USA > South Carolina > Men of mark in South Carolina; ideals of American life: a collection of biographies of leading men of the state, Volume I > Part 13
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WILLIAM CARTER LINDSAY
desirable or prominent position, as the church was not strong financially and its membership was not large. He has remained at his post of duty for about thirty years, and he has seen his church grow to become one of the most influential in the city and one of the best in the state. He is more popular with his own members and with the people of the city than ever, and he is held in the highest esteem, not only by the people in that city, but also wherever he is known. He has not been very robust in health, but he has done a vast amount of work in his study, in the pulpit, and in the pastorate. He has met calls for special services in Columbia and in other parts of the state. A few years ago his church provided him with an assistant pastor, and if the people can have their way he will remain in his present field the remainder of his natural life.
Doctor Lindsay has been a close student; he keeps up with the thought of the day, is interested in public affairs, reads a great deal, and has traveled extensively in this country and in Europe. He is a fluent, eloquent and forcible speaker. He knows people, understands human nature, has a fine vein of humor, a genial disposition, and a warm, sympathetic nature. He is held in the highest esteem by the religious denomination of which he is a distinguished member, and for many years he has filled prominent positions, as a member of the board of state missions, and also a member of the board of trustees of the Southern Baptist Theological seminary, and for several years he was a member of the board of trustees of Furman university. He received the degree of Doctor of Divinity from the Washington and Lee university, Virginia.
The First Baptist church, of Columbia, of which Doctor Lindsay is pastor, meets in one of the most historic buildings in Columbia. It was in this building that the South Carolina Secession convention first met and organized and held its first sessions. Owing to the existence of smallpox in the city, and which had become epidemic, it was decided to adjourn and meet in the city of Charleston, which was done, and the ordinance of secession was passed in that city. The edifice of the First Baptist church in Columbia is a beautiful and almost perfect specimen of the Doric style of architecture; it is kept in fine condition, is well located, and is greatly prized by the people of Columbia and of the whole state. In addition, it is a monument
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to the liberality and farsightedness of one of its earliest pastors, the late Doctor James P. Boyce, formerly president of the South- ern Baptist Theological seminary. He was a man of large means and but for his large gifts to the building funds such a splendid house of worship could not have been built in Columbia in those times, and in the early history of the church. Doctor Lindsay is a worthy successor of Doctor Boyce, one of the finest and ablest men South Carolina ever produced.
Doctor Lindsay married Margaret Ella Steen, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Steen, of Greenville. They have an inter- esting family of sons and daughters.
His address is Columbia, South Carolina.
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JAMES JONATHAN LUCAS
L UCAS, JAMES JONATHAN, soldier, merchant, and viti- culturist, was born at Tiller's Ferry, Kershaw county, South Carolina, November 21, 1831. His father, Benja- min Simons Lucas, M. D., was an eminent physician and surgeon, noted for his intelligence, sound judgment, and amiability. His mother, Melita Eleanor (Tiller) Lucas, whose ancestors were English and Welsh families well known for their integrity and ability, strongly impressed her powerful moral character upon her son, to his lasting good. His blood is English, and French Huguenot. On the paternal side, the founder of the American branch was Jonathan Lucas, who came from England to Charles- ton in 1785. He invented a rice mill in 1787, upon which his son, Jonathan, made improvements, which were patented in 1808. The first ancestor of the family on his father's maternal side to settle in America was Benjamin Simons, who came from France to Charleston, South Carolina, in 1685, upon the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, and at once took an active part in the affairs of the embryo city. His grandson, Benjamin Simons third, was a member of the Jacksonboro legislature.
Lucas arms: Ar. a fess gu. between six annulets gu. Crest : Out of a ducal coronet or, a griffin's head couped, gu. Motto : Veritas Vincit.
Major Lucas lived on a farm until he was sixteen years old. He was not robust physically, but that he had the stamina which was to be one of his marked characteristics in after years was demonstrated when he was only fifteen. One of the negro plow hands being taken sick, he offered to do the work. His father laughingly doubted both the lad's ability and perseverance. Thus spurred, the boy, though unaccustomed to manual labor of any sort, took the negro's place and plowed every day for a week In youth his favorite occupations were reading and horticulture. He received his preparatory education in the country schools, which he attended until he was sixteen, when he entered the South Carolina Military academy, from which he was graduated November 20, 1851. In 1904 the same institution conferred upon him the degree of B. S.
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JAMES JONATHAN LUCAS
He began his business life in 1852, as a clerk in his uncle's hardware store, in Charleston, but the year following he engaged in the same line of business for himself, which he successfully conducted until the opening of the War between the States. He represented Charleston in the house of representatives from 1856 to 1862, and was the first graduate of the Military academy to attain this distinction. Among his notable achievements in the legislature were the acts: To appropriate dividends on state- owned railway stock; for deepening the entrance to Charleston harbor; for presentation of a sword to Captain Nathan George Evans, United States army, for gallant services in Indian war- fare; and for the first appropriations for the library at the Citadel. But the proposal of which he was proudest failed, because other members of the legislature were not gifted with his foresight. This was the recommendation of General A. M. Manigault, Colonel Lewis M. Hatch, and himself, members of a state commission to reform the militia laws, of a bill authorizing the formation and equipment for the field of a select militia force of ten thousand men. Opponents ridiculed it as "Lucas's standing army" bill, but before Sumter was fired on they realized how wise its adoption would have been. In February, 1861, while serving as aide-de-camp to Governor Pickens, Major Lucas brought forty thousand pounds of powder from the Mt. Vernon arsenal, in Alabama, to Charleston without publicity. This was used for the reduction of Fort Sumter.
The history of Lucas's battalion of heavy artillery, which he commanded from its organization to the end of the war (when he thinks he was the senior major in the Confederate service), is a part of the history of the notable and gallant defence of Charleston, much of which may be found in official publications.
Credit is due Major Lucas for the most striking recognition given the enlisted men by General Beauregard-the naming of Battery Tynes, adjacent to the famous Battery Pringle, in honor of First Sergeant S. A. Tynes, Company A, Lucas's battalion of artillery, who was killed during the defence of Battery Wagner. He and his command participated in the capture of the gunboat Isaac Smith, in the Stono river, January, 1863; also in the famous continuous night and day bombardment of Fort Sumter, and Batteries Wagner and Pringle. It was the failure to silence Battery Pringle, where Major Lucas commanded, that prevented
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the capture of Charleston from the rear, as Admiral Dahlgren had planned. He was in charge of the fortifications on the Stono river, which guarded the back door to Charleston for nearly four years-until the evacuation of that city and its defences. With his command he joined General Hardee's army in its retreat to North Carolina, where he took part in the battles of Averysboro and Bentonville, and was struck five times. One wound might have proved fatal had not the musket ball been stopped by a suspender button. As a result, he was three weeks in the hospital at St. Mary's school, Raleigh, North Carolina, where he was the pet of fifty young ladies. When the fearful collapse of the Confederacy came, he was at home on sick leave.
In 1865 he removed from Charleston to Society Hill, Dar- lington county, South Carolina, where by his intelligent culti- vation of grapes and wine-making he formed a noted industrial show place. His home is one of the most refined and cultivated in the state. He is a director of the Atlantic Coast Line Rail- road company; a member of the board of visitors, South Carolina Military academy; and a trustee of the Porter Military academy, Charleston, South Carolina. He was president of the Darlington Agricultural society for three years; is a life member of the St. Cecilia society, of Charleston; is a member of the Huguenot society of that city ; was for seven years captain of the "Palmetto Guard," Charleston, and trained that company for its brilliant career in the Confederate army. He has been a Mason since 1856. In politics he has always been a Democrat. In religious conviction he is an Episcopalian. He is, and has long been, a lay reader of Trinity in his home town, and he was elected an alternate delegate from the diocese of South Carolina to the triennial convention of the American Episcopal church, which met at Richmond, Virginia, in October, 1907.
Hunting and shooting were long his favorite recreations, but he has done little of either for some years. His advice to the young is: "Be prompt in whatever you have to do, and try to do it a little better than your fellows." Fear of being in the minority never prevents him from expressing his opinion. He never fought a duel, but, in 1856, he was one of the seconds in "an affair of honor," in which, fortunately, no blood was spilled. He is an open advocate of the code duello on the ground that it elevated the tone of society.
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On November 21, 1861, he married Carrie McIver, daughter of Rev. David R. Williams McIver, and granddaughter of Judge Samuel Wilds. Doctor Thomas Smith married the widow of Judge Wilds, and adopted her granddaughter, Carrie McIver, changing her name to Smith, three years before her marriage.
Mr. and Mrs. Lucas had seven children, five of whom are living in 1907. Mrs. Lucas and J. J. Lucas, Jr., passed into the eternal world in October, 1901, within sixteen days of each other. Melita Eleanor Lucas, the youngest daughter, died July 20, 1907.
The address of Major Lucas is Society Hill, Darlington county, South Carolina.
JOSEPH ALLEN MCCULLOUGH
M cCULLOUGH, JOSEPH ALLEN, LL. D., lawyer and legislator, was born in Dunklin, Greenville county, South Carolina, September 9, 1865. His parents were the Reverend A. C. and Ann Rebecca (Mccullough) Stepp. His father was a Baptist minister and farmer. He was a man of strong convictions, very outspoken, with a taste for controversy, a close student and a preacher of great power. He was brought prominently before the public in 1876 by a controversy with Doctor Toy on the inspiration of the Scriptures. He was not only able as a writer and forceful in the pulpit, but he was also an effective stump speaker, and in this line he did good service for the Democratic party. His adopted father, Colonel James Mccullough, was a farmer, an officer of the Sixteenth regiment, South Carolina volunteers, in the Confederate States army in the War between the States, a member of the state legislature, and a member of the convention which nominated Wade Hamp- ton for governor of South Carolina in 1876. His first ancestor in America was Joseph Mccullough, who came from County Antrim, Ireland, and was one of the earlier European settlers in this country.
When the subject of this sketch was an infant his mother was seriously ill, and her brother, Colonel James McCullough, and his wife, having no children of their own, adopted him and by an act of the legislature had his name changed to McCullough.
In his early years Joseph Mccullough was in good health. His home was in the country. He was fond of reading, fishing and hunting, and took pleasure in working with the thresher, the cotton gin, and other farm machinery. At this time mechanical devices for feeding had not been introduced, and he was regarded as the best cotton gin feeder in the county. For ordinary farm work, however, he had no taste. This fact, together with his love for books, led him to study for one of the learned professions. He attended the schools in the neighborhood, studied a year at Wofford college, and then went to South Carolina college, which he entered in 1882 and from which he was graduated, with the degrees of A. B. and LL. B., in 1887. The active work of life
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JOSEPH ALLEN M'CULLOUGH
was commenced in September, 1887, as a lawyer in Greenville, South Carolina, where he soon secured a large and profitable practice. In 1892 he became city attorney, which position he held for six years. For several years he was president of the Carolina Loan and Trust company, and from 1896 to 1900 he was a member of the state legislature. He has held several terms of court as special judge; has also conducted a law school for one session at Furman university. He has delivered numerous addresses on important occasions and written many articles for the newspaper press. He is now, and has been for years, a mem- ber of the board of visitors of Wofford college.
In obtaining an education he not only had no difficulties to overcome, but he received a great deal of encouragement. He says that he is not, in any sense, "a self-made man." Of the books which helped him greatly in boyhood and youth he names the Bible, history and biography, and the works of Dickens and Bulwer. In recent years he has derived much benefit from the writings of Tolstoi, Emerson, and Doctor Watson. His first strong impulse to strive for the prizes of life seems to have come to him from reading biographies of distinguished men and from the encouragement given him by Doctor McBryde, president of South Carolina college, when, by reason of an attack of fever, he had fallen behind his class and was thinking of giving up his studies and going back to the farm. Thus incited, he returned to college, did the work of four years in three years, and led his law class in its final examinations.
In estimating, by request, the relative strength of various specified influences in enabling him to succeed in life, he places that of home as first. For some years he lived within two miles of his own parents and spent considerable time with them. The influence of both his mothers was especially strong for good. Next in the scale he places private study; and third, he names contact with men in active life. He adds, however, that above all these should be placed religious ideas and influences. He was free to choose his own profession, and from the fact that he has made a success therein, it is evident that his choice was wise. He finds his principal relaxation in driving and reading. He has taken one course of physical culture, from which he derived great benefit. Of the prominent fraternities with which he is connected, he names the Masons, Odd Fellows, Knights of
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JOSEPH ALLEN M'CULLOUGH
Pythias, and Woodmen of the World. He has been high priest of the Cyrus chapter of Masons, and president of the "Club of Thirty-nine." In politics he has always been a Democrat. His religious affiliation is with the Methodist Episcopal church, of which he is a prominent member and in which he has held an official position for many years. He was chairman of the lay delegation to the general conference of his church, which con- vened at Birmingham, Alabama, in May, 1906. Together with four other jurists and lawyers, he was appointed a member of the Vanderbilt commission for the purpose of investigating and deciding the legal relations existing between Vanderbilt univer- sity and the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. Several sessions were held and a decision was filed settling these issues, which had long been a matter of controversy in the church.
On June 3, 1890, he was married to Miss Maud d'Alvigny, of Atlanta, Georgia. Of their five children, three are living in 1907.
In reply to a request for suggestions regarding the principles and habits which will most help young people to attain true success in life, Mr. Mccullough advises them to avoid all intoxi- cants; to use tobacco, if at all, in moderation; to care for the body; to be systematic, looking carefully after details; and to fully master the subject in hand. For reading he recommends good literature, and especially the Bible, history and biography. By hard and persistent study and effort he has secured a place in the front rank of his profession in the state, and by his upright life, his courtesy, and his fidelity, he has won a large measure of public esteem. At its Centennial celebration in January, 1905, South Carolina college conferred upon him the honorary degree of LL. D.
He owns large plantations in the country, but his home, which is attractive and to which he is strongly attached, is in Greenville, South Carolina.
JAMES McINTOSH
M CINTOSH, JAMES, a leading professional and business man of Newberry, South Carolina, was born at Society Hill, in the county of Darlington, South Carolina, on Febuary 27, 1838. His father, James Hawes McIntosh, was a merchant and farmer, and a man of strict integrity, and was successful in his business and other relations.
An early ancestor, John McIntosh, a man of distinction, came from Scotland to the Welsh Neck settlement on the Pee Dee in 1750.
Strong, athletic, and unburdened by labor, save such as he chose to perform, young McIntosh passed in his native village a happy childhood. His mother, Martha Gregg McIntosh, had much to do with shaping his moral, spiritual and intellectual character, and her influence he regards as the dominant factor in his life. School privileges were his from the first. He attended the village school at Society Hill, and South Carolina college at Columbia. Having a decided leaning toward medicine, he resolved to prepare himself for this profession. To this end he entered the South Carolina Medical college at Charleston, the leading institution of its character in the state. In the year 1861 he was graduated with distinction. Ten years later he supplemented this course with studies in gynecology, and the therapeutics of the throat and lungs, in New York city. His standing in general scholarship and in his profession has been recognized by the South Carolina college and the South Carolina Medical college, both of which institutions have honored him, and, at the same time, honored themselves, by conferring upon him their degrees.
For the subject of this sketch the serious work of life began when, at the opening of the War between the States, he enlisted in Company F, Eighth regiment of South Carolina volunteers. Soon afterward he was appointed assistant surgeon in the state service. Two weeks later the Eighth regiment was mustered into the Confederate service, and, as he was anxious to go to Virginia, Mr. McIntosh resigned his commission, joined the same company and regiment, and went to that state. He served through the
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summer campaign and was under Kershaw's command at the first battle of Manassas. On November 1, 1861, he was appointed assistant surgeon in the Confederate States army, and until Feb- ruary, 1865, he served continuously at Charlottesville, Virginia. After the capture of Charleston, and the destruction of Columbia, he was ordered to South Carolina, established a temporary hos- pital at Newberry, and continued there until the last of the volunteers of the armies of Lee and Johnston had passed through to their Western homes. In June, 1865, he entered upon the general practice of medicine and surgery at Newberry, South Carolina.
Among the positions held by Doctor McIntosh may be named the presidency of the South Carolina Medical association (1876- 1877) ; trustee of Furman university; president Newberry Build- ing and Loan association, and president of the Newberry Savings bank. Doctor McIntosh has also served as chairman of the board of commissioners of public works of Newberry, South Carolina, for eight years.
Throughout his life, and in the midst of changing party policies, Doctor McIntosh has been a Democrat. In religious faith he is a Baptist. In addressing young Americans he would emphasize the supreme worth of character, honesty, honor, and truthfulness, and would urge the importance of fidelity to obli- gations; of energy, industry, application, and the determination to succeed.
On the 25th of November, 1862, Doctor McIntosh married Miss Fannie C. Higgins. They had four children. On June 13, 1903, he married Mrs. Sarah B. Boozer (née Rook), of which union two children have been born. Five of the children are now (1907) living.
The address of Doctor McIntosh is Newberry, South Caro- lina.
JOHN LOWNDES McLAURIN
M cLAURIN, JOHN LOWNDES, lawyer, legislator, some- time member of the United States senate and house of representatives, was born at Red Bluff, Marlboro county, South Carolina, May 9, 1860, son of Philip Bethea and T. J. (Weatherly) McLaurin. He is of Scotch descent, and the family tradition records Colin McLaurin, the celebrated Scotch mathematician, as the earliest known ancestor. His great-grand- father, John Lauchin McLaurin, who emigrated from Argyle- shire, Scotland, about 1785, was the founder of the American branch of the family, in the paternal line, while his mother's forebears were substantially settled in this country before the Revolution.
The father of John L. McLaurin, was an extensive planter in Marlboro county, a lawyer of marked ability, and a public speaker of high local reputation. He served in the legislature of the state two terms, entered the Confederate army during the War between the States, in which he commanded a company in a regiment of South Carolina volunteers, and gave promise of a brilliant career, when, at the age of thirty-three, he met an untimely death. He was a graduate of Davidson college, North Carolina, a man of refined nature, scholarly habits, and much intellectual force. At his death he left three children: John L., the eldest; Thomas, who died at Englewood, New Jersey, at the age of thirteen; and Margaret, who married Throop Crosland.
His mother was a daughter of Colonel T. C. Weatherly, a prominent legislator of the state, and author of the South Caro- lina "Lien Law" and several other important measures. After the death of her husband she married W. S. Mowry and removed to Englewood, New Jersey, where the youth of her children was in part passed.
Mr. McLaurin was educated at Bennettsville academy; the academy at Englewood, New Jersey; Swarthmore college, Penn- sylvania; Carolina Military institute, and the University of Virginia. He was graduated from the Carolina Military institute in 1880, and received his degree in law from the University of Virginia in 1882. In the year following he was admitted to
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the bar, and began the practice of law at Bennettsville, South Carolina. His training and natural abilities soon gave him a commanding place at the bar of the county, and made him a strong advocate and a leader in local politics. For some years after his admission to the bar he was associated in practice with Judge C. P. Townsend, of Bennettsville.
In 1890 he was elected to the South Carolina legislature, and to the office of attorney-general of the state in the following year. After a brief career as the chief law officer of the state, he was elected to the lower house of congress, and served in that body from 1891 to 1897. Here he was a member of the Ways and Means committee. Upon the death of Joseph H. Earle, United States senator from South Carolina, he was appointed by Gov- ernor Ellerbe, on May 27, 1897, to fill out the unexpired term of that senator. After a vigorous campaign, in which the question was submitted to the people of the state, he was regularly elected to the United States senate for the term ending March 3, 1903.
While in the United States senate Mr. McLaurin was a mem- ber of the committees on claims, improvement of the Mississippi river and tributaries, Indian affairs, manufactures; organization, conduct and expenditures of the executive departments; trans- portation routes to the seaboard, and industrial expositions. His attitude on public questions was one of dignified independence, and his advanced views brought him into sharp conflict with the conservatism of his party in the state. On July 25, 1901, the Democratic State Executive committee of South Carolina asked him to tender his resignation as United States senator, which request he ignored as coming from a misunderstanding of his true position on important issues to the South. A very clear and logical vindication of his political course in congress was made in a speech delivered at the annual dinner of the New York chamber of commerce in 1901.
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