USA > West Virginia > Encyclopedia of contemporary biography of West Virginia. Including reference articles on the industrial resources of the state, etc., etc. > Part 31
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decision maintaining the court's power to punish for contempt any one assaulting a court through the columns of a newspaper has been cited and approved and favorably commented on by the Supreme Courts of the States of Ohio and Colo- rado, and is generally conceded to announce a sound doctrine of law."
Judge Johnson, while on the bench, was twice called upon to speak in memoriam of an associate : first, Judge Patten, whose death was quite un- expected, and again on Judge Green. Both ad- dresses will be found in the 19th and 32d vol- umes, respectively, of the West Virginia Reports. Both of the deceased judges mentioned were un- fortunate in lacking the physical stamina de- manded by their arduous labors, a condition which it would have been a matter of great satisfaction to Judge Johnson to alleviate, if it had been in his power to impart something of his own magnificent vitality to his fellow-judges-so earnest and faithful was his professional and per- sonal regard for them. Judge Johnson is over six feet in height and of massive stature, pos- sessing great physical powers, enabling him to undergo long-continued activity of mind, whether as jurist or practitioner. Judge John- son retired from the bench on January 1, 1889. He at once entered upon a good practice, which has increased continually. He has been re- tained in some of the most important cases in the Supreme Court of his State, and his familiarity with the books and authorities is considered to be equal to that of any other lawyer in West Virginia. The Judge was married in 1863 to Sarah Elizabeth Jackson, widow of B. W. Jack- son, a brother of General W. L. Jackson, of the Confederate army, known by the sobriquet of " Mudwall" Jackson. She was the daughter of Hon. J. M. Stephenson, of Parkersburg. They have five children, one son and four daughters, three of whom are grown. During Judge John- son's judicial life he lived at Parkersburg, ex- cept from March, 1879, to March, 1883, when he made his residence in Wheeling, where his busi- ness mostly called him. In November, 1888, he removed to Charleston, which became his permanent home. While the judge has been a Baptist for well on to half a century, his wife and children are Episcopalians. During the Civil War he was a Union man, but would not engage in a fratricidal strife. He is President of the West Virginia Bar Association.
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JAMES CALWELL.
JAMES CALWELL, a leading merchant of Baltimore in the early part of the present cen- tury, and who became widely known as the popular proprietor of the Greenbrier White Sulphur Springs, was born in 1773 in Harford County, Md. In him energy and patriotism were hereditary. His father, Samuel Calwell -he sometimes spelling his name Caldwell, after the old Scottish fashion-had served in the Revolutionary War as Captain, and was known to the great leader himself. Samuel Calwell married a Miss Taggart, also of Mary- land. Their five sons were all born in Harford County. William, the eldest, lived and died a farmer at Gunpowder Neck, about twelve or fourteen miles outside Baltimore. Thomas entered commercial life and was for many years a merchant in Baltimore city. The others were Samuel, Jr., Dorsey, and James, the sub- ject of this sketch. Of the early years of Mr. James Calwell not very much has been pre- served. Like Thomas, he entered on commer- cial pursuits, and if we may judge of his early manhood by what we know of his maturer years, we must believe that he evinced even then that tact and flowing courtesy to all which after- ward became his distinguishing characteristics. What we do know, however, is that, enlarging the bounds of ordinary trade, he not only be- came a shipmaster, but carried on extensive operations in foreign commerce. The times were in some respects propitious for this, and especially for the trade with France. The French flag had been utterly swept away by the imperious Mistress of the Seas, who, in her re- taliation for the bitter but bootless Berlin De- crees, and perhaps, too, flushed by her unparal- leled successes, aimed at depriving France of the only chance of commerce still left open to her, that of trading in foreign bottoms. The American merchant or mariner-or both-was not slow to see his chance of gain, and trusted to his flag to bear him safely through. James Calwell, among others, was wont to load ships with grain for export, while on the return voy- age they brought him the products of the French loom and articles de luxe for which there was a ready home market. Soon, however, the exercise of his daring and enterprise was
checked. It is useless here to refer to the quar- rels and recriminations which arose between the two great English-speaking peoples. The quarrel soon ripened into stormy strife. The conflict at first raged at sea in isolated encoun- ters, but assumed larger dimensions when Wel- lington's veterans, relieved by the peace of 1814, enabled England to send a division of her army across the ocean. Baltimore was taken, and the English steamed off to New Orleans, there to recoil before the breastworks of the immortal Jackson. James Calwell, like a good sturdy patriot, served in the ranks. He was wounded in the arm at the memorable battle of North Point and Fort McHenry, and we may feel sure that he fought none the less manfully since he had just before witnessed the capture of all his ships in the harbor of Baltimore by the British squadron. The interruption to his business and the loss of his ships turned Mr. Calwell's thoughts elsewhere, to a place already endeared to him by tender ties. In 1795 James Calwell visited the Greenbrier White Sulphur Springs, since so justly celebrated. It was then far different from what it became a few years later. It had always been known to the Indians as one of the most important deer-licks south of the Alleghanies. A generation earlier a woman, belonging to one of the pioneer families, desperately stricken with rheumatism, had been borne in a litter many miles, had been housed in a hut, and bathed in a bath-tub hewn from a tree felled for the purpose, had drunk the waters, and had come away completely cured. Others had come to drink of the healing water, had put up their tents, and enjoyed these days which they afterward recalled with rapture, even amid the elegant splendor of a generation later. But the roads were bad, accommoda- tions scanty, and so the number was limited. Among those who came in 1795 was, as we have said, young James Calwell. He made the ac- quaintance of the proprietor of the Springs, Michael Bowyer, in whose family the ownership of the Springs had always remained since a Bowyer first traded with the native Indians for it. We must suppose that there was something in the spot congenial to the tender feelings in- cident to his years, and that Miss Bowyer, popularly known as "Polly Bowyer," specially favored him, for he wooed and won her, and
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two years later he bore her away, his bride, to Baltimore. The bride's father, Michael Bow- yer, had been a Captain in the War of the Revo- lution. He could tell many camp-stories of those heroic times of a passing generation, for he was personally acquainted with General Washington. He owned not only the Sulphur Springs, but also a large tract of country con- tiguous, and all the buildings around, such as they were, belonged to him. All this he left in 1808 to his children; and so it happened that James Calwell, after his troubles and crosses at Baltimore, turned his eyes to the favored region of Virginia where he had won his bride. In 1818 he settled there permanently and under- took the entire management of the Springs. Thenceforth until our own time the name of Calwell has been indissolubly linked with that of the famous resort. With an eye to the ad- vantages of the locality and possessing a rare faculty of administration, he made the wilder- ness bloom as the rose, and the Springs, so long the shrine of the pilgrims of health, now be- came the centre, during "the season," of the beauty and the elegance of Southern society and of that refined manliness which then, as now, graced Virginian chivalry. He laid out the grounds with the art of the landscape gar- dener; long rows of cottages, their white fronts gleaming amid the foliage, were named as ave- nues after the leading Southern States; the Springs were inclosed; gently sloping lawns, forest lanes, and bridle paths made; while a handsome hotel furnished comforts and ac- commodations which seemed in those days to embody the highest achievements of science and art in ministering to the pleasures of life. All these were brought together by James Cal- well, and his efforts won for him the patronage of an appreciative public. One trait in James Calwell's life stood out in bold relief, and that was his untold liberality and generosity. No citizen of Monroe, Pocahontas, or Greenbrier Counties-and these were the localities from whence all of his supplies came-was ever charged a bill when they came to that place on business with Mr. Calwell. Wagons coming there with anything that the concern was pur- chasers of were always treated most kindly and entertained over night without any charge. Any one visiting the Springs in the long ago
from either of the above localities during the season, and wanting to see the sights, was enter- tained during the day, his team cared for, and he given a good dinner at the public table, for the nominal charge of twenty-five cents for his dinner and twelve and a half cents for his horse -and in about the same rate if he chose to spend the night. In early times it was the horse-mart of Greenbrier County, and scores of fine animals were then daily on exhibition and for sale. All of these horses were on the lawn in charge of their grooms immediately after dinner, this being a privilege accorded them by Mr. Calwell, and many were the sales made annually at that place. Not merely were the beauty, fashion, and chivalry to be found at the White Sulphur Springs, but noted men of the South, whose names and utterances held the attention of the nation, came to crown so many other superior attractions : the Hamptons, the Rives, the Barbours, Crawford, William C. Preston, Mangum, Gilmer, McDuffie, and Ste- venson. There, too, came the Breckinridges and Crittenden, the great Calhoun; and the all but matchless Henry Clay listened to accents which were even sweeter, if not more persua- sive, than his own. He was a yearly visitor until his death on April 8, 1851, in the seventy- ninth year of his age. Mr. and Mrs. Calwell were blessed with eleven children, nine sons and two daughters, in the following order of births: I, John Bowyer Calwell, who never married; 2, William Bowyer, whose sketch follows; 3, Henry B., who married a Baltimore lady, Miss Churchman; 4, Lewis Meriwether, who never married, and died in 1879 at the advanced age of seventy-two years; 5, James H., killed at the battle of Buena Vista during the Mexican War; 6, Edmund S .; 7, Augustus A. ; 8, Alfred A., none of whom married; 9, Bedford Calwell, who married Miss Margaret Frazer, of Lewis- burg, Va., both of whom still survive; 10, Frances, who married Fleming B. Miller; and II, Virginia, who married the late Admiral Leven Powell, of the United States Navy .*
* Mrs. Calwell had two sisters, viz .: Mrs. Fanny Bedford and Mrs. Elizabeth Copeland. Each of these sisters had separate homes laid off in the western end of the White Sul- phur Springs estate and they had a number of brothers, all of whose interests in the W. S. S. property Mr. James Calwell acquired title to by purchase and deed from them. The sisters retained title during their lives to their division and disposed of it by will. Mrs. James Calwell inherited her full share as one of the children of Michael Bowyer,-M. L. S.
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WILLIAM B. CALWELL.
WILLIAM BOWYER CALWELL, the sec- ond son of the preceding, for many years pro- prietor of the White Sulphur Springs and dis- tinguished for his ennobling qualities of mind and heart, was born in Baltimore, Md., in the year 1803. He was but fourteen years of age when the family removed to the White Sul- phur Springs, and he passed his youth and early manhood there, and saw that resort, under his father's skilful management, cast off its uncouth surroundings and become in due time the classic resort of all the South. The early education of William B. Calwell was probably of a character suited to his prospects, sound and sensible, a good foundation for the finish which, later, it was to receive from his own exertions. Nature had fitted him for the career open to him. His father, perceiving his bent and capac- ity, gave him his entire confidence and made him his agent and adviser. Under their united guidance everything prospered. The young man, trained in such a school, was able to shoul- der the responsibilities alone when advancing years warned his father against maintaining so onerous a task. Mr. Calwell had the advan- tages already touched upon in the preceding sketch of his father's life. He availed himself to the full of these advantages. He cultivated liter- ary pursuits, and his mental accomplishments were manifest in the choice library he collected, which is said to have been one of the most select in the State, containing many rare and costly books. Nor were they sealed treasures. He was considered to have been one of the best scholars in belles-lettres in the State of Virginia. His manners were courtly; of medium height, of rather slight but well-built frame, vigorous and alert, he seemed to many the very beau ideal of good breeding and refinement. With so many commanding qualities, Mr. Calwell be- came well known and a general favorite. In fact, so highly did his reputation stand as a man of affairs before the war, it was in the minds of many to elect him to the Legislature of Virginia as the representative of Greenbrier County. There were then great hopes of open- ing up the vast resources of western Virginia and utilizing the river systems of East and West Virginia, first, by the James River and the
Kanawha Canal, and, secondly, by the Coving- ton and Ohio Railway. It was thought that Mr. Calwell was eminently fitted by business expe- rience and wide acquaintance among the lead- ing men in the eastern parts of the State to serve in this juncture. But when the matter was urged upon him his characteristic modesty forced him to decline; and he gave as grounds of his refusal his many business engagements, and especially his relations to his father's affairs. * Mr. Calwell died at White Sulphur on April 29, 1881. He was twice married; first to Miss Columbia Gwathmey, daughter of Robert Gwathmey, of Richmond, Va., by whom he had three children, named Agnes Nicolson, James, and Columbia Gwathmey; and secondly to Miss Ella Fontleroy Temple, who, with an only daughter, Columbia G. Cal- well, still survives. They live in comfortable retirement at Richmond, Va., but year by year go to White Sulphur Springs, and there renew the associations of other and happier days. A retrospective of the brightest days in the his- tory of the White Sulphur is outlined in the following article printed in the Richmond Dis- patch of May 7, 1879. The writer gives an account of the resort as it appeared in 1830, which was before the days of railroads, when visitors journeyed to the Springs in their own conveyances of all types and styles, while many men traversed several States on horse- back to spend the suminer amid "charms of scene and society unsurpassed in the land." He gives a lingering sigh over the fascinations of the " horse-market" and "the noble crowd of men that assembled upon the green," and con- tinues :
"The remarkable family of the Calwells was in its zenith. The elder Calwell presided with grace over the economy of the grand watering- place, and was the general object of the respect and friendship of his generous guests. We shall never see the like of that day again. But last week one of the sons of the elder Calwell -Lewis Meriwether Calwell-died at the
*"In the spring of 1857 this property, having been greatly enlarged by the purchase of adjacent territory, making its entire area equal to six thousand acres, was sold to a com- pany of Virginia gentlemen who made various and important additions and improvements, and among others erected in the centre of the Springs grounds the largest hotel in the Southern country, its dimensions being four hundred feet long by a corresponding width, and covering more than an acre of ground."-From published pamphlet of W. S. S.
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PHOTO BY M.S.WILSON, PARKERSBURG. W.VA
ATLANTIC PUBG& ẾNG CONY
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White Sulphur, in the seventy-third year of his age. He was in his early day a man of prowess, as well as one of marked politeness. He was a great hunter and an excellent horseman. He held his career in the springs region of which the White Sulphur was the centre, and did his share in maintaining the manly sports and in- trepid hunts in the mountains. Times sadly changed before his eyes closed upon the moun- tains forever, and some of the forest monarchs and modest inhabitants of the hunter's path, the sweet 'trailing arbutus,' were among the last of the companions of his youth left to cheer his closing hours. The family of Calwells was distinguished for the qualities of other of its members in its palmy days. Colonel James Calwell commanded a regiment in the Mexican War, and went off in the prime of manhood to fall amid the rude hills and chaparral of Buena Vista. Sad was the fate of him who had re- joiced in the lovely mountains of Greenbrier, whose hunter's horn had echoed in her hills and who had followed the deer through her meadows and her glades. We recur to the cvent with sadness, and add with regret the latest occurrence that marks the continuous drift of change and departure from among us of the men and the scenes that once made the pride and the pleasure of our days."
HENRY S. WILSON.
HON. HENRY STEWART WILSON, Mayor of Parkersburg, was born in a small vil- lage called High Spire, situated in Dauphin County, Pa., July 5, 1829. His parents, Robert Wilson and Mary Stewart, immigrated to this country from the north of Ireland, Mrs. Wilson being a member of the same family of Stewarts from whom was derived the great New York merchant, Alexander T. Stewart. The parents were able to give their son a good academical education, first in the public schools of Phil- adelphia, then from Rev. David McCarter, a clergyman who had an academy at Strasburgh, Lancaster County, Pa .; while he afterward at- tended a military school at Harrisburg, Pa., which was at this time under the direction of Captain Partridge, who was a graduate of West Point Military Academy. The young man made a special study of civil engineering, in which he was greatly interested, and as soon as he had completed his studies at once entered into active field employment. His first im-
portant undertaking in this line was in the capacity of engineer of the branch of the Erie Railroad running from Hornellsville to Attica. He was also employed on the survey of the Ohio and Mississippi Railroad and in the build- ing of the Huntington and Broad Top Mountain road. These were heavy enterprises, making great demands upon Mr. Wilson's knowledge, ability, and experience; and besides these, he was engaged for several years in other enter- prises of a similar character, but smaller in degree, though frequently requiring not only thorough engineering skill and ability, but also executive capacity and judgment, as well as rugged physical health and power of endurance. A few years ago Mr. Wilson established himself at Parkersburg in the lumber business, and in even this brief residence he won the confidence and respect of his fellow-citizens so completely that he was nominated Mayor of the city, and elected in April, 1891, by a majority of 350, being a considerable increase over that of his predecessor, who was also a well-known and popular citizen. Parkersburg is one of the most progressive of the smaller cities of the United States. Market Street, which is its main thoroughfare, presents a metropolitan aspect quite surprising to the stranger, who readily makes himself at home in it, recognizing that here every comfort and advantage of civiliza- tion can be found. The city is well paved, its water-supply and general sanitary arrangements are excellent, and with regard to this part of the municipal affairs the scientific knowledge of Mayor Wilson eminently qualifies him for his position of chief magistrate; and his recom- mendations to the Council are always met with the most respectful and careful consideration and hearty approval. Even in the brief time in which he has occupied the office of Mayor, Mr. Wilson has suggested and the Council have adopted a number of improvements in public works; among other things a high-class water pump, at a cost of $5,000, capable of forcing 1, 500,000 gallons of water in twenty-four hours. This is known as No. 13 Fort Pitt Duplex Plunger, 20-inch cylinder, 13-inch plunger, 24- inch stroke; and it will greatly augment the water-supply of the city. The following his- torical record is supplied by City Clerk L. W. Hughes from the official records: The act in-
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CONTEMPORARY BIOGRAPHY OF WEST VIRGINIA.
corporating the town of Parkersburg was passed January 22, 1820. The act to extend the limits of the " city" of Parkersburg was passed in No- vember, 1863. All the records of the town up to 1844 were lost. In that year Peter Van Winkle was chosen President of the Board of Trustees of Parkersburg and filled the position each successive year up to 1850. He was suc- ceeded by James Cook, and he by A. M. Ster- rett, who, however, resigned in the same year of his election, 1852, his term being filled out by his predecessor, Mr. Cook. The latter was again elected in 1853 and resigned in 1854, being succeeded by A. J. Boreman, afterward Governor. He was succeeded by Henry Logan in 1855. John Jay Jackson was chosen in 1856 and 1857, when James Cook was again called to the position and served until 1861. He then resigned and was succeeded by M. P. Amiss. It is probable that Mr. Cook was the first one called " Mayor," and Mr. Amiss the second who received by courtesy that title. In November, 1863, the act already mentioned, extending the corporate limits and creating the city of Par- kersburg, was passed; and the first election after its passage occurred in January, 1864, when James W. Dils was elected Mayor, and he may therefore claim to be the first legally elected officer with that title. Mayor Wilson was for two years a Director in the Board of the State Hospital for the Insane, at Spencer. In business he is largely interested in the West Virginia timber product-the style of his firm being H. S. Wilson & Sons, who deal princi- pally in white oak for car and ship building purposes. They export extensively to the United Kingdom, principally Liverpool and Glasgow, where fully half of the output of their mills-several millions of feet-is sent annually. Mr. Wilson was the first manufacturer in the State to export direct to the customer. He is also at present engaged in constructing a nar- row-gauge railroad from Cairo, W. Va., south for a distance of about forty miles, and for the particular purpose of transporting timber and lumber to the trunk lines for the seaboard. This road is known as the Cairo and Kanawha Valley Railroad, of which Mr. Wilson is Presi- dent, Robert Wilson Secretary and Treasurer, and Harry S. Wilson Superintendent. He also built a narrow-gauge road running from Graf-
ton to Philippi, directing the construction and management of both of these enterprises per- sonally, as the directors of both companies gave him full and absolute control. Mayor Wilson's eldest son, Robert, is President of the Parkers- burg Chair and Furniture Company, which is a thriving concern with $60,000 capital. Mayor Wilson occupies a commodious residence with ample grounds on Ann Street, formerly the home of United States Senator Van Winkle, where he is happily surrounded by a family of three sons and two daughters. In 1856 he mar- ried Miss Anna M. Ennis, a native of Hunting- don County, Pa. Mrs. Wilson takes an intelli- gent interest in her husband's affairs, and has made his life happy and his home one full of culture as well as comfort. The eldest daugh- ter, Carrie Porter, married Rev. R. C. Hughes, a Presbyterian minister, who is now President of Tabor College, at Tabor, Iowa, a flourishing institution. It may be remarked that Mr. Hughes belongs to a family in which there have been thirteen Presbyterian clergymen in three generations. The second daughter, Ellen Blair, became the wife of Rev. Edgar W. Work, a Presbyterian minister of Wooster, Ohio, where he is professor of one of the chairs of scholar- ships. He is a young preacher of superior cul- ture and eloquence. In conclusion, it is but the simple truth to say that Henry S. Wilson has always been public-spirited and prominent wherever he has resided. His career bids fair to be one of constant achievement, and doubt- less higher honors await him. He is actively interested in the progress of the beautiful city of Parkersburg, which has been materially benefited under his practical and enterprising administration. A gentleman of democratic manners, he is not fond of display or self-as- sertion, but is earnest and sincere in all his associations and a man of action rather than promises.
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