in 1871, accept the nomination of both the Democratic and Reform parties of the Twenty-second Ward for Com- mon. Council; but the Republican majority of the ward being about 1400, there was little chance of his election. However, against a party majority of that figure for the general ticket, the majority against him was less than 500, showing in what favor he stood with the people of a ward " How fine a Poet was in Murray lost."
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