USA > West Virginia > Prominent men of West Virginia: biographical sketches, the growth and advancement of the state, a compendium of returns of every election, a record of every state officer; > Part 29
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He was a member of the mass convention that assembled in Wheeling in May, 1861. The first day revealed the difficulties of the loyal men of the State. Several speeches were made by leading men of the Convention, and the question of treason to the General Government and treason to the State of Virginia was fully discussed. Able orators could picture the troubles we were in, but when a remedy was called for our old political leaders were silent. Some urged a protest against the action of the leaders at Richmond; others called for a new State, by force, that would embrace about the territory now included in our first Congressional District. At noon on the second day, the delegation from Hancock county was called together, and a set
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of resolutions were adopted as the sense of the loyal people of that county. Among the resolutions was the following :
" Resolved, That in the event of the ordinance of secession being ratified by a vote, we recommend to the people of the counties here represented, and all others disposed to co-operate with us, to appoint, on the 4th day of June, 1861, delegates to a General Convention to meet on the - of that month, at such place as may be designated by the committee hereafter provided, to devise such measures and take such action as the safety and welfare of the people they represent may demand. Each county to appoint a number of representatives to said convention equal to double the number to which it will be en- titled in the next House of Delegates, and the Senators and del- egates to be elected on the 23d inst. by the counties referred to, to the next General Assembly of Virginia, and who concur in the views of this convention, to be entitled to seats in said con- vention as members thereof."
These resolutions Mr. Atkinson laid before Hon. Daniel Pols- ley, who also agreed that the course therein proposed was the proper one to pursue. When the Convention assembled for the afternoon Mr. Atkinson read this resolution and made a strong speech in its advocacy, when it was referred to a committee of thirteen members already appointed, by whom it was incor- porated in their report and unanimously adopted by the Con- vention. If the papers of that committee of thirteen have been preserved, the original draft of this resolution, as it came from the Hancock delegation, will be found in Mr. Atkinson's hand writing. Mr. Polsley's advocacy of this plan, cleared the ques- tion of its perplexities in the minds of many, and when the time came for the selection of officers for the restored govern- ment of Virginia, his advocacy of this resolution made him the Lieutenant Governor of the State.
Mr. Atkinson was elected a member of the Convention that met the 11th day of June, 1861, and he took part in the passage of all the ordinances that were deemed necessary to adopt in the coming fight with secession. When the State of West Vir- ginia was organized, the 20th day of June, 1863, he took his seat as one of the Senators from the First District, and was awarded a re-election for the succeeding term. He was com- plimented with the chairmanship of the Committee on Educa- tion, having been a school teacher for a number of years, and had the honor to report the first free school system for the new
h
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State of West Virginia. We then had a few hundred log school houses; now we have over five thousand neat and respectable buildings, that will compare favorably with those of any of the older States of the Republic.
Mr. Atkinson has ever kept in the vanguard upon the tem- perance question, and for fifty years has regarded the use of intoxicating liquors as a great moral evil-standing in the way of happiness in the home, of political purity, and of individual financial success.
GEORGE LOOMIS.
HE first Judge of the Sixth Circuit, under the new State, and afterwards presiding over the Ninth continuously to January 1, 1873, when the revised Constitution cut short the term, was the above named attorney from Parkersburg. He was born at Little Falls, New York, April, 1824. In 1840 he removed to Fairfax county, Virginia, taught school, completed academic studies with Professor Burnley, of Culpeper, located in Fayette in 1848, and was county surveyor, studied law and was admitted in 1851; fixed his residence in Parkersburg in 1852, and served as prosecuting attorney for Jackson and Roane counties in 1860. He was elected Judge of the Circuit in 1862, ere West Virginia was created, and ably served on the bench for ten years. He took an active part in establishing Free Schools in the State, in extending the elective franchise, in or- ganizing West Virginia, and advocating then, as he still contin- ues to do ably, its advancement and substantial development. He was Mayor of Parkersburg in an exciting period; was State Senator from 1875 to 1877; contested unsuccessfully the election of Judge J. Monroe Jackson for the eight years' term, beginning January 1, 1873, as Judge of the Circuit; was made the candi- date of the Republican party for Congress in the Fourth Dis- trict, but failed of election, though he made a vigorous and pru- dent campaign. Judge Loomis has a large practice in State and Federal Courts, deals largely in real estate, and is able and en- ergetic in pushing railroad enterprises from Parkersburg as a center, being an officer in the proposed Norfolk line.
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ANDREW RUSSELL BARBEE.
A LTHOUGH opposed to the principle or practice of seces- sion, duty as a Virginian impelled Dr. Barbee to enter the Confederate army, in which he served as Captain and then Colonel; was twice wounded, after which he served in the med- ical department. He had been a tanner by trade, but studied medicine under Dr. J. J. Thompson (deceased), in Luray, Page county ; graduated at the University of Pennsylvania, at Phila- delphia, April, 1857, and began practice at Flint Hill, Rappa- hannock county, Virginia. He moved to Madison county, Va., in 1852, and finally settled at Point Pleasant, where he continued the practice of physician and surgeon, and has since served as President of the State Medical Association. He was a member of the State Senate in 1880-'84, and twice the nominee of his peo- ple for Congress, but was defeated. Dr. Barbee says he is a " protectionist," and by no means a "civil service reformer." He was born December 9, 1827, in Hawsburg, Rappahannock county, Virginia, and married Miss Margaret A. G., daughter of the late Dr. J. J. Thompson, in May, 1852. They have been blessed with three boys and three girls, but two of their boys have died.
HENRY STREIT WALKER.
T the head of the oratorical group among the prominents in our volume must, it will be conceded, be placed this journalist and politician, the present Secretary of State.
He was born May 31, 1840, at Winchester, Virginia, the son of Samuel and Elizabeth Walker, of Frederick county, Vir- ginia, and great grandson of Christian Streit, the first Lutheran minister of the Shenandoah Valley. His primary and acade- mical training were bestowed at Winchester and Morgantown, Monongalia county. In the fall of 1861 he entered Washing- ton College, Pennsylvania, graduating in the summer of 1863, receiving the first honor, and delivering the class valedictory. Journalism was his professional choice, and although, he read law, yet never sought admission to the Bar. He was first con- nected with a local paper at Clarksburg, whither his father had removed; then in 1865, became editor of the Wheeling Daily Register. While thus editing the leading exponent of Demo-
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cracy, in 1868, he was made the nominee for Congress in the Wheeling District, but was defeated by his Republican opponent, General I. H. Duval. In 1870, with the removal of the seat of government to Charleston, he located in Kanawha county and founded the Weekly, then Tri- Weekly, and afterwards Daily Courier, which he edited and published for ten years, making it, as a political force, the Democratic paper of the State. In 1875 he was the principal candidate, during the Legislature, for election to the United States Senate, but was, after a protracted struggle, beaten in caucus by a small majority. Afterwards, in 1878 and 1880, he ran for Congress in the Third District, against the party nominee, John E. Kenna, one of the present United States Senators, upon the Greenback platform, but was defeated. In 1871-2 he was Public Printer for the State. In 1885 he was appointed Secretary of State for the term ending March 3, 1889, and holds over pending the contest for Governor. He was for ten years Regent of the University. For the past seven years he has been largely engaged in stock raising upon a fine farm, which he owns in the Valley of Virginia.
In June, 1868, he married Emma, daughter of Hon. Geo. W. Bier, of Moundsville, Marshall county, sister of Captain Philip Bier, who was his schoolmate at college, and who was killed while serving as Adjutant to General Crook, at the battle of Cedar Creek. They have two children, Emma, a graduate of Granville Seminary, Ohio, and Philip, a youth of fifteen, just preparing for college.
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7 LITTLE.
HON. J. M. M'WHORTER.
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WEST VIRGINIA.
JOSEPH MARCELLUS MCWHORTER.
N the history of West Virginia, from March 4, 1865, to March 3, 1869, the records of the Auditor's office of West Virginia were signed with the above name. He was born in Lewis county, Virginia, April 30, 1828. The educational ad- vantages of his early life were only those afforded in the com- mon schools of the country. From the age of five to thirteen, he spent the years in the public schools of Ohio. The success of later life indicates that the opportunities over the river were not neglected. Some time during the next fifteen years he entered the county of Roane to seek the fortune and destiny of manhood. From 1856 to 1863, he was Clerk of both County and Circuit Courts, and the records of those years show an excellent penmanship, and a methodical accuracy creditable to any official. In 1863, June 20th, the State assumed its individ- uality, and the Legislature entered upon the duty of law-mak- ing under the Constitution of West Virginia. In that body, as the first member from Roane, was Joseph M. Mc Whorter. His honesty of purpose, industrial habits, and common sense ex- perience, fitted him to be a useful member, in both committee- rooms and House. He won his way into favor with the repre- sentative men from every portion of the State, and thus unin- tentionally cut the grooves leading to a future nomination for Auditor, to be in control of the revenues and finances of the State. As such his record is that of faithfulness and of com- petency. At the expiration of his official term he removed to Greenbrier county, with residence in Lewisburg, where he has since made his home. In 1870 Governor Stevenson appointed him to the Judgeship of the Seventh Circuit, composed of the counties of Greenbrier, Monroe, Pocahontas, Nicholas and Summers, to fill the vacancy occasioned by the removal of Nathaniel Harrison. In this, then difficult, jurisdiction he gave great satisfaction, and while maintaining the dignity of the Court and the observance of law, won the esteem of the Bar and the people. His term of office, by the ratification of the Constitution of 1872, ended December 31st, since which time he has devoted his energies and capabilities mainly to the prac- tice of his profession. In religious sentiment and adherence he is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and active in the work of his denomination. In politics, before the war he 1
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was a Whig, a Union man during the Rebellion, and since the war, a Republican. In the Congressional conventions of the Third District he has had an influential following for nomina- tion, and if made a candidate, would no doubt have given strength to the ticket.
GEORGE WILLIAM BROWN.
THE United States had for its Collector of Internal Revenue in the Second District of West Virginia in the years from 1868 to 1881 the able gentleman who pleasantly responds to the above name. He was born in Kingwood, Preston county, Vir- ginia, May 19, 1839. His educational opportunities were more than fair, and he improved them. His studies were pursued at Kingwood Academy, Washington College, Pennsylvania, and Duff's Business College, Pittsburgh. ยท In 1860-1, he was a Dep- uty U. S. Marshal; in 1861-2 Deputy Sheriff of Preston county, and in 1862-3 Clerk in the U. S. Quartermaster's Department at Clarksburg. He was always faithful, always true to his re- mote or immediate official superiors.
Col. Thomas Hornbrook, of Wheeling, was Military Agent for West Virginia till September 1, 1863, when George W. Brown was commissioned as Quartermaster General, with the rank of Colonel, in which capacity he served until January 1st, 1867. The Legislature then added the title and duties of Adju- tant General from November 1, 1866.
He held the office of Mayor of Grafton and has twice been elected Justice of the Peace, a very important office in the grow- ing town of Grafton.
He was Collector of Internal Revenue nearly fourteen years, . appointed by Andrew Johnson, General Grant, General Hayes, and served a part of General Garfield's administration.
He now resides at Grafton, Taylor county, where the constant roar of the passing trains of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad almost remind, faintly, but less apprehensively, of the din of battle.
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JOHN AUGUSTUS WARTH.
S the careful and able compiler of the present edition of the Code of West Virginia, Hon. John A. Warth is best known. His ancestors on his father's side were English, from the Isle of Man, who came to Virginia before the Revolutionary war. His father, the late John Warth, was one of the first set- tlers of the State of Ohio, at Marietta, under General Rufus Putnam, in the year 1788, and after Participating in the Indian wars of that period, removed to, and became one of the early salt makers of the Kanawha Valley, but in the year 1818, he removed with his family to his farm, in Mason (now Jackson) county, Virginia, where the subject of this sketch was born, on the 28th day of September, 1822. He has never lived outside of what is now the State of West Virginia, and since the death of his father, in the year 1837, his home has been in Kanawha county. He was educated at the Ohio University, when that institution was under the management of the late Dr. William H. McGuffey as its President.
He was married to Miss Alethea Briggs, daughter of the late Hon. Benjamin Briggs, of Newark, Ohio, on the 19th day of November, 1846. He was, from 1843 to 1846, employed as a steamboat clerk, and from 1846 to 1852 was engaged in the business of salt making. He was admitted to the Bar in 1852, and has ever since been a practicing attorney. .
In the years 1857 and 1858 he represented the District com- posed of Kanawha and other counties in the Senate of Virginia. He was one of the representatives of Kanawha county in the Convention of 1872, that framed the present constitution of West Virginia. He was President of the County Court of Kanawha county, from 1876 to 1880. He was, in 1887, ap- pointed by the Legislature of the State of West Virginia to compile the laws of the State into one volume with marginal notes to former laws and decisions of the courts, which resulted in the present Code, and as such was approved by the Supreme Court of Appeals.
In politics Judge Warth has always been a Democrat. In business he has Finvariably pursued a straight forward course, being specially careful to meet his engagements and promises. He is a good lawyer and an honest man.
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CHARLES MORTIMER BISHOP.
IN the prime of manhood and usefulness still is Charles M. -
Bishop, of Kingwood, Preston county. He was born at Moorefield, in the county of Hardy, Virginia, January 4, 1827, and attended school there and in Charlestown, Jefferson county In 1843 his father moved to Kingwood, and he learned the trade of saddler, working under his father's instruction and com- mand, early and late. July 16, 1851, he wedded Margaret E., daughter of Reuben Morris. From that time till August, 1872, he was in mercantile business at Rowlesburg, on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, when he returned to Kingwood. He was elected as a Republican to the House of Delegates in 1870, serv- ing till 1872, when he was chosen State Senator for the District composed of Preston and Monongalia counties. In both branches of legislation he was an important member of the Finance Committee, also of the Senate Committees on Educa- tion and Humane Institutions. In religious faith he is a mem- ber of the Methodist Episcopal Church. He devotes his time between his store at the county seat, his several stock farms, the National Bank of which he is a director, and the affairs of the county as Commissioner. He neglects none, and is earnest, sincere and esteemed in all.
THOMAS J. WEST.
CT HOMAS J. WEST, son of Nathaniel West, was born in Monongalia county, Virginia, in 1830. He attended the subscription schools of his native county for a number of years, and took an academic course at Smithfield, Pennsylvania. He settled in the beautiful section of Harrison county, near West Milford, prior to the war, and became a farmer on a large and profitable scale. In 1870 his fellow-citizens elected him to the House of Delegates of West Virginia; and in 1876 he was elected State Treasurer on the Democratic ticket, and served during the Executive administration of the Hon. Henry M. Mathews. Upon the expiration of his term as Treasurer he was appointed Superintendent of the West Virginia Penitentiary, which position he filled honorably and acceptably for upwards of four years. Since his retirement from the management of the Penitentiary he has resided upon his Harrison county farm, where he is both popular and prosperous.
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JOHN W. MASON.
THE grandfather of the subject of this sketch lived in a large, double log house-which was the stately mansion of that era-near the old road from Kingwood to Morgantown, in what is now Valley District, Preston county, but at that time was in Monongalia county, Virginia. Here he brought up a family in the manner peculiar to those days. One of his sons the father of the subject of this sketch, was a blacksmith. Though indus- trious and energetic, it was out of his power to give his sons other than a common English education, such as could be ob- tained in the subscription schools of the county. He had two sons. The elder became a physician, and has practiced medi- cine in his native county for many years. The younger, John W., chose law for his profession. While working upon his father's farm, in his native county of Monongalia, as opportu- nity afforded, he read, with thoughtfulness and care, such rudi- mentary law books as he could secure from friends. Later he studied at Morgantown; was admitted to the Bar and located at Grafton, Taylor county, where he has since resided, and con- ducted a large and profitable practice.
When a mere boy, Mr. Mason became a soldier in the Union army, and remained in the service till the close of the Rebellion. In early life he developed a taste for politics, but never sought office at the hands of his party. He preferred home life and the practice of the law to office-holding. In 1872 Mr. Mason was made Chairman of the Republican State Executive Committee of West Virginia and served efficiently for four years. He was eight years the West Virginia representative on the National Republican Executive Committee, serving with entire satisfac- tion to his constituency. He was the Republican nominee for Congress in the Second West Virginia District in 1882, and was defeated by the slim majority of ten votes. He was urged to make the race again for the same position in 1884, but declined. In 1888 he was nominated, by acclamation, on the Republican ticket, for Judge of the Supreme Court of Appeals of the State, and was defeated along with the balance of the ticket by a ma- jority of less than six hundred-General Goff, the candidate for Governor, being the only Republican who secured a majority of the votes cast in that campaign. Under President Harrison's administration, Mr. Mason was appointed to the high position
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of Commissioner of Internal Revenue, which office he is now filling ably and acceptably.
Commissioner Mason is a good lawyer ; is a member of the Presbyterian Church ; is a genial, clever gentleman, and is high- ly esteemed as an honorable, upright citizen.
PATRICK FEE DUFFY.
D ANIEL WEBSTER made the remark " Ireland is making America," at a Teachers' Convention in Boston, some years ago-and there were not enough Irish teachers present to call for " blarney." To a very great extent this is true regard- ing West Virginia. Very many of our ablest legislators and officials are either born Irishmen or direct descendants. The present State Auditor is a native of County Monoghan, Ireland, where he was born March 14, 1841, but has been a resident of what is now West Virginia, since 1855. His parents were Michael and Margaret Fee Duffy. The lad enjoyed only the sparse advantages of a common school for his education, but upon that foundation he builded wisely by close application and observation for useful citizenship in his adopted country. He first served his people as commissioner to re-assess lands in Webster county in 1875 and in 1882; was Sheriff of the same county from 1877 to 1881, and was also Commissioner of School Lands for the same county. He was elected Auditor of West Virginia on the Democratic ticket for the term of 1885 to 1889, and re-elected for the four subsequent years, ending December 31, 1892.
Like all our Irish citizens, he is full of the fire of patriotism, and when his adopted State called her sons to her defense in the war of 1861, he responded as promptly as only an Irishman would. He was First Lieutenant of the Thirty-sixth Virginia Infantry Regiment; served throughout the war, except while a prisoner at Johnson's Island, Ohio, having been captured in June, 1864. Few men are more deservedly popular with the masses. In official life, as in commercial, his integrity is only equalled by his industry and care. His home is at Webster C. H., where, when not engaged in official duties, he follows merchandising.
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WEST VIRGINIA.
HON. PATRICK F. DUFFY.
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PROMINENT MEN OF
FONTAINE SMITH.
H ON. FONTAINE SMITH, whose name has been familiar for many years to every well-informed citizen of the State, was born within the limits of historic Virginia. He began law study in 1848 and was admitted in 1850. In 1857 he located at Mannington, Marion county, where he divided time between school teaching and law practice for several years. In 1860 he was made an elector upon the Douglas Democratic ticket. He was an ardent opponent of secession in every phase. In 1861 he was elected to the Virginia Legislature, but declined to serve after the ordinance of secession was passed, but took an active part in the restoration of Virginia to the Union in the Wheeling movement in 1861. In the Legislature there met, he was Chair- man of the House Committee on Courts of Justice. At the Grafton Democratic Convention in 1868, he was tendered the Congressional nomination for the Second District, but refused the candidacy. In 1872 he was editor of the Liberalist and a member of the Constitutional Convention of 1872, in Charleston, Kanawha county. He was a member of the State Senate from 1881 to 1883. Since that time he has taken no active leadership in politics, preferring the quiet of a large law practice. His son, Clarence L. Smith, a young lawyer of promise, is, and has been for several years, the efficient and accommodating Clerk of Ma- rion Circuit Court, and in 1886 was made a Regent of the State University.
WILLIAM ALEXANDER QUARRIER.
H ON. W. A. QUARRIER was born in Kanawha county, Virginia, October 1, 1828. He wedded Cora Greenhow, of Vincennes, Indiana, August 26, 1865. From 1877 to 1881 he was a member of the House of Delegates of West Virginia. He was prominently mentioned and voted for by devoted friends when the Democratic party had the power to elect the United States Senator. This was, perhaps, the only office to which he ever aspired. The law was his profession and pride. In it he was remarkably successful, and from a rapidly growing practice, and in the prime of a promising life, he was suddenly summoned to the Bar above, and died September 10, 1888, in his recently constructed beautiful home, on the banks of the Kanawha, where his widow and children continue to reside.
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WEST VIRGINIA.
WILLIAM T. ICE.
H [ON. WILLIAM T. ICE was born in Marion county, Vir- ginia, March 9, 1840. His boyhood was passed upon a farm, and his education received in the common schools of his native county. He read law with Hon. Fontaine Smith in Fair- mont; was admitted to the Bar in 1864, and soon thereafter lo- cated at Philippi, in Barbour county, West Virginia, where he has since resided. In 1866 he was elected Prosecuting Attorney for that county, and was re-elected in 1870. In the Legislature of 1875 he represented the Delegate District composed of the counties of Barbour, Taylor and Harrison. In October, 1880, he was elected Judge of the Third Judicial Circuit, and filled that responsible position for the ensuing term of eight years, at the expiration of which he resumed the practice of law. Judge Ice is a careful lawyer, and left an enviable record as a Judge when he laid down the Judical ermine to resume his place at the Bar.
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