History of West Virginia old and new, Volume 2, Part 1

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LIBRARY WEST VIRGINIA UNIVERSITY

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West Virginia University Libraries 3 0802 100302095 8

West Virginia University Libr This book is due on the date below.

JAREITURNED

JUN 2 9 1989

OCT 22 93

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5 - 31 - 2019

DEC 3 J1996

HISTORY

WEST VIRGINIA

Old and New

and

WEST VIRGINIA BIOGRAPHY By Special Staff of Writers

VOLUME II BIOGRAPHICAL

ILLUSTRATED

THE AMERICAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY, INC. CHICAGO AND NEW YORK 1923

APPAL RM.

Library est Virginia University

Sincerely yours

History of West Virginia

DR. ISRAEL C. WHITE received his Bachelor's degree from West Virginia University in 1872. In the interval of half a century his work has brought him a reputation among America's foremost scientific scholars and greatest authori- ties in the field of geology. West Virginia is proud of him not only as a native son, but for the fact that, so frequently associated with labors in other states, under the national government and foreign governments, he has regarded Morgantown as his home, and for much the greater part of fifty years has been officially connected with the faculty of West Virginia University or as state geologist.

While the investigation has been the result of labors of others, Doctor White is one of the few men who pre- sent a connected genealogical account of his family run- ning back through twenty-eight consecutive generations. A volume published in 1920, entitled "Genesis of the White Family" furnishing a connected record of the White family beginning with 900, at the time of its Welsh origin, when the name was Wynn. Briefly this lineage of twenty-eight generations is given in the fol- lowing paragraphs.

1. Otho, living in the time of Edward the Confessor, 1042-65; 2. Walter Fitz Otho, whose name appears in Domesday Book; 3. Gerald Fitz Walter, married Nesta, daughter of Rys ah Tewdwdwr (Rhys ab Tudor), Prince of South Wales, slain in 1093; 4. Maurice Fitz Gerald; 5. Walter White (Whyte), of Wales, was made a knight by Henry II. His descendant : 6. Thomas de Whyte, was assessed in Martock in 1333; 7. Robertus White, men- tioned as Robert Whyte de Alnewyk, in the Knights of Yorkshire, 31 of Edward I., 1303, as of Agton (the pres- ent Egton in North Riding), in Chapter House, West- minster; 8. Wilelmus White, living in Yorkshire in 1339; 9. Adam White, living in 1365; 10. Johannes White, of Yorkshire, living in 1390; 11. Johannes White, Jr., Alder- man and Grosinor of York, living in 1394; 12. Johannes White, of North Colyngham, Nottinghamshire, is named in the list of landed gentry of Nottinghamshire, drawn by order of Henry VI, 1428; 13. Robert White, "mer- chant and maior of the staple of Calais, b. at Yatley, in Hampshire, his dwelling (sic) was first at Sandwich, in Kent and after at Farnham, in Surrey where he de- ceased, hee purchased the mannor of Southwarnbourne, of Sr. Foulke Pembridge, knt., hee had a wiffe Alice." He was living in 1461 or 1462. 14. John White of Swan- horne, died 1469-70, married Eleanor Hungerford; 15. Robert White, born about 1455, married Margaret Gayns- ford; 16. Robert White of Swanborne, married Elizabeth Englefield; 17. Henry White, father of "The Chancellor; " 18. Henry White, born about 1514; 19. John White, mar- ried Isabel Ball; 20. Stephen White, married Marie Water- house (he died 1629); 21. Stephen White, of Maryland, came in 1659, married Anne Rochold; 22. Stephen White, died 1717, married Sarah -; 23. John White, died November 14, 1737, married 1722, Mary Rencher (Ren- shaw) ; 24. Stephen White, born January 26, 1723, died 1754, married January 1, 1751, Hannah Baker; 25. Grafton White, born 1752, died July 15, 1829, married Margaret Dinney; 26. William White, born Angust 15, 1783, died 1860, married Mary Darling; 27. Michael White, married Mary Anne Russell (Rischel) ; 28. I. C. White.

The first American ancestor was Stephen White, who, as noted above, came over in 1659 and settled in Anne Arundel County, near Baltimore, Maryland. Dr. I. C. White is a son of Michael and Mary Anne (Russell) White. His father was a farmer and one of the com- missioners who divided Monongalia County into districts after the formation of West Virginia and gave the nanic to Battelle District. He served in the Federal Home Guards during the Civil war.

Israel C. White was born in Monongalia County, Novem- ber 1, 1848, acquired a private school education, graduated with honors from West Virginia University in 1872, re- ceived the Master of Arts degree in 1875, and took post - graduate work in geology at Columbia University in 1875- 76, and in 1880 was awarded the degree of Ph. D. by the University of Arkansas. West Virginia University in 1919 conferred upon him the degree of LL. D., and in 1921 he was made a Doctor of Science by the University of Pittsburgh.

The services upon which his reputation is based are suggested rather than described in the following itinerary of his experience : He began the practical study of geology in 1875 as field aid to Dr. John J. Stevenson, assistant geologist on the second geological survey of Pennsylvania. Subsequently he was assistant geologist of the second geological survey of Pennsylvania in 1875-83; professor of geology in West University, 1877-92; assistant geologist of the United States geological survey, 1884-88; chief geologist of the Brazilian Coal Commission, 1904-06, when he visited Brazil at the request of that government to make studies and an official report on the coal fields of Southern Brazil; and has been state geologist of West Virginia since 1897. Doctor White resigned his position in the University of West Virginia in 1892 to take charge of a large petroleum business which he had developed for himself and associates through scientific discoveries made in connection with his studies of the occurrence of petro- leum, natural gas and coal, in all of which he is an expert specialist. He discovered in 1882 the anticlinal theory of petroleum and natural gas, and was the first one to apply it practically in locating new oil and gas pools. He has written extensively on his discoveries and investi- gations, being the author of eight volumes of reports on the second geological survey of Pennsylvania from 1875 to 1884. While assistant geologist on the United States survey in 1884-88 he prepared and published "Bulletin 65" on the "Stratigraphy of the Appalachian Coal Field." As state geologist Doctor White has also prepared and published five of the volumes of the reports, which in- clude "Petroleum and Natural Gas, " "Coal, "" and "Levels and Coal Analyses." He has also supervised and edited thirty other volumes published by the West Virginia geological survey. His report on the Brazilian coal fields was published in 1908 in a quarto volume, in both English and Portuguese, and that same year he also delivered an address on "The Waste of Our Fuel Resources, "' at the First White House conference of governors.

Doctor White is a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and was vice president of section E of that association in 1896-97. He was president of the Association of American State Geologists

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HISTORY OF WEST VIRGINIA

in 1913-15, and a Fellow of the Geological Society of America, which he served as treasurer in 1892-1907, vice president, 1911-12, and its president during 1920. He has been vice president of the American Association of Petroleum Geologists, and also its president for 1919 20.

Aside from his profession he has taken an active interest in civie affairs, having been vice president for West Vir- ginia of the International League for Highway Improve- ment, president of the West Virginia Board of Trade and president of the Morgantown Board of Trade. Ile was president of the Union Utility Company in 1902-05, and has been a director of the Farmers and Merchants Bank of Morgantown since 1895 and president of the Morgantown Brick Company since its organization in 1890, Ilis only military experience was as member of the West Virginia University Cadet Corps in 1867-72, where he was graduated as a captain. He has held but one political position, that of delegate to the Minneapolis convention which renominated Benjamin Harrison for president in 1892. Doctor White is a member of the Cosmos Club, Washington, D. C., the Rocky Mountain Club of New York, the American Philosophieal Society, the American Geographical Society, in addition to numerous other scien- tifie bodies in which his presence is so highly esteemed.

Doctor White has been twice married. On July 27, 1872, he married Emily MeClane, daughter of .James Shay, a merchant tailor and postmaster of Morgantown. The only child of this union is Emily McClane, wife of Dr. R. W. Fisher, of Morgantown. Mrs. White died in 1874. On December 4, 1878, he married Mary, danghter of Henderson H. Moorhead, a merchant of New Castle, Penn- sylvania, and of this union were born five children; Nell Moorhead, wife of C. W. Maxwell, of Elkins, West Vir- ginia; Fanny Russell, wife of H. P. Brightwell, of Charles- ton, West Virginia; Edith Nina Miller, deceased wife of K. L. Kithil, of Denver, Colorado; Charles Stevenson, purchasing agent of the New York Central Railway Com- pany at New York City, who married Miss Helen Todd; and Mary Gertrude, wife of E. R. Wise, of Cleveland, Ohio. Doctor White is the happy grandfather of nineteen grand- children, ten boys and nine girls, one of his grandsons being named I. C. White, II.

ROBERT JEFFERSON ALEXANDER BOREMAN, one of the most estimable citizens of Parkersburg, who died June 24, 1922, was very actively associated with business affairs in this city for half a century.

He was a great-grandson of John Boreman, who was a native of Manchester, England, and ran away from home at the age of sixteen, coming to America on a sailing ves- sel. He landed at Havre de Grace, Maryland, and eventu- ally became a merchant at Fifth and Arch streets in Philadelphia. He served his apprenticeship there until he was twenty-one, and then continued in business on his own responsibility. With the beginning of the Revolu- tionary war he joined the Colonial forces as a private in a Pennsylvania regiment. ITis superior penmanship attracted the attention of his officers, and he was made adjutant of his company, then adjutant of the regiment, then chief clerk to the paymaster general of the army, with head- quarters in New York City, and finally was assistant pay- master general of the army, with headquarters at Pittsburgh, and had the duty of paying off the troops in Pennsylvania. With the close of the struggle for iu- dependence he established a home iu Western Pennsylvania, and when Greene County, that state, was organized he was made probate judge and clerk of the courts, and served as such during the remainder of his life. Jolin Boreman married Betty Kenner. Their son, Kenner Sea- ton Boreman, became a merchant. He was a whig in polities and a member of the Methodist Church. He mar- ried Sarah Ingram, and their family consisted of six sons and one daughter, namely : William, Kenner Seaton, Arthur Ingram, James Mason, Thomas Ingram, Jacob Smith and Agnes Mason, who married James M. Stephenson. With the exception of Jacob, who was educated at Washington and Jefferson College, these sons had ouly a common school education, and their subsequent prominence in business

and public affairs was largely due to their native ability It was this generation of the family that became ident fied with West Virginia and particularly with Wood County The son William was a lawyer at Middlebourne, and serve many years in the House and Senate. The son Arthur Boreman was the first governor of West Virginia, and a appropriate sketch of his career is given elsewhere, and als his name figures in the accounts of the formation of Wes Virginia found in the general historical narrative. Th son James Mason Boreman was a merchant, and was aj pointed postmaster of Parkersburg by President Lincol and held that office for twenty-three years. The số Thomas I. Boreman devoted all his active life to merchan dising at Parkersburg. Jacob S. Boreman at one time pul Jished the Kansas City Star and later, under appointmen from the President, was judge of the United States Cour in the Territory of Utah for forty-two years. He preside at the trial of John D. Lee, convicted and executed fo participation in the historic Mountain Meadow massacre

Kenner S. Boreman, Jr., a brother of Governor Boremal was also a man of more than ordinary intelligence an capacity. He was born at Waynesburg, Pennsylvania, Apr 19, 1819. Nature especially equipped him for a carce: as a lawyer and politician, but owing to impaired vision which eventually terminated in blindness, he became a mel chant at Parkersburg and finally an insurance man, an. was widely known for his success in business and th probity of his character. He began voting as a whig an Jater was a republican. On January 30, 1850, he married M. Theresa Alexander, who was born at St. Clairsvilk Ohio, September 5, 1832, daughter of Robert Jellerso and Ann (Jennings) Alexander. ler father was a lawyer

Robert Jefferson Alexander Boreman was the only chib of his parents and was born at Parkersburg November £ 1850. His well informed and disciplined mind was rathe the result of self training than because of long contac with schools and edneational institutions. Ile entered busi ness for himself at Parkersburg when a youth, later wa in the insurance business, also a wholesale dealer in chin: and house furnishings, and took a prominent part il banking affairs as one of the executive officers of th Farmers and Mechanics National Bank, now the Firs National Bank. He was a republican, but showed little disposition to get into polities. The one office which lu held and in which he did distinctive service was as presi deut of the Board of Education of Parkersburg for two years. During that time he succeeded in providing a larg sum for school buildings and a complete reorganizati 1 of the school system, and after retiring from office kep in close touch with educational interests. Ile was also : member of the State Debt Commission.

Mr. Boreman never married. Ile was a Scottish Ritt Mason and held chairs in the Lodge, Royal Arch Chap'ry and Knight Templar Commandery. He was a meml el of the Presbyterian Church.

ARTHUR I. BOREMAN, first governor of the State of Wes Virginia, was born at Waynesburg, Pennsylvania, July 24 1823, son of Kenner Seaton Boreman. A nephew of Gov ernor Boreman was the late Robert J. A. Boreman of Parkersburg, and under his name will be found a moro complete account of the family as a whole, one of the most distinguished in West Virginia.

Governor Boreman was a child when taken to Tyler County, Virginia, where he attended common schools. IF began the study of law under his brother William and hi: brother-in-law James M. Stephenson at Middlebourne il that county, and was admitted to the bar in May, 1845 In the fall of that year he moved to Parkersburg, where in a few years he had earned a reputation as an ahl jurist and lawyer. In 1855 he was elected to the Virginia House of Delegates from Wood County, and continued il that office by successive election until 1861. Ile was stil a member of the Legislature at the time of the extra session of 1861 to consider the matter of secession. Hc took an active stand against secession.

In the trying times which followed, during the formation period of the new state, his integrity, clearness of under-

IHISTORY OF WEST VIRGINIA

standing, quickness of decision, persistence and definite ness of purpose, his force of will and indefatigable energy placed him in the very forefront, among the leaders. Being a man of the most positive convictions, he was inevitably a devoted partisan. When the threat of civil strife was impending over our country in Is61, and when the north- western part of Virginia determined to maintain a place in the nation and to hold allegiance to the flag, Mr. Bore- man's peculiar innate qualities of untiring energy and industry, indomitable will and intense purpose fitted him to be a successful leader in the great erisis, and were un- loubtedly the causes impelling the people to call him into a high and commanding position in the councils of the new state.

After the extra session of the Virginia Legislature in 1søl he presided over the convention hekl at Wheeling for the purpose of reorganizing the state government. In October, 1561, he was elected judge of the Circuit Court under the restored government of Virginia. He presided over this court until his unanimous election, in 1863, to he the first governor of the new State of West Virginia. The wisdom with which he wielded the executive power and his rare, accurate conception of the needs of that critical time are apparent in the success of the effort to form and the movements to develop the state, but his personal bravery and fearlessness can be appreciated only in the light of a full understanding of the conditions and circumstances attending that interesting and complicated portion of our history. In 1864 and in 1866 Mr. Boreman was re-elected to the office of governor; in 1868 he declined to be again a candidate The Legislature of West Virginia at its ses- sion in 1569 elected Arthur Inghram Boreman to the I'nited States Senate, in succession to Hon. Peter G. Van Winkle; and he took his seat in that body March 4, 1869, and served the state with great efficiency. He was a mem- ber of the committee of manufactures, the committee on territories, and the committees on political disabilities. During the Forty-third Congress he was chairman of the committee on territories and a member of the committee on claims.

Probably no truer aspect of the personality of the man as he was can be given than that in the following deserip- tion, quoted from a former historian: Viewing Governor Boreman as a partisan leader in those times that tried mou's souls even his opponents in after years conceded that he possessed many high and generous qualities of both head and heart. If he struck hard blows, he did not shrink from receiving hard blows in return; and when the strife was ended he was ever ready to extend a hand and to sink, if not to forget, the past. And while he never gave up a partisan advantage, he was ever ready to perform a personal act of kindness or friendship to a political adversary, as well as to a political friend; and the admiration, love and affection of those who stood nearest to him in those dark days of the past conhl then, as now, attest that warmth and strength of his own affec- tions. llis record is before the people of the state. From it no fair-minded man would blot out a single page. It is easily understood-hold, fearless, direct, distinet. There is no evasion or darkness in the definitions of his principles or policies. As the bold, fearless, loyal president of the Wheeling Convention that reorganized the government of Virginia, and as the first governor of the new State of West Virginia, his heroic, manly conduet gave him a place in the affections of the Union people of the state that will not soon be forgotten.

At the expiration of his term as United States senator, West Virginia, having become a democratic state, he re- sumed law practice at Parkersburg. In 1858, as an In- solicited tribute, he was nominated and elected as judge of the Circuit Court, and began his term January 1, 18\9. He had just completed a term of court at Elizabeth in Wirt County when he was seized with a fatal illness that took him off April 19, 1896.

Governor Boreman was a loyal Methodist and in 1888 was chosen a lay delegate by the State Conference to attend the General Conference at New York. November 30, 1864. he married Lauraue Tanner, daughter of Dr. James

Timmer, who was a physician of high standing at Wheeling. ller first husband was John O. Bullock. Governor Boreman was survived by two daughters: Maud, wife of G. I. Cotton, and Laurane, wife of Abijah lays, of Parkers. burg.

(. TALBOTT HITESH W. a business man of many interests at Parkersburg, is by profession a banker, having been in the service of Parkersburg's banks for thirty years. He was honored with election as president of the West Vir ginia Bankers Association in 1910.11, having previously served four years as secretary.

Mr. Hiteshew was born at Parkersburg September 30. 1872, oldest of the four children of Isaar Wesley and Columbia Ann (Bradford) Hiteshew. His father, a native of Maryland, was during the Civil war a division super- intendent of the Baltimore & Ohio Railway. After the war he removed to Parkersburg, where he was engaged iu the milling and feed business until about 1875. He then retired and for a number of years was an invalid. He died in 1889, and is remembered for his success in business and for his kind hearted, generous nature.

(. Talbott Hiteshew has spent the whole of his busy and useful life in his native city. He graduated from the Parkersburg High School in 1889, following that with a course in Eastman's Business College in Poughkeepsie, New York. On returning to Parkersburg he was a clerk, first in the wholesale hardware establishment of R. L. Neal & Company and then in the Citizens National Bank. Later he was assistant cashier of the Farmers and Mechani 's National Bank and subsequently promoted to cashier. In 1917 this bank was consolidated with the First National Bank, the second oldest national bank in West Virginia. With the consolidation Mr. Hiteshew became cashier and upon the death of W. W. Van Winkle, was elected man- aging vice president of the First National Bank, which position he still occupies.

During the World war he was chairman of Liberty Loan drives for ten counties in this section of West Virginia. Of his extensive business interests he is director and vice president of the Imperial Ice Cream Company, director and vice president of the American Creamery Company, director and treasurer of the Walker Oil Company, treasurer of the Mingo Block Coal Company, a director in the Gilmer Fuel Company, director of the Grande Oil Company, oper- ating in the Oklahoma fields, and a director in the West Virginia Metal Products Company of Fairmont. Mr. Hite- shew is a vestryman and junior warden of the Episcopal Church at Parkersburg and a democrat in politics. He is a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason and Shriner and a member of The Blennerhasset (lub and Parkersburg Country Club.

April 26, 1917, Mr. Hiteshew married Miss Mary Van Winkle, only daughter of the late W. W. Van Winkle, one of the foremost lawyers and men of affairs of West Vir- ginia, whose biography follows.

WALLING WALLENSON VAN WINKLE at the time of his death on April 15, 1921, had been a member of the Parkers- burg bar ahnost fifty-five years, being the oldest active practitioner in Wood County. He was one of the foremost business lawyers of West Virginia, and in many ways he exerted a great and helpful influence in the affairs and development of Parkersburg throughout most of the city's history.

The late Mr. Van Winkle stood in the eighth generation of the Van Winkle ancestry in America. The founder of the family was Jacob Walling Van Winkle, who arrived at New Amsterdam from Holland in 1636, and subsequently moved over to New Jersey, where the name has been a distinguished one for nearly three centuries. The grand- father of the lale Mr. Van Winkle was Peter Van Winkle, whose wife, Phoebe Godwin, was of Revolutionary ancestry and of prominent literary connections in the East.

The distinguished West Virginian, Peter Godwin Van Winkle, was an uncle of the late W. W. Van Winkle of Parkersburg. Peter G. Van Winkle was born in New York City in 1808, and died at Parkersburg April 15, 1872. He

HISTORY OF WEST VIRGINIA

became noted as a man of deep scholarship, was a poet and wrote verse as a diversion from the busy activities of a life devoted to legal, commercial and political affairs. He settled at Parkersburg as early as 1835, when it was a village of 200 inhabitants. He finished his law studies and for several years practiced law with Gen. John J. Jackson, but after 1852 his time was chiefly devoted to the promotion and building of railroads and other large affairs. He was the first president of the Little Kanawha Navigation Company, and was also president of the North- western Virginia Railroad Company and the Parkersburg Branch Railway Company. Of his public life the follow- ing is a brief account: "His political career began early in the development of Parkersburg, with membership in the town council, and he was president of the board for several years. For many years active in local affairs, he was soon called to a wider field. In 1850 he was elected a member of the constitutional convention of Virginia, in which he served with distinction, performing arduous work on important committees of that body. Some ten years later he was a delegate to the convention at Wheeling, called to reorganize the government of Virginia. In 1862 he was a delegate to the convention assembled to frame a con- stitution for the proposed new state of West Virginia, and he was a member of its first house of delegates. In August, 1863, he was elected one of the first United States senators from the new state, and drew the long term. He was one of the seven republican senators who voted for the acquittal of President Johnson in the impeachment proceedings. In all these various positions of public trust he performed his duties with laborious attention, conscientiousness, exact- ness, devotion and ability. In his case honorable position sought the man invariably and no office was obtained by personal solicitation, but because of his integrity and capableness. Pure and incorruptible, he was a noble specimen of that highest type of a true manhood, a Christian gentleman."

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History of West Virginia old and new, Volume 2, Part 1

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