Encyclopedia of Virginia biography, Volume V, Part 44

Author: Tyler, Lyon Gardiner, 1853-1935, ed. cn
Publication date: 1915
Publisher: New York, Lewis historical publishing company
Number of Pages: 848

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ber 8, 1794; married Ann Shepherd, of Han- over.

Fanny Taylor, sixth child and fifth daugh- ter of Edmund and Ann (Day) Taylor, mar- ried Harry Tompkins, of Richmond, Vir- ginia. Their son, Edmund William Tomp- kins, married Julia Mosby Burton.

Ellen Gertrude Tompkins, daughter of Edmund William and Julia Mosby ( Burton) Tompkins, married John Boulware Kidd, of previous mention.

In her younger years Mrs. Kidd discov- ered that the pickles she put up in her home seemed to be specially enjoyed by her vis- itors, and conceived the idea of adding to her pin money by making and selling them for a few of her friends. This she did, call- ing them "Pin Money" pickles. The de- mand for them so increased that she decided to enter the business regularly and manu- facture for the general market. She began with a small plant which has grown to one of large proportions located at 1500 Mar- shall street, Richmond, and "Pin Money" pickles are sold literally "all the world over," as well known in New York, London, Hong Kong and other large cities of the world as in Richmond. Mrs. Kidd continued the business all through her married life and is yet proprietor and manager. Her sons are her assistants, but the business she estab- lished, built up and has always managed, is solely her own. To say that she is a wise woman of affairs, possessing great execu- tive ability, courage, energy and initiative. would be superfluous; the large plant and business she founded, developed and man- ages, speaking louder than tongue or pen. Her residence is "The Shenandoah," an apartment building that is one of her in- vestments.

Walter Washington Foster. Walter Washington Foster, of Richmond, Virginia, was born February 22, 1857, at Norfolk, Virginia, a son of Joseph G. and Mary A. (Brownley) Foster. He attended the pub- lic schools of Norfolk, and at the age of six- teen years started out to learn the art of photography, in the studio of D. H. Ander- son, of New York. With a natural artistic sense and a keen interest in his work, he made rapid advancement, and acquired a thorough knowledge of all details pertain- ing to the photographic business. In 1881 he established himself in a studio at Rich- mond, and from that time to the present has

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continued at the same location, and during this time has acquired a very high repu- tation for work. He is known everywhere south of Washington, and his studio is one of the best equipped in the state of Virginia. At the present time Mr. Foster is giving much attention to painting in oil, and his reputation as an artist in this direction is very high. Mr. Foster is deeply absorbed in his work, and has given very little atten- tion to other matters. In disposition he is modest and retiring, and he has never sought any part in the direction of public affairs. He is an active member of the Christadel- phian Church of Richmond, and is affiliated with the Masonic fraternity, a member of Highland Park Lodge, No. 292, Free and Accepted Masons, and has attained the thirty-second degree in Scottish Rite Ma- sonry. In Masonic circles he is highly esteemed, and is known for his fidelity to the broad fraternal principles of the order. These principles guide the conduct of his daily life, and thus he is esteemed outside of Masonic circles for his manly worth and large-hearted sympathy.

He married, February 21, 1877, Carrie S. Hughes, a daughter of Josiah and Sallie (Ellison) Hughes, of Richmond. They are the parents of two children: 1. Dr. Walter Brownley Foster, at present head of the health department of the city of Roanoke, Virginia, a position which he has held with credit and honor; he married Clara Cren- shaw, and they have three children: G. H., Constance and Gene Foster. 2. Nellie Vir- ginia, wife of Arthur W. Orpin, who is an able assistant of his father-in-law in the photographic studio; Mr. and Mrs. Orpin have two children: Helen R. and Walter Foster.

Armistead Churchill Gordon, LL. D. An enumeration of the men of the present gen- eration who have won honor and public rec- ognition for themselves, and at the same time for the state to which they belong, would be incomplete were there failure to make mention in a prominent manner of Armistead Churchill Gordon, LL. D., of Virginia.

The maternal ancestry of Mr. Gordon in- cludes the father of Colonel Nathaniel Ba- con, the elder, member of the council, and cousin of Nathaniel Bacon, sometime called "The Rebel;" Lewis Burwell, first of that name in the colony; William Bassett, pro-

genitor of the Bassetts of "Eltham," New Kent county ; Colonel John Stith, in Vir- ginia in 1663, grandfather of William Stith, the historian and president of the College of William and Mary; Colonel Miles Cary, first of that name in Virginia ; William Ran- dolph, of Turkey Island, who was the an- cestor of the distinguished Randolph fam- ily ; Colonel Nicholas Long, of Halifax, North Carolina, commissary-general of the North Carolina troops in the revolutionary war; and Barnabas McKinne, of Edenton, North Carolina, a colonial landed proprietor and magnate of the early half of the eight- eenth century.

James Gordon, the first of this family at Sheepbridge, in county Down, Ireland, was there in 1692, and was of a cadet branch of the ancient Gordons of Lesmoir, in Aber- deenshire. Scotland. He married Jane Campbell, whose mother was of the house of Wallace, of Elderslie, Scotland.

James Gordon, son of James and Jane (Campbell) Gordon, was of Sheepbridge, in the lordship of Newry, county Down, Ire- land, and married Sarah Greenway. Among their children were: John, of further men- tion; Colonel James Gordon, an eminent planter of Lancaster county, who married Mary Harrison, daughter of Colonel Na- thaniel Harrison, of Surry county, and had a daughter, Elizabeth, who married her cousin John, as mentioned below.

John Gordon, son of James and Sarah (Greenway) Gordon, married Lucy, daugh- ter of Colonel Armistead Churchill, of Mid- dlesex county.

James Gordon, son of John and Lucy (Churchill) Gordon, removed from Rich- mond county, which he represented in the house of delegates in 1781, to Orange, and resided at Germanna, in that county, which he represented in the state constitutional convention in 1788. He was a planter. He married Elizabeth Gordon, a daughter of Colonel James and Mary (Harrison) Gor- don, mentioned above.

General William Fitzhugh Gordon, sec- ond son of James and Elizabeth (Gordon) Gordon, was of "Edgeworth," Albemarle county, Virginia, and was for a long time distinguished in the political annals of the state. It was to the combined influence of Hon. Joseph C. Cabell in the senate, and General Gordon in the house of delegates, that Mr. Jefferson largely attributed the success of the bill establishing the Univer-

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sity of Virginia. As a member of the con- stitutional convention of 1829-30 he was the author of the compromise provision for rep- resentation known as the "Mixed Basis," which was adopted by the convention. In 1829 he was appointed by Governor Wil- liam B. Giles, brigadier-general of the Third Brigade, Second Division, Virginia troops. In 1840 he was appointed major-general of the Second Division. While a member of congress he proposed what is known as the sub-treasury plan for the management of the funds, which was afterwards adopted. He married (first) Mary Robinson Rootes, a daughter of Thomas Reade Rootes, of Fed- eral Hill, Fredericksburg, Virginia, by whom he had no children. He married (sec- ond) Elizabeth Lindsay, daughter of Colo- nel Reuben Lindsay, of Albemarle. By this marriage he had eight sons and three daugh- ters who lived to maturity. Six of the sons were soldiers in the Confederate army dur- ing the civil war, among these being : George Loyall, of further mention ; and Cap- tain Charles Henry Gordon, his twin brother, of Fauquier county, Virginia, at one time a lieutenant in the Black Horse Company, later on the staff of General Bev- erly Robertson.

George Loyall Gordon, son of General William Fitzhugh and Elizabeth (Lindsay) Gordon, studied at the University of Vir- ginia, practiced law, and edited the Alex- andria "Sentinel." He served in the Con- federate army as a member of the "Edge- combe Guards," from North Carolina, and was killed while adjutant of the Fifteenth North Carolina Regiment, at Malvern Hill, July 1, 1862, falling the nearest man to the enemy's guns. Mr. Gordon married Mary Long Daniel, who died at "Longwood," the family residence in Louisa, February, 1876, who was a woman of much amiability and brilliant mind. and inspired her children with a love of literature and a desire to ex- cel in life. She was the eldest daughter of Judge Joseph J. Daniel, of the Virginia fam- ily of that name, and a son of Lewis Daniel, of "Burncourt," Halifax county, North Car- olina. Judge Daniel died while in office as judge of the supreme court of his native state, January, 1848. Prior to his election to this office, he had been a judge of the superior court of law and equity, and served as a member of the North Carolina house of commons, and as a delegate from Halifax county in the state constitutional

convention. Mr. and Mrs. Gordon had five children, of whom three attained maturity : Armistead Churchill, of whom further; James Lindsay Gordon, a lawyer of Char- lottesville, Virginia, and later of New York, where he died in his forty-fifth year, No- vember 30, 1904, a former state senator of Virginia, later assistant district attorney and assistant corporation counsel of New York, and noted for his oratorical powers and his success as a trial court advocate ; Mary Long Gordon, married Dr. Richard H. Lewis, of Raleigh, North Carolina, secre- tary of the state board of health of that state, and died in Raleigh, August 13, 1895, of typhoid fever.

Armistead Churchill Gordon, LL. D., son of George Loyall and Mary Long (Daniel) Gordon, was born at "Edgeworth," Albe- marle county, Virginia, December 20, 1855, and lived in the country until he settled at Staunton in 1879. His early years were spent with his parents at "Longwood," the years of the war between the states, on a cotton plantation in North Carolina, and when he returned to Virginia in 1868 he lived near Charlottesville, with an uncle, Mason Gordon. He was a student at the Charlottesville Institute, under the late Major Horace W. Jones, and at the age of seventeen years became a state student in the academic department of the University of Virginia. After a thorough course of modern and ancient languages and of mathematics he was graduated, then spent four years in teaching school in Charlottes- ville. At first he was associated with Major Jones in the conduct of the Charlottesville Institute, became his successor, and asso- ciate principal of the high school of Char- lottesville, a public graded school. In 1877 he was a student in the summer law school of the University of Virginia, and again in 1878 and 1879, and read law privately in the intervals of teaching school.

In October, 1879, Mr. Gordon commenced the practice of law in Staunton, Virginia, and at the same time taught Greek and Ger- man one year in a classical school in Staun- ton, conducted by Henry L. Hoover. In 1883 he formed a law partnership with the late Meade F. White, who was for many years commonwealth attorney of Augusta county. This partnership continued until January 1, 1891, during a portion of which time the firm of White & Gordon had the unique experience of representing, the one

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member the commonwealth for Augusta county, and the other member the common- wealth for Staunton. In January, 1891, Mr. Gordon formed a partnership with William Patrick, and the firm of Patrick & Gordon was dissolved by the death of Mr. Patrick in June, 1909, since which date Mr. Gordon has continued the practice of his profession alone.

Since residing in Staunton, Mr. Gordon has filled the following positions of trust or prominence : Mayor of Staunton, 1884-86; city commissioner of accounts, 1883 to 1892 ; commissioner in chancery of the Hustings court of Staunton; commissioner in chan- cery of the circuit court of Augusta; com- inissioner of accounts for Augusta county since 1911 ; president of the Staunton Cham- ber of Commerce; commonwealth's attor- ney of Staunton, 1890-92; city attorney of Staunton five terms of two years each ; sec- retary of the University of Virginia Alumni Society of Staunton and Augusta County ; president of same ; charter member and first president of the Beverly Club of Staunton ; charter member and first president of the Staunton Savings Bank, now the Farmers' and Merchants' Bank of Staunton; chair- man of the city Democratic committee of Staunton, 1892-93-94; director of the Bald- win District Fair Association; chairman of the Democratic committee of Augusta county for many years; member of the board of visitors of the University of Vir- ginia, 1894 to 1898; member of the state board of visitors to Mount Vernon ; mem- ber of the building committee, composed of three from the visitors and two from the faculty, for the restoration of the buildings of the University of Virginia, destroyed by fire in 1895; member of the royal charter board of the College of William and Mary in Virginia, 1897 to 1906; rector of the Uni- versity of Virginia, 1897-98; common- wealth's attorney of Augusta from May 23, 1898, to July, 1900, by appointment, to fill an unexpired term; vice-president of the Virginia State Bar Association; charter member, and member from 1902 to 1904 of the executive committee, of the General Society of Alumni of the University of Vir- ginia; commissioner to the board of super- visors of Augusta county, and member and first chairman of the state library board of Virginia, from July 1, 1903, to July 1, 1908. In the opening of 1906 he was again ap- pointed a member of the board of visitors

of the University of Virginia, for a term of four years, commencing February 28, 1906, and was thereupon reelected rector of the university by the unanimous vote of his col- leagues on the board, which office he still holds.

Pursuant to resolutions of the council of Staunton, Mr. Gordon, in 1885, made the first codification of the city ordinances; and in 1897 revised and recodified the city ordi- nances. He has been a contributor at irregular intervals, of fiction, essays and verse to the "Century," "Scribner's" and "Atlantic Monthly," and other periodicals, and has published: "Befo' de War; Echoes in Negro Dialect," in conjunction with Thomas Nelson Page, 1888; "Congressional Currency ; An Outline of the Federal Money System ;" "For Truth and Freedom ; Poems of Commemoration ;" "Envion and Other Tales of Old and New Virginia ;" "The Gay Gordons; Ballads of an Ancient Scottish Clan ;" and three novels: "The Gift of the Morning Star ;" "Robin Aroon ;" and "Maje : A Love Story." During the years 1914 and 1915 he contributed a number of short stories to. "Scribner's Magazine." He has also written the lives of several eminent men, in "Great Judges and Lawyers," edited by Dr. William Lewis Draper, dean of the law faculty of the University of Pennsyl- vania.

Mr. Gordon is a member of the Chi Phi fraternity, a Greek letter college secret society, and has been poet before its annual convention; he is an Odd Fellow and a Knight of Pythias, though no longer in active affiliation with these orders; and is a member of the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks ; he is a member of the Alpha Chapter of the Phi Beta Kappa Society at William and Mary College, and in 1896 de- livered an address before this society on "The Valley Ulsterman ; A Chapter of Vir- ginia History." He is a member of the Scotch-Irish Society of America, and de- livered an address before its seventh con- gress, in June, 1895, on "General Daniel Morgan." He is a member of the Virginia State Bar Association ; Virginia Historical Society, and of its executive committee ; the New Spalding Club of Aberdeen, Scotland, to whose publication, "The House of Gor- don," under the editorship of J. M. Bulloch, of London, he contributed material concern- ing the history of Gordons in Ireland and America. He also collaborated with Mr.

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Bulloch and Miss Olive Skelton in "Gor- dons Under Arms," a biographical cyclo- pedia of Gordons who have borne arms throughout the world, contributing a large part of the American section. He delivered the annual address before the West Virginia State Bar Association, at Martinsburg, Jan- uary 5, 1900, 011 "The Citizens and the Re- public," and an address on "Judge William McLaughlin," before the visitors, faculty and students of Washington and Lee Uni- versity, in June, 1903. He has made many other addresses on various occasions.

Mr. Gordon has, composed and read the following memorial and dedicatory poems on the several occasions named: "The Gar- den of Death," at the unveiling of the monu- ment to the Confederate dead in Thornrose Cemetery, Staunton, Virginia, September 25, 1888; "Roses of Memory," before the Pickett-Buchanan Camp of Confederate Veterans at Norfolk, Virginia, on Memorial Day, June 19, 1890; "Pro Monumento Super Milites Interemptos," at the unveiling of the monument to the private soldiers and sailors of the Confederacy at Richmond, Virginia, May 30, 1894; "The Fostering Mother," at the dedication of the new buildings at the University of Virginia, October 27, 1895; "Mosby's Men," at the seventh annual re- union of the survivors of the Forty-third Battalion, Virginia Cavalry, at Fairfax Courthouse, Virginia, September II, 1900; "Vitai Lampada; A Song for a Centenary Year," before the Phi Beta Kappa Society of William and Mary College, February 19, 1901; "The Stonewall Brigade," at the re- union of the Stonewall Brigade at Staun- ton, October 16, 1901 ; "The Head Master," at the presentation of a portrait of Captain William Gordon McCabe to the University of Virginia, by his "Old Boys;" and "New Market: A Threnody," at the dedication, June 23, 1903, of Sir Moses Ezekiel's monu- ment at Lexington, Virginia, to the cadets of the Virginia Military Institute who fell in the battle of New Market.

Mr. Gordon was the originator of the agitation for the creation of the office of president of the University of Virginia, hav- ing, in June, 1897, while a member of the board of visitors of that institution, first offered a resolution for the appointment of a special committee of the board to inquire into and report upon the expediency of creating such an office. As chairman of this special committee, Mr. Gordon drafted and

filed a majority report, recommending the establishment of the office of president. This report met with the approval of the majority of the visitors, but action on it was in- definitely postponed owing to the antag- onism which the proposition aroused in many directions. The seed was sown, how- ever, and a few years later the office was created, and Dr. Edwin A. Alderman ap- pointed. It may be further mentioned that it was upon the motion of Mr. Gordon that the inscription was placed over the portico of the academic building of the university : "Ye shall know the Truth and the Truth shall make you free," a text from the Gospel of St. John, which has since come to be recognized as the motto that best illustrates the spirit of the university. In June, 1906. the College of William and Mary, Virginia, conferred on Mr. Gordon the honorary de- gree of Doctor of Laws.

Mr. Gordon married, at Trinity Episcopal Church, Staunton, Virginia, October 17, 1883, Maria Breckinridge Catlett, eldest daughter of Nathaniel Pendleton and Eliza- beth (Breckinridge) Catlett, and of this union there were born five children, viz .: Margaret Douglas, Mary Daniel, James Lindsay, Armistead Churchill and George Loyall.

In 1901 Mr. Gordon was invited by a written request of almost one thousand of the citizens of Augusta county and Stann- ton to become their candidate to represent the county and city in the state convention then called to assemble in Richmond, to make a new constitution for the common- wealth. This complimentary request, how- ever, was declined by him for personal rea- sons. Mr. Gordon's biography has appeared in each consecutive volume of "Who's Who in America" since the publication of the first volume.

George Gibson Worsham. George Gibson Worsham, of Richmond, is a son of John Henry and Mary Bell ( Pilcher) Worsham, who had children: I. Bell, married S. Ed- ward Bates, Jr., and had daughters, Mil- dred and Mary. 2. Jessie, died in infancy. 3. George Gibson, of further mention. 4. Natalie, wife of W. Wirt Henry, and mother of John W. Henry. George Gibson Worsham is a grandson of Richard and Clark R. (God- din) Worsham, the latter a sister of Welling- ton Goddin. Mr. Worsham's father, John H. Worsham, was a Confederate soldier, having

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served throughout the war until he was wounded at Winchester in 1864. He is the author of "One of Jackson's Foot Cavalry." Shortly after the war he went to Scottsville, where he engaged in the milling business, and operated a line of boats on the old James river and Kanawha canal until the canal was sold to the Richmond & Alleghany railroad, when he returned to Richmond and engaged in the insurance business.

George Gibson Worsham was born No- vember 26, 1874, at Scottsville, Virginia, and was educated at his mother's knee and in the public schools of Richmond and Scotts- ville. Mr. Worsham took to printing early in life, and earned enough to pay for his small press and buy a bicycle before leaving school. He then went with Joseph Bryan, who shortly after acquired the "Richmond Times." Mr. Worsham then went to New York and learned the operation of the lino- type machine, and in 1892 set up the first of these machines in this section of the coun- try. Mr. Worsham met the late Otmar Mergenthaler, the inventor of the linotype, in Baltimore, on his return from New York, and had him explain the working of the wonderful machine to him. When the "Even- ing Leader" was reestablished, in 1896, Mr. Worsham took charge of the mechanical de- partment of the newspaper, and made up the first forms of that paper, which attracted wide attention and were the first display or modern newspaper pages made up in Vir- ginia. In 1899 Mr. Worsham left the "Even- ing Leader," and with Harvey L. Wilson, now editor of the "Ledger-Dispatch" of Nor- folk, Virginia, established the "Richmond News," and when they sold this paper to the John L. Williams interests Mr. Worsham formed an association with Charles A. Zincke and they organized the "Richmond Press." This printing establishment is one of the largest of its kind in Virginia, and occupies spacious and convenient quarters in Rich- mond. Some years ago it bought from the late Dr. Hunter McGuire's heirs the old St. Luke's Hospital building at the corner of Ross and Governor streets, and erected upon the site the present mammoth Richmond Press building. In 1913 Mr. Worsham ac- quired the Patterson tobacco factories, at the corner of Seventh and Canal streets, and there erected the present modern Express building.

He married, November 27, 1907. Julia Pilcher, of Petersburg, daughter of Rev.

John Mason Pilcher, D. D., for three years president of the Baptist General Association of Virginia, and his wife, Mary Lucy Du Val. Children: Bell, born September 25, 1908; John Gibson, October 1, 1911; Sarah Du Val, July 7, 1913.

Joseph William Eggleston, D. D. S., has throughout his career been an exceedingly close student, a careful reader, a lover of literature and science, and a fascinating con- versationalist. His mind is a rich store- house of the most extensive and varied in- formation, garnered from almost every de- partment of human thought and action- law, politics, religion, history, folk-lore, science, romance. He entertains the firm opinion that a young man's first step toward success consists in taking measure of his own capacity and adaptability to perform a certain specific work, and then to resolve to do it with all his energy. In conjunction with this, he must take into consideration the rights and feelings of his fellow men. He must cultivate their good will, not by slavish blandishments, but by a dignified self-respect and a manifest fairness. The family from which Dr. Eggleston is de- scended is among the oldest in the country. In this country the first lineal paternal an- cestor of Dr. Eggleston was Richard Eg- gleston, of "Old Powhatan," near James- town, Virginia, who emigrated from Eng- land in 1634. He may have been of Irish birth.

William Eggleston, great-grandfather of Dr. Eggleston, removed from James City county, Virginia, about 1728, to what was then Prince George county, and is now known as Amelia county. Prior to his re- moval he married Judith Cary.

Edward Eggleston, son of William and Judith (Cary) Eggleston, was born in 1752, in the house in which he spent his entire life. This is still standing, as an old landmark, and was later occupied by Dr. Eggleston. He was a lieutenant in the Virginia militia, and was an active partici- pant in the battle of Yorktown. In 1830 he was a presiding magistrate of the old county court of Amelia county. He married Bet- sev Booker, a niece of Governor William B. Giles. Joseph Eggleston, a cousin, was a major in the army, a congressman and a state senator.

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Encyclopedia of Virginia biography, Volume V, Part 44

Author: Tyler, Lyon Gardiner, 1853-1935, ed. cn Publication date: 1915 Publisher: New York, Lewis historical publishing company Number of Pages: 848

Author: Tyler, Lyon Gardiner, 1853-1935, ed. cn
Publication date: 1915
Publisher: New York, Lewis historical publishing company
Number of Pages: 848