Sketches of prominent Tennesseans. Containing biographies and records of many of the families who have attained prominence in Tennessee, Part 126

Author: Speer, William S
Publication date: 1888
Publisher: Nashville, A. B. Tavel
Number of Pages: 1278

USA > Tennessee > Sketches of prominent Tennesseans. Containing biographies and records of many of the families who have attained prominence in Tennessee > Part 126

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

Judge Meck sprung from as good ancestry as the country affords. His grandfather, Adam Meek, emi- grated at an early day from the north of Ireland to America, and came of Scotch and English ancestry, which had emigrated to Ireland to escape religious intolerance at home during the reign of James I., and who assisted in the organization of the Irish Presbyte- rian church at Carrickfugus, in the year 1642. He settled first in Pennsylvania. He served in the conti- Dental army during the Revolutionary war, and had his thigh broken at the battle of the Cowpens, and ever afterward used a cratch, but would never take a pen. sion, as he said he was able to support himself. Settling

أبنا J |

569

PROMINENT TENNESSEANS.

after the war in North Carolina, he soon after emigrated . to make our country and its institutions the pride and to Tennessee and located in Jefferson county. He was glory of the world. At the age of eighteen he was sent to school at Maryville, where he graduated in 1850. under Rev. Isaac Anderson, D. D., L.L. D., president of Maryville. College, After graduation, he read law. at Now Market. under Judge Robert Anderson, and was licensed to practice in 1852 by Judges Alexander and Thomas L. Williams. a government surveyor, and entered large tracts of very valuable lands near Strawberry Plains, a part of which still remains in possession of members of the Meck family. He was one of the first justices of the peace of Jefferson county. For a fuller account of this old pioneer, see Ramsey's : History of Tennessee."

In 1855, he represented Jefferson county in the Ten nessee Legislature. He then practiced law at New Market, and in the surrounding counties until 1862. When the war broke out he took the Union side. In 1861, he was again elected to the Legislature as a Union member.

April 20, 1862, he was arrested at his home by Con- federate soldiers, taken to Tuscaloosa. Alabama, con- fined in a prison there with the Federal troops under Wirtz, and was removed from Tuscaloosa to Montgomery, from Montgomery to Macon, and July 4, 1862, was released and returned home. June 20, 1863, he was arrested again on a charge of high treason, carried to Knoxville and tried by a military commission, of which Isaac Shelby. jr., of Kentucky, was president. Prior to this. in May. 1863, there was a special order from Gov. Isham G. Harris, for the purpose of cleeting an attorney general for the State, in the Second judicial district, to fill the place made vacant by the death of attorney general Thornburgh, and Judge Meck was elected over' four competitors, receiving more votes than all of them.

Upon an investigation of the case for treason, the presi- dent of the commission ordered his discharge, July 1. 1863. He then left the State and spent most of the time in Kentucky and Ohio, until the summer of 1865. In December of that year, he represented Jeffer- son county in the constitutional convention at Nashville.

In January, 1866, he was commissioned by Gov. Andrew Johnson, attorney-general for the Second judi- cial circuit and held that office eight years. In 1866, he was a candidate for judge against James G. Rose (present judge of the Second circuit ), and was beaten by one hundred and fifty votes

February 28, 1853, he was commissioned, by President Arthur, United States district attorney for the eastern district of Tennessee, the position he now holds, term expiring March 1, 1887.

Politically identified with the Whig party until that party ceased to exist as an organization, he has since that time taken an active interest in. and warmly advo- cated the principles and measures of, the Republican party.

In 1866, Gov. Brownlow appointed him a director of the East Tennessee, Virginia and Georgia railroad, a position which he filled until 1874. In 1875, he was elected a director by the stockholders of the road, his term expiring in 1879. In that year, he was elected the attorney for the East Tennessee and Georgia railroad, a

.Adam K. Meck, Judge Meek's father, a venerable, well preserved and highly respected old gentleman, now in his ninetieth year, having been born July 15, 1796, is still living on a part of the original homestead, where he was born. He was a captain in the Cherokee war, in 1836, and has at times rendered his country efficient service in her armies and in civil positions. The farm on which he now resides at Strawberry Plains, and on which he and all of his children were born, was settled by his father, Adam Meek, when it was a wild Indian country, on the very borders and outskirts of civilization.

It will doubtless be observed by the curious reader of this volume that very few families appear in it who have not moved several times, Migration seems charac- teristic of the great body of American people, Change of scene, change of location, mark the history of a : great majority of our families. The Meek family, however, have demonstrated extraordinary staying power. They are fair representatives of the manners, morals, religion and manhood of the State. Of the first and second generations, all were farmers. Of the present, three are lawyers. The family are all . Presbyterians, and all well educated. It is a long-lived people. The grandfather lived to be eighty-seven, the grandmother seventy-five; the father is now ninety. the mother eighty-eight. The men and women are all something above the average of people among whom they live.

Judge Meck's mother, nee Elizabeth Childress, was born in Virginia, December 1, 1798, daughter of John Childress, a Revolutionary soldier. He came to Ten- nessee and settled in Jefferson county, where he died at an advanced age, leaving a large family, now scattered over the western States, except two daughters: Nancy, the widow of James Hamilton, now ninety-five years' old, is living in Jefferson county, and is remarka ble for her activity in domestic life. The other daugh ter, Mary, married Alexander Douglass, and lived to be seventy years of age, and left a large family. Mrs. Meck's praise is that she has raised a strong, industrious family and stood by them in every trial. and that they are all in creditable standing in society.

Judge Meck's early life was spent apon a farm amid the duties and surroundings incident to an indus. trious and progressive farmer's life. Many of the most distinguished and best men our country affords, have just cause to be proud that they were reared under just such circumstances. The farm and work -shop give us, in most cases, the men that have contributed so much

0:1122:1 /

١٠: ١٠

. 1

570

PROMINENT TENNESSEANS.

position which he held until 1883. By election of the bar, he has several times occupied the bench as special judge of the circuit court. He is a director in the East Tennessee National Bank at Knoxville. He became a Mason at New Market, in 1859, and in religion is a Presbyterian.

Judge Meek married, at New Market, November 8. 1859, Miss Elizabeth J. Walker, who was born in Haw- kins county, Tennessee, August 5, 1839, daughter of Maj. James IL. Walker, a farmer and merchant at New Market. Her mother was Louisa Clarkson. Mrs. Meck's only sister, Mary A., is the wife of Arthur Dead. erick, son of chief justice Deaderick (whose sketch see elsewhere in this volume). Her children are James W., Henry MeDowell, Lizzie, Lula and Arthur Monroe Deaderick .

Mrs. Meek graduated at Rogersville Female Col- lege, and is a member of the Presbyterian church, and president of the- Union Presbytery Home Missionary Society, embracing the counties of Blount, Knox, Jefferson, Sevier and Grainger. To this marriage have been born three children : (1). James K. Meck, born October 23. 1860; graduated in the class of 1881, from the University of Tennessee ; now 'a wholesale merchant at Knoxville. (2). Ada Burnside Meck,

born July 23, 1863; graduated from the Glendale (Ohio) Female College, June 12, 1881. (3). William M. Meek, born August 26, 1866; now a student in the University of Tennessee.

Judge Meck began life on money he made by teach- ing school for two years after leaving college, and is now one of the wealthiest men of Knoxville. What he has acquired in the way of property has been by industry" that never tired, and a resolution that would brook no opposition that a will, determined to succeed, can over- come. He never made a debt he did not pay ; never made a promise he did not fulfill, or give a good reason why he did not do it ; has a strong, tough constitution and good health ; and has outstripped his competitors in the race for success, by having more energy than they. Ile is a man of fixed religions and political principles, has made friends by showing himself friendly, and is open, frank, liberal and candid to a fault, yet a prudent, economical manager of his affairs. Among the lawyers it was a common remark that he could do more work than any two men in the profession. From 1866 to 1874, he studied and worked, almost as a rule, until twelve o'clock at night. The appreciation in his railrood stock and his judicious speculations in real estate in Knoxville, have also contributed to his financial success.

HON. JERE BAXTER.

NASHVILLE.

H ON. JERE BAXTER, the subject of this sketch, was born in Nashville, Tennessee, Feb ruary 11, 1852. He was educated at the Montgomery Bell Academy in that city, going to school in all only twenty-two months.

At nineteen years of age, much against his father's wishes, he went abroad and spent several years in for- cign travel. This trip has a flavor of adventure in it which makes it not uninteresting to relate. He left home on money received from the sale of two mules, and reached Berlin with four dollars in his pocket, all told. Here he obtained employment as a teacher of English, and taught there for two years. His purse thus replen- ished, he started again for an itinerate over the conti- nent, much of which he accomplished on foot, spend . ing his time in the acquisition of the languages, and in studying the arts of painting and sculpture. During this absence from home, he received in remittances not exceeding eight hundred or nine hundred dollars.

Up to this time of his life his manners were char- acterized by a quiet and reserve bordering on timidity, in his boyhood even suffering from a terror of the dark, and embarrassment in the presence of strangers, both of

which weaknesses he conquered by pride and a strong will, forcing himself habitually to go into a dark room, and frequently into society.

After Mr. Baxter's return from Europe in 1874, he started an industrial publication in Nashyllie. It was fairly successful, but he removed it to St. Louis, where it was continued under his management till he sold it out to another publisher. He then applied himself to the study of law, and was soon admitted to the bar Subsequently he founded the Legal Reporter, which contains the decisions of the State Supreme court, which appointed Mr. Baxter Assistant State Reporter. Ilis publication "supplied a pressing want," and the nine bound volumes of the Reporter are officially recognized authority. At this time Mr. Baxter was but twenty- five years old.

His enterprising spirit was not quite satisfied with the monotony of legal reporting, and he conceived the idea of building what is known as the Baxter Block, on Union between Cherry and Summer streets, in 1879-80 The new Baxter Court, recently erected by him on Church street, is the most admirable office building in the city, and equal to any in the South ; with its broad

٠٠٠

PROMINENT TENNESSEANS

.magnificent front, extending far above the adjacent buildings, it attracts the attention of spectators at once. It is six stories high, and contains forty-two rooms which are all leased from three to five years, to first-class oc- eupants.

In the fall of 1879, he engaged in the railroad busi- ness, against the advice of his father and brother -who urged him to stick to his profession -- and, from Novem- ber 21, 1880, to November 22, 1882, he was vice presi- dent of the Memphis and Charleston railroad, and from November, 1882, to November, 1883, president of that road, when his term expired. Immediately thereafter, however, he was again elected vice-president of the road, by request of Gen. Hancock.

About this time he began to investigate the coal and iron fields of North Alabama; organized a company composed of George T. Seney, Gen. Samuel Thomas, Calvin S. Brice and others, in the north ; J. C. Neely, Napoleon Hill, of Memphis; Samuel Keith, Nat. Bax- ter, jr., John P. Williams, James C. Warner, and A. M. Shook, Nashville, and others in Atlanta and Mont- gomery, and was elected president of the company. They purchased two hundred thousand acres of coal and iron lands in that section and are now building a railroad from Tuscumbia to Birmingham to put coal and iron on water transportation-the first time in the history of the South. This road is known, as the Shef- field and Birmingham railroad, and Sheffield, Alabama, on the Tennessee river, is its northern terminus.

Mr. Baxter enjoyed the distinction of being the young- est railroad president in the United States, and is al- ready classed among railroad magnates.

Hle contributed very greatly to the founding of Shef- field, in Alabama, being largely interested in the stock of the company, and by his push and energy and sublime faith, did probably more than any other one individual towards bringing about the prosperity of that place. He also organized the company to buy South Pittsburg, and is now engaged in building up Arkansas City, which, as president, he is pushing to the front as one of the best commercial points in the South.

While engaged in these multifarious projects, Mr. Bax- ter bought Maplewood, an extensive farm, settled long ago. He built his present residence, a stately brick, the first two-story brick building in that section of country. The interior furnishings of the beautiful Maplewood residence were selected with the greatest care, and the evidences of wealth and artistic taste are seen on every hand. Rare books, war implements, Revolutionary relies, Grecian statuary, Japanese embroidery, and eu- riosities in almost every line are to be seen by those who are so fortunate as to visit this delightful home. Maplewood farm is one of the richest and best stocked in the South, and the work under Mr. Baxter's diree- tion is performed in the most systematic and thorough manner. There are twenty-eight hydrants about the place, over two miles of water pipe, and a wind-mill

which does nearly all the pumping from a well eighty feet deep. Five thousand dollars is invested in ma chinery, and probably half as much more in farm im plements. Two hundred horses and fancy thorough- bred cattle wear collars, and at night in the winter or bad weather, each animal is haltered, These facts con- vey but a poor idea of Mr. Baxter's system and scien- tific methods in farming.

Mr. Baxter was married at Terre Haute, Indiana, May 21. 1877, to Miss Mattie Mack, daughter of Judge William Mack, of that city. Miss Mack was educated in Cincinnati, and after leaving school traveled exten- sively in Europe and Egypt. With her brilliant lite- rary attainments and accomplishments in the fine arts, she combines a rare practical judgment and a keen perception of character -- qualities which, clad with a queenly presence and graces both of person and manner, mark her as the perfect woman. Of this marriage have been born two sons, Mack and Jere Baxter, jr.

The great success which Mr. Baxter has achieved at so early a period in his life, entitles him to be classed among the most remarkable men which this country has ever produced. His intuition, will power, fertility of resource, strength of constitution. power of endurance and tensity of purpose ensure success in anything he undertakes. . By always overcoming difficulties, he has but few difficulties to overcome. What would appear insuperable obstacles to most other men only act as a stimulus to the boldness of his character. He never ac- knowledges a defeat. When once he fairly enters upon his work all the concentration of his immense energies is directed to its accomplishment. He has been aptly termed a steam engine on legs. Difficulties vanish like bodiless speeters at his approach. He is never at a loss to provide a remedy. In this he stands pre-eminent among all his associates. With a sanguine tempera- meut, never giving way to discouraging circumstances, he inspires confidence and wins victories. This pecu- liarity of temperament would make him a great general. He never knows when he is whipped. When his plans are thwarted in one direction, like a great floodtide, he seeks other outlets, and always comes out conqueror. His mind is severely analytical and at the same time synthetical. He sees at a glance all the weak points in a proposition and provides for them. He combines with the power of a master and brings every ageney to work for him. There is no mystery or luck in his success. His powers of intellect, supplemented by a vigorous physical constitution, all bearing in one direction, are simply invincible. He is a good manager of men and always works in the lead. He selects his agents with rare skill and judgment and forms his combinations so as to bear on the strongest points in the accomplishment of his purposes. He is frank and open and keeps noth- ing in the background, believing that the best way to inspire confidence is to have no secrets. One always knows where Mr. Baxter stands, and he is either an

572

PROMINENT TENNESSEANS.

open foc or a sincere friend. His aptitude for acquir- ing information is very great. He learns in a few days all the salient points in any new field which he may on- ter. The writer of this sketch has had ample oppor tunities to admire the readiness with which he famil iarizes himself with new subjects, and after a little study he presents them with a perspeenity that is unsurpassed.

His liberality is unbounded. No one in distress ever went to Mr. Baxter without having his distress miti gated. He gives largely of his substance. His dona- tions to charitable institutions and churches within the past five years would make a very respectable patrimony. Among his recent gifts is one of ten acres of land for the building of a Widows' and Orphans' Home.

While not regarding Mr. Baxter as faultless, his faults are not so much against society as against himself. With his commanding powers it would be a miracle to have no faules; but these faults are of such a nature that age will cure them. The broad character of Mr. Baxter and his liberal judgment, often too severe on himself, will soon reduce these faults to a minimum. His career thus far is a remarkable. one, and life has barely opened to him. He is not yet in his prime, and his friends and country all look forward to the accom- plishment of much greater things by him. He has the ability, the courage, the energy, the tenacity of purpose and the power of combination which ought to place him among the great men of the republic.

HON. H. H. INGERSOLL.

KNOXVILLE.

J JUDGE INGERSOLL was born in Lorain county, Ohio, in 18H4, but has been a resident of Tennessee for more than twenty years, and has taken rank among the State's most prominent and valued adopted citizens. He is a fair representative of that better class of men the tide of war brought to Tennessee, and the State is richer for the fact that when the tide went out. he found permanent lodgment on our shores.

Tu boyhood Judge Ingersoll worked as a farmer's lad on his father's farm, two miles out from Oberlin, and also worked occasionally in a printing office as a print- er's boy. When the late war came on, he was barely turned sixteen, but with boyish enthusiasm, he resolved to enter the Federal army and fight for the preservation of the Union. He enlisted as a private in the Sev- enth Ohio infantry regiment. Col. Tyler command- ing. His regiment went with Gen. George B. Me- Clellan, on his campaign through the wild, rugged region of the West Virginia mountains. Serving that campaign, he returned home to complete his education.

In the winter of 1861, he entered Yale College, Con- neetieat, as a junior His educational advantages prior to going to college were exceptionally good, as he at- tended the public schools every winter until fourteen years old, after which he taught school during the winter months, taking charge of his first school when he was only fifteen years old. Being the youngest of a family of six children, four of whom are college graduates, his educational training at home was first-class. As a boy, he was very fond of study and of play ; he worked because he was hidden, and because he wanted pocket money. His parents, who were of strict old Presby. terian or Puritanical stock, did not believe in spoiling a boy by giving him money to spend. Taught by them that idleness is a disgrace, and that without industry

and economy one could not expect to succeed in life, his early steps were well directed. His systematic habits, however, are not more the result of study and painstak - ing than of heredity from his mother, who was a most industrious, busy, excellent housekeeper, ambitious for her children, and systematic in everything, in fact, as regular as the mantel clock in all her household duties. This trait appears to-day in Judge Ingersoll's conduct of his cases in court. Always ready, always prompt, the steps he takes logically follow each other, and are the evidences of carefully studied and prepared plans-al- ways pre-arranged.

A turning point in his young life occurred when about fifteen or sixteen years old, he chanced to meet a traveling phrenologist and physiologist-a su- perior man in his vocation, big brained, big bodied, big souled. After examining young Ingersoll's head and physique, and learning that he was given too much to study, he told him he would do a great deal better for himself if he would give up his place at the head of his class as a student and scholar, and would never neglect physical exercise, which he advised him to take every day three or four hours ; " because, " said he, " you have not more than two-thirds as much body as you need ; to succeed in life you must have a stouter body to carry your head." He followed the advice, and left Yale College the third strongest man, physically, in a class of one hundred and twenty-five ; and from a chest measure of thirty five inches at sixteen, he has grown to a measure of forty inches. To this is attributable much of Judge Ingersoll's success, as he has always been able to endure the severest mental strain and most exhausting professional labor without breaking down.

His parents assured him when a lad he should have as good an education as the country afforded, but after

11.17

١: ٠٫٠

٠:١١ ١)٠

11 1

HON. H. H. INGERSOLL,

573

PROMINENT TENNESSEANS.

that he must make his own living. The idea in their minds was that from his boyhood he should be equipped for a start in life, mentally and morally, equal to the best, and that then he must win the race for himself. His life was planned on the idea that success follows a law, and that there is no excellence without labor.

He graduated A. B. at Yale, in the class of 1863, and in 1866, his alma mater conferred on him the degree of A.M. He graduated under the learned and celebrated faculty comprising President Woolsey and Profs. Por- ter, Dana, Whitney, Loomis, Hadley, Thatcher and Dwight. Of his fellow graduates, several have since become prominent men in many stations, among them, William C. Whitney, present secretary of the navy ; Bishop Whitehead, of Pennsylvania; Prof. Sumner, of Yale; Judge Vann, of New York ; President Perry, of Drury College in Nebraska; II. L. Terrell, esq., and Dr. Keys, of New York city; Dr. Shepard, of Charles- ton, South Carolina, and George Sheffield, a capitalist, of New Haven.

At Yale College young Ingersoll devoted himself equally to his studies and to athletic sports, being every day in the gymnasium or boating in the harbor. To this and a similar course of exercise, he owes his strong and compact frame and physique. He chose to content himself with a good or fair scholarship in order to get the very best physical training. As a consequence of this double course of education, he has not suffered serious sickness from the day of his graduation till the present time ; but in the midst of arduous and exact- ing professional labor, he has always had a sufficient reserve force to bear him through ; and this is to be at- tributed as much to that excellent physical training as to the good constitution inherited from his mother, a woman of great moral and physical strength and en- ergy. In college he was fondest of mathematics and languages, in which his attainments are about equal,

Immediately after leaving college he went to Kenton, Ohio, and at nineteen, consented to take control of a school of six hundred pupils, in eight departinents, studying law at the same time under Col. A. S. Ram- sey, of Kenton. In 1864, he read in the office of Mr. William M. Ramsey, of Cincinnati. He was admitted to the bar at Kenton, by Judge Jacob Brinkerboff. of the Ohio Supreme bench, and Judge J. S. Conkling, of the common pleas bench.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

Sketches of prominent Tennesseans. Containing biographies and records of many of the families who have attained prominence in Tennessee, Part 126

Author: Speer, William S Publication date: 1888 Publisher: Nashville, A. B. Tavel Number of Pages: 1278

Author: Speer, William S
Publication date: 1888
Publisher: Nashville, A. B. Tavel
Number of Pages: 1278