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FRDM-THE-LIBRARY-OF
TR1NITYCOLLEGE TORONTO

FROM THE LIBRARY
OF THE LATE

COLONEL HENRY T. BROCK

DONATED NOVEMBER, 1933

Presented to the
LIBRARY of the

UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO

TRINITY COLLEGE
LIBRARY

BIOGRAPHIES

SUCCESSFUL

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS.

PHILADELPHIA:
PUBLISHED BY JAMES K. SIMON,

If o. 33 SOUTH SIXTH STREET.

1864.

Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1864, by
STEPHEN N. WINSLOW,

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of

Pennsylvania.

\58

INTRODUCTION.

DURING the years 1860 and '61 the Commercial List of Phi-
ladelphia, published a series of sketches, giving a lively ac-
count of the personal and private history of the Bank Presi-
dents of that city, and also, in the same connection, some no-
tice of the antecedents and career of the cashiers of the
same institutions. The record was generally a fair one, though
a few of the officials came oifwith drooping colors and a repu-
tation far from enviable. As, however, no effort was made
by the writers to suppress truth, and as there was much
intrinsic merit in the sketches, they attracted a wide circle of
readers, and were the subject of much attention among those
interested in banks and banking, and in many classes of
the business community who have heavy financial relations.
These sketches, of so much interest to the banking commu-
nity, would have been published in book form, for permanent
preservation, profit and interest, both historically and locally,
had it not .been for the earnest protest, with but one excep-
tion, of the entire body of whom the sketches were the chro-
nicle. Their value would have been considerable, as we know
from experience. Think how interesting it would be to have
a full, reliable local account of the operations of the great
financier, Robert Morris, written all fresh and glowing with
life, at the very time when Morris was carrying the financial
burthen of the United States as he walked through the streets
of the Quaker City.

Of course maturer views come later than contemporaneous

VI INTRODUCTION.

impressions ; but there are certain facts and incidents in the
lives of all distinguished men, which, if there is no Boswell at
hand to record, perish beyond the reach of the historic pen.
Though as fleeting and evanescent, they are far more charac-
teristic than the snow flake on the river, or the bubble on the
fountain, to which they have been likened. As Shakspeare
has it,

" There is a history in all men's lives,
Fig'ring the nature of the times deceas'd ;
The which observed, a man may prophesy
With a near aim, of the main chance of things
As yet not come to life."

Mr. Girard's gig, his peculiar coat and his characteristic
walk, might have been sketched by any habitue of Third
street thirty years ago; and yet, at this date, how few there
are who remarked him sufficiently well to give a correct pen-
portrait of the great financier, or one even half as accurate and
satisfactory as the marble statue which stands in the glo-
rious marble edifice by which his name has become renowned
throughout the country. Hence we see the importance of
treasuring up what appears to be gossip now, for it may be-
come history hereafter. Let us keep an eye on our nascent
leaders of finance, and our youthful generals of the business
world, for we know not who may be the master minds and
mighty men of the future.

In addition to the Bank Presidents, the Commercial List
published, in later issues, choice sketches of successful mer-
chants, who have earned and spent their capital in Philadel-
phia, and whose lives, thus written, have also attracted atten-
tion and interest in business circles.

The approbation which both sets of sketches have met
with, in the circles for which they were written, determined
the production of the present work, the character of which is
indicated by the title. In pursuance of the plan upon which
they were started the sketches take a wide range, and care has
been taken to have them accurate and readable ; not only
containing lessons for practical use, but such personal gossip as
indicates character or will interest the reader. Broad traits

INTRODUCTION. Vll

are outlined with a liberal hand, while narrow and petty cha-
racteristics have no courtly veil thrown over their deformities.

"An absolute historian

Should be in fear of none ; neither should he

Write anything more than truth for friendship, .

Or less for hate."

Little things go further than many of us think toward making
up the character of all humanity, and frequently much can
he learned by watching how a merchant signs his name,
handles a bank note, or gives an order. Magnanimity and
meanness have each their set marks, by which the thinking
eye and the quick intellect detect them, be they ever so ob-
scure to the idle brain or the foolish vision of the indolent and
silly.

The interest of the work will spring partly from the fact
that in Philadelphia there is more real, solid, enduring wealth
than in any city in the Union. Financial crisises, which have
swept like a tornado over the land, have touched Philadelphia
with gentle wings. lips and downs are common to all business
communities, but our city claims a greater immunity than any
other. There are, however, in Philadelphia, perhaps, a num-
ber of mean men in business equal to the proportion in any
other metropolis. This class is marked by its selfish unwil-
lingness to assist in the promotion of the general interests of
the community, unless they can see without an opera glass
that the stream of direct pecuniary profit is to percolate and
trickle into their capacious pantaloons pockets. We have
expounded, for general edification, glimpses we have obtained
of the contemptible characteristics of this class of men, and
thus, perhaps, do some good in the prosecution of our general
plan. There is a wide field for such elucidation, and in the
dry goods line it especially exists. It is with pain that we
have time and again observed that merchants, after a prosper-
ous career of twenty, thirty or forty years in this line, and
after having accumulated a handsome competency, make up
their minds to retire, and cut loose absolutely from all con-
nection with their partners, clerks and other employees. After
a profitable association with young and struggling men, these
curmudgeons vanish from the stage of active business, leaving

Vlll INTRODUCTION.

all their employees to shift for themselves, when, hy a little
timely liberality, they might assist them to enter on a career
of honor and usefulness. In New York a much more liberal
idea prevails. On retiring, the Gothamite merchant frequently
leaves a large portion of his capital in the house to which he
has been attached, and thus benefits a wide circle who have
become endeared to him by hourly association, and whose
sterling qualities he has learned to respect and honor. Many
who fail to act this just and generous part were mean in their
active life, and are still meaner in their retirement ; meanness
is a component part of their character, and particular attention
should be paid to their ignoble qualities. It may be that our
disclosures will hardly comport with their present apparently
dignified seats in the social synagogue, but the lesson of their
lives may be made a jewel of value to others who are about
entering on a career, and need landmarks by which to avoid
rocks, quicksands and shoals. The achievement of wealth
and position is accomplished in ways as various as the idio-
syncracies of the seekers after money and honor ; God has
gifted some men with liberal minds and hearts ; in other cases
a coarse-grained and illiberal nature struggles through all the
cultivation or courtly veneer which the instincts of selfish pru-
dence induce men to throw over their moral deformities.
Some men are benevolent, charitable and kindly natured by
as simple a process as the sun shines, or the flowers bloom, or
the glad waters run. Kindness is a law of their being, and
they shed as chivalrous and noble an influence around them
as those knights of old shed opulence by the scattering of
largess or the dropping of pearls from their jeweled garments.
A room is cheerful because such generous men are in it, and a
kindly action seems ten fold more kindly because they have
so large-hearted a way of going into it.

Philadelphia is remarkable for the number of self-made
merchants and manufacturers in it ; men who feared not

"Those twin-jailors of the aspiring soul,
Low birth and iron fortune,"

't^p-pushed right onward over difficulties which would appal
any heart less stout, and energy less powerful and untiring.

INTRODUCTION. IX

To the American, whose country is a living epistle, known
and read by all men, as to the capacities of the entire human
race for elevation, honor and usefulness, such lives are the
most inspiring of lessons. They teach patience, boldness, pru-
dence, energy and daring ; and they should also teach us that
every man can help his brother, if he will only set about it in
the right spirit, and with a generous determination to act as
fairly by others as he would wish to be dealt with himself.
We can find many bright and striking contrasts in the lives of
such men as Stephen Girard, John Grigg, T. P. Cope, John
Welsh, J. W. Claghorn, Richard Wistar, Jos. R. Evans, Adam
Steinmetz, J. W. Myers, J. B. Lippincott, John Macrea,
Richard Ashurst, Samuel Grant, I. Cornelius, S. Morris
Wain, John Stitt, and a host of other noble Philadel-
phians, who have built up the fabric of their fortunes, and now
hold, or have held while living, positions of influence or
honor by the title of their own intellect. It is from this class
that liberal subscriptions to enlightened public improvements
come, and they are constantly performing disinterested and
high-minded acts, of which the world knows but little, be-
cause they are not done for the sake of mere ostentation or
self-glorification, but from a sincere and wise conviction of
the justice and sagacity, as well as liberality of such actions.
We do not know what we would do without such atlas-like
men to uphold the commercial and manufacturing interests of
Philadelphia; they sustain grandly the projects which have
built up our beautiful city, and genius and patriotism, litera-
ture and the arts, never look in vain to them for recognition.
Visit their mansions, and behold how our merchants are
princes ; see the graceful appreciation awarded to genius and
intellect in the works of art which adorn their walls and
drawing-rooms ; scan their rich libraries and delicate and fra-
grant conservatories. Then go to the abodes of the humble,
and learn how many of the rich and honorable recognise their
duties to humanity and shed the bright light of generosity
over places which would else be dark and desolate.

Let us, without at this time revealing the name, tell the
simple story of the career of a manufacturer, who has long

X INTRODUCTION.

been an honor to the circle in which he moves. It is as fol-
lows :

About thirty years ago, an Irish lad of eleven years of age,
arrived in Philadelphia. He was fresh from the Emerald Isle,
and was probably rough, awkward and untutored. But he
had the stuff in him of which men of grit are made. He
entered a counting house at a weekly stipend of one dollar.
Patiently and slowly he won his way. By promptness, quick-
ness, energy and industry he won on the regard of his em-
ployer, and ere long the post of assistant clerk rewarded his
zeal. A vacancy occurring after he had shown his trusty qua-
lities, he was awarded the position of first clerk. Then he be-
came cashier, and then a partner in the business. He is now
sole proprietor of one of the largest manufactories in Philadel-
phia, and he may be set clown as worth $200,000. All of this
sprung from his one dollar per week, together with his ster-
ling qualities of head and heart. He is just the same modest,
simple, unassuming man to-day, as he was a lad of eleven
when he came to Philadelphia. He has his oddities of man-
ner and peculiar eccentricities about other minor matters,
but his heart is as sound and his brain as clear as a silver bell.
|Ie is ever ready for a work of real benevolence, while abhor-
ring humbug and cant, and he can always be appealed to on
behalf of any extensive improvement, irrespective of the ques-
tion whether his own personal bank account is to be increased
or not. His life has been honorable and useful, with not a
few of the elements of greatness mingling with its warp and
woof.

As the pole suggests the tropics, such a career brings to
mind other and meaner lives. There are some men, wealthy
and influential ones, too, who commit acts which, if they were
done by the poorer classes, would result in their incarceration
within the walls of the Eastern Penitentiary. We have a case
in point, which is calculated to make an honest man blush.
The gentleman^.} who is the hero of the narrative — for he is re-
cognized as a gentleman in society— has been in the frequent
receipt, by mail, of remittances in large and small sums. Not
long since he made his appearance at the desk of the Chief

INTRODUCTION. XI

Clerk in the Post Office, and alleged that he had just taken
from his box a letter from which a draft on a city bank, for
about one hundred dollars, had been fradulently abstracted,
and as the point from which the letter had been mailed was
but a short distance from Philadelphia, he was confident that
the draft had been abstracted by some one in the Post Office
here. This imputation on the character of the office nettled
the chief clerk, and that functionary determined to sift the
matter to the bottom, and ferret out the criminal, if such there
was. He made the necessary inquiries as to the day the letter
was due here, closely cross-examined the clerks, and after a
diligent investigation, proceeded to the bank on which the
draft was drawn. He found that it had been paid, and bore the
endorsement, or seeming endorsement, of the loser. He bor-
rowed the draft, and brought it to the office. On comparing
the apparently forged signature of the loser, on the back of
the document, with the hand-writing of a certain night clerk,
a remarkable resemblance was discovered. Several experts
were called in, and declared that the hand- writing of the clerk
and the chirography of the "forger" were one and the same.
A clerk in the bank was privately shown the suspected clerk,
and he identified him as the man to whom the money had been
paid ! The net- work seemed to be closing around the poor
night clerk, and it was determined that he should be arrested.
The Chief Clerk, jubilant at his discovery, sent for the mer-
chant who said he had lost the draft. While the Chief Clerk
and the merchant were closeted in the Postmaster's private
office, and the former was detailing his success to the mer-
chant, he observed, as he proceeded with the recital, that the
merchant began to wear a livid hue ; his countenance assumed
a pallid aspect, in which a guilty conscience seemed to come
to the surface to horrify and disgust the beholder. Trembling
lips, too, were seen, and as the truth, in all its damning mean-
ness, Hashed across the mind of the Chief Clerk, he at onoe
boldly charged the merchant with having written his own sig-
nature in a feigned hand, so as to secure the spoils of his own
guilt, and ruin an innocent man. The guilty, miserable crea-
ture, overwhelmed with confusion, confessed his guilt and im-

Xli INTRODUCTION.

plored mercy. He acknowledged his criminality in the whole
transaction — a transaction which was about to stain forever
the reputation of an honest, hard working man, whose only
capital was his skill as a scrivener and his integrity in his cle-
rical position. The Chief Clerk, determined that the reputa-
tion of the night clerk should be vindicated, threatened to have
the guilty merchant exposed and punished, unless he proceeded
to a magistrate at once, and made an affidavit confessing the
crime in all its details. The merchant humiliated himself by
signing and swearing to the odious confession, and the matter
there rested.

Look on this picture and then on the one given before it.
Contrast the character of the two men, and read the moral
which stands out so plainly.

In the line of our sketches we enliven our recital by such
incidents as appear instructive to the young and interesting to
the old. Personal gossip, wiien reliable, is not disdained, nor
graphic pen-portraits omitted. We all know how John Jacob
Astor peddled the figs in the streets of New York, and Stephen
Girard retailed the fragrant orange in Philadelphia ; and yet,
these facts only make more instructive the subsequent career
of these great men, one of whom blessed mankind when he
founded the Astor Library, and the other set an example for
all future ages when he endowed the college which bears his
name. All men cannot leave such towering monuments to
their memory, but all can do something that will leave " foot-
prints on the sands of time," so that after they are dead, the
recollection of their elevated qualities will be grateful to their
descendants, and instructive to all who learn the story of their
lives, with their toils, trials, struggles, successes, downfalls and
victories.

" No age hath been, since nature first began
To work Jove's wonders, but hath left bejiind
Some deeds of praise for mirrors unto man,

i Which more than threatful laws have men inclined;

To tread the paths of praise excites the mind ;
Mirrors tie thoughts to virtue's due respects;
Examples hasten deeds to good effects."

EDWARD G. JAMES,

THE FOLLOWING PAGES ARE

A TRIBUTE TO ONE OF PHILADELPHIA'S MOST SUCCESSFUL MERCHANTS,

AND ONE WHO STANDS FORTH AS A TYPE OF

THE SELF-MADE MAN,
THE LARGE-HEARTED PATRIOT,

(With the ardent wishes of the author ^ that the biographies recorded

in these pages may incite the young generation ofmer=

chants^ now growing up around us; to a

career as honorable and as successful as

that cfhim to whom/ this worlo is

affectionately inscribed^ ly

STEPHEN N. WINSLOW,

CONTENTS.

JOHN GRIGG,

JOHN JORDAN, ....
HENRY BUDD, ....
SAMUEL CARPENTER, . .
WILLIAM MUSSER, . . .
JOSEPH H. SEAL, . . .
EDWARD C. KNIGHT, . .
HUGH CRAIG, ....
THOMAS KIDGWAY, . .
ALEXANDER ELMSLIE,
SAMUEL BRECK, . , .
THOMAS LEAMING, . . .
JAMES MCHENRY, . . .
COL. WILLIAM B. THOMAS,
QUINTIN CAMPBELL, . .
DANIEL H. BOCKHILL, .
DR. DAVID JAYNE, . .
ALEXANDER G. CATTELL,
CHARLES MACALESTER, .
JOSEPH E. EVANS, . . .
JOHN T. EICKETTS, . .
WILLIAM CUMMINGS . .
A. J. DERBYSHIRE, . . .
ISAAC E. DAVIS, . . .
GEORGE W. CARPENTER, .
EGBERT WALN, ....
ALEXANDER HENRY, . .
JOHN PRICE WETHERILL,
THOMAS SPARKS, . . .
MATTHEW CAREY, . . .

PAGE.

103

107

111

114

117

121

124

129

132

137

141

144

PAGE.

DAVID FREED, 149

CHARLES OAKFORD, . . . 152

DENNIS KELLY, 158

ALEXANDER YOUNG, . . . 163

JOHN WELSH, 167

EDMUND A. SOUDER, . . . 171
ARCHIBALD GETTY, . . .175
THEODORE H. YETTERLEIN, . 177
THOMAS P. COPE, .... 181
THOMAS DRAKE, .... 186
SAMUEL COATES, .... 192
CHARLES S. BOKER, . . . 195
THOMAS MIFFLIN, .... 199
SAMUEL BISPHAM, .... 202
LAWRENCE PETERSON, . . 206
BENJAMIN W. EICHARDS, . 209
BENJAMIN BULLOCK, . . . 213
JOHN B. AUSTIN, . . . .217
HORATIO A. FITZGERALD, . 221

JOHN TRUCKS, 225

CHARLES MASSEY, JR., AND

MANUEL EYRE, . . . 227
ELLISTON PEROT AND JOHN

PEROT, 230

EGBERT MORRIS, .... 234
EODNEY FISHER, .... 237
JOSEPH B. SHEWELL, . . . 239
PERSONAL PROSPERITY OF

MERCHANTS. .... 241

JOHN CRICC

BIOGRAPHIES

SUCCESSFUL PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS.

JOHN GRIGG.

THE history of the book trade in the United States is yet to be
worthily written. Beginning in the smallest way, amid the con-
temptuous sneers of the egotistical foreigner — continued under
circumstances of the most discouraging description — illustrated
during the progress of its development by noble examples of reso-
lute energy, daring enterprise and successful tact, this department
of American industry has reached such a degree of importance and
perfection that we need have no fear of comparison. As late as
the year 1786, book publishing was still in its infancy in this
country, and we depended almost entirely upon England for literary
pabulum. Four publishers of that period held a consultation in
regard to the probability of their being remunerated for the labor
and expense involved in the production of an American edition of
the New Testament. But not many years afterwards, thanks to
the efforts of such men as Matthew Carey and Ebenezer Hazard,
our own publications obtained decided success, and amply rewarded
their projectors. Carey, particularly, distinguished himself by
issuing an edition of the Bible, at a cost of about fifteen thousand
dollars — a bold enterprise at that day. Nearly all the standard
educational works were imported, and the prices of some of them
were so high that they were beyond the reach of the masses.
Philadelphia was then the principal centre of the book trade, and, as

18 BIOGRAPHIES OF

the business of the dealers increased, branch establishments were
founded in the leading cities of the South. It was not until the
West began to loom up in importance as a market, that New York
could maintain a respectable rivalry with the city of Penn in sup-
plying the literary wants of the nation. Book trade sales were
inaugurated in Philadelphia in 1824, and have been continued with
great success ever since. Boston and ISTew York now enjoy the
superiority in the publication of light literature ; but Philadelphia
publishes more medical and educational works than any other city
in the Union, and can boast of containing the most extensive book
distributing concern in the world. The latter was founded, and
raised to the summit of prosperity, principally by Mr. John Grigg,
whose career we now propose to sketch.

Mr. Grigg began life at the foot of the ladder of fortune. He
was left an orphan at a very early age, and compelled to gain his
bread by the severe drudgery of a farm. But while still a lad he
was remarkable for restless activity and self-reliance ; and we find
that he soon left the plough to try the roving and adventurous life
of the sailor. The sea has often an irresistible charm for bold and
sanguine youth. The desire of seeing strange lands and people —
the anxiety to behold the wonders of the deep — the thirst for
thrilling exploit in the face of deadly peril — send thousands of boys
to encounter trials which their fancies clothe with wild romance.
Young Grrigg remained long enough on shipboard to gain a tho-
rough knowledge of a seaman's duty — to enlarge his acquaintance
with the world and to discipline his own character. Ambitious,
industrious and energetic, his earnest desire to acquire all the
knowledge and advantages of his position, enabled him to resist
many of the temptations that assail youth in all circumstances and
places. Leaving his seafaring life, he took up his residence in
Richmond, Ya., and devoted thirteen months to arduous study;
his ability and application attracted his relatives, who offered him
some assistance; but his main reliance was upon his own quick-
ness of apprehension and unwavering industry in acquiring know-
ledge. The West, then opening bright pages of promise for enter-
prise, next won the attention of the young student, and he left
Yirginia for Ohio. Here he established himself in Warren county,
where he was appointed Clerk of the Court of Common Pleas and
Chancery. This was an arduous and exacting office, but Mr.
Clrigg mastered all the details of the business, and displayed such
extraordinary industry that his friends became alarmed for his

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 19

health. While thus employed he won the esteem arid cordial
friendship of some of the first men in Ohio — among whom were
Hon. John McLean and Hon. Thomas Corwin. With the latter
gentleman his friendship was of the closest intimacy, each holding
the other in that loving esteem which is founded on congeniality
in tastes and habits. Writing of him, Mr. Corwin says: "I can
say of him, with entire confidence in the opinion, that he was, from
boyhood up, through every change of place, occupation and for-
tune, an earnest, frank, sincere, honest man. After entering the
Clerk's office, he very soon made himself master of every detail,
and became, in fact, clerk of the court. I know he often wrote
from fifteen to eighteen hours, every twenty-four, for weeks to-
gether." The intimacy thus begun has continued until the pre-
sent day.

The trying industry of his life began to show itself upon the
young overtasked frame, and Mr. Grigg was compelled by claims
of health to leave his situation and again seek a new sphere of
action. He found no difficulty in procuring a less trying and har-
rassing situation, being well known and highly esteemed in a large
circle of influential friends. At that time woolen manufactures
were engaging much attention in Kentucky. The business had
been encouraged by the prevalence of a war between this country
and Great ^Britain, and new proprietors were commencing the
lucrative pursuit with much zeal. Mr. Joel Scott had a prosper-
ous factory in Scott county, Ky., on the Elkhorn Creek, a region
renowned for its beauty, fertility and salubrity. In 1815 Mr.
Grigg entered Mr. Scott's establishment, as superintendent, bring-
ing to bear upon his new employment the same resolution to
conquer all its difficulties that had already given him insight into
the mysteries of his former vocations. Many times his best ener-
gies were sorely tasked; on one occasion he found himself unex-
pectedly left with the entire charge of the establishment resting
upon him; but his ability proved equal to every emergency, and Mr.
Scott bore willing testimony to his value in his new capacity.
From the most minute details of sorting wools, to the enlarged
comprehension of the duties before him as a whole, he proved him-
self competent, willing and untiring in his position. Mr. Scott
writes of "his uncommon industry, activity and efficiency in busi-
ness," and of "his exalted and honorable feelings and principles."
He says: "Mr. Grigg won the ejitire confidence and most cordial
attachment not only of myself and family, but also of all with

20 BIOGRAPHIES OF

whom he had been associated in business. This attachment was
fully reciprocated by his own warm and generous heart, and was
evinced not only by the manifestation of feeling, but also by the
bestowal of some memorial to the various members of the family
when he took leave of us." Again Mr. Scott writes: "Still (1851)
the warmth of his noble heart is unabated. Not a single year has
been allowed to pass without the receipt of some substantial and
cherished memorial of his abiding friendship, not only to myself,
but to my children and grand children, all of whom he seems to
embrace in the wide scope of his generous affections, although he
has never seen but a single individual of them."

But Mr. Grigg had not yet reached the vocation in which he
was to achieve a great name and a great fortune. Although he
was pleasantly situated in Kentucky, his ambition increased as he
became more conscious of his natural aptitude for extensive busi-
ness operations. He desired a broader field for exerting his abili-
ties. In 1816 he determined to go to the city of Philadelphia —
then the commercial metropolis of the country — and seek a situa-
tion in a wholesale dry goods house. But when Mr. Grigg arrived
at his newly chosen theatre of action, he discovered that the dry
goods trade was much depressed. He found himself in a large
city, comparatively without means, and with but few friends. It
is stated that he was about to abandon the plans he Jiad formed
for the future, and return to Kentucky, when a fortunate circum-
stance occurred, which rendered it necessary that he should remain
a citizen of Philadelphia. He made the acquaintance of Mr. Ben-
jamin Warner, a bookseller, who was a remarkably keen judge of
character. Mr. Warner was quick to appreciate Mr. Grigg's good
qualities, and immediately gave him the situation of clerk. This
was the commencement of John Grigg's connection with the book
trade. The business was entirely new to him; but so the woolen
manufacture had been. The young clerk acted upon the principle
that energy and perseverance will enable a man of ordinary intel-
ligence to master any mercantile or mechanical occupation, and
applied himself to the book trade as if he had never been trained
to any other branch of industry. Among the clerks then in the
house were John Bouvier, who afterwards became eminent as a
Judge and legal writer; our venerated citizen Uriah Hunt and
John B. Ellison, all of whom became the life-long friends of Mr.
Grigg. One of the great advantages enjoyed by Mr. Grigg was a re-
markably tenacious memory. His first achievement in his new

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 21

employment was to fix in his mind the name, character and price of
every book in the establishment, so that he could promptly put his
hand upon the article wanted by a purchaser. His evident supe-
riority not only awakened the admiration of his employer, but
kindled the jealousy of an older clerk in the house. Mr. Warner
apprehending that trouble would arise from this circumstance, re-
solved to maintain peace and yet gratify his young clerk's ambition,
by sending him to Virginia, to settle up the affairs of a firm with
which the Philadelphia concern was connected, and which had been
dissolved by the death of a partner. This duty was gladly under-
taken, and performed in such a manner as to strengthen the young
man in his employer's good opinion. A few years later, Mr. War-
ner closed his noble and useful career. One of the latest acts of
this estimable gentleman was to recommend John Grigg as a
suitable person to continue the extensive business of the concern,
writing in the memorandum of his wishes, that "one or two young
men, in whom confidence can be reposed," should undertake the
charge, adding, " I consider John Grigg as posessing a peculiar talent
for the bookselling business. Very industrious, and from three years'
observation (the time he has been employed in my business) I
have found nothing in his conduct to raise a doubt in my mind of
his possessing correct principles."

It was during the time he was with Mr. Warner (1817) that
Mr. Grigg visited almost every part of the State of Virginia, for
the purpose of replacing by a correct map, the defective one then
published, and so successfully attained his object that the map be-
came the best, and the State Legislature cordially acknowledged
its great value. The original map, with the corrections in Mr.
Grigg's hand writing, now hangs in his counting house.

Mr. Warner's executors, taking that gentleman's own advice for
their guide, confided the settlement of the affairs of the firm to Mr.
Grigg, as the individual in whom the deceased reposed most
confidence. These affairs were found to be complicated and
widely ramified. Mr. Warner had large dealings with firms in
the South and West, besides a branch house in Charleston, S. C.,
and various agencies in the^ West. This caused Mr. Grigg's labors
to be very heavy and harrassing. He had also to encounter the
difficulties of traveling slowly, by primitive conveyances. But
habits of rigid punctuality in meeting engagements, and deter-
mined energy in the performance of duty, enabled him to work
through the business with infinite credit to himself. On one

22 BIOGRAPHIES OF

occasion (in Dec. 1825) he was m Charleston, and had promised to
be in Philadelphia upon Christmas day. There was but a brief
interval, considering the character of the travel to be undertaken,
but, resolved to fulfill his promise, M>. Grigg accomplished one of
the most remarkable journeys on record. He pushed forward by
day and night, through a week of stormy weather, and succeeded
in reaching Philadelphia on Christmas morning, almost exhausted
by fatigue. If tfiat journey had been performed by a soldier, the
man would have been crowned with laurel. This was the peaceful
triumph of a tradesman. On another occasion Mr. Grigg was
taken sick at Lexington, Ky. He was unable to stand, but he
ordered himself to be carried to the stage coach, and thus made a
wretched, jolting journey back to the city of Philadelphia. But
such energy and punctuality are certain to win for a business man
general confidence in the end. At the close of the first year a
statement of the aifairs of the concern, as conducted by Mr. Grigg,
was exhibited by that gentleman to the executors of Mr. Warner,
who expressed the highest commendation of the skilful manage-
ment displayed. In November, 1823, the affairs of the house were
entirely settled, to the satisfaction of all interested parties.

Once more without a fixed occupation, Mr. Grigg was undecided
what course to pursue. He had some means and much experience
in a difficult branch of trade. The advice of a Baltimore friend,
Mr. Joseph Gushing, was, "Eely on yourself; you cannot fail to
succeed. You will yet astonish yourself and the book trade of the
whole country." Acting upon this advice Mr. Grigg took a store,
with lodgings in the rear, on Fourth street, above Market, and
opened the store, which afterwards became so renowned. He began
prudently, and without attempting extravagant display. He eco-
nomised his resources, was always attentive to business, and only
enlarged his sphere of operations when he was assured that it could
oe done with safety. The rapid extension of the public school
system creating a great and steady demand for educational books,
he devoted much attention to such publications, for which he found
a ready sale in all parts of the Union. As the business increased
and the establishment was enlarged, Mr. Grigg found it expedient
and necessary to take into partnership individuals in whom he had
confidence. Young men, trained under his own eye, were prefer-
red, for he valued energy, capacity and integrity, more than the
possession of wealth. The firm was long known as Grigg & Elliott,
and then as Grigg, Elliott & Co.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 23

During the year previous to withdrawing from the book trade,
Mr. Grigg wrote the scorching letter to the President and Direct-
ors of the Bank of Pennsylvania, whose subsequent career proved
the justice of his reproaches. Seeing with clear forsight the ille-
gitimate and irregular method the bank was pursuing, looking
upon the deposits as sacred trust funds, and bravely daring to
speak the truth, Mr. Grigg wrote to these gentlemen one of the
sharpest letters ever penned.

In 1850 the firm was dissolved. Mr. Grigg felt the necessity of
withdrawing from the concern, as age was stealing on and he had
accumulated what he considered a sufficiency, the care of which,
alone, would give him sufficient employment. January 1st, 1847,
Mr. Henry Grambo, Edmund Claxton and George Eemsen were
taken in as partners, the new firm styling themselves Grigg. Elliott
& Co., afterwards Lippincott, Grambo & Co. In 1850 Mr. G. re-
tired. Joshua B. Lippincott purchased the interests of Messrs.
Grigg and Elliott, and, with the junior members of the old firm,
established the present house of J. B. Lippincott & Co. The
general business includes that of publishers, printers, bookbinders,
and wholesale booksellers and stationers. The premises of the old
concern, where Mr. Grigg commenced with a small store, proved
to be too contracted for the vast operations of the new firm, and
they have erected a large six story building, in Market street, be-
tween Seventh and Eighth streets — a wonderful tree, grown from
the original seed planted by Benjamin Warner's indefatigable
clerk.

Mr. Grigg has always been distinguished for caution and fore-
sight. Indeed we have heard complaints of him as being rather
too cautious. He has preferred to be safe in his investments, and
not endanger the fruits of many years of toil in hasty experiments.
He foresaw the financial crash of 1836-7, and skilfully provided
against the day of trial. Although his business was of vast extent
he had not confined his operations to the book trade. He was
largely interested in stocks and other property, which a period of
depression was likely to depreciate. He promptly changed his
investments in stock to real estate, and bought immense proper-
ties in Mississippi, Illinois and Philadelphia. When the shock of
the storm broke over the country Mr. Grigg was ready, and he
stood unscathed, while the majority of those engaged in all
branches of trade were forced to succumb. The rapid appreciation
of real estate in Philadelphia and Illinois has contributed to swell

24 BIOGKAPHIES OF

the fortune of this gentleman. He was an early friend and a large
subscriber to the stock of the Pennsylvania Eailroad Company,
and that could scarcely fail to be a remunerative investment. He
is represented to be worth a million of dollars.

In activity, firmness of purpose, economy, punctuality, foresight
and general capacity for trade, he was always a shining example.
No man had ever a more complete knowledge of the book business,
although several have made a more ostentatious display, claiming
to be " Napoleon's of the realm of print." We may add, that John
Grrigg is particularly deserving the remembrance of Philadelphians
for having labored so successfully to prevent the complete transfer
of the book trade to New York.

JOHN JOEDAN.

THOSE familiar with the history of the men who, during the last
century, gave to Philadelphia the enviable and well deserved re-
putation of being a city whose merchants were alike remarkable
for industry, enterprise and integrity, will scarcely have forgotten
Godfrey Haga, the founder (ninety years ago) of the well-known
house of Jordan & Brother, wholesale grocers, now doing a flourish-
ing business at No. 209 North Third street. Mr. Haga was one
of that oft quoted, though rare class, known as " self-made men."
Like many of his countrymen, poverty compelled him at an early
age to leave his native place, Isingen, in Wirtenberg, and seek a
new and better home in America. Being sorely straitened in cir-
cumstances, he left his native town with little save an earnest and
unflinching determination to win success in the land, which at that
period offered special inducements to the energetic and perseve-
ring. Not having funds sufficient to pay his passage across the
Atlantic, he became a " redemptioner," or, in other words, pledged
himself to the captain of the vessel that his labors should be at his
(the captain's) disposal, after his arrival here, until it yielded a
sum equal in amount to the passage money. His allotted term of
service was disposed of to a tailor in Philadelphia, named " Beck,"
whom he faithfully served until his obligation was fully cancelled,
earning in the meanwhile sufficient by overwork to enable him to

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 25

contribute materially to the comforts of a kind widowed mother,
whom he left behind in Isingen. The honorable manner in which
the young " redemptioner fulfilled his contract with his purchaser
(Beck) is one of the brightest spots in Mr. Haga's character, clearly
foreshadowing the uprightness and persevering industry which
marked his after life. Having accumulated a small capital, he
commenced the grocery business at what is now No. 239 Race
street. In a comparatively short period, by dint of untiring
industry and economy, coupled with a scrupulous regard for
promptitude and integrity in all his transactions, he amassed a
splendid fortune, and in 1793 retired from the business he had so
successfully established, leaving it in the hands of his two principal
clerks, John Jordan (the subject of our present sketch) and Frede-
rick Boiler.

In referring thus somewhat at length to the history of Mr.
Haga, our object has been not to present a sketch of his life, but
simply to show the prominent characteristics of the man under
whom John Jordan received his mercantile training, and to whose
counsel and example he was doubt 'ess largely indebted for the
eminent success which crowned his career as a merchant, as well as
for those higher traits of character which marked him as a gentle-
man and a Christian. There are few persons who properly appre-
ciate the immense influence for good or evil which the master ex-
erts upon the mind and character of the apprentice or clerk.
" Like master like man," is a trite but truthful maxim. Mr. Haga
was remarkable for industry, enterprise, integrity and sobriety, and
in all of these estimable traits were developed in a special manner
in the conduct and character of John Jordan.

The Jordan's are of German descent; the grand parents of John
Jordan having emigrated to this country about the year 1698.
His parents were both born in America, and the family may there-
fore be regarded as thoroughly American. Frederick Jordan, the
father, was born near Trenton, N. J., 1744, and Catherine Eckel,
the mother, near the same place, in 1750. The elder Jordan was
a well-to-do farmer and mill owner, managing his business with
shrewdness and frugality, and securing for himself and family a
comfortable independence.

John Jordan was born at Frenchtown, Hunterdon county, New
Jersey, September 1, 1770, at a place known as Mount Pleasant.
Having at an early age manifested unusual aptitude for busi-
ness, it was his father's earnest desire that he should lead a mer-

26 BIOGRAPHIES OF

cantile life. This desire was carried into effect shortly after his
father's death, which occurred early in 1784; and in October of
that year young Jordan, then only fourteen years of age, was sent
to Philadelphia, and placed under the guardianship of his uncle,
Godfrey Haga. He was employed as a clerk, being assisted in his
labors by Frederick Boiler, with whom he was after associated in
business, as a partner of the firm of Jordan & Boiler, successors to
Godfrey Haga. Untiring in his attention to business, faithful to
his employer's interests, polite and obliging to all, and possessed
of that indomitable spirit of enterprise which strongly character-
ized the merchants of his day, his uncle could safely entrust to
young Jordan the control of the business with which, for nearly
eleven years, he had been so closely identified.

The new firm commenced business March 28, 1793, under the
title of Jordan & Boiler, in the store No. 123 North Third street,
where Mr. Jordan resided, and where he continued to reside until
the rapidly growing business of the firm demanded more commo-
dious store rooms. Mr. Boiler, who was a brother-in-law of Mr.
Jordan, died in 1802, but the firm continued without change of
title until 1807, for the benefit of Mr. Boiler's widow. In 1809 the
widow's interest was withdrawn, when a new firm was established,
under the title of John Jordan & Co., with Samuel Worman a junior
partner. This partnership continued until Mr. Worman's de-
cease, in 1813, when the business was transacted by John Jordan
alone until 1828. On February 21, of that year, William H. Jor-
dan, eldest son of John Jordan, having attained his majority, be-
came associated with his father in business, under the title of John
Jordan & Son, which partnership was continued until July 1, 1832,
when the father retired, having, in the course of thirty-nine years,
secured the fruits of an active business life.

Upon the retirement of the father, Edward Jordan, a younger
brother, was associated with W. H. J., under the title of W. H. &
E. Jordan. The business was most successfully managed by the
brothers until 1835, when it was interrupted by the* death of the
elder brother. William H. Jordan was a most estimable young
man, possessed of all the requisites of a successful merchant, and
combining with them the nobler traits of open handed generosity
and uprightness, he won the entire confidence of those with whom
he transacted business as well as the golden opinions of all who
knew him. Although but thirty years of age at the time of his
death, he filled with honor and ability the responsible position of

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 27

Treasurer and Director of the Philadelphia City Savings' Institu-
tion. This institution subsequently wound up its affairs with great
credit to all concerned.

After the death of "W. H. Jordan, in 1835, the firm was changed
to Jordan & Brother, being composed at various times of Edward,
John and Francis Jordan, until 1842, when Edward Jordan died.
The business was then continued by John Jordan, Jr., & Francis
Jordan, until 1854, when the arduous duties connected with his
position as President of the Manufacturers' and Mechanics' Bank
compelled the senior partner, John Jordan, Jr., to withdraw from
the active duties of the firm, leaving the business in the hands and
under the special management of Francis Jordan and his brother-
in-law, Thomas J. Woolf, whose connection with the firm fifteen
years previously was then admitted as a partner January 1, 1855,
the name of the firm remaining the same. From that period until
1862 John Woolf Jordan, a son of Francis Jordan, the senior
partner, was added to the firm, the title remaining the same, Jor-
dan & Brother.

And we may also make record of the fact, that the sterling and
meritorious George Francis Clay, drayman, who commenced his
career with the elder John Jordan, still continues in the employ of
his sons and grandsons — now a period of half a century.

In thus briefly summing up the various changes of partners in
this well-known house during a period of ninety years, it is a fact
worthy of special note, that during the whole of that long period,
although the financial crisis of 1794, 1804, 1815, 1822, 1837, 1842,
1857 and 1861 occurred, in no single instance was its paper dis-
honored or its credit in the slightest degree impaired. It is not
less worthy of note, that all the persons connected with the house
as partners, from its first establishment down to the present time,
were members of the Jordan family, either by blood or marriage
ties.

The business relations of the house continue as when first esta-
blished, (wholesale grocers and dealers in East India saltpetre,)
principally with Pennsylvania, Tennessee, North Carolina and
Virginia. Intimate business relations were established between
this house and Moravian settlements and mission stations in the
West Indies, Kussia, Greenland, Europe and the Indian tribes of
this country, and up to this time these relations continue unimpaired.
The firm of Jordan & Brother are the principal disbursing agents
of the Moravian Church, and also act as agents for those time-

28 BIOGRAPHIES OF

honored seminaries located at Bethlehem, Nazareth and Litiz, in
this State.

John Jordan was a prominent, active and consistent member of
the Moravian Church. He was what may be emphatically termed
an honest man and an humble and devoted Christian. At various
periods of his life he contributed liberally to the support of the
church, and for a period of more than thirty years he was treasu-
rer of the church in Philadelphia, (which position is now held by
his youngest son, Francis Jordan.) At his decease he bequeathed
a handsome legacy to the congregation with whom he had been so
long associated, to be applied to the support of the Moravian mi-
nisters in Philadelphia.

The high estimation in which he was held by the Moravian de-
nomination, is shown in the almost unlimited confidence reposed
in him, in placing the funds of the church in his hands, and this
confidence has been extended to and is fully maintained by his
successors, as we have already shown.

In business Mr. Jordan was always distinguished for his clear
perception and sound judgment. His almost uniform success
attests this ; while his transactions were always characterized by
prudence and good fortune, his ventures were not unfrequently of
a bold and dashing style. Less clear-sighted men predicted failure,
where he felt perfectly confident of success. His spirit of enter-
prise was always made subject to the control of that practical,
clear common sense judgment for which he was remarkable. As
a mutual sequence, wealth flowed in upon him surely and rapidly,
so that, after an active business life of nearly forty years, he was
enabled to retire with a handsome competency. As a man of such
notable business traits, he was naturally sought for as a fitting
person to fill places of honor and profit ; but with a firmness in
striking keeping with his modest and unassuming nature, he inva-
riably declined all the public positions offered him.

In politics he was a Federalist, though never actively engaged
in political life. His duties as a good citizen were faithfully dis-
charged by regular voting, but beyond this he never ventured in
politics. An idea of his tastes may be formed from the character
of his intimate associates ; prominent among these were Paul Beck,
Jacob Ridgway, Lewis Clapier, Captain Daniel Man, John Welsh,
(the father of the present firm of S. & W. Welsh,) Stephen Girard,
the Wlllings and the Latimers, nearly all of whom were regular
visitors at Mr. Jordan's house or store. From these associations

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 29

the natural inference would be that he was a perfect gentleman of
the old school, and such, in fact, he was. Although making no
pretensions of a literary character, he was, nevertheless, tho-
roughly versed in the current literature of the day and conversant
with the standard authors.

In his domestic relations he was peculiarly happy ; his family idol-
ized him, while his friends were devotedly attached to him, not less
for the many amiable and admirable traits of character displayed
in his intercourse with others, than for his uniform kindness and
gentleness towards those of his own household. An indulgent
father, he was nevertheless a thoughtful and considerate parent,
counseling his children always to tread those paths which alone
could lead to usefulness, honor and happiness — illustrating his ad-
vice by his own example.

He was married in 1804, to a daughter of Judge William Henry,
of Northampton county, Pa., son of one of the members of the
second Continental Congress. His happy union was blessed with
six children, five sons and a daughter ; of these only three sur-
vived him — John, Francis, and the daughter Antoinette.

Mr. Jordan died February 18, 1845, at the advanced age of
seventy-four years. His wife died two months previously. Their
remains were interred in the Moravian graveyard, at Franklin
and Vine streets, but subsequently removed to Woodland's Ceme-
tery, and were followed to their last resting place by a large num-
ber of his old and distinguished associates.

Thus ended the career of a man who was an ornament to his
profession and an honor to his native city; his example is one
which should stimulate the young men of the present day, and
especially those engaged in mercantile pursuits.

John Jordan won his way to affluence and respectability by
close attention to business, unspotted integrity, Christian-like libe-
rality, strictly temperate habits, and gentlemanly associations.
The same principles, properly carried out, will, in almost every
instance, lead to like happy results.

30 BIOGRAPHIES OF

BUDD.

A MAN'S reputation is the property of the world. The laws of
nature have forbidden isolation. Every human being submits to
the controling influence of others, or, as a master spirit, wields a
power, either for good or evil, upon the masses of mankind.
Therefore, while a sense of delicacy and honor would deter us from
invading the sanctity of strictly private life, there can be no im-
propriety in justly scanning the motives and acts of any man as
they affect his public and business relations. If he is honest and
eminent in his trade and profession, investigation will brighten his
fame and point the path that others may follow with like success;
but if dishonesty has marked, and ruin closed his career, then let
the warning be proclaimed, that it may be carefully heeded.

It is not presuming too much to assert that the course of every
man is guided by one predominant sentiment, that overrules all
other feelings — ennobling or degrading every transaction — a single
bright, or else discolored, thread running through the tissue of
existence. This individuality of spirit is felt in the first aspira-
tions of boyhood ; it nerves the energies of the man, and takes its
parting flight as hope's last glimmer leaves the face of age. It is
difficult, indeed, to find this key-note of destiny.

In the subject of this sketch, Mr. Henry Budd, we are enabled
to form some judgment of a picture which charmed a youthful
fancy, and principles which seem to have directed his aspirations.
A diary of this gentleman contains the following memorandum,
which we copy verbatim :

" PHILADELPHIA, April 1,1828.

" This day I commenced living with Messrs. T. Latimer & Co.,
for the purpose of learning their business ; and, to receive as a com-
pensation for my attention and service $200 per year, for the first
two years, and $250 for the third year of my stay with them.

"This day, perchance, may be a memorable date of my life's his-
tory. Being nearly eighteen years of age, I may be said to com-
mence the action of my life, when a desire for forbidden things is
strongest and indulgence most dangerous. Now, when in the
midst of temptations and dangers, may the Father of Mercies guide

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 31

me through the sea of life — teaching me to avoid the shoals and
rocks on which has split the happiness of thousands. And may
my mind never soar to unattainable objects; may a sober and
friendly disposition be the means of gaining me many friends; and,
may my path in the business of life be marked with justice, pre-
caution and upright dealing."

How far the sentiments thus early expressed have been fulfilled
in his subsequent acts, the community in which he has passed to
the present time all his days, can best determine. Certainly such
resolution and piety as the diary evinces, were very remarkable in
a man of his years. It is seldom that we find a young man sur-
rounded with the temptations of city life, exhibiting such strength
of will and devotion to the right path as we discover in the early
career of Henry Budd. A diary is an aid to discipline. In making
a daily record of our proceedings, we are compelled to review
them, and we cannot do this without exercising a certain degree
of criticism, which must have a wholesome influence upon the cha-
racter.

Mr. Budd attained his majority in the house of Thomas Latimer
& Co., and he remained there afterwards until the decease of Tho-
mas Latimer.

Wm. B. Potts, the surviving partner, continued the business, and
Mr. Budd remained with him until the first of January, 1836. This
house was a fine school for merchants. Mr. Latimer and Mr. Potts
were^ among the best business men that this country had produced,
and those who were in their employment enjoyed the advantages
of their tact and experience. Mr. Potts, especially, we have had
occasion to commend as a man of great skill and energy in his
peculiar line of business.

On the first of January, 1836, Mr. Budd commenced the flour
business, in company with Mr. Thomas Kidgway, who, before that
time, was a member of the house of Bidgway & Livezey . The title
of the new firm was Bidgway & Budd. The subject of this sketch
was a junior partner, but he soon became extensively known in
the business world.

During his connection with this firm, Mr. Budd found occa-
sion to serve his fellow citizens in the exercise of a public
spirit, which is a feature in his character which affords him a
pleasure to indulge. The trade of the Susquehanna and Juni-
atta rivers, at that time, was of great importance to this city,
and was threatened to be diverted to Baltimore by the com-

32 BIOGRAPHIES OF

pletion of the tide-water canal. At this juncture Mr. Budd was
active in aiding the establishment of a line of tow-boats between this
city and Havre de Grace, which converted the dreaded canal from
an injury to a benefit, and re-invigorated the declining energies of
the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal Company. On this occasion,
as upon several others, Mr. Budd showed that he had a generous
regard for the public weal, and could rise above considerations of
selfish profit.

About this time, animated by public spirit, Mr. Budd gave what
time his regular business permitted to the duties of a Director, and
afterwards to the Presidency, of the Beaver Meadow Kailroad and
Coal Company, exhibiting abilities that convinced everybody of
his thorough competency for the most responsible positions.

On the first of January, 1846, Eidgway & Budd associated with
them Mr. Roland Kirkpatrick, a young gentleman who had been
brought up with the house. The firm was then Bidgway, Budd &
Co., and continued until 1849, when Mr. Kirkpatrick withdrew
from it.

Thomas Bidgway and Henry Budd continued the business until
the first of August, 1850, when Thomas Bidgway retired. The
great conflagration of the 9th of July of the same year, destroyed
the entire stock of Bidgway & Budd, and afforded a favorable op-
portunity for a dissolution of partnership. Henry Budd, upon the
retiracy of Thomas Bidgway, formed an association with Mr. S. J.
Comly, and the firm of Budd & Comly was then established. This
is one of the most distinguished firms engaged in that department
of trade. The number of flour and grain houses had now greatly
increased, numbering, perhaps, from fifty to sixty, of various
grades in the commission business. The trade, lacking system
and proper understanding among those engaged in it, was at once
unpleasant and unprofitable. As the results of an ungoverned
competition, jealousies approaching in degree almost to hatred,
had nearly crushed out every friendly and manly feeling, and the
compensation was reduced to a point altogether inadequate to the
capital and labor employed and the risk encountered. Necessity
demanded a reform. At this period Mr. Budd invited to his house
some twelve gentlemen engaged in the trade and occupying anta-
gonistic positions, (as near as their interests could be determined
by their locations and the character of their respective business,)
for the purpose of organizing the business. Here it was resolved
to effect the object, if possible. Meetings were held from time to

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 66

time, and in due course the " Corn Exchange of Philadelphia" took
its place among the institutions of this city, a living and useful
reality, of which its members have cause to be proud for its effi-
ciency in drawing them near each other in the bonds of friendship
and interest. This organization gives a position to the flour and
grain trade which could not have been obtained by any other
means. It renders the flour dealers influential at home and abroad.
Mr. Budd deserves at least local renown for his efforts to place
this organization upon a proper basis.

Mr. Budd has been very successful in the management of his
private affairs. In energy, tact and industry, we cannot call to
mind a man who is superior in this community. But, as we have
intimated, Mr. Budd has not limited his attention to transactions
in flour and grain. He has been connected with the Northern Li-
berties Gas Company ever since it was started, and has been Pre-
sident for five years. He has been a member of the Board of
Trade for many years, and has always taken an active part in the
proceedings of that body. For more than ten years past he has
been an attentive Director in the Bank of Penn Township ; and is
now the Yice President of that substantial and time-honored insti-
tution, " The Fire Insurance Company of the County of Philadel-
phia."

In social life, Mr. Budd is amiable, intelligent and always agree-
able. As a citizen he is full of public spirit, and ever anxious to
advance the general welfare. The city of Philadelphia has urgent
need of a few more merchants as liberal in heart and mind as Mr.
Budd, who, ever prompt in the honorable promotion of his own
business, and the faithful discharge of all its obligations, has never
suffered the slothful consideration of personal ease to find a place
between his matured convictions of utility and ready actions, when
required in aid of a worthy cause.

Mr. Budd has never entered the field of politics. The claims of
party have been too weak to enslave his independence of thought
and expression. His morals are simple, for they are founded upon
the eternal and immutable principles of nature — unsophisticated,
pure from the hands of the creator — controlling the relations of
man, social, political and religious — dispensing justice to every
creature — bestowing gifts and blessings according to the manifest
capacity of each recipient ; and when these are invaded by private
interests, political factions, or specious doctrine, he claims the
right, sanctioned by our own beneficent government and by the

34 BIOGKAPHIES OF

" divinity that stirs within" every honest heart, to resist such en-
croachments, as leading to the ultimate destruction of the earthly
happiness and liberty of mankind.

SAMUEL CAKPENTEB.

THE curious view of Philadelphia, by Peter Cooper, which hangs
in the Philadelphia Library, and is supposed to have been painted
about the year 1714, contains as a conspicuous object the store-
house of Samuel Carpenter, situate upon the wharf, below Chestnut
street. " Carpenter's stairs/' nearly opposite, was a passage from
Front street to what was then called King street, but which since
the Eevolutionary war has been called Water street. Carpenter's
wharf was a well known land-mark among the drab coated men
who came over with Penn, and Samuel Carpenter has literally the
the distinction of having been one of our first merchants. It is
impossible, at this time, to give much information in relation to
the state of our commerce during the period between the settle-
ment of the city, in 1682, and the death of Samuel Carpenter, in
1714 ; but all accounts agree that Carpenter was the most success-
ful merchant of his time. Commerce was then mostly confined to
coasting trade, with greater voyages occasionally to the English
West India Islands. Barbadoes and Jamaica were the principal
points of intercourse, and from these islands came many of the
settlers whose blood still courses through our Philadelphia fami-
lies. Our exports were mostly agricultural products, in which
grain, flour and tobacco held a large proportion. Skins and furs
were important articles of trade also. Our imports were fruits,
spirits, and many articles of British manufacture, which were
thus brought through second hands, in preference to the risk of
voyages to England. Ships were then more plentiful than they
are now, but these ships were small craft of from one hundred to
two hundred tons burthen. There was much danger from pirates,
even in the short voyages which those vessels made. The names
of Kidd and Blackbeard are yet remembered, and their exploits in
sea robbery were quite as daring, considering the amount of com-
merce and the perils of encountering the king's cruisers, as those

PHILADELPHIA MERCHAXTS. 35

of the Florida and Alabama at this unhappy day. The pirates fre-
quently came to the capes, and at times landed and came to the
city, where they spent their ill-gotten money in drinking and re-
velry, which greatly shocked the sober prejudices of the Quakers,

In 1700. to enforce the laws against piracy and illegal trade, it was
declared that strangers should not travel without a pass ; that inn
keepers should give notice to some neighboring magistrate when
strangers came to their houses ; that ferrymen and boatmen should
not carry strangers or suspicious personages on the water, unless
each passenger produced a good testimonial under the hands of a
magistrate. The old law. a part of the original frame of govern-
ment of Pennsylvania, that no person should leave the province
without fastening a notice of his departure on the court house
door thirty days before he left the province, was also declared to
be enforced.

Samuel Carpenter, writing, in 1708. to Jonathan Dickinson, says :
*• I am glad thou didst not COme this summer, for craft from Mar-
tinico and several other privateers, have been on our coast, and
captured many. Our vessels here have been detained some time in
fear of the enemy, and now. by this conveyance to Jamaica, they
are hurrying off sixteen vessels, to join convoy at the capes under
the York man-of-war.'*

Vessels were at that time generally armed with small cannon,
and occasionally they made so much noise when in port, by firing
salutes, that they not only wounded the peaceful ears of Friends,
but produced political disasters thereby. A curious evidence of
this feet is preserved in the minutes of the Council of the Province,
under the date of August 7. 1700.

u Complaints having been made to this Board by some of ye Mem-
bers of Councill. that ye late firirg of Gunns. from on board some
vessels lying before Philadelphia, hath not onlly frightened some
women and children, but hath also occasioned some of the Seneca
Indians, that came hither to treat with this Government, to de-
part, as believing ye fireing of sd Gunns to have been signs of hos-
tilities intended against them : It was yrtbre ordered, that no ves-
sel lying before Philadelphia shall fire aney Gunns. but an coming
in and going outt, as a sign of yr arrivall and departure; and yt
James Logan give notice to mrs of vessels of this order, at their
entree of their vessels in his office..- Ye Gov'r. also in open Coun-
cil!, informed ye three Seneca Indians that stayed behind the rest,
that it was the custom of ye English to fire gunns, as * sign of joy

36 BIOGRAPHIES OF

and kind entertainment of ye friends, coming on board, and was in
no manner of way intended to frighten or disoblige ym, that they
were and should be ever welcome to this Government. And in
token of amitie and friendship with ym, ye Gov'r gave ym a belt
of wampum by ym to be showen to ye other Seneca Indians, yt
went away upon fireing of ye sd gunns, which they kindly accepted
of. The Gov'r also desired ye Members of Councill to go on board
Capt. Sims' vessel, with ye sd three Indians, and their interpreter,
that they might see ye manner of ye English on board ye vessels,
which was accordingly done to yr great satisfaction."

In 1707, Isaac Norris says, in a letter : " The Province consumes
annually of produce and merchandise of England, £14 to £15,000
sterling. The direct returns are in tobacco, furs and skins. The
indirect are in produce and provisions, via the West Indies and
the southern Colonies. In 1706, about eight hundred hogsheads
of tobacco went from Philadelphia, and about twenty-five to
thirty tons of skins and furs."

But whilst Samuel Carpenter was an enterprising merchant, and
actively engaged in commerce, it was as a citizen and improver of
Philadelphia that he deserves a prominent place in our memory.
" He was the Stephen Girard of his day in wealth, and the William
Sansom in the improvements which he suggested and the edifices
which he built."

He owned a crane, bakery, granary and mansion house near the
wharf, above Walnut street ; a storehouse, wharves, warehouses, a
tavern called "The Globe," and a large vault adjacent; the coffee
house and " scales" in Front street, near Walnut. He erected,
together with William Penn and Caleb Pusey, the third mill in the
Province, which was built at Chester, in Upland. He owned the
Eristol mills, in Bucks county, where the present town of Bristol
is situated. This property was valued at £5,000 sterling — a very
considerable sum of money in those days. He built, for his own
use as a residence, the fine old mansion, now sadly dilapidated but
still standing, at the southeast corner of Second street and Car-
penter's alley, afterwards called Norris' alley, and now bearing the
barbarous name of Gothic street. This mansion was considered,
when built, the greatest house in Philadelphia, and it maintained
that eminence until the Revolution. James Logan wrote to Wil-
liam Penn, in relation to it : " There is nothing in the town so well
befitting a governor." The grounds extended south to Walnut
street, and eastward halfway to Front street. Here, in 1696, the

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 37

Assembly of the Province convened, and in 1700 Samuel Carpenter
gave it up to the use of William Penn, upon his second visit to the
Province. • In 1703 Carpenter sold it to Judge William Trent, the
founder of Trenton, and from Trent it came into the possession of
the Norris family, in which it still remains, having lately fallen to
the heirs and devisees of Sally Norris Dickerson, a descendant in
the female line.

This house became the official residence, and was known as " The
Governor's House," and later as "the slate roof house." John
Penn, afterwards Governor of Pennsylvania, was born here. Lord
Cornbury, Governor of New York and New Jersey, was feasted at
this house with great ceremony, in 1702. Governor Hamilton lived
in it. General Forbes, the successor of Braddock, also boarded here,
after it ceased to be the government house. Baron De Kalb was
at one time its inmate. John Adams, and other members of the
Continental Congress, resided there when in Philadelphia, and the
eccentric and it is now said traitorous General Lee died under its
roof.

Of landed property Carpenter was an extensive owner. Be-
sides the Darby mill, in which he had one-half interest, he owned
a saw mill and large pond of water near by. He was the owner
of the Sepviva estate, adjoining Fairhill, in Philadelphia county,
containing three hundred and eighty acres. Besides the above,
there wa's land at Poquinny creek, five thousand acres, with large
tracts in New Jersey and elsewhere

It must have been with regret that a merchant of so much
ability and experience felt himself compelled to withdraw from
active participation in trade. James Logan, in writing to the pro-
prietors of Pennsylvania concerning Samuel Carpenter, says : " He
lost by the war of 1703, because the profitable trade he before car-
ried on almost entirely failed, and his debts coming on him, while
his mills and other estate sunk in value, he could by no means clear
himself, and from the wealthiest man in the Province in 1701, he
became much embarrassed."

Isaac Norris, in a letter dated June 10, 1705, says of him :
" That honest and valuable man, whose industry and improvements
have been the stock whereon much of the labors and successes of
this country have been grafted, is now weary of it all, and is re-
solved, I think prudently, to wind up and clear his encumbrances."
He carried out his intentions, disposed of considerable portions of
his property, and retiring to the Sepviva estate, which was near

38 BIOGRAPHIES OF

enough to the city to be of convenient access, devoted his leisure
time exclusively to public affairs. In 1689 he was a Trustee for
the Quaker school and a member of the Assembly. In 1701 he
was appointed a member of the Provincial Council, the official
advisers of the Governor. Subsequently he became the Treasurer
of the Province, a position which he held at the time of his death,
in 1714.

Samuel Carpenter left three children — Samuel, John and Hannah.
Samuel married a daughter of Samuel Preston, a grand-daughter
of Governor Lloyd. There are many descendants of Samuel Car-
penter yet among us who bear other names, in consequence of the
partial failure of the male lines. Among them were the late Col.
Charles F. Ellet, the civil engineer, the builder of the bridge at Ni-
agara Falls, and the originator of the ram fleet now operating
upon the western waters. His sons are officers in the Union ser-
vice. Prof. Ellet, formerly of Columbia College, 1ST. Y., the husband
of Mrs. E. F. Ellet, somewhat known as an authoress; Charles P.
Smith, ex-State Senator, New York, and Wm. J. Wainwright, of
this city. Hon. Thomas P. Carpenter, formerly Judge of the Su-
perior Court of New Jersey, is a descendant of Samuel. John
Carpenter married a daughter of Eeece Meredith. Hannah mar-
ried William Fishbourne, who was Mayor of Philadelphia in 1719
and 1720. From that branch of the family are descended the
Whartons, Clymers, and Fisbournes, names once proudly regis-
tered among those of the best families of Philadelphia.

Whilst it is impossible to give much information concerning our
early merchants, it is equally proper to make this record of the
few items gleaned in relation to Samuel Carpenter. A member of
the Society of Friends, and associate of the founder of the State, '
he entered into business immediately upon his settlement among
us. He built up our commerce, gave comfort to the doubting and
timid, encouraged the emigration of industrious mechanics and
tradesmen, founded the business of ship building, and directed the
course of trade. His successful ventures for many years, gave him
the means of expending his wealth in decorating and improving
the town. The memory of such a man is entitled to preservation
and respect. He was literally, as well as figuratively, the first
merchant of Philadelphia — the predecessor in whose footsteps have
since walked hundreds of eminent mercantile characters, whose tact,
ability, integrity, and enterprise have made Philadelphia a magni-
ficent city.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 39

WILLIAM MUSSEK.

IN the various branches of the leather manufacture no city in
the Union has attained greater distinction than Philadelphia. The
tanneries of the Keystone State, in which a capital of about four
and a-half millions of dollars is invested, find their principal depot
in this centre of wonder-working industry. Immense quantities of
the leather tanned in the interior, among the forests of white and
chestnut oak, are brought to the city in a rough condition, to be
transferred to the numerous establishments of the curriers. There
are also about a dozen tanneries, within the limits of the city, which
are extensively engaged in the production of sole leather, belting
leather, and calf skins. The finer kinds of leather manufactured
in Philadelphia are beyond all competition in this country; and,
upon the other side of the Atlantic, are admitted to be equal to
those for which the French are so renowned. The number of deer,
sheep, lamb, and goat skins, consumed by the firms engaged in
this department of industry, might induce a morbidly sensitive
Cowper to weep over the incidental sacrifice of animal life. The
noble buck of the grand old woods of Pennsylvania, the bleating
sheep upon a thousand hills, and the leaping goat among the moun-
tains of Hindostan, are made to contribute their valuable articles
to supply the steady and increasing demand of our manufacturers.
It is stated that three-fourths of the whole number of goat skins
imported into the United States from the East Indies are brought
to Philadelphia ; and, in addition, a large number of very superior
goat skins find their way here from Tampico and Curacoa. The
morocco produced here is in demand throughout the country. The
total value of all ramifications of the leather manufacture in this
city cannot be precisely ascertained, but the following is an ap-
proximate estimate :

Leather, exclusive of Morocco $1,610,000

Morocco and Fancy Leather 1,158,000

Boots and Shoes 4,142,000

Saddles, Harness, &c 1,500,000

Hose, Belting, &c 180,000

Gloves, Buckskin and Kid : ., 150,000

Trunks and Portmanteaus 313,000

TOTAL, $9,053,000

40 BIOGRAPHIES OF

The finer varieties of leather are also used in the manufacture of
porte-monnaies, daguerreotype cases, and in book binding; so that
if we say the leather interest is valued at nine and a-half millions
of dollars we shall not be accused of exaggeration. Lynn, Mass.,
is renowned for its enormous production of course boots and shoes.
But Philadelphia is still more celebrated for the fine workmanship
bestowed upon our pedal coverings. The ladies' shoes produced
here are unrivaled in tasteful style and durable quality.

It is our purpose in the present article to sketch the career of a
self-made man whose name has long been associated with the lea-
ther trade of Philadelphia. There are few men engaged in the
business who have not heard of William Musser. For more than
fifty years he has been identified with this important interest. Mr.
Musser was born in the ancient town of Lancaster, Pa., August
17, 1789, and came from one of the numerous German families
which originally peopled that beautiful portion of the State. He
received but an ordinary education, such as the times and the
country afforded; but he inherited the qualities of energy, self-re-
liance and thrift, which have always distinguished the German
element among the American people. In July, 1803, when young
Musser had reached the age of fourteen years, he came to Phila-
delphia, then still recognized as the commercial metropolis of the
Union, and entered the counting-house of his brother-in-law, John
Singer, wholesale dealer in hides aud leather, who was located at
137 Market street, but in 1808 removed to 263 Market street. This
branch of trade was comparatively in its infancy. Our domestic
manufactures were of small account. The business was to be de-
veloped and men of the right stamp were needed to accomplish that
desirable object. By close application, rigid integrity, and the dis-
play of practical talent, the young Lancasterian soon won the confi-
dence of his employers, and was entrusted with responsible duties.
But the clarion of war was destined to break in upon all peaceful
avocations. In 1812, the " second war of independence" was de-
clared. The British invader was expected at all points along the
seaboard. On account of the position and importance of Philadel-
phia, it was thought that this city would be one of the first objects
of attack.

A patriotic spirit pervaded the whole population. Old and young
men prepared to shoulder the musket and defend their beloved fire-
sides. Individuals of all classes, of all trades and professions, came
forward promptly at the call of their country. A number of those

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 41

who have since became very distinguished in public life were then
in the ranks by the side of clerks from the counting-house and ar-
tisans from the work-bench. Among the first volunteers was no
less a person than James Buchanan, late President of the United
States. William Musser was filled with patriotic ardor. He
joined the force raised in Philadelphia and its vicinity, and accom-
panied the troops to Camp Dupont. The service performed by
these volunteers was not at all varied by excitement and adven-
ture. It was a tedious routine of duty. But the spirit of all in
the camp were cheered by the consciousness of the important pro-
tection they extended to a populous region of the Eepublic. The
British made no attempt to reach Philadelphia. At the close of
the war the volunteers returned to the city and received the honors
earned by their protracted and patient service, and their sacrifice
of private interests in behalf of the general weal. Mr. Musser
was so highly esteemed that he was readily admitted to partner-
ship in the firm of John Singer & Co. in 1814. His attention and talent
for trade soon made him the leading member of that firm — the
pack-horse and the manager of the business. All kinds of do-
mestic manufactures had been greatly stimulated by the war which
had the effect of a prohibitory tariff, and the affairs of the house
had risen in importance. Upon the retirement of Mr. John Singer,
senior, in 1829, the style of the firm was changed to John Singer,
Jr. & Co., who continued the business with great success until the
year 1836. Then Mr. Singer's ill health compelled him to give up
the cares and anxieties of trade. The firm was then reorganized
under the title of "Wm. Musser & Co., as it has been known ever
since. In the meantime, the subject of this sketch had steadily
advanced in mercantile reputation, in knowledge of the leather
trade, and in pecuniary means. He had chosen to climb slowly
and surely, and when he reached the height of which he had
dreamed while a boy in the counting-house, he felt that noble pride
of position which leads a man to endeavor to honor the standing
he has so laboriously attained. In 1846, an amiable, intelligent
and very active gentleman — Mr. A. Euth, also of Lancaster County,
was added to the firm. Mr. Euth justified the good opinion formed
of his abilities at the commencement of his career, and he has
always been considered, since that time, as one of the substantial
pillars of the house. Mr. Eicharct M. Greiner, also an efficient
young man of business, is the third partner of Mr. Musser. The
three members of this firm constitute, in the phrase of the day,

42 BIOGRAPHIES OF

"a strong team/' which the mercantile classes have learned to
respect.

Mr. Musser accumulated an ample fortune. But in 1848, the ca-
lamity which always hangs over commercial operations, and which,
in many instances, even consummate foresight and prudence cannot
avert, fell upon the firm, and it was announced, to the general re-
gret, that the house had suspended. Mr. Musser's reputation,
however, was now worth to him a mint of money. The creditors
were convinced of his strict integrity and capacity for recovering
from the severest strokes of disaster. They promptly granted an
extension, and the firm continued the business with more energy
than ever. And now we have to record a fine example of mercan-
tile honesty, which fully substantiates all the claims that have
been put forth by the friends of Mr. Musser, as to the sterling
worth of his character. The trade in hides and leather having
been unusually prosperous and profitable, and the firm having more
than regained the ground it had lost during the lapse of four years,
Mr. Musser called upon all their creditors in 1853, and satisfied to
the cent all their just demands. From that period until the present
day, no house in the country has stood higher in credit and general
esteem than that of William Musser & Co. It is notorious that there
are men engaged in trade who "make money by failing," and they
are usually considered but little better than " respectable " swindlers.
But there is an honorable way of making money out of a failure,
and that is by paying creditors as soon as possible and thus estab-
lishing a reputation for integrity. This policy is wisest in the end,
and perfectly justifies the venerable saw concerning the wisdom of
honesty.

Mr. Musser has no children, but has adopted and educated a
number, who have since made their mark. The junior member of
the house is among the number. Mr. Ruth married a Miss Martha
Glenn, a most intelligent and estimable lady, who was another of
Mr. Musser's adopted children.

Mr. Musser is about seventy-five years of age. His career has
been one of constant activity. His means are ample to secure com-
fort and luxury in his declining years. He is hale and well pre-
served. In gaining a knowledge of men and things in the busy
world of trade, he has not found the truth of the selfish maxim of
Rochefocauld, or learned to be misanthropical. A more benevolent
man in an unostentatious way does not exist. He never omits to
aid the deserving unfortunate if it is in his power to lend a help-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 43

ing hand. In private life, as in commercial relations, he is irre-
proachable.

Mr. Musser has been much sought after to lend the weight of
his name to corporations, and has been invited to preside over the
affairs of various coal companies, a railroad, and one of our principal
monied institutions. But he has invariably declined, not from any
defect of public spirit, but from the inherent modesty and diffidence
of his nature. This is the age of "brass," and modesty ought to be
honored according to its rarity. Mr. Musser was one of the foun-
ders of St. John's Lutheran Church, and has long been President
of its Board of Trustees. As trustee for a number of large estates,
he has discharged his onerous duties with admirable fidelity and
skill. Such is the history of a Lancaster boy, developed by his
own industry and tact, into a wealthy and influential merchant in
a great metropolis.

JOSEPH H. SEAL.

" THERE is a tide in the affairs of men, which, taken at the flood,
leads on to fortune," according to the immortal Shakspeare ; but
how many are there who drift about wildly, and never get into the
strong current. And how many there are whose desperate exer-
tions carry them into eddies, from which they sometimes fortu-
nately escape, but are more frequently whirled round in the same
unquiet circle. The secret of success in business is to try, and the
best of all qualities to a merchant is indomitable perseverance, with
a steady determination, and a disposition which is undaunted by
reverses. We shall endea\»r to show the applicability of these
maxims to the mercantile career of Joseph H. Seal.

Born in Birmingham township, Chester county, Pa., on the thir-
teenth of December, 1792, Joseph H. Seal seemed destined by nature
for the life of a farmer. His parents were farmers — plain, honest
people ; and their son was given that sturdy and practical education
which the country furnished in his youthful days, the great rule
then being that labor was better than book learning. The country
school was not much of an institution fifty years ago. Farmers
thought that their boys were wasting time in conning lessons — and

42 BIOGRAPHIES OF

"a strong team," which the mercantile classes have learned to
respect.

Mr. Musser accumulated an ample fortune. But in 1848, the ca-
lamity which always hangs over commercial operations, and which,
in many instances, even consummate foresight and prudence cannot
avert, fell upon the firm, and it was announced, to the general re-
gret, that the house had suspended. Mr. Musser's reputation,
however, was now worth to him a mint of money. The creditors
were convinced of his strict integrity and capacity for recovering
from the severest strokes of disaster. They promptly granted an
extension, and the firm continued the business with more energy
than ever. And now we have to record a fine example of mercan-
tile honesty, which fully substantiates all the claims that have
been put forth by the friends of Mr. Musser, as to the sterling
worth of his character. The trade in hides and leather having
been unusually prosperous and profitable, and the firm having more
than regained the ground it had lost during the lapse of four years,
Mr. Musser called upon all their creditors in 1853, and satisfied to
the cent all their just demands. From that period until the present
day, no house in the country has stood higher in credit and general
esteem than that of William Musser & Co. It is notorious that there
are men engaged in trade who "make money by failing/' and they
are usually considered but little better than " respectable " swindlers.
But there is an honorable way of making money out of a failure,
and that is by paying creditors as soon as possible and thus estab-
lishing a reputation for integrity. This policy is wisest in the end,
and perfectly justifies the venerable saw concerning the wisdom of
honesty.

Mr. Musser has no children, but has adopted and educated a
number, who have since made their mark. The junior member of
the house is among the number. Mr. Kuth married a Miss Martha
Glenn, a most intelligent and estimable lady, who was another of
Mr. Musser's adopted children.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 43

ing hand. In private life, as in commercial relations, he is irre-
proachable.

JOSEPH H. SEAL.

" THERE is a tide in the affairs of men, which, taken at the flood,
leads on to fortune," according to the immortal Shakspeare ; but
how many are there who drift about wildly, and never get into the
strong current. And how many there are whose desperate exer-
tions carry them into eddies, from which they sometimes fortu-
nately escape, but are more frequently whirled round in the same
unquiet circle. The secret of success in business is to try, and the
best of all qualities to a merchant is indomitable perseverance, with
a steady determination, and a disposition which is undaunted by
reverses. We shall endeaw>r to show the applicability of these
maxims to the mercantile career of Joseph H. Seal.

46 BIOGRAPHIES OF

duty to society. He has invested his money as a special part-
ner in several firms, and is thus the means of assisting worthy
young men to improve their own condition and add to the business
of the city. In 1840 he became a special partner with E. S. Bur-
nett. In 1842 he was a special partner with Tanguy & Bringhurst ;
afterwards with Erringer & Pease, and then with Pease & Foster.
In 1854 he engaged as special partner in the wool business, with E.
L. Eeece and Wm. H. Seal, his son. Wm. H. Seal died in 1857.
He was a most estimable young man, with fine business qualities.
The same assistance was extended after his death to Eeece, Seal &
Co., composed of E. L. Eeece, J. Howard Seal and Alfred Seal, who
still occupy the honorable position as leading wool merchants, at
No. 20 North Front street, a situation at which they have been
located for fifteen years. He is also a special partner with John
Zebley, Jr., at No. 17 North Fourth street, and since his retirement
from business has been thus associated with seven firms. Few of
our retired merchants can show a similar record of usefulness, and
the example of Mr. Seal is one which is worthy of being extensively
followed.

Mr. Seal has kept himself aloof from politics, and has never held
public office. He was an " old line Whig," and supported that
party as a citizen and voter. He has been a Director of the Penn
Township Bank and of the Manfacturers' Bank for the last twenty
years. He was for three years Director of the Schuylkill Naviga-
tion Company, and he has been a Director of the Delaware Mutual
Insurance Company since it has been established. He is a quiet
and unassuming gentleman, and has proved himself to be an honor-
able and useful citizen.

EDWARD C. KNIGHT.

FROM among the ranks of quiet, persevering, steady going citi-
zens, whom we meet in the walks of everyday life, there are but
few more deserving of a place in these pages, than the subject of
the present sketch.

Mr. Knight was born upon a farm, in Gloucester county, N. J.,
in December, 1813. His parents were members of the Society of

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 47

Friends. His father (Jonathan Knight) died in 1823, when Ed-
ward was but ten years of age, leaving his mother, with three
children — two daughters, in very narrow circumstances.

But the boy was healthy, stout hearted, and industrious. Ani-
mated by affection for his mother and sisters, he exerted himself to
the utmost of his ability, doing such £arm work as generally falls
to much older persons. In 1828 he was fortunate enough to obtain
a situation in a store at Kaighn's Point, N. J. This was his first in-
troduction into business life. Here he remained four years, steadily
devoting himself to the interests of his employers, and improving
his acquaintance with men, and the manner of transacting busi-
ness.

In 1832, when but nineteen years of age, being anxious to im-
prove his circumstances, he obtained a situation in the grocery
store of Atkinson & Cuthbert, at the foot of South street, in Phila-
delphia. In this house Mr. Knight toiled as a clerk until 1836,
when he adopted the resolution of going into business on his own
account, and, in connection with his mother, (Eebecca Knight,)
opened a wholesale and retail grocery store in Second street opposite
Almond. There he continued for ten years; at the end of which
time, in 1846, his mother having some time previously withdrawn
from the business, he removed to the southeast corner of Water and
Chestnut streets, and entered upon the wholesale grocery, tea, and
commission business. After being here some years, Mr. Knight as-
sociated with him in the business, under the firm of E. C. Knight &
Co., Mr. Charles A. Sparks, who had been with him, as principal
clerk, from his removal there.

In addition to their wholesale grocery business, they are also the
sole agents of the grocers' sugar house of Messrs. Kusenberg &
Bartol, the celebrated refinery, on Passyunk avenue below Car-
penter street. They are also extensively engaged in shipment to
and from California, Valparaiso, Cuba, and New Orleans. The
business of the concern is very extensive, and its reputation for
healthy prosperity is not exceeded by that of another house en-
gaged in the same trade. During the crisis of 1857, a number of the
wholesale grocery houses in this city were prostrated. Mr. Knight
was not only able to weather the storm, but to assist several estab-
lishments which were in a tottering condition. He came out of
that terrible ordeal with greatly increased distinction as a mer-
chant and a man.

Mr. Knight was interested in the barque Onioto, that sailed from

48 BIOGRAPHIES OF

this port in 1849, for San Francisco, when she took out on deck the
small steamer " Islander," and which was the first steamer that plied
upon the waters above Sacramento City. Mr. Knight was inte-
rested in the building of the ships Morning Light and John Trucks.
He built a block of stores on Penn street below South, also, the
Corn Exchange Bank building; both of which he still owns, as also
several other properties in different parts of the city. As an active
and useful member of the Board of Trade, as an efficient Director,
successively, in the Southwark Bank, the Bank of Commerce, and
the Corn Exchange Bank, he has continually evinced his capacity
for dealing with matters of finance, and has rendered good service.
He has exhibited a warm interest in all the great railroad enter-
prises, which have contributed so much to the prosperity of our
trade, and was an earnest friend of the Pennsylvania Central Bail-
road, when that magnificent project had need of support. And in this
connection, we may mention that he is the inventor of a railroad
sleeping car, which is being introduced on many of our railroads,
and bids fair to be largely appreciated by the various railroad com-
panies, and the traveling public.

Mr. Knight is no politician. He has no relish for the intrigues
and excitements that characterize the strifes of parties at the
present day. Still, like all intelligent Americans, he has political
opinions, and these are of the kind asserted and vindicated by the
great Clay and Webster. In 1856 the People's Party of the First
District, in which Mr. Knight resided, nominated him for Congress
by acclamation. This nomination was entirely unsolicited on his
part. There being a decided Democratic majority in the district,
Mr. Knight was defeated, although running far ahead of his ticket.
Probably if we had a few more such practical men at Washington,
instead of the inveterate wranglers, the interest of the nation
would gain by the change.

P.S. — Since the above sketch was written in April, 1860, Mr.
Knight has been engaged as a Director in the Pennsylvania Rail-
road Company, elected by the City of Philadelphia, for two years.
He is at present a Director in the JSTorth Pennsylvania Eailroad Co.,
and the Insurance Company of the State of Pennsylvania. He is
also a joint owner, with Messrs. Kusenberg & Bartol, of the South-
wark Sugar Refinery, a new and extensive establishment lately
erected by them on Shippen street wharf, of which E. C. Knight
& Co. are the sole agents. He is interested in other enterprises,
among which are the development of an extensive and valuable

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 49

coal property at West Pittston, in Luzerne county, Pa., and the
erection of the Camden Woolen Mills, on Cooper's creek, Camden,
!N". J. He is an active member of the National Union League, of
Philadelphia, and, in connection with many of his colleagues therein,
has rendered material aid and valuable services in support of the
government of the United States.

HUGH CRAIG.

IT has been observed that the sons of green Erin get along
rapidly everywhere except at home. We find them earning fame
and fortune in all quarters of the globe. In Ireland, until quite
recently, Irishmen seemed to groan under a kind of nightmare ;
all their worldly hopes were centred in leaving that emerald sod
upon which they played in childhood. Our country must acknow-
ledge a heavy indebtedness to the Celtic element of her popula-
tion. From the earliest colonial times until the present day, Irish-
men have been conspicuous actors in the drama of our republican
life. When the storm of battle has swept over the land, brave and
chivalrous sons of the Emerald Isle have bared their breasts to the
foe; and when we have enjoyed the sunny days of peace, sons of
the same soil have shown their capacity for civil station and for
success in trade. Irishmen, and the children of Irishmen, now
swell the ranks of our self-made men. A native quickness of wTit,
cheerful humor in the midst of difficulties, and a healthy activity
of body and mind, are the characteristics of this portion of our
people, and the most ingenious and indefatigable son of Yankee
land will frequently meet his match among them in the negotia-
tions of bargain and sale.

Hugh Craig, the subject of this sketch, first saw the light at Cole-
raine, Ireland, in 1817.

The well known charms of his native town, as set forth in the
ballad of "Kitty of Coleraine," were not sufficient to enchain the
youth, for he was only fifteen years of age when he sailed for the
United States. In 1832, on the day after landing in the city of
Penn, Craig entered the store of Eobert Fleming, dealer in flour
and grain, at Seventeenth and Market streets. The Irish lad be-

50 BIOGRAPHIES OF

gan at the foot of the hill, but he began with the determination to
reach the top. Mr. Fleming's business was very extensive. Craig
could not have found better opportunities than this house afforded
for learning everything relating to transactions in flour and grain.
Mr. Fleming retired with the comfortable sum of a million and
a-half of dollars. Craig must have advanced very rapidly in his
knowledge of commercial affairs, for in 1838, when he had just
reached his majority, he ventured to commence business on his
own account, at the northwest corner of Broad and Cherry streets,
where, after the lapse of twenty-two years, he still remains. Mr.
Thomas Bellas was the principal partner of Mr. Craig, and the firm
was styled Craig, Bellas & Co. In 1845 the firm was changed to
Craig & Bellas ; but Mr. Bellas retired about five years ago, having
secured a fortune.

The prosperity of the concern is chiefly due to the industry and
practical talents of the senior partner. The reputation of Mr.
Craig among mercantile gentlemen has remained unsullied during
many severe ordeals, and no man engaged in the same branch of
trade has risen more rapidly in the social scale than he who came
to us a poor boy from Coleraine. After the retirement of Mr. Bel-
las, Mr. Craig carried on the extensive business of the concern
alone for a time, when he took into partnership a young man
named William Wilson, who had been for eighteen years a clerk
in the house, and who was distinguished for industry and integrity,
commercial talent and pleasant manners. This is what may be
called the immediate history of this well known firm.

In 1845 a very destructive conflagration occurred at Broad and
Cherry streets, and before the flames could be extinguished the
warehouse of Craig, Bellas & Co., that of James Steel & Co., on
the opposite corner, and several other buildings, with nearly all
their contents, were consumed or ruined. Consignors of produce
had no legitimate claim for a dollar's worth of the loss : but Craig,
Bellas & Co. acted on this occasion in a highly liberal and honor-
able manner. They immediately issued a circular, containing the
following remarkable feature : " Those having claims against this
firm for produce destroyed by the late fire, will please present the
same at once for payment " This was no mere flourish of a pro-
mise never meant to be fulfilled. Every dollar of such 'claims was
promptly paid upon demand. There w^as nothing lost by this ge-
nerous method of doing business. Indeed, considered as a saga-
cious stroke of policy, nothing more effectual could have been de-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 51

vised to ensure the concern a future career of heavy patronage
and prosperity. Such a course demonstrated the entire soundness
of the house, and gave the business community the greatest confi-
dence in its operations. From that very day there was a steady
increase in the profits of the concern. But the conduct of Craig
Bellas & Co. stands in marked contrast to the policy pursued by
other produce houses under similar circumstances. The latter
refused to recognize the claims of consignors, and have been
involved in almost interminable litigation, the natural consequences
of which is a wholesale depreciation of their business.

The energy of the firm of Craig, Bellas & Co., was brilliantly
displayed in another way. They immediately set about the erec-
tion of one of the most spacious and convenient produce ware-
houses that the city could boast — the building we now see at the
corner of Broad and Cherry streets. This structure has three
fronts — one of one hundred feet on Broad street, but a second of
one hundred and eighty feet on Cherry street, and a third of one
hundred feet on King street. It is in this establishment that the
immense business of the firm is now transacted, and an admirable
system prevails in all the arrangements. The warehouse is the
property of Mr. Craig himself.

There are two brothers of Hugh Craig now engaged in business in
this city. They, also, are remarkable for their industry and tact.
Andrew C. Craig, the elder, is now about forty-seven years old.
He commenced the liquor trade in 1831, at Sixth and South streets.
Afterwards he associated with Mr. Catherwood, and the firm was
known as Catherwood & Craig. Their store was located at Thir-
teenth and Market streets. After the dissolution of this firm, An-
drew entered into partnership with his brother Joseph, and they
are now largely engaged in the liquor business in Front street,
above Walnut. Both brothers have been successful in achieving
wealth.

Hugh Craig is esteemed very rich, and able at any time to retire
from the active pursuit^ of trade. He is in the prime of life and
the full vigor of manhood. Activity, shrewdness, enterprise and
liberality, have marked his whole career since boyhood. The suc-
cess that has crowned his labors in his own private affairs, has
recommended him to the good opinion of the financial circles. Mr.
Craig has been a Director of the Delaware Mutual Insurance Com-
pany, and has also held the same position in the Corn Exchange
Bank. In all these positions he has shown himself a capable,

52 BIOGRAPHIES OF

attentive and upright officer. He still cherishes a warm regard
for the land of his birth and her representatives among us. He is
a prominent member of the Hibernia Society, and serves faithfully
as the chairman of its committee on charity. But no deserving
sufferer in our midst, no matter what may be his nativity or creed,
ever appeals to this large-hearted Irish merchant in vain. Gene-
rosity is one of his most conspicuous traits, and we have reason to
believe that his success in life, and the universal esteem in which
he is held, are as much due to his broad liberality as to his earnest
devotion to business and skilful management. He seldom neglects
an opportunity for aiding enterprises of public importance and
unquestionable advantage, and is worthy to be entrusted with any
responsible position demanding strict integrity and consummate
financial ability. This is not eulogy ; it is but a transcript of the
general opinion that this community entertain of Mr. Hugh Craig.
Mr. Thomas Bellas, who retired in 1854, was eighteen years in
business. He always enjoyed an enviable reputation for integrity,
and carries with him in his retirement the esteem and respect of
all his fellow merchants.

THOMAS KIDGWA Y.

IN writing the name of this successful merchant, we are reminded
of the Society of Friends, of which he is a member, and the mem-
bers of which have always enjoyed power and wealth in this city.
At the first settlement of Philadelphia, "the people called Quakers"
were at the head of the community, and they have retained a con-
siderable proportion of their ancient prominence up to this time.
They have given to this city many of its peculiar features, and the
name of "Quaker City" is a testimonial of their influence, which
is as widely known as the name of Philadelphia itself. The repu-
tation of individuals like the Copes, Townsends, Davises and Prices,
with many others whom we might name, has been completely iden-
tified with Philadelphia, and the extent of their business operations
has justified the identification of their names with that of the " City
of Brotherly Love."

Thomas Bidgway is a native of New Jersey, and was born near

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 53

Walnford, Monmouth County, on the fifth of May, 1797. His
father, John Ridgway, an elder brother of the late distinguished
merchant, Jacob Ridgway, was a highly respected farmer, who,
after a long life of usefulness, died in 1845, at the advanced age of
eighty-nine years, esteemed and beloved by a large circle of friends
and acquaintances.

It may not be inappropriate to mention here that Jacob Ridgway
was also a native of New Jersey. He was born in 1768, and came
to Philadelphia at the age of sixteen. He had some capital left
him by his father, which he rapidly increased by merchandising.
He was most successful as a shipping merchant, and lived abroad
many years, for the protection of his interests in that line. While
in Europe he constantly remitted sums to be invested in real estate
in Philadelffhia, and on his return to this country, he devoted him-
self exclusively to the management of his real estate. Eventually
the rise in this description of property made him enormously weal-
thy, and when he died, in 1843, he w^as justly accounted a mil-
lionaire.

When about thirteen years old, Thomas was placed by his father
in a commission house on the wharf below Chestnut street, where
he remained till 1816, when he entered into the flour and grain
commission business with his brother Jacob, under the firm of J.
& T. Ridgway. The senior partner retired in 1821, when Thomas
took into partnership his cousin Benjamin Ridgway, and the busi-
ness was continued under the firm of Thomas & Benjamin Ridgway.
In 1823 Mr. Benjamin Ridgway retired, when a co-partnership was
formed with Mr. John Livezey, under the firm of Ridgway &
Livezey. In the year 1825 this firm was in full and successful ope-
ration, and many business men who have since become prominent
were just making their way into active life. At this date, Henry
Budd, Esq., was a clerk with Messrs. Latimer & Murdock, on the
wharf near Arch street; James Steele, whose silvered locks and
smiling countenance are now seen daily at the Corn Exchange, was
a clerk in the same house; Alexander Derbyshire was a clerk in
the flour house of Timothy Paxon; Henry Sloan was a lad in John
R. Neff's office; Charles Camblos, the broker, was clerking for
Amos W. Butcher, and subsequently for Scull & Thompson, and it
would be interesting to follow their futures, if we had time at
present. Mr. Livezey retired Ja-nuary 1, 1836, with an ample
competency, which he has since largely increased by fortunate ope-
rations, and is now one of the rich men of our city.

54 BIOGRAPHIES OF

On the first of January, 1836, Mr. Ridgway, with Mr. Budd,
formed the firm of Ridgway & Budd, and the circle of their busi-
ness was greatly enlarged. At that date Mr. Roland Kirkpatrick,
quite a lad, was in their employ, and he remained with them until
1846, when he was taken into the firm. In 1850, just after the
great fire of the ninth of July, the firm dissolved, and the style of
the house was changed to Budd & Comly, Mr. Ridgway retiring.
Mr. Kirkpatrick, we may here remark, is quite a character; he
came to Mr. Ridgway's store in 1835, when a mere lad, and was
employed at a salary of fifty dollars for the first year. He re-
mains unmarried, and has been quite cautious in disposing of his
accumulating means (and they now amount to a handsome sum)
so much so, that we believe that some of his original salary still
remains in his possession as originally invested. He is quiet, re-
tiring, and unassuming; minding "his own business," and never
intermedling with that of his neighbors or his competitors in busi-
ness, which is more than can be said of many others in the bread-
stuff trade. He never mingles in convivial assemblies; he is
never —

" With weariness and wine oppressed."

He commenced without a dollar, and by his own untiring industry
and economy has built himself to his present position. In 1816,
the year Mr. Ridgway began his business career, there was
frost in every month, which injured the wheat crop so seriously
that flour advanced in 1817 to $14 and $14.75 per barrel, and wheat
$3 per bushel. In 1821 flour declined to $3.75 per barrel and wheat
to 75 cents per bushel.

The store now occupied by Messrs, A. Derbyshire & Co., No. 126
North Delaware avenue, is the oldest "flour house" in Philadelphia.
In 1780 it was occupied by Mr. Samuel Smyth. In 1782 Timothy
Paxon succeeded him, and continued there for forty-five years. He
was succeeded by Mr. A. Derbyshire, who has now been in the
same store forty years. In the days of Smith, Paxson, Lattimer,
Hollingsworth and Potts, business in breadstuffs was conducted on
far different principles than at the present period; then trade was
slow and sure, now it is fast and uncertain. This remark will ap-
ply equally well to all other branches of business.

" All sects, all ages smack of this vice."

How differently different people consider opulence and influence ?
How few have the moral courage to resist the temptation to spread

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 55

themselves with pride and hauteur after having secured a compe-
tency? A man's riches do not consist in his having more gold,
silver or " green backs," but in having more in proportion than his
neighbor.

Mr. Ridgway's means were not large when he began business,
but his prudence in the care of his " sinews of war/' as well as his
energy and enterprise, have enabled him to accumulate quite a
large fortune. His character is quite a marked one, and his ac-
quaintances can never misunderstand his peculiarities. When
engaged in any transaction he unites every energy of his mind
upon the single object before him, and holds fast to it until his ob-
ject is thoroughly secured. He has no sympathy wTith anything
that is not entirely practical and which does not present a surface
for common sense operations in the legitimate line of business. In
politics he is a decided Republican, having sympathized with that
party through all the exciting events which have culminated in the
present war for the integrity of the Union. In religion he inclines
to the Hicksites branch of the Society of Friends. His residence
is at 'No. 911 Arch street, where he has lived for the past fifteen
years in a comfortable, though not ostentatious style. He talks
well when he chooses, but except on business subjects he is usually
taciturn; and, though taking an active interest in public matters,
he is never seen at banquets or other gatherings of this character.
In his business career he has always been too shrewd to be caught
in any "wild cat" operation. His fortune was made in the com-
mission business, and it has been built up slowly but surely.

The Hon. Benjamin W. Richards died in July, 1851 ; by his death,
the office of President of the Girard Life Insurance, Annuity and
Trust Company became vacant, and Mr. Ridgway was unanimously
chosen by the Directors his successor, and still continues President
of that substantial and prosperous institution. Its office is located
at 408 Chestnut street. With one exception, this is the oldest Life
Insurance Company in the State, having been chartered in 1836.
From the day thie Institution went into operation, it has always
enjoyed, and justly so, the confidence of the public, but under the
skillful and prudent management of its President, Mr. Ridgway,
assisted by the accomplished Actuary, John F. James, Esq., and an
able Board of Directors, it has assumed the very front rank among
Life Insurance Companies, and is regarded as one of the strongest
and most reliable Institutions that our city or country can boast of.

Mr. Ridgway has always been a warm advocate of our com-

56 BIOGRAPHIES OF

mon school system, and we believe the only office he ever con-
sented to accept from the public, was that of school director.
In this capacity he served several years, and gave much of his
time and attention to its duties He has also, for years, been a
liberal contributor to our various public libraries, in several of
which he has taken an active interest — serving as manager, trea-
surer, &c. ; among others, in the Friends' Library, at Fifteenth and
Race streets, and the Apprentices' Library Company, in the free
or fighting Quakers' church, at Fifth and Arch streets. This
library company, by the way, has about eighteen thousand well
selected volumes, which are loaned out, without charge, to persons
of both sexes, and deserves a more liberal support from the public
than it has heretofore received. It is supported by individual do-
nations and bequests.

Mr. Ridgway has also been, within a few years past, one of the
visitors to the convicts of the Eastern Penitentiary.

During the alarming ravages of the yellow fever, in 1820, and of
the cholera, in 1832, when many of our citizens fell victims to these
dire diseases, and many fled in fear and dismay from the infected
city, Mr. Ridgway, with a devotion to duty characteristic of the
man. remained, faithfully attending not only daily to his business
as a merchant, but exerting himself to calm the fears of the timid,
and ministering, so far as he was able, to the relief of the suffering
and the destitute. Through both of these fearful periods, owing,
doubtless, to his abstemious and methodically correct habits, he
escaped from all disease. To these same careful habits he is, no
doubt, indebted for his almost entire exemption from sickness, for
we think he has never been confined to his house by sickness more
than a couple of weeks in his life.

In concluding our brief sketch of some of the prominent events
in the life of Hr. Ridgway, we would direct the young, and espe-
cially the young merchants, to his career, as worthy of their study
and imitation. When he began business his means were limited,
and his difficulties great ; but he determined to succeed, and he
did so. By undaunted perseverance and untiring industry, by the
closest application and attention to his business, and by the prompt
fulfilment of every engagement, he soon became a prominent and
rising merchant, and thus was the circle of his operations enlarged,
so that in the prime of life he was enabled to retire from active
pursuits, with ample means — a reasonable portion of which he has
always conceived his duty to appropriate to religious, benevolent.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 57

and other institutions useful to society. No truly benevolent ob-
ject ever appeals to him in vain. May his life of usefulness be pro-
longed, and may the evening of his days be passed " in otium cum
dignitate"

ALEXANDER ELMSLIE.

WITHIN the past few years we have lost from the mercantile com-
munity many of those who may be called the old merchants of
Philadelphia. Those who began their career early in the century,
maintaining honorably their own position, and forming the basis
upon which the future generations of merchants do and will work.
Among the most prominent of such men stands the name of Alex-
ander Elmslie, who in his life held his position in the fast thinning
circle of the father merchants.

The career of a successful merchant is not only interesting to
the contemporaries with whom his life is pleasantly familiar, his
memory green. But it has another and deeper interest for the
young aspirant for mercantile honor and position. In the struggle
for a start, the early encouragement or draw-back, the successful
ventures or disastrous failures, the young merchant finds a guide-
book by which to steer his own bark through the ever varying cur-
rent of trade, may learn the whirlpools and safe deep waters, and
how best to avoid the many temptations that lead to ruin. "Ex-
perience keeps a dear school/' but those who have bought their
tuition may offer the more lenient mistress — example, for the sons
following in their footsteps.

Mr. Elmslie was born in Scotland, about the year 1768, and
came to this country in 1780, when he was only twelve years of
age. Eight years after this date he embarked in business on his
own account. Soon after this the firm of Olden & Elmslie was
formed, and located at No. 35 Chestnut street, where they were
very extensively engaged in the importation and sale of foreign
dry goods, and did a larger business than any other firm in that
branch of trade. He was brought up in Mr. Olden's store. Mr.
Elmslie then resided at No. 311 South Second street, below Lom-
bard, where he continued to reside until his decease, a few months

58 BIOGKAPHIES OF (

ago. In 1806 the firm was dissolved, and James Olden & Son went
into business on their own account. The son, in 1811, became in-
flated with the idea that coffee would soon rise to a fabulous price.
He built a large warehouse in the rear of No. 33 Chestnut street,
and bought up an immense quantity of the article on speculation.
It did not go up; his stock was sold out at a ruinous loss. He
failed, and soon afterwards died quite poor, at No. 19 Crown
street.

Among the prominent merchants, in 1800, were Joseph Sims,
Eobert Wain, Willing & Francis, G-urney & Smith, Eyre & Massey,
John Wilcpcks, Eobert Ealston, Edward Thomson (the great tea
speculator), Chandler Price, Maris, Evans & Welsh, Nicklin &
Griffith, Joseph Clark, Montgomery & Newbolds, Henry Pratt,
John Mease (father of Dr. James Mease, and paternal grandfather
of Pierce Butler), Eobert Smith, John Donaldson, and Elliston &
John Perot, who did business at 43 North wharves, and at the
date of their dissolution formed the oldest firm in the Unite States.
Ellison Perot died in 1834, and John Perot in 1841. Mr. Olden
came from New Jersey, and died in 1801, only a few years after
his son became associated with him.

Mr. Elmslie was a Quaker, and attended the Pine street meeting
until 1830, after which period he attended the "Orange street"
meeting, on Washington square. He retired from active business
pursuits in 1824, and during the past thirty years has occupied many
positions of honor. He was a Manager of the Pennsylvania Hos-
pital and of the Humane Society; a Director of the Philadelphia
Insurance Company, and of the Philadelphia Charity School. For
several years past the principal companions of Mr. Elmslie were
Joseph Jones, of the Commercial Bank, Alexander Derbyshire, the
retired flour merchant, and James Carstairs the father of Charles
S. and James Carstairs, No. 126 Walnut street.

The fortune of Mr. Elmslie was made entirely by his regular
business, by his knowledge of trade, and by his judgment in re-
gard to the value of mercantile paper, and of the credit of those
entitled to consideration at his hands. He was content with profits,
however small, and was economical, saving, and extremely indus-
trious. These great qualities, exercised during many years, have
made, and will make every other man who possesses them, very
wealthy. Mr. Elmslie was no believer in the rich velvet carpets,
costly furniture, and brown stone residences of the west end. He
dressed plainly, and wore his clothes carefully. He resided in the

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 59

same building, occupied the same parlor, slept in the same chamber,
and occupied the same seat at the same table for upwards of thirty
years. So far as we can learn, he never threw away his money on
beggars, nor squandered it on institutions of a doubtful character;
and never permitted his name to be placarded in the public prints,
in connection with acts of charity, yet he gave freely. But few
merchants in this city have possessed so correct a judgment, and so
rarely erred. He never ventured upon outside hazardous and reck-
less speculations. He left, at his decease, about $400,000, of which
sum $25,000 was in gold in his house, and $25,000 in bank.

While upon the dry goods trade we will refer to John Bobins,
of New York, one of the richest merchants of that city, wrho com-
menced his career in Philadelphia. He was born in 1779, in Mon-
mouth county, New Jersey. When a lad he wandered to Phila-
delphia. Congress met here at that time. They were considering
the propriety of rejecting or confirming "Jay's" treaty. Meet-
ings were held in different parts of the city, and young John
Eobins attended them to hear what was going on. On one occa-
sion, Mr. Dallas, the father of the late minister to England, was
speaking. He had a copy of the treaty in his hand, and after vent-
ing his indignation in the most fiery language, he flung it from him
and exclaimed "kick the d — d thing to hell." The boys picked it
up and made a bonfire of it, in front of the British minister's
house.

Where John was born there was game. He caught a muskrat,
skinned it, and took the skin to Philadelphia on his first visit. He
bartered the skin off for two books — one was Bobinson Crusoe,
and the other a bible. He keeps the bible yet.

John was idling about Philadelphia, waiting for something to
turn up, when the whiskey rebellion broke out. A proclamation
was issued to raise troops. There had to be notices served upon
the military privates raised. He did this business, and received
seventy-five cents, the first money he ever earned.

Not long after this, John Bobins went on to New York, then
quite a town, but not so large as Philadelphia. He had an elder
brother, named Enoch, who kept in Old Slip.

Enoch Bobins owned several vessels, and was quite a shipping
merchant of those days. He loaded his vessels with all sorts of
assorted provision cargoes, pork, beef, onions, etc., and sent them
to the West India islands. He owned no vessels larger than 150
tons. In fact, the largest ship owned in New York, in 1796, did

60 BIOGRAPHIESOF

not exceed 250 tons burden. One of 200 tons was an uncommonly
large ship.

Enoch owned one brig called the Mary, of 150 tons burden. He
loaded her with staves for wine casks, dried codfish, and other
truck, to make up the assorted cargo, and despatched the "Mary"
from New York to Bilboa, in the Bay of Biscay. He sent his bro-
ther John out as supercargo. At that time the United States was
at war with France, and the brig "Mary" had a narrow escape
from a French privateer. She lay at Bilboa three months, selling
cargo. Then the "Mary" went to Lisbon, disposed of her staves,
and took on board a quantity of gold and silver for New York.
The exportation of silver was prohibited by Portugal, but Mr.
Robins had a belt made, and every trip he made on board his ves-
sel he would take a thousand Spanish dollars. In this way he got
on board $16,000.

At that time the British fleet was anchored at Lisbon, and among
the vessels was the sixty-four gun ship, "Asia," that had given the
city of New York so much trouble in the dark days of the Revo-
lution.

Finally the brig "Mary" went to St. Ubes, loaded with salt, and
got back safe to New York, making a splendid voyage. The salt
sold for a dollar a bushel. The supercargo had saved several hun-
dred dollars, which he put away in a safe place. On his return,, in
1797, he made another voyage to the West Indies as supercargo.
When John Eobins got back he did not go to sea any more.

He made up his mind to go into the dry goods business. He
fancied he should like it, but, of course, it would be necessary to
learn the business before attempting it on his own account.

Now I come to the reason why John Bobins came to start a dry
goods store in that particular part of Pearl street, near to Chat-
ham, No. 446. John was passing along Pearl from Chatham looking
at the various stores, and the tasty manner in which the dry goods
were temptingly displayed in front and in the windows. Young
John Robins stepped in at one of these dry goods stores and
asked if they wished to get a young clerk. He had no success.

Finally, he halted at the door of 430 Pearl, where was kept a
large stock of dry goods. It was a wholesale as well as retail
store. Bobins asked the owner the usual question :

"Do you want a clerk?"

"What to do?"

"I want to learn the dry goods business."

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 61

"What wages do you expect?"

" None. I want to learn the dry goods business/'

The proprietor of the store looked at him. He was earnest and
honest. He liked his appearance.

" Yery well, you may come; I'll try you."

That merchant was the celebrated Henry Laverty, who in after
years became a renowned merchant and very rich. After the year
or eighteen months for which he was engaged was up, he told Mr.
Laverty he should leave him. Mr. Laverty was not ready to part
with him.

"Oh, yes, John, you'll stay. I'll give you a good round salary."

"No, I know how to handle goods. I have acquired a good deal
of knowledge, and I will try and do something for myself," said
John.

Mr. Laverty offered a still more tempting salary. John still said
"No." Then he was offered a partnership. John still said "No."
His mind was made up. He was astonished at the partnership
offer, but he firmly declined it. Mr. Laverty parted with him re-
gretfully. He had found out his sterling integrity, and his industry
and care made him invaluable to anybody who was doing so large
a business as Mr. Laverty.

After leaving the employ of H. Laverty, John Robins started a
dry goods business on his own account, and finally retired with a
competency.

SAMUEL BRECK.

ONE of our most honored and beloved members of the mercantile
world, a man whose strict integrity, active benevolence and warm
sympathies endeared him to all companions, was called to his last
home, August 31, 1862, at the advanced age of ninety-one years.
This long term of usefulness contains many points both of interest
and instruction, being that rare and beautiful object, a well spent,
useful youth, manhood, and old age.

Samuel Breck was born in the city of Boston, on the seventeenth
of July, 1771, and it is a memorable fact that his infancy and child-
hood, his old age and death, have both occurred during the periods

62 BIOGRAPHIES OF

of the great national struggles of the country of his nativity —
the country he loved with a devoted ferver. It is a well authenti-
cated fact that, as a child, held aloof in his nurse's arms, he saw
the great dawning of American Independence, the battle of Bunker
Hill. Lexington, too, the scene of the first revolt from British
tyranny, was the town where his first years were passed, until in
his fourth year, he, with the wondering unconsciousness of child-
hood, witnessed the great battle of Bunker Hill. The natural pride
felt in his more mature years at this event of his childhood, seems
to have been the firm foundation upon which was built as strong
and fair a structure of patriotism, loyalty and devotion to coun-
try, as ever dwelt in the breast of man. It was the key of his
heart, the ruling passion of his life, this pride and love of country.

From a very early age Mr. Breck took a delight in occupying
his leisure time by keeping a minute and copious diary, which at
his death filled about twelve closely written volumes. Having
much leisure time, and passing a great portion of it alone, this oc-
cupation grew into a delightful habit, and these pages are filled
with the recollections of the men and events of his long life. They
contain, in a familiar and agreeable style, much that is instructive
and pleasant about the master minds of the age, with the opinions
of a keen, well educated intellect on the events passing around him.
It is a proof of the kindliness of the old gentleman's heart that he
left with the manuscripts a strict injunction to the legatee to ex-
pugn from his diaries any lines that can possibly be painful or
offensive to others. In the many contributions which his pen has
given to the literature of the societies to which he belonged, he
referred to and quoted from his diaries, feeling certain of the
correctness of information written as the event or opinion recorded
was passing under his own eye, or within his own knowledge.
Such information must be as reliable as it is interesting and freely
offered. Without waiting for invitation, his unusual fund of useful
knowledge was contributed readily and frankly wherever he saw
an opportunity for making it useful or available. As a man of
strong literary tastes, and a good amateur artist, his pursuits were
naturally such as led to the accumulation of information, and his
search was chiefly directed towards historical anecdotes and events
which his pen clothed with all the charm of a retentive memory
and keen perceptions.

In the year 1782 an opportunity occurred for sending Mr. Breck,
then a lad in his twelfth year, to complete his education in France.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 63

Several military and naval officers, friends of his father, were re-
turning to France, and it was determined to send the lad, under
their protection, to a college in that country. On the twenty-
fourth of December he sailetf. from Boston in the frigate Iris,
sharing the cabin of the commander, Marquis de Traverse. The
College of Soreze, in Lower I^anguedoc, was recommended to his
parents by the French admiral, and one of the officers in Rocham-
beau's army, residing at Toulouse, within twenty-four miles of the
college, undertook to see him safely placed in the charge of the
principal. Provided with letters from the admiral to the principal,
the Yery Reverend Dom Despaulx, and others, he entered thus, in
very early life, upon a career removed from all home influence,
parent's care, or any but new friends around him.

During his residence in college, his opportunities for instruction
were excellent. The teachers who had the care of the pupils were
attentive and efficient. Languages, both ancient and modern, sci-
entific studies, music, drawing, fencing, dancing, and drilling were
all within reach, and all actively studied. Joseph R. Ingersoll, in
his "Memoirs of Samuel Breck," says:

" It is a proof that he became thus endowed at this seminary,
that his education in reality began and ended there. It was pur-
sued no further, either abroad or at home. A mind sufficiently in-
telligent, industry and application sufficiently faithful, and a dispo-
sition sufficiently ambitious, were all kept in order and employment
by a moral principle and rectitude that appear to have been his
guardians at all times. Habits of occupation were formed which
were always afterwards ready for exercise. All exercise, or rather
indulgence of them, was a pleasure and a pride. While they
brought him knowledge, they made it easy for him to impart its
fruits on suitable occasions in after life."

During his residence in France, Mr. Breck became so strongly
interested in the tenets of the Roman Catholic Church, that he re-
quested the principal of the college to appoint for him a confessor.
Having been educated at home in the most rigid and intolerant
form of Presbyterian worship, it is not strange that his young
heart was captivated by the beautiful outward forms of the reli-
gion of the country in which he now found himself; he frankly
acknowledges that no attempt was made by the monks in the col-
lege to influence his religious views; but an intimate friend, to whom
he. confided his desires, advised him to confess, as the first step in
the new belief. The principal showed no eagerness upon the sub-

64 BIOGRAPHIES OF

ject, advising the young convert to reflect a week before taking so
important a step. At the end of that time, his wish never changing,
a confessor was appointed, to whom he went at stated times during
his residence at the college. On Easter Sunday, being in Lyons,
he attended mass, confessed and communicated.

Upon his return home his religion^ views, now that his mind was
more matured, again changed, and he joined the Episcopal Church,
of which he was a member until his death." His moral principles
were always remarkable for their soundness, and his life was free
from any taint of intemperance or dissipation.

After an absence of four years and a-half, he left Havre for his
return to America, in one of the monthly packets. Paul Jones,
the celebrated sea captain, at that time an admiral in the Russian
service, is mentioned in his diary as one of his fellow passengers.
On the second of July, 1787, he landed at Boston, to leave a stu-
dent's life for one of greater activity. His appearance at that time
is described as very prepossessing. Mr. ingersoll says :

"Before his departure from that country (France) he visited its
great capital. A kind temper given to him by nature, was here
adapted to gentleness and grace of manner, and personal accom-
plishments must have been almost unconsciously cultivated among
those to whom they were then still familiar, under a yet undisturbed
government. This was combined with the fact that he found
Boston, on his return in 1787, crowded with well educated French-
men, driven there by disturbances in St. Domingo. It made him
still more closely acquainted with the habits, and accustomed to
the politeness of a people the most polished and refined. The great
revolution in France was yet some years ahead. His knowledge
was increased by the elegant literature of France, and he is not
supposed to have been contaminated by the surrounding tendency
to religious scepticism. His deportment naturally assumed a
finished air, which did not leave him during his long life. No one
could have known him, however slightly, without being struck with
these peculiarities, which were marks of cultivated kindness, with-
out undue affectation. He was a thorough gentleman of the old
school — courteous, animated, affable and kind."

Shortly after his return home, having expressed his desire to
enter upon the life of a merchant, his father, at a cost of one hun-
dred guineas, obtained for him a position in a counting-house, where
he remained until 1790. In his journal he speaks with indignation
of the principles of trade as taught him in these three years ; they

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 65

were, he says, "of the most immoral character, owing chiefly to
the disturbed and feeble state of the old Confederate Government,
and in execution of the revenue laws of -the Commonwealth of
Massachusetts. On the arrival of a vessel one-half the cargo was
placed in the upper part of the store, and the other half only en-
tered at the Custom House, and thus they were initiated into the
secret of smuggling." " To ask," he says, " one hundred guineas
of young gentlemen, educated in honorable principles, to teach them
low fraud and disreputable course of trade, showed the times to be
sadly out of joint." The laws were a dead letter; the states, col-
lectively and individually, were bankrupt; the public debts at ten
or twelve dollars on a hundred. Each state was pulling against
the other, and the fruits of our seven year's war for independence,
did not then appear to be worth gathering."

He felt and wrote, expressing his strong patriotic interest in the
machinery of government that changed this melancholy prospect
to such unrivalled brightness. In speaking of the "Constitution
adopted in 1798," he says, it " carried this great nation, in the course
of forty years, from a fearful state of poverty and disorder, to high
station and unrivalled prosperity."

In 1790 Mr. Breck again visited Europe, remaining one year
abroad. Upon his return, having received from his father a capi-
tal of ten thousand dollars, he entered upon a mercantile career,
but did not establish himself permanently until 1792, when the
family removed to Philadelphia. He himself states the cause of
the removal from Boston to have been a most iniquitous and unjust
system of taxation which drove many of the richest inhabitants
from the city. After rating an inhabitant for watch where there
were no watchmen; for lighting streets where there were no lamps;
for municipal regulations in general where there was almost an
entire absence of police, they put down under the head of " faculty,"
just what they pleased — guessing this man to be worth so much,
and that other so much — thus laying a heavy tax upon him who
lived liberally, and spent his income among his fellow-townsmen in
acts of hospitality to them and to strangers, while the rich miser
who kept his money out of circulation was deemed poor, and
scarcely taxed at all. This long corrected injustice was not to be
patiently borne when in full operation, and Mr. Breck was only
one of many who left the city solely on that account.

In September, 1792, the family removed to this city, and three
months later Mr. Breck followed them. His first year was one

66 BIOGRAPHIES OF

long to be remembered in our city records, when the yellow fever
thinned the population fearfully. The fall, however, removed the
disease; and although in the heart of the worst region (near Wal-
nut street wharf), Mr. Breck escaped the contagion.

The family residence was situated in what was then the centre
of fashion, the " court end" of the city. It was 319 Market street,
above Eighth, where now not a private dwelling is to be found.

During the progress of the whiskey insurrection, in the interior
of the state, Mr. Breck joined the Macpherson Blues, which em-
bodied most of the ardent young men of the city. There is, how-
ever, no mention of his ever having served his country in a
military capacity.

In 1823 he was elected to Congress, and was the only one of the
Pennsylvania delegation who voted for John Quincy Adams, when
the votes of the people failing to elect the President, and he was
chosen by Congress. He was in this body for two years.

In 1825 he was elected a member of the Historical Society of
Pennsylvania, in which he continued to occupy a prominent posi-
tion until his death, being at that time vice-president of the society.
His interest in this association was warm and untiring, and at one
period his zeal was all that saved it from dissolution. The luke-
warm indifference of many of the members was so clogging the
operations of the body, that it was proposed to abandon the attempt
to maintain it. Mr. Breck, in a letter to Mr. John Yaughan, in
which was enclosed a list of the members, says: — "You will see
that the deaths are twenty-two, the resignations are fifty-five, and
the number remaining as members is fifty-three. Perhaps several
of those who have resigned maybe induced to rejoin. At any rate,
even with our present number, there is no occasion to dissolve, or
think of any such thing. Should you be of this opinion, please to
return me the list after conferring with Mr. Learning. I will draw
up a report upon the subject. March 15, 1838." Upon his death
Mr. Breck bequeathed a portion of his library to the Historical
Society.

This was only one of the many societies to which Mr. Beck gave
his time, means and influence. He was a Trustee of the Pennsyl-
vania University ; one of the Directors of the Philadelphia, Wil-
mington and Baltimore Railroad; one of the Common Council;
President of the Institute for the Blind, and one of its founders.
Mr. Ingersoll mentions an interesting incident connected with Mr.
Breck's interest in the Institute for the Blind. He says :

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 67

" Soon after the attack on Port Sumter he was at a concert of
the pupils of this institution, and occupied a seat on the platform.
He here availed himself of an opportunity, as he had done on a
former occasion, to manifest his deep interest in the events that
have been crowded into the months elapsed since the opening of
the Southern rebellion. At the close of the concert a call was made
for the Star Spangled Banner, and it was sung with great spirit. At
the last chorus, Mr. Breck sprang up in view of the audience, (about
seven hundred persons,) and waving his hat over his head, called for
three cheers for the Union and the Constitution, one and indivisible,
adding, ' I was a man when they were formed, and Grod forbid that
I should live to witness their downfall.' The cheers were given
with three times three, to the great wonderment of the blind pupils,
who knew not what it all meant. This relation is given by a gen-
tleman who was present."

Mr. Breck's residence was at Sweet Briar — a lovely villa on the
West bank of the Schuylkill, not far from the city. He resided
here for thirty-eight years, having a strong love for farming, bo-
tanical pursuits, horticulture, and indeed all country pleasures.

On the twenty-fourth of December, 1795, Mr. Breck married the
daughter of Mr. John Ross, one of Philadelphia's prominent mer-
chants. She died in 1859, at the advanced age of eighty-six years.

Mr. Breck's fondness for research and literary pursuits was
proved by the number of articles that he has contributed to the
many societies of which he was a member. While a member of the
Pennsylvania Senate he published a work on the prosperity and
prospects of the State, which passed through two editions. Among
other productions may be° mentioned "The recollections of Samuel
Breck, Sweet Briar, in the township of Philadelphia, state of
Pennsylvania, removed to the city of Philadelphia, in December,
1835, having resided at Sweet Briar about thirty-eight years ;" a
" Discourse before the Society of the Sons of New England of the
city and county of Philadelphia, on the history of the early set-
tlement of their country;" a "Sketch of the benevolent services
of the late Jacob G. Morris ; a " Biography of Robert M. Patter-
son;" " An address to the pupils of the institution for the blind;"
a speech on the " Abolition of slavery in Pennsylvania," delivered
in the Senate ; a " Historical sketch of continental paper money,
presented by him to the American Philosophical Society;" an "Ad-
dress made when President of the Athenaeum, at the laying of the

68 BIOGRAPHIES OF

corner-stone of the new hall, in 1845," with many other reports,
speeches and addresses.

One of the most prominent points in Mr. Breck's character was
his love of occupation. He was never idle. Study, literature, mi-
croscopic investigations and scientific research were varied by ac-
tive out-door pursuits.

In July, 1828, he lost his only surviving child, who died in his
arms, at the age of twenty-one. He writes of this sad event to his
sister in these terms : " Thus is my greatest hold on this earth dis-
solved, and she whose future comfort and happiness was my great
study, and a source of anxious thought, is snatched from me. No
worldly transactions of mine took place that had not 'reference to
that dear child's future life. I am now without solicitude, it is
true; but I am also without her society, her companionship, and I
may add without her counsel, which was generally the dictate of
good sense and mature judgment/' Again he writes : " One sub-
ject is forever uppermost in my thoughts. It seems often as if I
took a melancholy pleasure in nourishing my grief. In spite of
myself I have her before my mind's eye in my solitary walks
* * * until the last sad week of her existence rushes on my mind,
and makes, by its most painful recollection, my heart move within
me. An effort to shut the whole scene out follows, and succeeds
for a time, when the dear image recurs again, and so twenty times
a day. But I trust time will weaken, without wholly obliterating,
these sad recollections."

On the twenty-second of August, 1862, an illness which had
troubled him for some months, resulted in an attack of paralysis,
and on the thirty-first, at noon, he breathed his last, at the ad-
vanced age of ninety-one years, one month and fourteen days.

Mr. Ingersoll says: "He was correct in deportment and honor-
able in conduct; of amiable temper and lively and affectionate feel-
ings; quick in perception, and of tenacious memory and sound
judgment ; industrious when he had anything particular to do, and
looking out for it when he had not ; of strict punctuality ; a good
Christian and husband, father, neighbor and friend, and a patriotic
citizen • domestic in habit and temperate in living — yet well in-
clined to social intercourse."

Again he says: "A pious spirit, however, seems to have chiefly
aided him in his departing hours. He had habitually manifested
a more than common respect, which was real and devout, for reli-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 69

gion and its institutions and practices. For many years he had
been a communicant at St. Luke's Episcopal Church ; he was an
active member of the vestry, and at all times present at the meet-
ings ; and he persevered in his attendance on public worship. He
was visited, at his own request, after his fatal attack, by a distin-
guished clergyman, and expressed to him with great clearness his
trust in his Saviour, and his readiness to depart. He desired
prayers to be offered, wishing the attendance of all the family, and
specifying the prayer for the sick on the point of departure. His
utterance was imperfect, but all was calm and clear. It is attested
by one who knew him best in this respect, that his piety did not
render him morose or severe in manner, but just chastened the
natural gayety of his disposition into a beautiful and most attractive
cheerfulness. He was lively and buoyant, and retained an interest
in passing events, it may be literally said to the day of his death.
After he was stricken with paralysis, and one hand was entirely
disabled, his patriotism was still manifested. On learning from a
friend some cheering news respecting his beloved country, he raised
his eyes and his hand in an attitude of prayer and thanksgiving,
and moved his yet remaining vigorous hand above his head, and
waved it three times around — a silent but cheering expression of
his joy. The medical gentleman who attended him also informs
us that the ardor of his patriotism was extinguished only by death.

THOMAS LEAMING.

IN the course of these sketches we have, in a certain degree,
illustrated the variability of the American temperament. The
adaptability of our countrymen to the circumstances which sur-
round them; the ease with which they aecommodate themselves
to social and business changes; the handiness with which they lay
aside old habits and engage in pursuits entirely new to them, are
peculiarities which have frequently engaged the attention of intel-
gent foreigners, who endeavored to make themselves acquainted
with the characteristics of the American mind.

In the career of Thomas Learning it will be shown that a classic
education, a course of legal studies and practice at the bar are not

70 BIOGRAPHIES OF

impediments to the making of a good merchant; and, that a mer-
cantile experience and success are no barrier to a resumption of
the profession of an advocate and counsellor.

Thomas Learning was born in the city of Philadelphia on the
twentieth of August, 1748. His parents were in comfortable cir-
cumstances, descendants of a wealthy and respectable English
family, some of the members of which came to this country about
the year 1688. They had prospered in the colony of Pennsylva-
nia, and they had the means and the will to procure for their son
an education equal to the best that the literary and scholastic re-
sources of North America could furnish. They obtained for him
in childhood solid and judicious instruction at Philadelphia, and
when he had attained sufficient age they placed him in the college
at Philadelphia, at that time one of the most noted institutions of
learning on this side of the Atlantic. Having graduated with credit,
his fancy, or the wishes of his parents, led him to the profession of
the law. He was entered as a student by the celebrated lawyer
John Dickinson, whose professional reputation has, in the regards
of posterity, been eclipsed by his patriotic essays in " the times
that tried men's souls," known as the " Farmer's Letters/'

About the year 1769 Mr. Learning was admitted to the bar, and
he commenced the practice of the law amid a talented but small
circle of professional brethren, many of whom were soon to make
their names celebrated in the history of their country. When the
troubles with Great Britain, which had been growing more serious
during his minority and early manhood, became so threatening
that it did not seem possible to avert hostilities, Mr. Learning was
found arrayed upon the side of his country. He joined one of the
" association" companies which were formed in Philadelphia foi
the purpose of preparing for the conflict. He devoted himself to
the acquisition of the infantry drill, and made it his business to
study military tactics. Having thus accomplished himself in this
practical school, he determined to make his knowledge valuable in
organizing military bodies elsewhere. He was in good circum-
stances, and owned, in the right of descent, a handsome landed
property in the colony of New Jersey, upon which it was his cus-
tom to reside during the warm season of the year. As a natural
consequence, he made many friends in that colony and was con-
sidered as a citizen. Repairing to his estates, he exercised his in-
fluence among his neighbors for the purpose of raising military
companies. He was exceedingly successful, and not only in raising

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 71

companies but in forming a battalion, which he instructed in mili-
tary exercises. Whilst engaged in these patriotic duties his energy
and enthusiasm naturally attracted the attention of the people of
the county, and he was chosen to represent them in the conven-
tion which assembled June 10, 1776. Its labors were completed
by the second day of the ensuing month, and among the resolu-
tions passed by it, with the support of Mr. Learning, was one call-
ing upon Congress to declare the Colonies free and independent
States — a request which was complied with two days afterward.

Relinquishing further residence in New Jersey at that time, he
returned to Philadelphia to find that his own profession had ceased
to exist. " Inter arma leges silent." The sentiment of the Latin
poet was fully exemplified throughout North America during the
American Revolution.

In this condition of affairs his active spirit induced him to en-
gage in mercantile adventure. The field of commerce was not
large, but it was prosecuted by some adventurous spirits. With
Andrew Bunner, who before the Revolution had been a merchant
in successful business, Mr. Learning associated himself, furnishing
a most important assistance in capital. Andrew Bunner & Co.
prosecuted their business under constant risk of loss from captures
of their vessels by British ships of war. Their transactions were
of the utmost importance to the American cause. They imported
ammunition largely, and frequently in the hour of necessity the Con-
tinental troops were indebted to them for the means of meeting
the enemy. They also put their capital into vessels intended to
retaliate upon the British. They built several privateers, which
made havoc in the commerce of the " mistress of the seas." One
of these privateers, the schooner Mars, Captain Yelverton Taylor,
took, in three vessels, five hundred English and Hessian soldiers.
During the war the privateers of Bunner & Co. took one thousand
prisoners, for whom American prisoners, languishing in the " Old
Sugar House" and the " Jersey Prison Ship," at New York, were
exchanged. Fifty prizes were also captured by the privateers of
this firm. The house was patriotic, and ready at all times to aid
the government. The firm of Bunner & Co. subscribed to the
amount of £6,000 to the fund of £260,000, raised among a few citi-
zens of Philadelphia, in 1780, for the support of government in an
hour of great need.

Mr. Learning joined the " First Troop of Philadelphia City Ca-
valry," in 1775, and was a spirited and active member of that

72 BIOGRAPHIES OF

honorable organization until his death. He was one of the twenty-
six members of that company who served at Trenton and Prince-
ton in 1776-7, during which time their services were so valuable
that they received the special thanks of Gen. Washington upon
their discharge. During the Kevolution they performed other du-
ties, when called upon by the executive of Pennsylvania or by
high general officers in the Continental service, and their record of
the congratulations extended to them for these actions remain a
proud legacy to the members of this volunteer association.

The house of Andrew Bunner & Co. was dissolved shortly after
the close of the Revolution, and Mr. Bunner was appointed vendue
master. Mr. Learning resided at No. 152 South Front street, next
door to the store of the firm.

His withdrawal from mercantile aif air s,natur ally took him back
to the law. In 1791 his office as counsellor at law was at his old
residence, but he did not long remain there. He removed to the
corner of Vine street and Cable lane, (New Market street,) where,
during the yellow fever of 1797, he fell a victim to that dread
disease.

Mr. Learning's sons — Thomas Fisher Learning and Jeremiah
Fisher Learning — devoted themselves permanently to those mercan-
tile pursuits which their father temporarily followed. They were
in partnership for many years. Descendants of Thomas Learning
still keep up the family connection with business affairs. J. Fisher
Leaming and Robert W. Learning, at No. 30 South Front street,
maintain a name which, among merchants of the Revolution in the
same locality, was known and universally respected.

JAMES McHENEY.

THE name of the subject of this sketch is as familiar on both
sides of the Atlantic as that of any man who for generations has
created reputation and fortune by the pursuit of an exclusively
mercantile career. Perhaps there are a few instances, like that
of Roscoe, the banker and historian, of Liverpool, (whose eulogy
was so gracefully pronounced by Washington Irving, in his
" Sketch Book,") who have acquired an equal reputation in both

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 73

mercantile and literary life. Charles Sprague, too, the presi-
dent of a Boston bank, and an eminent poet, may also be cited as
an example of wide fame resulting from the blended exertions of
the study and the banking-house ; but still we reaffirm that the
reputation of James McHenry is unsurpassed by any case of strict
devotion to business life.

The elements of Mr. McHenry's greatness are finely mingled, yet
we can point them out for imitation so clearly as to prove that his
large fortune and the honor in which his name is held, are the na-
tural outgrowth of the noble qualities of the man. He is a native
of Ireland, and in his early life his mother was the proprietor of a
retail dry goods store, No. 36 South Second street, and he was em-
ployed as a clerk on Market street. He grew up amid the busy
scenes of these wonderful streets, and we can fancy that the cease-
less activity which was ever before his eyes exerted a large influ-
ence over his subsequent career. Second street, as most of our
readers are aware, stretches for seven or eight miles through the
most populous part of Philadelphia, and is almost exclusively de-
voted to retail trade. Market houses dot its extent in very many
places, while venders from wagons by thousands cluster around
them. Dry goods stores, drug stores, groceries, hardware estab-
lishments, fancy goods shops, iron mongers, factories, furniture
warehouses, foreign fruit stands, book stores and stalls, stationery
establishments, clothing dealers, glass and china warerooms, hotels,
restaurants, intelligence offices, and every class of place where the
wants of an immense city are supplied, range themselves side by
side along mile after mile of pavement. Crowds upon crowds of
buyers, sellers, and gazers at the busy scene who throng the side-
walk from daybreak until long after dark, also present a thousand
characteristics as worthy of the pen of the novelist as any scene
on the Strand or in the London Cheapside. It was amid the busy
scenes of such a thoroughfare that James McHenry, as a youth,
mingled, and we doubt not that even now he turns from the scenes
passing before his eyes in London, and recalls the active life of his
youth in Second street.

In London he has so ably managed his affairs that he has secured
an ample fortune, which he controls and uses most nobly and gene-
rously. To Americans, and particularly Philadelphians visiting
England, his hospitality is unbounded, and to make his acquaint-
ance there, is, to a native of the Quaker City, like "brother meeting
brother in a foreign land." To Mr. McHenry the recollection of

74 BIOGRAPHIES OF

Philadelphia is a pleasant memory, and he keeps it alive by gene-
rous deeds. Nor are the claims of kindred less powerful with
Mr. McHenry. He has with loving affection gathered comforts
and luxuries around his mother who resides in this city. Nor
are the claims of patriotism less strong with him. When this ac-
cursed rebellion broke out, his sympathies were at once aroused for
the stars and stripes, and he affirmed his detestation of treason.
He contributed five hundred dollars to the equipment of the
Corn Exchange Regiment, and as a testimonial of his love for the
City of Independence, he sent the Whitworth gun battery as a
gift to our municipality. A warm rich character like this contains
the seeds of all successful and noble designs within it, and we can-
not wonder that the name of James McHenry is honored wherever
patriotism and all manly qualities are revered.

James McHenry was born in Larne, Ireland, May 3, 1817, and
came with his father to Baltimore in 1818. At this place he re-
mained a short period, when his father removed to Pottsville, in
this state, and afterwards to Butler county, where he remained
from 1819 to 1824. About this time his parents removed to Pitts-
burg, and early in the year 1826 came to Philadelphia. During a
greater portion of the ensuing twelve years, from 1826 to 1838,
Mr. McHenry resided in Philadelphia, where he received his educa-
tion. From 1835 to 1838 he was employed by Messrs. Trevor,
Spering & Mixell, an extensive dry goods jobbing house, on Market
street above Fourth. In 1838, at the suggestion of his brother
Alexander, he went to England, where he remained about a year,
at the expiration of which time he became the junior member of
the firm of A. R. & J. McHenry, who were engaged in the commis-
sion business up to the close of 1846, when the copartnership was
dissolved, and Mr. McHenry was taken into the firm of Messrs.
Allen & Anderson, one of the largest provision, grain and flour
commission houses in Liverpool. This association was a most un-
fortunate one, for at the expiration of eight years the firm failed,
and was unable to pay but a very small per centage of its indebted-
ness. In 1855, Mr. McHenry associated with a Mr. Crow, of Liver-
pool, and commenced business again under the firm of James
McHenry & Co. This association was a most successful one, result-
ing to the pecuniary advantage of both members of the firm. In the
ensuing year, Mr. Ward, of Ohio, and Mr. Doolittle, of Germantown,
went to Liverpool, and succeeded in engaging this firm to negotiate
the bonds of the Great Western and Atlantic Railroad Company,

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 75

amounting to the sum of £3,000,000. This arrangement was con-
summated through Salamanca, the great banker of Madrid. Inde-
pendent of this, Messrs. McHenry & Co., were largely engaged in
the provision and breadstuff's commission business, in which they
were very successful in accumulating for both members of the firm
a handsome competency.

Dr. James McHenry, the father of Jardes McHenry, died in this
city, in the year 1845. He resided for many years at No. 36 South
Second street, where Mrs. McHenry superintended the management
of a dry goods establishment. Dr. McHenry was a gentleman of
great literary abilities, having written a number of works, among
them, "The Wilderness," "O'Halaran," "Mysteries of Mischanza,"
" Pleasures of Friendship/' and others. He was also the author of
the Irish tragedy known as the "Usurper/' which had quite a suc-
cessful "run" at Weym's & Warren's old Chestnut street Theatre,
in this city.

Mrs. James McHenry, wife of Dr. McHenry, is still alive, and
lives in elegant style at No. 1902 Chestnut street. The McHenry
family consists of four children: — Alexander McHenry, now en-
gaged largely in the petroleum trade in Philadelphia; James
McHenry of London ; George McHenry, formerly of this city, but
now in London (sympathizing with his Southern friends), and Miss
Mary McHenry, a most estimable and patriotic lady, who still
resides with her mother.

Last year Mr. McHenry paid every dollar — principal and in-
terest— of the indebtedness of the suspended firm.

COLONEL WILLIAM B. THOMAS.

THE subject of our sketch was born in Upper Merion township,
Montgomery county, Pa., on the twenty-fifth of May, 1811. He is
now, therefore, about fifty-two years of age. In early youth his
attention was attracted toward the manufacture of flour. The
neighborhood of his home boasted many fine mills ; at this early
day the use of steam was resisted, on- the plea that it drove the
stones too rapidly and heated the flour too much ; but this, like
the old fogy prejudices against gas, railroads and telegraphs, has

76 BIOGRAPHIES OF

been dissipated by increased intelligence. Flour manufactured in
our city by steam mills is now generally preferred in this and other
markets. Within the past thirteen years an extraordinary impetus
has been given to the business.

Immense quantities of grain are now brought to our city which
formerly sought other outlets. Our increased and constantly in-
creasing railroad connections are enabling the miller to bring the
products of the teeming granaries of the great and fertile West to
his door, without breaking bulk ; and the wonderful and rapidly de-
veloping resources of our great throbbing artery, the Pennsylvania
Eailroad, promise bright hopes for the future to our goodly town.

The energies of young Thomas w^ere early devoted to the flour
business, and in 1832, upon attaining his majority, he commenced
the business, at the " Gulf Mills," where, with the interval of a
year, during which he made an experiment in storekeeping at Ly-
onsville, Pa., he continued till 1843. Mr. Thomas now wished for
a larger field for his activity and enterprise, and accordingly he
came to Philadelphia, determined to begin business in a small way.
Yery soon, through the efforts of clear sighted men, like Mr.
Thomas, the use of steam power in the manufacture of flour be-
came not only tolerated, but recognized by all as a necessity, and
was found perfectly practical in its workings. He commenced in
a diminutive mill, at Thirteenth and Willow streets, starting with
but twenty horse power ; but such energy, industry and sagacious
management as that of Mr. Thomas could not fail of its reward, and
he soon ranked as one of the most successful manufacturers of this
community. The power of his mill was raised from twenty to
eighty horse. Still the demand increased so rapidly that Mr. Tho-
mas found it imperative to increase his facilities for manufacture ;
and to effect this, secured another mill at Thirteenth and Button-
wood streets. Time rolled on, and again such was the popularity
of Wm. B. Thomas' flour, that another enlargement was called for,
and he has within the past year increased his capacity for manu-
facturing by the introduction of an additional engine, of three hun-
dred horse power, which propels sixteen pairs of mill stones, making,
in his entire establishment, three engines, with an aggregate power
of four hundred horse and twenty-four pairs of mill burrs, which
are capable of manufacturing twelve hundred barrels of flour per
day; requiring to feed them five thousand bushels of wheat daily,
or a grand total of three hundred and sixty thousand barrels of flour,
requiring one million five hundred thousand bushels of grain annu-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 77

ally. The manufactory of Mr. Thomas, it is believed, will produce
more flour, and consume more wheat per annum, than any other
milling establishment in the world. Where the demand, and the
consequent increase to meet it, will cease, it is futile to attempt to
predict, as there is no appreciable limit to energy, coupled with
clear, sound judgment.

From very small beginnings, Mr. Thomas has steadily battled
his way to wealth and distinction as a manufacturer of fine flour,
second to none in this or any other market.

Mr. Thomas has not limited his activity to the private pursuits
of trade; "no pent up Utica confines his powers." Possessing
liberal views on all subjects, and great public spirit, he was not
content to hide his light under a bushel, but has sought to make
himself useful to his country and his fellow citizens. He was one
of the founders of the Corn Exchange Association — an organiza-
tion full of vigor and patriotism, and keenly on the alert to every-
thing that promises to advance the interests of commerce and pro-
mote the welfare of the nation. Appreciating the advantages to
be derived from a fraternal union among those engaged in a kin-
dred pursuit, and desiring to stimulate that feeling and that local
pride so essential to the development of a true metropolitan spirit
of enterprise, he strove to establish this association on a firm basis;
how he succeeded, let the record of the Corn Exchange Association, in
peace and war, answer. He was chosen first President, and at the
expiration of his term was relected unanimously, and was only
allowed to leave that highly honorable position by his peremptory
declination of any further service as President. He has, however,
continued one of its leading men ever since. Mr. Thomas is also
a prominent member of the Board of Trade. He is always prompt to
assist in and contribute to any measure which his clear judgment sanc-
tions as being of real advantage to Philadelphia. He is one of the
few among us who have the practical talent to enforce their views
of public policy. No man in the Board of Trade is more prompt
with wise suggestions, or more earnest and impressive in pleading
for what he believes right and beneficial. We need more men of
this stamp, as examples and shining lights to point the w^ay to true
mercantile success for young and unwary feet. When we add that
he is a director of the Manufacturers' Insurance Company, and
that his reputation is very high among business men as a high-
toned, honest, liberal merchant and manufacturer, we have said all

78 BIOGRAPHIES OF

that is necessary of Mr. Thomas in connection with trade. But
this gentleman is widely known in other relations of life.

Mr. Thomas was originally a member of the " GREAT" Demo-
cratic party; but when still a young man he formed decided opi-
nions on the subject of slavery, believing it to be the sum of all
villainies, and also denying the right of any man to hold his bro-
ther man in bondage; and becoming convinced that the Demo-
cratic party had swung from its old mooring, and drifted under the
dangerous rule of the fire-eating oligarchy of the South, he cut
loose from that organization and united himself with the then
hated and despised Republicans, and became a warm and sturdy
champion of free labor, free soil, free speech and free men, when to
espouse that cause — now so dear to the hearts of the American
people — was to be shunned and branded as a fanatic and disor-
ganizer.

Mr. Thomas, in common with other kindred spirits, struggled
on, bearing the heat and burthen of the strife, striking heavy
blows against error from a few brave and valiant arms, knowing
that truth is mighty and must prevail. The nomination of Van
Buren and Adams was the first great evidence of a radical change
in the North. Defeated in that strife, but never conquered, we
again find Mr. Thomas true as steel to his convictions of truth and
the right, supporting and voting for John P. Hale in the memo-
rable year 1852.

During the administration of Franklin Pierce the firm founda-
tions of the great Republican party of to-day were laid. Mr. Tho-
mas was one of those who led that great crusade against the damn-
ing sin of the nineteenth century, in this section ; and contributed
not a little, by his wealth and position in this community, to give
the young giant of freedom, just rising in his strength and burst-
ing his bonds, prestige and respectability. He participated in the
preliminary arrangements of the campaign of 1856, and took a
very active and influential part in that determined struggle. Al-
though the Republicans were defeated, they demonstrated their
strength to such a degree that it was an object with politicians to
conciliate them. Upon the general union of the opposition in this
state, under the name of the People's Party, a number of promi-
nent Republicans were honored with official positions. Mr. Tho-
mas was elected to the Common Council : here, as everywhere, his
great qualities shone forth. The ever memorable and stirringly

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 79

eventful year of 1860 dawned upon the land, and we find Mr. Tho-
mas in the foremost ranks of the champions of freedom, and oppo-
nents of the further extension of the one hlot upon our bannered
stars. He participated in the nomination of Abraham Lincoln, at
Chicago, and, on returning to his home, entered heart, hand and
purse into that absorbing contest, marching to victory beneath
that glorious banner inscribed, " No further extension of human
slavery." 'His were some of the few keen eyes which early disco-
vered the little cloud, no bigger than a man's hand, rising on the
Southern horizon, and his ears could distinguish afar off the mut-
tering of the coming storm of secession, so soon to burst in all its
terror on our heads. Holding firm to his faith in God and the tri-
umph of the truth, he passed undaunted through the trying hours
of the winter of I860; utterly refusing to lend his aid to any
scheme of conciliation or compromise, to fritter away the dearly
bought and hard won victory of truth over error, and right against
might; or to "crook the pregnant hinges of the knee, that thrift
might follow fawning;" nor would he bow bis head to the threats
of incipient treason, and begging pardon for having dared to vote
and act like a man, place his neck beneath the Juggernaut of South-
ern slavery — that whited sepulchre, without full of rotteness, and
dead men's bones within ; whose figure-head of the golden calf so
many of our Northern men fell down and worshipped — promising,
if taken again to the horrible ogre's embrace, never to venture to
think and act, except as it dictated.

As the eventful year of 1801 drew nigh, the dark shadow of trea-
son settled thicker and thicker o'er the land. Men held their
breath at the terrific coming of the tempest, and looked anxiously
in their neighbor's face — longing, but not daring, to place confi-
dence even there ; not venturing to hope for the peaceful inaugu-
ration of a chief magistrate legally and constitutionally chosen.
The time that tried men's souls was upon us, and we find Mr. Tho-
mas, with many more brave hearts, wending his way to the nation's
capital, to stand by that President in his hour of extreme peril, and
carry him safely through the expected fray ; for he realised that
on honest old Abe hung the hopes of a great free people and the
freedom of a continent. Happily the storm burst not then; a kind and
merciful Father watched over us, and Mr. Lincoln quietly took his
seat. Louder, and still more loud, roared the gathered wrath of the
tempest. State after state joined hands with impudent and treason-
able South Carolina in her mad dance toward the yawning gulf of

80 BIOGKAPHIESOF

disunion. Not yet could the North realise that the South was in
deadly earnest, but thought it only the rantings of a spoiled child,
to be appeased by the appetising tit-bit compromise. But " man
proposes and Grod disposes." While the North was hugging " the
delusive phantom of hope," athwart the Southern sky flashed
the fire and rolled the smoke of rebel guns opened upon de-
voted Sumter, the echoing boom rolled over the hills of the sturdy
Northland; then did we realise that " grim visaged war had un-
masked his wrinkled front;" and from every hill and valley, where
had been heard the story of Sumter's doom, rushed out armed thou-
sands to do battle for their country and her unity. Mr. Thomas,
being in Washington when the mad waves of secession rolled over
Baltimore, and our capital seemed doomed — being cut off from pre-
sent succor — enrolled himself as a volunteer in Hon. C. M. Clay's
company, and, musket on shoulder, paced the city, keeping watch
and ward over the centre of our nation's hopes and fears. On that
dark and gloomy night of early April — that night so sombre, with-
out a single star, and illumined only by the flashes of the trusty
muskets of our gallant volunteers, fighting their way through Bal-
timore— terrifying was the then condition of our country. Soon
was heard the joyful sound of the steady tramp of our glorious vo-
lunteers surging in billowy masses about Washington, throwing
around her the protecting arms of her brave sons, the soldiers of
the republic.

The President and his counsellors, recognizing the gravity of
the events by which they were surrounded, determined at once to
apply rigidly that blockade which has proved so singularly effect-
ive, and deeming it of immense importance that so important a
point as Philadelphia should be made secure, and that none but
men of proved loyalty should be put on guard in high places as
well as low, called Mr. Thomas to them at dead of night, when the
world was clothed in slumber as a garment, and offered him the
collectorship of the port. He accepted ; not a seeker after office,
but as one recognising the gravity of the President's reasons, and
at once left for his post, to reach it ere the blockade was pro-
nounced— passing round the gap in the ironway in Baltimore, and
through the dangers that there environed the path, undaunted and
unscathed. Arrived in Philadelphia the necessary arrangements
were soon completed, and Mr. Thomas took possession of the office
he so worthily occupies — in his official acts vindicating the wisdom
of the President's choice. Not content with guarding vigilantly

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 81

the great trust consigned to his care, he frequently — as the lurid
light of conflict shone with brighter glare over our beloved land —
offered his services in a military capacity to the government ; but
the President, wisely, thought him invaluable in his official posi-
tion, and courteously refused, desiring him to continue at his post.

We find Mr. Thomas always actively engaged in advocating and
supporting the war measures of the President, and stoutly uphold-
ing him in his efforts to crush this infamous rebellion ; advocating
a sharp, short and speedy eradication of the evil, by sending into
the defenceless portions of the South a large army, to march into
the interior, liberating as it went ; whose term of service should be
short and during the winter, thus avoiding the pestilential vapors
of the Southern clime ; earnestly asking for the decree of emanci-
pation, and ably seconding that great instrument when issued, in
immortal words from the inspired pen of the great liberator Abra-
ham Lincoln.

The autumn of 1862 found the arms of the republic generally un-
successful, and gloomy forebodings were manifested throughout the
land ; but Mr. Thomas never fainted nor grew weary in well do-
ing; so we find him — after McClellan's and Pope's defeats, and the
red mist of war came rolling dim and heavy on the Southern wind
— with that rare foresight for which he is remarkable, preparing,
notwithstanding the ridicule of many wiseacres, for the invasion of
his native state, which he saw was sure to happen. He saw the
imperative necessity of an organization that could be rendered
effective in case of need; and believing it the particular duty of
men in government employ to support that government with
sword as well as pen, he, in August, set about placing the Custom
House employees on a war footing. A meeting was called, and a
military company formed — the Revenue Guards— of which Mr.
Thomas was unanimously chosen captain. Although then compa-
ratively unskilled in military matters, he manfully accepted the po-
sition, and immediately equipped the company out of his private
means, in the most complete manner possible. ~No pains or ex-
pense was spared by him in his endeavor to produce an organiza-
tion worthy of our city. Scarcely had the arrangements been com-
pleted ere Captain Thomas was called upon to march to the
defense of his state and nation, against an insolent and triumphant
foe. Promptly answering the Governor's call, on the fourteenth
of September he marched his company to Harrisburg, the first
thoroughly equipped organization to report to Gov, Curtin. Ere

82 BIOGRAPHIES OF

leaving he made ample arrangements to equip the second company
of Revenue Guards, who followed the first almost immediately.
Upon the arrival of the second company, the twentieth regiment
was formed, from seven Philadelphia companies and three from
Beading, of which Captain Thomas was chosen Colonel. Com-
pleting the organization of the regiment he immediately marched
to the front, reaching Hagerstown the Saturday following the
bloody battle of Antietam, his being one of the few regiments who
hesitated not at crossing the border, but were willing and ready to
go where duty called. Here the regiment went into camp, but
soon were ordered to Green Castle, and took up their line at night
fall.- After a toilsome and dangerous march, in which Col. Tho-
mas' noble nature shone out with added lustre, scorning to ride
while others walked, devoting his horse to foot-sore private or
weary drummer boy. They reached their new encampment, but
owing to the imperfect arrangements, consequent upon the calling
out of so large a body of men as rushed to repel the invasion, the
commissary department was in a sad condition, and the rations
very sparse and irregular; but Colonel Thomas' liberality prevented
suffering among his men, as he furnished them with food from his
own private purse.

Not without death and wounds was the regiment permitted to
reach home. When in sight of Harrisburg an accident occurred,
so terrible as almost to paralyse. Amid the crash of colliding en-
gines, the noise of escaping steam, the groans of the dying and the
shrieks of the mangled, Col. Thomas moved a very ministering
angel, binding up wounds, soothing the dying, and pouring the
balm of consolation into many an ear listening its last to earthly
sounds, while tears coursed his manly cheeks at sight of sorrows
he was unable to prevent or alleviate.

At request of Gov. Curtin the organization of the twentieth regi-
ment was preserved, regular drills established, and the regiment
kept on a war footing. Early in the winter of 1862-63, with that
perspicuity to which we have before made allusion, Col. Thomas
predicted a second and more formidable invasion of the state, and
so important did he deem the emergency that he wrote the Presi-
dent and the war department that, in his opinion, such an invasion
would take place, in comparison with which the former one would
sink into utter insignificance ; that all signs and known facts in re-
gard to the rebel army pointed plainly at the extreme probability
of such an event ; the scarcity of food in the region infested by that

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 83

army ; the tempting bait of the teeming granaries of Pennsylva-
nia; the clamor of the Southern populace, urging the transfer of
the war from their soil to that of the North, thereby relieving them
from the devastations of the armed hosts of both combatants, and
the depleted and enervated condition of the Army of the Potomac,
the aid promised by Northern traitors to their infamous scheme,
all indicated that such an attempt would speedily be made. In
this view he urged upon them the complete and ample protection
of the border by a volunteer force of at least fifty thousand, called
out for six months — offering himself to raise ten thousand good and
true men for that purpose.

Unfortunately the government could not believe the danger so
imminent, and, thanking him for his warning and patriotism, de-
clined the oifer.

Still of the same opinion, strengthened by every day's record of
events, he prudently and wisely determined to place his regiment
on such a footing that it, at least, could be ready when called upon.
To this end, he called for all his employees to join in the movement,
and was nobly seconded by them ; and also sent a circular, embo-
dying the facts, as he believed them of imminent danger, to all the
loyal leagues and organizations in the city. The response to thia
circular was not such as he expected. So earnest was he in this
work, that by some he was called a military monomaniac. But
soon had Philadelphia cause to rue the hour when she paid not
heed to the watchman from the tower, and gave no listening ear
to his warning. Well do we all remember the dark days of early
June, when the air was full of rumors of the coming tempest, when
that portentous cloud of desolation rolled nearer and still more
near our borders, and there was none to stop its coming— neither
horsemen nor footmen ; and the Southern horizon grew black with
its gathering gloom; when white lips whispered words of ill omen
in the trembling ears of quaking, shivering fear — " Lee has marched
over the mountain wall, and holds Maryland."

" While nearer still, and nearer,
Did the red whirlwind come ;
From underneath the whirling cloud
Is heard the trumpets war note proud,
The trampling and the hum."

Then rang through our state the clarion call of the President
and Governor. Now was the proudest hour of Col. Thomas' life.
While others hesitated and shrunk back, knowing not what to do,
and urgent appeals for armed men came with every beat of the

84 BIOGRAPHIES OF

telegraphic pulse, thanks to his energy, foresight and determination,
Col. Thomas answered promptly, and without an if, a but, or a ques-
tion as to pay, bounty or time of service, mustered in and marched
his regiment, twelve hundred strong, to Harrisburg. forty-eight
hours after the telegram asking his speedy appearance reached him.
Immediately upon his arrival there he reported to Gen. Couch, and
was by him assigned to the important and dangerous service of
guarding the Northern Central Railroad, that great connecting
link between Harrisburg and Baltimore. This was looked upon
by the authorities at Washington, and by Gen. Couch, as of grave
moment, as the free travel of that railway facilitated the move-
ments of the pursuing army of the Potomac, and rendered easy the
transmission of supplies and information from headquarters to the
department of the Susquehanna. Not disguising the danger, the
General told Col. Thomas that he expected nothing less than that his
regiment would be sacrificed to the urgent necessities of the case.
The next forty-eight hours found the twentieth scattered for
twenty miles, above and below York, along this thoroughfare,
busily engaged in fortifying their different positions. From his
headquarters, at York, where the details of his responsible com-
mand were worked out, the keen eye of the Colonel was over all,
and a general personal supervision exercised. Scarcely a day
passed but he made the regular circuit of his extensive lines, and
every company felt his fostering care and fatherly interest. For-
tifications were erected, rifle pits constructed, and careful prepara-
tions made for the coming of the foe. On the third day preceding
the commencement of the bloody contest at Gettysburg, the rebels
appeared in very large force along the line of the Northern Central
Bailroad, menacing York with seven thousand men. Col. Thomas
finding the place untenable by the force at his command, ordered that
portion of the regiment in and about York to fall back to tne river.
So sudden was the appearance of the foe, that the portion below
York (five companies)was cut off from the rest of it, and knew not
their present danger. The wisdom and correct judgment of his
retreat at that time, is amply sustained by the following tele-
graphic correspondence between Major Haller, chief of staff, and
Gen. Couch, but which failed to reach Colonel Thomas until after
the object had been effected. On the twenty-seventh June Major
Haller telegraphed :

" I think Colonel Thomas' troops hopelessly exposed. Sought
for him, but he was absent; so could, not discuss the question.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 85

York must fall, and the bridges follow of course. He might, per-
haps, withdraw to-night."

The reply of General Couch came next morning, viz :
HARRISBURG, June 28, 1868. To MAJOR HALLER: — "When you
find it necessary to withdraw the main body of Prick's command
from Wrightsville, leave a proper number on the other side to de-
stroy the bridges, and use your own discretion in their destruction.
Keep them open as long as possible, with prudence. Send one (1)
or two (2) secret messengers with dispatches to Thomas to with-
draw if he has not already done so."

Col. Thomas had already fallen back, and the messenger arriving
at York, ascertained the fact, but it must be borne in mind that Col.
Thomas did not leave York until after the surrender of that town
by the chief burgess, which event took place at three o'clock on
Saturday, the twenty-seventh June. The companies at and above
York leaving just in time to prevent capture. Eeaching Wrights-
ville, the portion of the regiment mentioned took part in the spirited
engagement at that place, and suffered a considerable loss in
wounded and prisoners, and were ultimately forced to retreat across
the Susquehanna, burning the bridge at that place to prevent pur-
suit. The companies below York were also attacked, but succeeded
in beating off their assailants, and forcing their way to the river,
reaching the Lancaster county side in safety; from their point of
crossing they rejoined the regiment which had been ordered to
Bainbridge, and where they labored night and day on fortifications
and rifle pits on the mainland, and also on the islands in the river,
at the fords at that place, and by their efforts and determined as-
pect, prevented the threatened crossing of the river by the rebels
at that place. The Colonel was placed in command of all the
forces; thus did General Couch show his confidence in and reliance
upon Colonel Thomas. By his orders all the flat boats at the
different ferries had been brought to the Lancaster county side,
thus compelling the foe to try a crossing at the only accessive
ford on the river, which was foiled by this admirable arrange-
ments. After the battle of Gettysburg, the regiment, in common
with other militia, was thrown forward into the Cumberland valley,
making forced marches through mud and rain, through storm, and
the summer's heat, to join General Meade, that he might be enabled
with this reinforcement to drive Lee into the river and destroy him,
but reaching within co-operating distance of that army, only to
participate in its chagrin, felt so keenly, at the escape of that wily
rebel.

$6 BIOGRAPHIES OF

The twentieth now laid in camp for some weeks, perfecting them-
selves, under the leadership of their gallant Colonel, to do with
honor any duty they might be called upon to perform, until
ordered to return to their homes. In all the arduous duties of those
trying times, in rain, sun, or the dampness of night, on the weari-
some march, or lonely bivouac, everywhere was visible the evi-
dences of the love and kindness of Colonel Thomas; did rations
fall short, his ready hand and purse supplied the needed food.
Always soldierly in bearing and discipline, stern and exacting, re-
quiring that ready and prompt obedience from his inferiors, that he
so willingly accorded to his superiors; just in all judgment of cases,
kind and benevolent to a fault, when the stern duties of the soldier
did not conflict. We can point with satisfaction to Colonel William
B. Thomas as a pattern man in all relations of life, and ask the
young to look to such as he for their models by w^hich to form and
shape their own courses. Colonel Thomas is still in the enjoyment
of robust health, the result of temperate living and wholesome
activity > and entire freedom from those vices that do enervate.
His wealth is spread with lavish though discriminating hand upon
objects of real worth. He is a born philanthropist. His heart is.
" open as day to melting charity." He gives largely to benevolent
institutions, and contributes lavishly of his ample means for the
benefit of our sick and maimed heroes. Just as he is benevolent,
he long ago conceived the idea of a community of interest in his
milling operations, and carried it into practical working by giving
every man in his employ a share of the profits of the concern,
while he furnished the capital and requisite means to carry on the
business; this system has been found to work with very beneficial
results, and has assisted in procuring for Colonel Thomas his pre-
sent enviable and highly honorable position before the community
of which he is so bright an ornament ; long may it be ere Philadel-
phia has to morn her model merchant, miller, patriot, and high-
souled gentleman.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 87

CAMPBELL.

THOSE persons who remember Quintin Campbell during a whole
generation, as the Cashier of the Philadelphia Bank, an institu-
tion in which he held vast trusts, and discharged them with in-
dustry and fidelity, can have but little suspicion of the simple and
humble incidents of his early career. A sketch of his life will
show that the secret of success is good conduct, and that integrity
and attention must in all cases lead to honor and wealth.

Quintin Campbell was the son of the Eeverend John Campbell,
minister of the Parish of Glenfairn, in Galloway shire, Scotland, where
he was born, in the month of November, 1774. His father occu-
pied the manse and glebe lands, which were beautifully situated
upon the river Ken, which empties itself in the Loch of the same
name, near New Galloway. In the year 1780, the Reverend John
Campbell died, leaving three children — Quintin, Ivie and Agnes.
His death of course produced a great change in the circumstances
of the family. His mother removed from the manse to the village
of St. Johnstown, in the adjoining parish of Dairy, where she took
a house next door to that of her mother, Mrs. Hair. Here she
lived economically, her principal means of support being £21 per
annum, which she received from uthe fund for the widows and
ministers," at Edinburgh. This small sum, however, had at that
time a purchasing power equal to six times the amount at the pre-
sent day; and by frugality, Mrs. Campbell managed to live upon it,
and with assistance from her mother, to bring up her small family.
Quintin was sent to the free school of the parish, where, under the
direction of James Buchanan, a type of the flogging schoolmasters
of the time, he gained those rudiments of education which were to
assist him through life. At the age of sixteen, the young Scotch
boy naturally began to consider what course it would be necessary
for him to pursue in order to relieve his mother of the burden of
his support. The country offered him as the only occupations, the
life of a farm laborer, or a shepherd, and the prospect of following
these pursuits was distasteful to him. James Douglas, a boy com-
panion, and himself, frequently conferred upon those subjects, and
the result was a youthful resolution that they would join their for-

88 BIOGRAPHIES OF

tunes, and go out into the world together associates and friends.
Their relatives were consulted upon the subject, and finally gave
their consent. The boys were of opinion that the navigation of the
sea offered them inducements, and they left home determined to
seek employment in a principal seaport town. In the month of
April, 1790, Quintin Campbell and James Douglass, with their
little wardrobes tied up in their handkerchiefs, and with a small
stock of money, (Quintin Campbell was the owner of forty-two
shillings,) left St. Johnstown forever. They walked to Kircud-
bright, where they stopped the first night with a relative of Camp-
bell's, who treated them kindly. They took with them letters of
introduction to persons of standing in Liverpool, from Miss Dick, a
benevolent maiden lady, who for many years had made St. Johnstown
her home. This assistance was of great advantage to the young ad-
venturers. On the fifteenth of April, 1790, the boys sailed from
Kircudbright, in a small sloop, bound for Liverpool. They expe-
rienced a severe storm during the passage, and the vessel was
forced to put into Whithaven. They reached Liverpool a few days
after, and having been consigned to Sandy Eeed, a canny Scotch-
man, took lodgings with him until the gentlemen to whom Miss
Dick had recommended them, could do something for them. These
strange friends succeeded in getting a situation for Douglas upon
board of a ship in the Guinea trade, and for Campbell they secured
an apprenticeship to Captain Andrew English, master of a small
ship called the "Hope," which was bound to Baltimore.

Thus, these boys, who had so bravely resolved at St. Johnstown
to unite their destinies, were separated forever. What became of
Douglas, Mr. Campbell never heard. On the twenty-fifth of April,
1890, the ship " Hope" sailed from Liverpool, and after a narrow
escape from stranding on the Irish coast, reached Baltimore, after
a passage of forty-nine days. The incidents of the voyage com-
pletely disenchanted Quintin Campbell of the romance with which
his young imagination had imbued the idea of sailor life. As the
youngest apprentice and cabin boy, he not only had to perform
many repulsive duties, but his religious training and principles
were shocked by the rough and brutal character of his associates.
His ingenuous young mind was pained by the profanity and blas-
phemy which prevailed on board of the ship, and the idea of con-
tinuing in his situation was so horrible, that he formed the design
of abandoning it at any risk. To escape from the ship was not an
easy matter — but fate favored him. He was instrumental in saving

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 89

the life of the ship's carpenter, who, whilst bathing in the basin at
Baltimore, was in imminent danger of being drowned. This ser-
vice secured the gratitude and friendship of the man, who being
informed of the intention of Quintin to run away, engaged to assist
him. He procured for him an asylum upon shore, to which the
boy succeeded in escaping. From this place he finally emerged to
take passage in the packet-boat for Philadelphia, sailing directly
by the dreaded ship "Hope," upon the deck of which Captain
English seemed to be in command, preparing to sail from the port-

Quintin Campbell landed at Market street wharf, Philadelphia,
about the middle of September, 1790, and walked up that street
with the same feelings which Benjamin Franklin experienced when
he left the packet-boat and proceeded to explore his new home,
with a loaf of bread under his arm. Campbell's forlorn appearance
was no recommendation to the landlords of different inns to whom he
applied for lodgings. After some rebuifs, he was taken in at a tavern
in Front street, near Callowhill, where he got to bed and slept
soundly. The next morning he inquired for Ive Porteus, his cou-
sin, a flour dealer, who had lived at Philadelphia, and in whom he
expected to find a friend and protector. The people at the tavern
did not know Porteus, but they sent the boy to Levi Hollings-
worth, as one likely to know, being extensively in the flour trade.
He was the father of the present Pascall Hollings worth, and the
store was at that time at No. 61 South Wharves. Mr. Hollings-
worth was standing at the door when the little Scotch boy ap-
proached him. He did not remember Porteus, but upon reference
to Maurice Kennedy, his chief clerk, the latter said that he had
dealt with Hollingsworth, but that he understood that he had died
some months before, at Norfolk, Virginia. This intimation must
have been a terrible blow to the hopes of the boy. There was
some gleam of sunshine, however, in reference to Thomas and Pe-
ter Mackie, at No. 42 Front street, who had been friends of Por-
teus. To these gentlemen the runaway sailor boy told his simple
story, and fortified it by the only evidence in his possession, a cer-
tificate of good character, from the Eev. Alex. McGo wen, of Dairy.
The Mackies promised to befriend him, and told him to call the
next day. Promptly he repaired there at the appointed time, and
was astonished and gratified at unexpected news.

It seemed that Mr. Hollingsworth was in want of an apprentice,
and liking the apparent artlessness of the boy, he called upon the
Messrs. Mackie to ascertain what they knew about him. They
12

90 BIOGRAPHIES OF

could only give Campbell's own story; but Mr. Rollings worth,
satisfied by his looks and manner, and having a favorable opinion
of the Scotch, offered to take him in his store for his victuals and
clothes. The offer was munificent to Quintin, and he gladly em-
braced it. Perhaps no occurrence in the life of Mr. Campbell was
of more importance than this. The revulsion jn the feelings of the
boy upon so suddenly finding friends and an agreeable employ-
ment, in a city in which he had only landed the day before, can be
imagined, but cannot be described.

Quintin Campbell went into the family of Levi Hollingsworth,
and was well provided for. He was diligent and trustworthy.
He served a faithful clerkship, disturbed by no adventure; but
meeting with his old master, Captain English, who, however, treated
him well, and did not seem inclined to enforce the obligations of his
indentures, even if he could have done so in a foreign country.
He gained the good will and esteem of Mr. Hollingsworth, and when,
after five and a-half years of service, his indenture expired, he was
not turned out upon the world without employment. Mr. Hol-
lingsworth exerted his influence in his favor, and procured for him
a clerkship in the bank of Pennsylvania, at a salary of $600 dollars
a year, which seemed to be an independent fortune to the young
man.

In this situation Mr. Campbell remained for five or six years,
when he was induced to resign, in order to undertake a commis-
sion for Gurney & Smith, to act for them as supercargo at Havana
for several ship loads of flour, sent there from Yirginia. Having
by these means obtained some knowledge of the West India trade,
he determined to establish a commission house at Havana. This
project was suddenly defeated by the peace of Amiens, in 1802, and
the closing of the ports of Cuba against foreigners. He then re-
turned to Philadelphia, where he was out of business for some
months, but was finally engaged by the Pennsylvania Insurance
Company to go to the Island of Guadalope, to inquire into the cir-
cumstances attending a supposed wreck there, which was thought
to be a fraudulent attempt to cheat the underwriters.

Upon his return to Philadelphia, in 1804, the Philadelphia Bank
was about being organized. He applied to the directors for a situ-
ation in the institution, and was appointed first teller. In 1806
the cashier, James Todd, died, and Quintin Campbell was chosen
his successor. For thirty-one years the name of Quintin Camp-
bell as cashier of the Philadelphia Bank was known and honored

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 91

throughout the community. In the sixtieth year of his age he re-
solved to withdraw from the active and responsible duties of cash-
ier, and retire to private life. But hip fellow citizens, who had
confidence in his business capacity, were not willing that he should
resign all interest in business affairs. In 1840 he was elected Pre-
sident of the Pennsylvania Fire Insurance Company, a position
which he resigned, in consequence of ill health, in 1853. From
that period until his death, March 2, 1863, he was active and use-
ful as a citizen. His career is a fine example of the benefit of early
moral training and of good habits. No one could have been more
forlorn than the runaway sailor boy who entered Philadelphia to
seek his fortune in September, 1790. No one could have been more
respected in consequence of his worth and a long life of probity
and usefulness, than the citizen who departed this life March 2,
1863.

DANIEL H. EOCKHILL.

THE progress of the tailor's art is coeval with the progress of
civilization. The difference between the bear skin of the savage
and the delicately fitted and tasteful coat of the elegant gentleman
who appears upon our fashionable promanade, is typical of the
difference between humanity in a condition, but little removed
from that of the brute, and mankind refined, polished and en_
lightened in cultivated society. The history of clothing, from the
days of the fig-leaves, to those of the Eaglan and Talma, is a most
curious and instructive study. Even the comparisons of the styles
in vogue in the various countries at the present day, would afford
matter for an entertaining volume. The primitive simplicity of
dress among many nations; the picturesque attire of others, who,
for centuries, have retained the same costume; and the fleeting
fashions of people who claim to be the foremost representatives <of
the highest refinements of civilization, may furnish the philosopher
with food for thought, and the artist with fanciful suggestions. In
styles of clothing, we are generally content to receive instructions
from Paris, but we doubt whether the Parisians ever dreamed of
such a wholesale manufacture of costumes for the millions as that
which has been developed in America.

92 BIOGRAPHIES OF

Let us glance at the tailoring business in this city alone, as an
illustration of our rapid improvement upon industrial operations
of the Old World, and of our own people in by-gone days.

About twenty-five years ago, the tailors' craft was entirely con-
fined to the production of what is called customer work — that is,
to the supply of single garments, of single suits, for special orders.
Every individual who desired to renew an article of clothing was
required to be regularly measured and fitted, and their garments
were made to suit them, whether in accordance with the fashion
of the time or otherwise. But this was at length considered too
slow a system for a fast and changeable people, who cared less for
the excellence of workmanship than for the promptitude and suffi-
ciency of manufacture. Ready-made clothing establishments were
started; at first their patronage was neither extensive nor of the
most desirable kind. But as more capital was gradually drawn
into the business, and the garments improved in style and
quality, the sales of these stores so largely increased as for a
time to threaten the "customer" tailors with ruin. The cheap
labor of women and indigent foreigners enabled the dealers in
ready-made clothing to under-sell their rivals, and to not only
supply a heavy local demand, but to send their goods to all parts
of the country. This business has increased to such an enor-
mous extent that the great clothing establishments of our prin-
cipal cities may be said to clothe the whole nation. The ca-
pital invested here in this branch of industry is estimated at
$3,500,000 annually. The wages paid annually, amounted to about
$3,000,000. There are sixty-seven firms, whose aggregate produc-
tion is valued at $6,050,000 annually, while others, who are en-
gaged in a smaller way, produce garments to the value of $3,500,000
annually. About ten millions of dollars per annum will barely
cover the whole production of ready-made clothing in this city.
It is worthy of note, however, that certain " customer" houses
here do a larger and more profitable business than any tailoring
establishment of the period before the commencement of the
wholesale manufacture. With the increase of aristocratic refine-
ment and the cultivation of taste in dress, the masters of the cus-
tomer's mystery have endeavored to keep pace, and the result is,
that they enjoy a kind of patronage which those who manufacture
for the masses cannot hope to gain. The old tailor "shops" of our
fathers have given place to palatial stores, in which the fashionable
gentleman may lounge, look over the latest styles of goods, select

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 93

patterns and give orders, with exquisite satisfaction. These resorts
are not inferior in attractions to any of those which are patronized
by the beau monde of any European capital; and we may point to
one of them — that of Messrs. Rockhill & Wilson, on Chestnut street,
above Sixth, as unsurpassed in reputation for taste and elegance.
This house is also worthy of particular notice on account of the
character and career of its founders, who is entirely the architect
of his own fortune.

Daniel H. Rockhill is a native of New Jersey. He was born at
Columbus, in that state, in 1801. His parents were in humble cir-
cumstances. He enjoyed but little educational advantages, and
was destined for a life of toil. He became an apprentice to the
shear and the needle, and his only hope of rising in the world was
based upon his becoming a thorough master of his trade. While
still a mere youth, Mr. Rockhill came to Philadelphia, and resided
in West's alley, while he obtained employment from Mr. Joseph
Ridgway, whose establishment was located in Third street, oppo-
site to the Mechanics' Bank.

He was careful, industrious, economical and self-reliant ; but it
was not until the year 1829 that he thought it expedient to com-
mence business on his own account. He then opened a " shop"
on Second street, below Callowhill. Here he labored early and
late to secure a reputation for excellence of workmanship, and a
consequent increase of patronage. Business flowed in upon him
as the reward of his toil, as a natural result of his endeavors to
please all customers. He remained in the same locality for fifteen
years, or until the enlargement of his means and the popularity of
his establishment induced him to display his energy, taste and en-
terprise, in a more fashionable neighborhood.

Mr. Rockhill had in his employ a young man named Franklin S.
Wilson, whom he had taken as an apprentice in July, 1834. Wil-
son was remarkable for his intelligence, active and attentive busi-
ness habits and pleasing manners; and having fully tested the
capacity of this young tradesman, Mr. Rockhill determined to take
him into partnership, at the commencement of tailoring on a more
extensive scale. Accordingly, the firm of Rockhill & Wilson was
formed in 1843, and in August of the same year they opened what
was then considered a commodious establishment, on Chestnut
street below Third. A number of foncerns in the same line were
located in that bustling portion of the city. The rivalry was keen,
and the struggle for supremacy aroused the energies of the com-

94 BIOGRAPHIES OF

peting clothiers. Some attempted to dazzle the public by glaring
display, or to delude by alluring misrepresentations. But Eockhill
and Wilson mainly relied upon their prompt fulfilment of orders,
their taste arid liberality in the selection of material, and the style
and perfection of their work. They succeeded beyond their first
anticipations. They gained a large and extremely valuable cus-
tom, and their establishment became the resort of the devotees of
fashion and the judges of elegance in garments. Their profits were
satisfactory, and the poor knight of the needle of West's alley be-
came a successful merchant In May, 1856, they removed to a
new, spacious and splendid store, on Chestnut street above Sixth,
where they are located at present. Their business is larger than
that of any other customer retail concern in the same line of trade
in this city. Their patrons are of the class who generally lead the
mass of people in their styles of dress, and who recognize this store
as the resort of all who are anxious to obtain the latest and most
fashionable article of male attire. Their profits are immense, reach-
ing in one year $300,000 ! They are large operators in real estate,
owning the handsome brown stone store on Chestnut street; four
brick dwellings on Seventh street above Green; three on Old York
road above Noble; two on Green street between Third and Fourth
streets; and two brown stone dwellings on Arch street above Eight-
eenth street, which cost $75,000.

Mr. Eockhill, now in his sixtieth year, is still active and full of
enterprise. He has never held any official position, being of rather
a retiring disposition and devoted to business. He has taken a
lively interest in that great philanthropic movement, the temper-
ance reform, and has given much time and money for the advance-
ment of the cause. In his opinion intemperance is the source of
the most frightful evils that afflict the land ; and he has felt called
upon, from a conscientious desire to benefit mankind, to do all in
his power to check the fiery flood that annually sweeps away
thousands who might be the pride and ornaments of society. He
has held the highest position in the order known as the Sons of
Temperance — the most efficient organization ever formed for the
rescue of humanity from the degradation of drunkenness. Mr.
Eockhill is said to be in very comfortable circumstances. To a
sound and practical brain he unites a warm and generous heart,
which is never closed against the appeals of the suffering. He is
one of those examples which we would especially commend to the
attention of our working men, as proving that industry, cultiva-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 95

tion of skill in a particular trade, and economical management,
will, under Providence, raise the humblest to a social position,
which may be the envy of men who were born with a golden spoon
at their lips.

DR. DAVID JAYNE.

THE infusion of new blood into the veins of the commercial body,
is, in this country, a continual process. In some of our large cities
the principal merchants who control the business character of
great communities are natives of other sections of the country,
and many of them never saw the localities which they were finally
to develope and manage, until they were well grown, and until
some of them had long passed the beginning of manhood. New
York and New Orleans illustrates this fact more generally than
other American cities. The industry, enterprise and success of
New York is in a small degree due to native New Yorkers. New
England men and Jerseymen are its merchant princes — men who
left their humble homes to seek their fortunes, have found them in
the Empire city; and whilst the descendants of the Dutch have
slumbered away in the drowsy comfort that made their venerable
ancestors respectable and dull, adventurers have seized the helm of
their affairs and contributed their quota toward making New York
the wonderful metropolis which it is. Philadelphia is indebted for
its present attitude very much to the enterprising persons who
have engaged in business here; and although our proportion of
native merchants is larger than it is in New York, we cannot shut
our eyes to the fact that some of the most successful business men
in the city came to us from other portions of the country.

Among the strangers whose settlement here have been of equal
advantage to themselves and to Philadelphia, few have been more
successful or more useful, as a citizen, than Dr. David Jayne. Born
in Monroe county, Pennsylvania, on the twenty-second of July,
1799, David Jayne was perhaps more fortunate than the sons of the
majority of his neighbors, in having-intelligent parents, who knew the
value of education, and used their endeavors to secure to their chil-
dren as thorough instruction as was possible in that wild region. His

96 BIOGRAPHIES OF

father, the Rev. Ebenezer Jayne, was a Baptist clergyman, a pious
and intelligent man, and the son received home tuition and counsels,
which exercised a happy influence upon his future career. He
availed himself carefully of these advantages, and after having
learned all that was possible in Monroe county, went out into the
world to learn more. Fate directed him toward Cumberland
county, New Jersey, where he commenced his active exertions in
the arduous business of earning his own living, by engaging in the
troublesome and unremunerative occupation of keeping school.
This fact alone, shows that David Jayne had received a fair edu-
cation at home. He enjoyed the confidence of his scholars, and
while he held the birch of the pedagogue his success was sufficient
to bestow honor upon the ancient profession. But whilst engaged
in this drudgery, school-master Jayne had a higher ambition. His
tastes led- him toward the study of medicine, and while yet sup-
porting himself by the profits of his school, he was preparing for
a wider sphere of usefulness.

In the year 1821, he commenced the study of medicine, under
the control of Dr. E. Sheppard, of Cumberland county, New Jersey.
He was a faithful and close student. His mind was fitted for ana-
lysis and reflection; he progressed rapidly in his investigations,
and in due time passed through his collegiate course, and received
a diploma, conferring upon him the degree of Doctor of Medicine.
Having thus gained the great object of his ambition, Doctor David
Jayne established himself in Salem county, in 1825, and devoted
himself to the laborious and badly paid duties of a country
physician.

His practice led him over a wide region of the surrounding
country, to the farm and the hamlet. His patients were plain peo-
ple, who appreciated his kindness and skill, but were slow to testify
their gratitude by liberal appropriations of the quiddem honorarium,
for which physicians, as well as lawyers, are ambitious to work.
For twelve years, Dr. Jayne tested the discomforts and disappoint-
ments incident to the career of a country doctor, and by the end
of that time, his experience was sufficient. He felt that he had
the energy and knowledge which fitted him to conduct more ex-
tensive interests than those to which he had been hitherto de-
voted. Accordingly, in the year 1837, with but a small accumula-
tion of profits to show for the twelve years of his life spent as a
Jersey doctor, he came to Philadelphia resolved to try his fortune
upon a more extensive arena. Upt>n his arrival, he sought advance-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 97

ment by every legitimate means. As early as April, 1837, he was
at No. 32 South Third street, at which place he offered "his pro-
fessional services to the citizens of Philadelphia/' and hoped " to
receive a share of their patronage."

In this location Dr. Jayne remained for many years, but he soon
gave up the uncertain remuneration of the consulting and prac-
ticing physician for the regular and steady profits of the druggist.
Engaging in the drug business with a small capital, his shrewd
mind and business qualities rapidly won for him a profitable set of
customers, and a steady trade. Being a thorough pharmaceutist,
having closely studied the materia medica, and having beside twelve
years actual experience as a practicing physician, Dr. Jayne soon
aspired to be something more than a mere buyer and seller ot
drugs. There was no reason why the physician's prescription, so
useful to the afflicted, should be withheld until those who needed
it could obtain (sometimes not easily procured), the advice of a
regular practitioner. Dr. Jayne saw that much good might be
done by placing within the reach of the people those simple com-
pounds, the foundation of the practice of medicine, which are suf-
ficient, in a vast number of cases, to arrest and conquer the pro-
gress of disease. He accordingly become something more than a
druggist, and was, if we might use the term, a merchant physician.
His preparations were the results of his own experience and ob-
servations. They were compounded with precision and accuracy,
and they were accompanied with such descriptions of disease, and
directions for use, that they were available to intelligent persons
without the necessity of consulting a regular physician. In a
country like this, such means of placing the safeguards of health
jn the hands of the pioneer and planter, the hunter, trapper and
denizen of the prairie and forest, are absolute manifestations of
humanity.

Dr. Jayne's preparations soon became popular, not only in this
country, but throughout the world. His business, from the line of
home commerce, soon flowed into the channels of foreign inter-
course. The West Indies and South America were his regular cus-
tomers; Europe did not reject the medicinal preparations of the
Philadelphia druggist; and in time, China and Asia were added to
the numerous countries which steadily imported Dr. Jayne's medi-
cines. At No. 32 South Third street, Dr. Jayne remained until
about the year 1845, when he removed to a larger establishment, at
No. 8 South Third street. Thfs was but a temporary expedient.

98 BIOGRAPHIES OF

Dr. Jayne knew the necessity which existed that he should occupy
more extensive quarters, and he determined that the new estab-
lishment should be a monument to his wealth and liberality.

The massive eight-story granite building, at Nos. 84 and 86
Chestnut street, is, as our readers well know, one of the most solid
and costly business edifices in the United States. The main build-
ing, with its extensive wings on either side, and the adjoining eight-
story building, running from Carter street to Dock street, lately
occupied by the United States Post Office, form together a magni-
ficent proof of the business capacity and success of one man.

About the year 1850, Dr. Jayne took possession of this splendid
store. Since that period, he has in other ways proved his taste
and liberality as an improver of the city. The splendid granite
building on the North side of Chestnut street, once known as
" Jayne's Hall," now occupied by Decoursey, Lafourcade & Co., and
with others, was succeeded by the more magnificent block adjoin-
ing, constructed of rich white marble, in which Yard & Gilmore,
M. S. Hallowell & Co., and others are now located; and to that
succeeded the "Commonwealth Building," a rich specimen of orna-
mental brickwork, which shows the architectural capacity of that
style of material in an elegant example. As an improver of the
city of Philadelphia, no man of the present generation has done
as much as Dr. David Jayne. His wealth and extraordinary profits
from his business enable him to spend handsomely upon the real
estate which he purchases. His fine taste is shown in the erection
of first class buildings, ornaments of the city, and enduring testimo-
nials of the liberality and judgment of this most successful among
all the drug merchants of Philadelphia.

ALEXANDER G. CATTELL.

THE grain trade of Philadelphia is a most important branch of
its commercial interest, and for many years has been steadily in-
creasing in magnitude. The principle cause of this increase is un-
doubtedly the extension of our great system of railways, which
brings to us not only the cereal products of the rich valleys of our
own state, but also those from the fertile regions of the extreme

A.G.CATTELL

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 99

"West. The iron horse now bounds over the Alleghenies, and we
are connected by the most direct routes with the father of waters
and the great lakes of the Northwest. These facilities must insure
to Philadelphia an increasingly liberal share of the produce trade
of the country. But in the development of this trade much credit
is due to the enterprise, energy and sagacious management of the
men who have engaged in this business. The Corn Exchange As-
sociation is composed of many of the most liberal and wealthy
merchants in the community; indeed, the general policy of that
body shows it to be rather in advance of our other business boards
in public spirit and fidelity to the interests of the city. It stands
ready to exert its powerful influence in favor of any measure that
has for its object the advancement of the prosperity of the city,
whether pertaining to their branch of trade or any other. They
are also a pre-eminently loyal body of citizens. When the treason
and rebellion of the South culminated in the attack upon Fort Sum.
ter, the echoes of the cannon had scarcely died away when the
Association, assembled for their daily business, laid aside their
" samples," and raising the flag of our country in front of their
Hall, pledged themselves to keep it floating till the rebellion should
be subdued and the honor of that flag vindicated. The Association
has been ever since faithful and zealous in the support of all mea-
sures for the suppression of the rebellion. They have contributed
largely of their means to aid in the enlistment of men and the sup-
port of the families of such as have gone to fight the battles of
their country. There have been enlisted and organized under their
auspices fully two regiments, and they have not exhausted their
liberality or abated their zeal.

Prominent among the members of this association, and one of
its early Presidents, is the subject of the present sketch, Mr.
Alexander Gr. Cattell. He was born in 1816, at Salem, New Jer-
sey, where his venerable father still resides, after an honorable ca-
reer as a merchant for more than half a century. At the early
age of twenty-four Mr. Cattell was elected to the legislature of his
native state, and in 1844 was honored with a seat in the conven-
tion called to revise the state constitution. Although the youngest
member of that body, which embraced the leading men of the
state, he was second to none in ability or influence. Distinguished
for sound common sense, a choice command of language, a graceful
and forcible delivery, he never rose to speak without commanding

100 BIOGRAPHIES OF

the respectful attention and generally securing the conviction of
his auditors.

In 1846 he removed to Philadelphia, and engaged in business at
his present location, No. 26 North Wharves; first in connection
with Mr. E. G-. James, (now of the firm of T. Eichardson & Co.,)
and afterwards with his brother, Mr. Elijah G. Cattell. Although
honored with seats in both branches of the municipal govern-
ment, and fully sustaining his previous reputation as a judicious
and eloquent representative, it is as a business man that he has
won his present enviable position in our city. ~No house has stood
higher in the confidence of business men for integrity, enterprise,
and all that forms the basis of mercantile success.

The traits of character which Mr. Cattell exhibited in his pri-
vate business could not fail to make a deep impression on business
circles at large, and consequently his services have been constantly
sought for in various responsible positions. Formerly as a Director
in the Mechanics' Bank, and now as President of the Corn Ex-
change Bank, he has proved himself to be an able financier, fully
meeting the high expectations which were formed from his cha-
racter and talents as well as his previous career.

We have spoken of the loyalty of the Corn Exchange Associa-
tion. As might have been expected, Mr. Cattell has been among
the foremost in this work. His private purse, always open to
every legitimate object of benevolence, was not closed now, when
the claims of the soldiers and their families were presented. While,
as chairman of the regimental committee of the Corn Exchange,
he devoted his time and talents to aid in raising, organizing, equip-
ping and sending forth the men who have done themselves such
honor and the country such service. As showing the esteem in
which Mr. Cattell is held by his associates in this work, we may
say that when the old flag-staff at camp "Union," around which
the gallant 118th Eegiment had been rallied, was taken down, it was
voted that it should be removed to the grounds of his handsome
residence, at Merchantville, N. J. A magnificent flag was then
purchased and presented to him, with interesting and appropriate
ceremonies. (See the Daily Press, Dec. 10, 1863.)

In conclusion we would add, that Mr. Cattell, always fluent and
graceful as a public speaker, is never more felicitous than when
called upon for " special duty" at the various meetings, public and
social, of his fellow citizens. We might refer to his eloquent re-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 101

sponse to the Hon. Montgomery Blair, Postmaster General, on the
opening of the new post office building, in Chestnut street; and
also to the following introduction of Miss Anna Dickinson to one of
the largest and most intelligent audiences ever assembled in Phi-
ladelphia. We quote from the Evening Bulletin, of Jan. 29, 1864 :

" Ladies and gentlemen : The distinguished lady," said Mr. Cattell,
" your own gifted townswoman, who is to address you to-night, needs,
I am sure, no formal introduction to you. The gushing words of
passionate eloquence which well up from her patriotic heart, have
been heard in this hall, and the presence to-night of this large and
graceful audience is a speaking evidence of your appreciation of
her worth and power, and of your sympathy with the cause she
so nobly advocates — the cause of our common country, and the flag
which is the emblem of its dignity and power.

" When the pestilent theory of secession, and the latent treason of
the haughty slave power, that would crack its whips over the
heads of Northern freemen, culminated into open rebellion, and the
paracidal hand was raised to strike at the life of the nation, the
loyal heart of the great North resolved that it would stand by our
time-honored flag, and maintain its supremacy or perish in the
attempt.

"Determining from the very outset, with a unanimity unbroken
save by the ignoble few who would

'Crook the pregnant hinge of the knee,
That thrift may follow fawning,'

that the rebellion should perish, and those who first took the sword
should perish by the sword, we have been driven by the inexorable
logic of cause and eifect, and the eternal principles of truth and
and justice, to the further determination, that slavery, the pestilent
cause of all our woes, the very root and groundwork of the rebel-
lion, should perish with it, and the twain be entombed together.

" Prominent among those who have nobly advocated this senti-
ment— a sentiment approved alike by reason and conscience, by
patriotism and humanity- — is the gifted lady who is to address you
to-night. Her eloquent appeals for the right, and her scathing in-
vectives against the wrong, have been heard and approved by large
and intelligent audiences in nearly every loyal state of the Union;
and while thus battling for the right, the resources of those bene-
ficent institutions, the Sanitary and Christian Commissions, for
'whose benefit she has so often spoken, have been largely aided.

" She comes to-night, by invitation of many citizens, to repeat

102 BIOGRAPHIES OF

in this, her own city, and before you, her friends and neighbors,
almost within the shadow of that Hall wherein the nation had its
birth, the eloquent address delivered recently at the National Ca-
pital, in the hall of the House of Representatives, crowded to its
utmost capacity — the honored President, the Yice President, and
members of the Cabinet and of Congress, being among her audi-
tors.

" And here the agreeable duty delegated to me should end —
but the circumstances of the occasion, the simple fact that it is a
lady who is to speak to us to-night, should awaken a deeper sense
of our obligation to the loyal women of the North for their stead-
fast patriotism in this hour of our country's peril. True, they
have no call to the tented field — it is neither fitting nor needful
they should be there. There are enough of just such brave boys
as grace this amphitheatre to-night, to crowd into that mythical
last ditch, all the boasted chivalry of rebeldom.

"But their undying sympathy for the soldier, their ceaseless, un-
tiring eiforts to promote his comfort and his welfare, the ten thou-
sand works of love and kindness which are daily emanating from
their hands and hearts, make up the silver lining to the dark cloud
of war that overhangs our land. They bear this great army on
their loving hearts, and follow the soldier, with their generous
contributions for his comfort and their personal deeds of kindness,
to the camp, the field, and even to the prison-house.

" How surpassingly beautiful are their kind and gentle ministra-
tions to the wounded, or sick and suffering heroes ! Their feet
press the wards of our government hospitals, where many a
gallant hero lies upon a bed of pain and anguish, far, perhaps,
from home and kindred. They bind up his wounds, lave his
throbbing temples, anticipate his every want, and cheer him with
words of kindness and sympathy. And when the flickering pulse
and filmy eye tell too plainly that the soldier's last conflict is well
nigh over, they whisper in his ear the consolations of our Holy re-
ligion, and watch by his couch till

' They see in death his eye-lids close,
Calmly as to a night's repose,
Like flowers at set of sun.'

God bless the loyal women of our country ! And may He reward
them abundantly in this life, and still more abundantly in the life
which is to come.

"It only remains for me to say, when this roll of honor shall be

PHILADELPHIA MEKCHANTS. 103

written up, composed of those who have made their names forever
illustrious by their prominence in these works of love and mercy,
high upon that immortal scroll shall be found names known and
honored, and loved, in our own goodly city, and conspicuous among
these the name of her who is to address you to-night will forever
stand.

"Ladies and gentlemen I have the pleasure of presenting to you
Miss Anna E. Dickinson."

CHARLES MACALESTEK.

•

PHILADELPHIA has hitherto boasted of one "merchant and mari-
ner," in the name of Stephen Girard. Whilst there can be no dis-
pute as to the propriety of the application of the title to that dis-
tinguished man, it is just to say that Philadelphia might boast of
other " merchants and mariners" if any care were taken to en-
lighten its citizens in relation to its commercial history. We have
chosen for the subject of the present sketch one who was much
more of a mariner than Girard, and who, if not as successful as a
merchant — if the acquisition of vast wealth is the test of mercan-
tile talent — was at all events a merchant of honor and integrity,
and prosperous in his affairs to a reasonable degree.

Charles Macalester first saw the light in the village of Camp-
bellstown, in Argyleshire, Scotland, on the fifth of April, 1765. He
was born in a strictly Presbyterian community; Campbellstown
itself enjoyed the distinction of being the seat of a Presbytery,
and its population was composed of godly people. Connected with
religion, in the minds of the Scotch Presbyterians, the interests of
education are invariably associated — an education which shall
strengthen religious principles and restrain young people from a
departure from the correct line of action. Charles Macalester re-
ceived at these schools a solid and stern tuition, which, while it
insured the scholar full and systematic instruction in the most
useful branches of human knowledge, never permitted him to forget
that high moral principle and integrity of purpose were the surest
means of rendering knowledge profitable.

After receiving as much schooling as fell to the portion of chil-
dren of the villagers, the question of a business avocation was pre-

104 BIOGRAPHIES OF

sented to the boy. It was natural that he should evince a prefe-
rence for the sea. Campbellstown was a sea-coast village. It was
situate upon the mull of Cantyre, a promontory of Western Scot-
land, which stretches into the Irish Sea. It had a fine harbor, was
a noted refuge for coasting vessels, and was the seat of an exten-
sive herring fishery. Sea-going men were its permanent and tran-
sient inhabitants, and sea-going matters were the great materials
for town talk. To become a sailor, therefore, seemed to be the
natural destiny of Charles Macalester. At a proper age he entered
into the calling, and learned the practical duties of seamanship
among the crews of vessels belonging to his native town. Having
thus instructed himself in navigation, his ambitious mind impelled
him to seek a wider sphere of action. When he arrived of age,
his thoughts turned to the United States. It was a young country
which had just emerged from the struggles of the Revolutionary
War, and to enterprise and industry it offered a most tempting re-
ception. Mr. Macalester, at the age of twenty-one years, arrived
in the United States a young Scotch sailor. So pleased was he
with the prospects of the country, that he determined to become a
citizen, and under the liberal naturalization laws which then ex-
isted, he was admitted to that privilege in the year 1786, establish-
ing his home in Philadelphia. In October of the same year, he
gave a new pledge of the sincerity of his citizanship by entering
into marriage with Miss Ann Sampson, of Baltimore, a young
Scotch lady, whose virtues and affections were his solace during
a long life. The young pair established their humble home at No.
78 Union street, at which location they remained for many years.
The sound education and intelligence of young Macalester soon
enabled him to rise in his profession. He had attracted to himself
the confidence and good will of respectable merchants, and it was
not long before he was the master of a ship, entrusted not only
with the safety of the voyage, but entitled, as supercargo, to dis-
pose of the merchandize on board, to the best advantage. His
fidelity in these trusts, and the good fortune which attended his
management, added to his gains in double measure, and in a short
time he began to accumulate portions of his savings. These were
invested in the vessels in which he sailed. Commencing with small
interests, he gradually increased them until he became a sole
owner. One of the ships acquired by him, in this way, was the
George Barclay, a very successful vessel. This ship was armed
with twenty guns, in order to keep off privateers, and those sea

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 105

desperadoes who at that time preyed extensively upon American
commerce. With a picked crew, this daring captain ran the gaunt-
let of the seas, and notwithstanding frequent dangers, the ship was
navigated safely from port to port during a season of peculiar
peril.

Captain Macalester next commanded the Fanny, one of the
fleetest vessels of her day. This beautiful vessel was built by Grice,
a ship carpenter of Philadelphia, from plans of his own, and she
proved a model of beauty, safety and speed. Her first voyage was
made from Philadelphia to Cowes in seventeen days — the quickest
passage ever made up to that time between the United States and
Europe. The Hon. William Bingham was a passenger with Cap-
tain Macalester in this trip, and from the incident, Captain Mac-
alester subsequently reaped the advantage of the acquaintance,
influence and friendship of Alexander Baring, (afterwards Lord
Ashburton), who was a son-in-law of Mr. Bingham. This connec-
tion introduced him to the confidence of the house of Sir Francis
Baring & Co., long among the most influential of the English ban-
kers.

When the Fanny reached London, she was chartered for a voyage
to Batavia and back, which was performed in seven months and
twenty days, a shortness of time which was so astonishing, that
when Captain Macalester presented himself at the counting-house
of the charterers in London, they supposed that the voyage had
been broken up, and that the captain had returned unsuccessful.
During this trip, the Fanny was chased for sixteen hours, by the
fastest frigate in the British navy. When overtaken, the boarding
officer remarked — "Sir, you have a very fast ship." To which
Captain Macalester replied — "I thought so until to-day." "Our
frigate," continued the officer, "is reputed to be the fastest in our
navy, and we never had such a chase."

After eighteen years sea service, Captain Macalester longed for
the quiet of the life of a landsman. His family was growing up to
maturity. His wife had, in consequence of his frequent absence,
the care and responsibility of the education of his children. He
had made money, and had sufficient capital to establish himself in
business. His resolution to do so was made in the year 1804. In
the succeeding year he established himself as a merchant at No. 51
South Wharves, and removed his family from the old homestead,
in Union street, to more capacious and comfortable premises, at
No. 142 Arch street. He established an extensive correspondence,

106 BIOGRAPHIES OF

and enjoyed the advantages of business relations with Baring &
Co., of London, Hope & Co., and Insinger & Co., of Amsterdam,
and numerous influential merchants in China, India, Surinam,
Ceylon, and other Eastern places. His business was chiefly as a
shipper and importer, and consequently he became much interested
in improvements in marine architecture. He built several fine
vessels, which were successful in increasing the commerce of the
city and in spreading the fame of American ship builders. In 1810,
Mr. Macalester removed his store and counting-house to No. 5
Dock street, and two years later he located himself at No. 66 Dock
street, where he remained until, at the age of sixty, he felt himself
justified in retiring from active business. During his commercial
career, he was for a long time one of the Directors of the Bank of
North America. His early religious training led him to connect
himself with the Second Presbyterian Church, of this city. He
was Treasurer of the Marine Bible Society of Pennsylvania.
He was an active promoter of the erection of the Mariners' Church,
which was eventually built in Water street; below Walnut, and
was for many years under charge of the " sa&6rs' friend," "Sosey
Eastburn," as he was affectionately called. i'Mr. Eastburn was
not a regular minister. He was a cabinet-maker by trade, but
being a pious, earnest man, his attention was called to the want
of spiritual instruction among the seamen transiently in port, and
he exerted himself to obtain for them instruction and religious
counsel. Failing in obtaining the assistance of the ordained
clergy he took upon himself the task of lecturer, with such ac-
ceptability to sailors and to citizens, that when the "Mariners'
Church" was finished, general opinion declared that it was the
right and duty of Joseph Eastburn, the fervent and devoted cabi-
net-maker, to continue in the position of teacher.

In 1825, the Insurance Company of Pennsylvania was in trouble.
It had encountered serious losses, and required energy to stem the
tide of disaster. In this emergency, Charles Macalester was called
upon to take the helm. So successful was he>that in two years the
danger was passed, and the Company was once more in a success-
ful course of business. The danger had been great, the service
important, and the gratitude of the stockholders was commensu-
rate with Hihe occasion. In 1827, they presented to their President
a service of plate, a gratifying testimonial of their esteem and
thanks. He remained President of this Company until his death,
which occurred at Willow Grove, Montgomery county, on the

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 107

twenty-ninth of August, 1832. His body was interred in the
burying ground of the Second Presbyterian Church, Arch street,
above Fifth.

The family is now represented by Charles Macalester, the emi-
nent banker, of the firm of Graw, Macalester & Co., a gentleman
whose sterling integrity and generous character are proud certifi-
cates of the influence of an honorable descent. Another son,
Edward Macalester, is, or lately was, a resident of Lexington,
Kentucky.

JOSEPH K. EVANS.

IT gives us especial pleasure, for several reasons, to open this
sketch with a slight memorial of this eminent merchant, who
died some years since. His high personal character well befits
eulogy, and his generous relations towards those in his employ
while engaged in active business, also merit more than passing-
notice.

Joseph Eussell Evans was born on the fourteenth of July, 1783,
in the two story stone building, yet standing, situate near the foot
of Dock street, some thirty yards west and north of the western
terminus of the city tobacco warehouse. He was at an early age
placed in the best school of the times, which with a natural intelli-
gence, the teachings of his devoted mother, and subsequently the
superintending care of an affectionate aunt, soon developed the
path of future usefulness and prosperity to which he was destined.
Shortly after leaving school, he entered the counting-house of ISTixon
& Walker, on Penn street, who at that period were actively en-
gaged in the West India trade. During his apprenticeship, Mr.
Evans became an accountant and book-keeper of the first class,
quick and correct in calculations, and always prompt to exhibit a
balance sheet to his employers. During the latter period of his
term of apprenticeship, the late Mr. John Stewart, former Presi-
dent of the Insurance Company of the state of Pennsylvania, was
a junior clerk, between whom and Mr. Evans an intimacy and
warm friendship continued through life.

Mr. Evans was married in this city, by Mayor Robert Wharton,
the twenty-ninth of October, 1805, to Miss Margaret Maris. This

108 BIOGRAPHIES OF

lady was born in Springfield, Delaware county, Pennsylvania, in
the same year with her husband, (1783.) Her elder sister was then
the wife of the distinguished merchant John Welsh. Shortly after
Mr. Evans' marriage, he entered into commercial business with his
two brothers-in-law, John Welsh and William Maris, under the firm
of Welsh, Maris & Evans, at No. 31 South Wharves, the site of
the present building immediately adjoining the Smith property, on
the north side of Tun alley (not Ton alley, as our present City
Fathers have it). The firm pursued an active and prosperous busi-
ness in the West India and European trade for some years,
when the senior partner, Mr. Welsh, withdrew with an ample com-
petency, and in consequence of impaired health, we believe, re-
moved for a brief period to Charleston, S. C. This eminent mer-
chant sebsequently returned to this city, resumed his wonted active
business life, on his own individual account, which he conducted
with untiring energy, skill and prosperity, for many years, in fact
until a short time previous to his decease. Mr. Evans, then the real
active partner, associated with Mr. Maris, under the firm of Maris
& Evans. Their correspondents became augmented, consequently
the business of the new firm lost none of the vigor of its immediate
predecessor. Mr. Maris having in prospect a new field of opera-
tion, in the erection of mills for manufacturing purposes, the firm
of Maris & Evans was dissolved.

Mr. Evans purchased of his former partner, Mr. Welsh, the stores
and wharf property so long occupied by the several firms, and con-
tinued business under his own name, and with his own capital.
Gradually, yet cautiously, he extended his correspondence, which
at one period embraced several of the West India Islands, London,
Liverpool, Dundee, Bordeaux, Rotterdam, St. Petersburg, and most
of the ports on our Atlantic coast. Mr. Evans was really cautious
in all his business operations. After nibbing his quill-pen, in order
to test it, his undeviating word was " caution," and caution could
be seen written from top to bottom and crosswise on the slips of
paper retained on his table for ready calculation.

Early in his individual business career, he had several ships in
the London trade; two of which, the Electra and Thames, he had
constructed by Philadelphia mechanics. The late Captain George
Robinson, of Southwark, was the successful commander of the
Thames. The New York and London line of packets, formerly
under the management of the late John Griswold, now conducted
by Captain Morgan, had a warm, zealous and financial friend in

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 109

Mr. Evans. He had a special interest in several of these ships, the
last of which, the " Margaret Evans," is yet a staunch, sound ves-
sel. The original share of which belonged to the father, and is
retained by his son, the present Joseph R. Evans.

Mr. Evans possessed a happy style of mercantile correspondence,
clear, explicit and condensed ; to the captains in his employ, though
the ship might be engaged in a regular trade, it was his custom to
deliver written instructions on starting on a voyage, which were
regularly recorded in the "Letter Book." So, in his frequent bu-
siness absence from the city, if only of two or three days' dura-
tion, special written directions were left with his chief clerk. Here
were caution and command.

He was well posted in maritime laws, frequently called upon to pass
judgment on general average and partial loss statements ; in nume-
rous instances he has also acted as sole arbitrator in matters of
difference between mercantile friends. Mr. Evans was a Director
in the Philadelphia Bank for upwards of twenty years, and rarely
missed a daily visit there, unless absent from the city, until the
unfortunate position of the late Bank of the United States, in 1837 ;
which, in the opinion of a majority of the directors of many of
the city banks, it was deemed expedient to aid in its resuscitation.
In this, Mr. Evans differed in opinion with his colleagues, and tem-
porarily withdrew from the meetings of the Board ; notwithstand-
ing, he was returned a member at the ensuing election of the stock-
holders.

In politics, Mr. Evans voted with the old school Federalists,
when, upon a re-organization of parties, he associated with the
Democratic party. He took a lively interest in the election of
General Jackson, whose administration of the affairs of the go-
vernment he approved, especially the firmness of the President in
arresting the Calhoun-Hamilton South Carolina rebellion, of 1833,
and his anti-tariff views. He was often the Democratic candidate
either for Select Council, State Senator, or Congress, from the old
city proper. Mr. Evans was an active member of the celebrated
Free Trade Convention, which assembled in this city in the year
1834, of which Judge Barbour, of Virginia, was President, and the
late Condy Raguet, of this city, was Secretary. In the year 1846,
Governor Shunk appointed Mr. Evans a member of the Commis-
sion, authorized by an act of the>Legislature of Pennsylvania, to
dispose of the Delaware Division of the State Canals, which, though

110 BIOGKAPHIES OF

not then accomplished, has been since happily consummated. Mr.
Evans was made Chairman of the Commission.

On the eighth day of September, 1848, Mr. Evans left in the
early P. M. train for New York, where he arrived in due time, and
proceeded to his usual lodgings, the old City Hotel, on Broadway.
While in the office conversing with a friend, the clerk of the estab-
lishment registered Mr. Evans' name, who, on inspection, disco-
vered some discrepency in the record, and while in the act of its
correction, fell back in the arms of his friend, and died in a few
moments, from heart disease. His widow survived him but a few
years.

Mr. Evans left one son, the present Joseph E. Evans, and one
daughter, the wife of Samuel Welsh, Esq. Also, as legatees under
his will, the widow and three daughters of his deceased son, Ed-
ward Eussell Evans. As an evidence of the caution displayed
through life by Mr. Evans, it may be well to note that the only
son of the late Edward R.Evans, who had been kindly remembered
in the will of his grandfather, died in the month of August, 1848.
A few days after, Mr. Evans made a codicil to his will, devising
the portion intended for the lad, between the sisters.

In opening this sketch, we alluded to Mr. Evans' noble conduct
towards his clerks and employees, and we will be borne out by all
who knew him, in eulogizing this admirable trait in his harmonious
and well balanced character. In February of the year 1831, Mr.
James Stuart came into Mr. Evans' employ as a clerk, when the
latter was located at No. 31 South Wharves. Mr. Stuart succeeded
in that capacity Mr. C. W. Churchman, who for six years had been
Mr. Evans' book-keeper. On leaving Mr. Evans, Mr. Churchman
went into the dry goods trade, in Market street, and subsequently,
moved into Front street, where, being quite successful, he accu-
mulated a large fortune. But, with many other merchants, he
" went down" in a heavy financial crisis, and gave up his accumu-
lated property. In this affliction he had the hearty sympathy
of all who knew him, for his character, like that of his early em-
ployer, was elevated and generous, and his reputation was as spot-
less as snow. He is now attempting to retrieve his disaster, and
he has the good feeling and assistance of all who respect integrity
and high toned honor. Mr. Stuart, however, continued in Mr.
Evans' employ for seventeen years, when the latter died, as above
stated, and the affairs of the firm were closed. The son of Mr.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. Ill

Evans then formed a copartnership with Mr. Stuart, which con-
tinued for some six years, when the firm dissolved, and both parties
retired.

Would that we could record more of such cases of just appre-
ciation of long and true devotion! Such things brighten the
pages of history, and elevate mercantile life to noblest point of
dignity.

JOHST T. EICKETTS.

SINCE these papers were commenced we have been asked, " What,
in a general sense, is meant by a self-made man?" The reply is
easy. A man who, without any extraordinary family or pecuniary
advantages at the commencement of life, has nevertheless battled
earnestly and energetically in the walks of trade, commerce and
manufactures, and by indomitable industry and unwavering integ-
rity achieved both character and fortune. The whole story is
thus told in a few words : Stephen Girard, the founder of the college
that has become one of the leading moral and intellectual ornaments
of our city, was a self-made man. He advanced step by step, little
by little, and through the magic power of industry and enterprise,
he rose from comparative obscurity, and became one of the most
eminent bankers and capitalists of modern times. Dollar by dollar
he accumulated at first, until, long before his decease, he was the
possessor of millions. And yet this extraordinary man, as we are
told, at one time peddled oranges through the streets of the city of
Brotherly Love. We might refer to another instance, in one of
the best and most useful of our living citizens, a native of the
interior of Pennsylvania, who commenced his career in a similar
manner. But this is no new thing. The builders of cities, the
founders of states, the pioneers of civilization, are, in the great ma-
jority of cases, self-made men.

It is so ordered, wisely and beneficently,' by a superintending
Providence. Affluence is in many respects desirable. When
properly appreciated and employed it constitutes a blessing not
only to the possessor, but to the many who are assisted through
his means or are the recipients of his bounty. But when abused

112 BIOGRAPHIES OF

or misapplied it is a curse, for it hardens the heart, embitters the
feelings, chills the genial sensibilities, and neutralizes the kindly
sympathies. This is too generally the case with those who inherit
wealth, who have been reared in the lap of luxury, and have never
experienced the caprices of fortune or realised the noble compensa-
tions of toil. It is, therefore, that a self-made man — one who started
from a comparatively humble position, and ascended step by step,
day by day, year by year, is better able to understand the trials of
others, and to feel for the multitude who have not been successful.
He is thus able not only to realise the true uses of affluence, but
to remember that he was at one time among the hewers of wood
and the drawers of waters.

" Oh ! who can tell how hard it is to climb
The steep where fame's proud temple shines afar,"

And so with the hill of fortune. Its ascent is a work of infinite
difficulty. The struggle and the competition are always keen.
Many falter and fail by the wayside. A single blow overwhelms
some, while others persevere for years, but succeed at last. And
hence it is that more honor and niore glory are due to those who,
despite the difficulties and dangers, the rugged paths and the many
pitfalls, press on, still on, and in the end achieve a triumph.
Time, faith and energy are almost invincible, especially when asso-
ciated with truth and integrity.

The subject of our present notice is John T. Eicketts, and he
may be referred to with confidence as a fitting illustration of what
is understood by a self-made man. Mr. Ricketts was born at Tus-
carora, Loudon Co., Ya., October 19, 1805, and commenced his busi-
ness career in Philadelphia, in 1834, as a manufacturer of ship bread
and crackers, in Front street below Race. A that period the ship
bread manufactories of the United States were in a primitive and
limited condition, as compared with the existing order of things.
The consumption by a single establishment of fifty or sixty barrels
of flour per day was consideredquite an extensive operation ; but
by the introduction of steam power and machinery this quantity
gradually increased, until four or five times the amount could be
baked within the same space of time. The factory and warehouse
owned and occupied by Mr. Ricketts are models of their kind.
We enjoyed the pleasure, a few weeks since of walking through
them, and were at once surprised and gratified. The most perfect
order exists throughout, and every department has a distinct
superintendent with an adequate number of subordinates. The

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 113

verting it into crackers or bread goes on as regularly as clock-
work, and the visitor cannot but experience pleasure at the regu-
larity, system and good management that everywhere prevail.
The building is one of the most substantial in the city. It occupies
eighty feet on Front street and extends forty feet in depth, to Wa-
ter street, being four stories high on Front and six on Water street.
It is of brick, with extensive and admirably constructed vaults,
which are used as storehouses. The machinery is propelled by
steam power, an engine having been introduced for the purpose in
1847. This establishment employs from fifty to sixty hands, and
the wages per week amount to several hundred dollars. An im-
portant feature in the business is exportation, and thus in the year
large amounts of ship bread and crackers are sent to the West In-
dies, South America and the British provinces. In some cases the
goods are shipped per order, and in others at the risk of the manu-
facturer, who thus unites the two occupations of merchant and
manufacturer.

The bakery of Mr. Eicketts is capable of converting two hundred
barrels of flour into bread per day, and is perhaps the most com-
plete and extensive in the United States. Slowly but surely this
work has progressed under the eyes and the mind of the enter-
prising proprietor, and those with whom he has been associated,
until it has become a prominent feature in the industrial establish-
ments of Philadelphia, and an important element in the commer-
cial world.

The fact that we have in the very heart of our city a ship bread
bakery that is capable of consuming, in the particular objects to
which it is devoted, fifty thousand barrels of flour per annum, is
one that speaks volumes upon the subject. The intelligent reader
may readily form an idea of the amount of labor in-doors and out
that is constantly engaged in the various occupations, the extent
of capital that is employed, and the usefulness to the community
at large of the individual who controls and directs so laudable an
enterprise.

And yet a more modest and unaffected man than John T. Rick-
etts maj not be found in Philadelphia. Of retired habits and un-
ostentatious disposition, he is rarely to be met with out of his
counting room, or his dwelling, except when called upon to dis-
charge the duties of a member of the Common Council, having last
year, without the slightest solicitation on his part, been elected by
his fellow citizens as one of the representatives of the Sixth ward.

114 BIOGRAPHIES OP

We have known Mr. Ricketts long and well, and therefore speak
of him with warmth and confidence. Integrity is his leading cha-
racteristic. He realises, to the fullest extent, the beautiful senti-
ment of the poet, that " an honest man is the noblest work of
God." In all the relations of life he is frank, manly, upright and
honorable. Liberal in his views, feelings and opinions, he is tole-
rant and charitable in relation to the errors and prejudices of
others. Although not in the enjoyment of robust health, he is
cheerful, nay, even joyous, in his disposition, and is as ready to
join in a laugh or to participate in a harmless scene of merriment
or festivity as the lightest hearted in the crowd. As a father he
is generous and indulgent, yet decided; as a husband he is devoted
and aifectionate ; as a citizen he is patriotic and public spirited;
and as a manufacturer and merchant he is at once clear headed,
direct, high-minded and honorable. Such, then, is one of the self-
made men of Philadelphia. Virginia may well be proud of him as
one of her sons, and the city of Brotherly Love may point to him
with pride and pleasure as a bright and shining example of the
force and beauty of industry, integrity and fair dealing.

Mr. Ricketts died in November last. His remains were interred
in the Woodland Cemetary.

WILLIAM CUMMINGS.

SOME of our readers may not be aware that the African trade of
Philadelphia is, and has been for a number of years, quite exten-
sive, and that in the person of William Cummings, Esq., our city
boasts the oldest merchant in that line of commerce. For over
thirty years, Mr. Cummings has been actively engaged in trading
to Africa, and he has built up a fine business and accumulated a
handsome fortune by his eiforts. He has, during that period, also
displayed a liberal interest in everything relating to Philadelphia
and her trade, while he has been quiet and unobtrusive in a re-
markable degree. The African trade flourished in the quaint old
seaport of Salem, Massachusetts, for several generations, and even
yet the ancient town claims a very large share of this kind of com-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 115

merce, which is destined, when Africa becomes more subject to the
developing force of civilization, to grow to an extent we little think
of at this period. That mysterious continent abounds in rich natural
productions and precious metals, and it may be called the region
par excellence of animal life, since there are more than twice the
number of animals in it according to late explorers, than there are
in the other quarters of the globe. Its kingdoms have been great
and powerful — Egypt and Carthage, for instance — and in modern
times we see Liberia and other colonies striking for commercial
and political control of the continent. The trade of Sierra Leone,
Liberia, the Ivory Coast, Cape Colony, and the islands along the
coast, is large, and is participated in to a very considerable extent
by the United States. Of a single article, (Palm oil,) in the year
1856, American importers drew from Africa 1,149,547 gallons,
valued at about half a million of dollars, while the trade in ivory
and other articles is increasing. Philadelphia's share in the trade
is handsomely represented by Mr. Cummings. He is a native of
this city, and was born February 6, 1806. He entered into part-
nership with his uncle, bearing the same name as himself, in 1828,
and in 1832, thirty-one years ago, he went into business on his own
account, on Delaware avenue, below Pine street. About the same
year he embarked in the African trade, which he has prosecuted
with such success that he is acknowledged, even by the best known
Eastern importers, to be the oldest established merchant in this line
in the country. This is a distinction he may well be proud of,
when it is recollected how many rivals he has had, and what flou-
rishing houses have risen and fallen since 1832. His operations
have been conducted on a sound basis throughout his career, and
he has built and owned the following vessels :

Schooners — Kathleen and John McCrea.

Brigs — Baron, Stranger, Pennsylvania, Morris Stanley, Delaware,
Jos. Cowperthwait, Emily Cummings, Clara, Huntress and Calvert.

Barques — Mary Irvine, Emily, Cora, Linda, Fairmount, A. I. Har-
vey, Ann Elizabeth and Margaret Hugg.

Ships — Frigate Bird and Wm. Cummings.

Among the merchants of 1832, we notice the names of such men
as Thomas P. Cope, Samuel Grant, Dexter Stone, John Welsh, An-
drew C. Barclay, Jos. B. Jenks, (who lived until his 94th year,)
William S. Smith, Nathan Bunker, Matthew Bevan & Porter,
Samuel T. Lewis, Jacob S. Wain, John Siter, John Coulter, John
F. Ohl, J. Neuman, Smith, Bidgway & Co., Jonathan Leedom, Ti-
mothy Paxton, Lewis Clapier, Lincoln & Byers, and others. How

116 BIOGRAPHIES OF

few of these still live? How few have escaped the financial crisis
of the times? How few now continue in active mercantile pur-
suits ? How many have been swept away by the current of ad-
versity? Death has blotted from existence the most of them.
How different the rich men of the old time from the opulent men
of the present. One would suppose that the attaint on the hands
of many of the latter who have attained to sudden affluence, were
enough to chasten their haughtiness, and keep their arrogancy
within moderate bounds. But, notwithstanding, these abjects carry
the marks of their baseness on their brow, and their character is
charged with the ill-odor of unfair advantages, artful concealments,
plausible misrepresentations, barefaced falsehoods; of injustice,
wrong and oppression ; they exact obeisance from integrity and
virtue, and frown if they refuse to do them honor. They are the
dupes of a foolish delusion, for though the needle of the widow re-
mind her of their villainy, and their suffering victims cease not to
load them with reproaches, they fancy that they have turned the
key upon their crimes. Emboldened by this strange infatuation,
these possessors of ill-gotten gain carry their heads high in the
presence of honor and purity, and glancing about with eyes of
pride from the seat of ther gilded chariots, they would not hesitate
to drive over the orphans they have robbed.

The conceit that some persons show, excites our amazement as
often as we witness its manifestations. They have no name wherein
they may glory; they carry their fortune upon their persons; their
wit is small, and all their knowledge is under their tongue, and yet
their self-sufficiency is boundless. Beholding their fine forms and
remarking their elegant carriage, in the absence of any other
claim to notice, failing to discover any ground for their conceit of
themselves, we are forced to the conclusion that the looking-glass
has turned their head.

Mr. Cummings is not one of this sort. He is remarkably modest,
retiring and unassuming. His capital was but small when he em-
barked on the sea of commerce, and he has worked his way up-
wards to liberal and liberalizing fortune by steady application to
his particular line, and by the manifestation of all those qualities
which mark the safe, sure business man. He has been a member
of the Episcopal Church almost all his life, and while as rigid in
the performance of his duties as a citizen as those of a merchant,
he has never mingled in politics, prefering the more useful pur-
suits of his profession. For a number of years he has served as a
bank director, a member of the Board of Trade, of the Corn Ex-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 117

change, as a manager of an insurance company, and he has also
been prominent in other mercantile organizations. As a liberal
and public spirited Philadelphian, he stands high, as may be seen
from the positions of honor and trust he has held ; and time, while
it has ripened his judgment, and made his sagacious counsels sought
after by business friends and associates, has not altered his quiet
demeanor or his carefully formed habits and opinions. He has re-
cently associated with him his son, Norris S. Cummings, a young
man of amiable disposition and excellent business qualifications.
His undeviating devotion to the African trade, while so many of
the business community have been vascillating from one branch to
another, fully indicates his turn of mind and comprehensiveness of
vision. The details of his operations, the successful voyages of
his vessels, the fortunate "hits" of his cargoes each way, would
make an interesting chapter of commercial life in Philadelphia,
had we leisure to chronicle them. As it is, we leave them to the
imagination of the reader, who can fill up the outlines we have
sketched, and then affix to the picture the legend " Success."

A. J. DERBYSHIRE.

IT is remarkable that many individuals who are pre-eminently
successful in the management of private business have, or appear
to have, but small capability for public office. "Wh ether the nar-
row calculations of trade have a tendency to contract certain minds,
or absorption in counting-house pursuits, render them timid and
diffident, when brought prominently before the community, we
are unable to decide ; but we know that some of our ablest mer-
chants and manufacturers are extremely loth to accept any posi-
tion of public trust, requiring them to exercise the voice or pen.
This ought not to be the case. Every business man, however
eager he may be in search of gain, should remember that he is a
citizen, and has duties to discharge beyond those of private con-
cern ; that he is interested in the prosperity of all enterprises that
will contribute to the wealth and influence of Philadelphia, and
that if men of his class keep in the background, either the work
will not be done at all, or it will fall into incompetent hands. We
know of nothing this metropolis has in more urgent demand, than
a body of earnest, practical, well-educated merchants, who will

118 BIOGKAPHIES OF

even condescend to become politicians, if they cannot otherwise
serve the public interest. Probably there are but few of our busi-
ness men who think themselves qualified for such a career. We
have seen even a railroad meeting, of great importance to the city,
where not a merchant could be found who would venture to
express his views, and the addresses were delivered by a western
judge and a Harrisburg borer. The debating school of our present
Board of Trade may prevent the repetition of that humiliating
display; but reference to several bright examples of public-spirited
merchants, will not be without its effect.

In Alexander J. Derbyshire, our city has an illustration of that
enlarged capacity for business which cannot be limited to indivi-
dual affairs — which can achieve success in the ordinary operations
of trade, and yet rise above them, to push forward works of im-
provement that will conduce to the general advantage of the com-
munity. We regard him as one of that progressive and vigorous
generation of merchants who are destined to infuse into Philadel-
phia the true metropolitan spirit. Let the record of his career
speak for him.

Mr. Derbyshire .was born in 1808. At fifteen years of age
(1824) we find the future merchant an apprentice boy in a flour store
of Timothy Paxson. But the boy was prompt, intelligent and in-
dustrious, and he was soon promoted to the more responsible posi-
tion of book-keeper. The business of the concern was favorable
to the acquisition of a thorough knowledge of the trade in flour.
Mr. Derbyshire appears to have improved the opportunities thus
offered ; for in 1836, when Paxson retired, a partnership was formed
between the former errand-boy and Mr. Watson Jenks. This firm
continued the business of the old house, with increasing profit,
until 1846, when Mr. Jenks retired, and Mr. Derbyshire went on
alone, enlarging the business of the concern and increasing his own
reputation for tact and fortunate enterprise.

In January, 1850, Mr. John Derbyshire, cousin of the subject of
this sketch, was associated in the business, and the firm is now
known as A. J. Derbyshire & Co. The operations of this house
are moderate, but under vigilant and skillful control — its credit
stands as fair as that of any other firm in the same trade. Mr.
Derbyshire erected and owns the two spacious and imposing ware-
houses, Nos. 108 and 110 North Delaware avenue. His parents
were Quakers, and Mr. Derbyshire is of the same persuasion.
This brief chronicle is sufficient to show that Mr. Derbyshire has
attained great success as a merchant, rising by dint of industry,

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 119

prudence and intelligence, from a very humble situation to the
foremost rank among the men engaged in the same branch of com-
merce. Another portion of his career is still more worthy of atten-
tion and emulation.

As a member of the Board of Trade, Mr. Derbyshire earnestly
strove to render that organization practical, efficient and public-
spirited in its deliberations. Although a modest and unassuming
man, he appreciated the fact that the Board was generally regarded
by our citizens and strangers as behind the demands of the times ;
and he therefore took an active part in the proceedings, as an ad-
vocate of various improvements. We are persuaded that it is due
to the influence of such progressives as Mr. Derbyshire, that the
organization of the Board has been enlarged and improved within
the past few years. That body is now in a condition to be of vast
service to the city, and if the spirit of old Eip Yan Winkle is en-
tirely banished from its deliberations, we may look upon it as an
excellent school for young men who are just commencing a mer-
cantile life.

The men who devoted their energies and means to the comple-
tion of the Pennsylvania Central Eailroad, are entitled to the
lasting gratitude of every citizen who has the interest of Philadel-
phia at heart. That highway has more than realised the promises
of its projectors, and yet its future business must inevitably cast
the present great transportation into the shade. The construction
of that road opened to us the trade of the teeming West, and
brought us directly into competition with an arrogant rival, who
was accustomed to sneering at our lack of enterprise. A more
powerful impetus has not been given to the trade of a city by any
improvement since the completion of the Erie Canal. Mr. Derby-
shire, Colonel *Gr. C. Childs and others, warmly advocated the con-
struction of the Central Eoad before the Board of Trade, and were
very active in collecting subscriptions for that purpose. Mr. Der-
byshire fully comprehended the immense importance of that work.
He also gave expression to the general regret that we had so long
delayed this magnificent enterprise. The energy and success of
this indefatigable merchant's labors recommended him for the posi-
tion of Director of the Central Eailroad, and, accordingly he was
selected, and served faithfully and intelligently for two years.
Taking abilities and means into consideration, no man did more
for the completion and success of that highway to the West, than
Mr. Alexander J. Derbyshire.

120 BIOGRAPHIES OF

Mr. Derbyshire also found time to serve his fellow citizens for
three years in the City Councils. In that body he was an active
and useful member, losing no opportunity of pushing whatever im-
provements he considered practicable and conducive to the general
welfare. Compared with the petty politicians who now occupy
the seats in our municipal legislature, Mr. Derbyshire was an in-
valuable member.

Philanthropic motives induced this active gentleman to accept
the position of Secretary of the Humane Society — an organization
which accomplished a vast amount of good in its day by saving
life and encouraging deeds of genuine heroism. This Society was
subsequently merged in the Pennsylvania Hospital, and Mr. Der-
byshire is now a Director of that noble institution. The only other
position of importance he holds at present is that of Director of the
Mine Hill Railroad, a work in which he is deeply interested, and
President of the Little Schuylkill Railroad Company.

During the past three years Messrs. Derbyshire & Co. have
given much of their attention to the development of the railroad
and mining interests of this and other states.

When Mr. Derbyshire commenced his mercantile career the
principal firms engaged in the breadstuff trade were Willis &
Yardley, P. Hollingsworth, Bunker & Starr, Ridgway & Livezey,
Timothy Paxson, Wm. S. Smith & Co., J. Fen Smith & Co. and
Thomas Latimer & Co. The two first named in this list failed ;
Timothy Paxson retired with $80,000 ; Mr. Bunker left that firm
with about $30,000 ; Mr. Smith, with a competency, and Mr. Ridg-
way with a fortune estimated at $120,000. Thomas Latimer's estate
at his decease was small — only about $10,000. These men, with a
single exception, have passed away,

" All that live must die,
Passing through nature to eternity."

The subject of this sketch is now about fifty years of age. He
is in the prime of life, full of energy, fond of active employment,
and has at his command a worldly independence. His career de-
serves to be studied by all who would be successful in business or
useful to their fellow men. In his character are happily blended
unflinching purpose, quick intelligence and stern integrity, with
mild, genial and winning manners.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 121

ISAAC E. DAVIS.

A PECULIARITY of American business men, which has done more
to develop the resources of the country than any other quality, is
the adaptability of individuals and communities to changing cir-
cumstances, and the ready provision which is made to meet the re-
quirements of the time. The unswerving routine of precedent is
not followed in slavish subservience in the United States, if it is
apparent that advantage is to be gained by the substitution of new
principle for old rules of action. In business here, it may be said,
that—

" Each man, in his time, plays many parts."

From merchandize to manufacturing, from manufacturing to
farming, from farming to navigation, from the ship to the locomo-
tive engine, and from the railroad to the painter's easel, might be
the erratic course of one man in the United States, attracting
scarcely any attention among his friends. In noticing the career
of Isaac R. Davis, we shall not be called upon to record a wide
range of employments to which he was devoted, dissimilar in ob-
ject. But an experience turned from merchandize to manufacturing,
brings him partially within the range of American changeability.

Isaac Roberts Davis was born in the year 1809, in Montgomery
county, Pennsylvania, near the estate of Isaac Roberts, in honor
of whom he was named. His parents were in moderate circum-
stances. They had no hereditary estate to oifer him when he
should become of age, but they secured him the foundation of
wealth and honor by obtaining for him a sound education, which
he received at Friend's School, Westtown, Chester county. John
Cook, a Quaker merchant, whose store was at the northwest corner
of Front and Walnut streets, was a friend of the Davis family, and
took some interest in young Isaac. The latter was, after leaving
school, an intelligent and well behaved boy, and friend Cook ad-
dressed himself to the task of finding an opening for him in some
reputable mercantile establishment. Henry C. Corbit was in the
dry goods business in 1825, and for some time afterwards, at No.
40 South Second street. Mr. Cook procured for Isaac R. Davis a
situation in that store. Mr. Corbit shortly afterwards relinquished

122 BIOGRAPHIES OF

the dry goods business, and took out license as a wholesale auc-
tioneer, at No. 39 North Front street. Davis went with him, and
from selling dry goods by the yard, he became an adept in selling
them by the package, to the music of, "going, going, one, two,
three — gone." This avocation was, perhaps, not entirely to the
taste of young Davis, but he served his apprenticeship faithfully,
and was his own master in the year 1830. He was anxious to ac-
quaint himself more thoroughly with the mysteries of the whole-
sale dry goods trade, and, accordingly, he accepted a position in
the importing house of E. & C. G. Fehr & Co., Kb. 28 South Front
street. The Fehrs did a large foreign business, and the opportuni-
ties of Davis in this house for becoming thoroughly acquainted
with the theory and practice of the wholesale trade, were very
important, and they were fully embraced by him. The Fehrs lived
at this time at No. 3 Comptroller street, and Davis resided there
with them.

In the meanwhile, he continued a favorite with the Corbits, so
much so that he succeeded in inducing one of the lovely members
of the family to give him her hand and heart, a union which was
attended with happiness and prosperity. This connection brought
him more closely to his old friend, Henry C. Corbit, and when the
firm of Fehr & Co. gave up business, a new partnership, including
Henry C. Corbit, Isaac B. Davis, and others, under the firm of
Corbit, Davis & Co., was formed about 1838, and located at the
southeast corner of Second and Market streets, up stairs. This
partnership with one brother-in-law, led him shortly afterward into
a new field of action. Jos. Corbit was for some time a member of
the firm of Jos. S. Lovering & Co., sugar refiners, at No. 27 Church
alley. Mr. Lovering commenced business in a small way, some
years before, at No. 101 North Seventh street, but business in-
creasing, he removed to the old sugar house in Church alley, where
his means were enlarged by the capital of partners. Mr. Davis
left the firm of Corbit, Davis & Co., and became a member of the
firm of J. S. Lovering & Co., in 1841. Having already had expe-
rience as an auctioneer, and in the wholesale and retail dry goods
business, he became interested in one of the largest manufacturing
establishments in the city.

Once enlisted in the interests of this firm, the energies of Mr.
Davis became also engaged in the subject of manufactures and their
encouragement. Up to this time he had been a faithful and close
servant of business, paying but little attention to public affairs,

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 123

other than that regard which in this country is given to them by
every intelligent citizen. But his active mind was now directed
to the great subject of the manufacturing industry of the country,
and the best means of encouraging it. He believed that it was
the duty of the government to sustain labor in its endeavors to
support itself against foreign competition. As a merchant, his
interest might have been in large importations and the widely
spread commerce for which free trade sighed. But as a manufac-
turer, his aims were different. He became a warm advocate of
the doctrine of protection. As such, his position as a principal
partner in a large manufacturing house naturally placed him in
the advance, and although never ranked as a professional politician,
he was forced into public notice as an influential friend of the old
Whig party. Earnest in his nature, a thorough going and faithful
man in all that he undertook, Mr. Davis was soon called upon to
take a prominent part in the aifairs of the country.

In Philadelphia he was considered a standby in the organization
of every meeting, convention or consultation, which might be
necessary for the good of the cause. His excellent judgment, judi-
cious tact and experience, were frequently called upon in the party
movements of the day. His integrity of character, calm and careful
attention to every subject which engaged his attention, recom-
mended him as a person who w^as to be relied upon on occasions
when responsibilities were to be met. And yet, with those quali-
ties which naturally placed him in the line of political preferment,
Mr. Davis shrunk from the actual occupation of public office. He
assisted in obtaining office for many men, but he could not be
induced to give his own service in official station. That was a
business which he was contented to leave to others, satisfied that
his duty was well performed when he lent the influence of his
counsels to the choice of good candidates.

In private life Mr. Davis was a warm and useful friend. He was
ever ready to bring the benefit of his experience to those who con-
sulted him upon their own aifairs, and to add, when necessary,
something more than advice. He was liberal and kind, and never
hesitated at the proper course when the subject was worthy. He
enjoyed a large circle of friends, whose admiration of him was the
natural expression of their sentiments towards a worthy and hono-
rable man.

Commencing life without a single dollar, by his talent and
industry he amassed in a few years a large fortune. When he be-

124 BIOGRAPHIES OF

sufficiently able to enjoy a country life, his mind reverted to
the scenes of his childhood in Montgomery county, where he pur-
chased for himself a fine plantation, and established his country
seat. At this retreat he died on the fourth of February, 1857, in
the forty-eighth year of his age, cut off in the prime of life, at a
period when his experience as a merchant and manufacturer was
ripened, and when he was in a position to have made the labors
and successes of his life more useful to others than he had ever been
able to do before.

GEORGE W. CARPENTER.

THE wholesale druggist is a modern associate among merchants.
The apothecary, until about the commencement of the present cen-
tury, was able, out of his small stock, to supply the wants of his
neighborhood and of places more distant. The merchant was the
importer of large quantities of drugs, among the miscellaneous
goods and fancy articles of an unclassified commerce, and the apo-
thecary procured his supplies from the general importer. It was
not until after the Revolutionary War that drug merchants in the
United States began to create the elements of what is now an ex-
tensive business.

The house of the Wetherills was among those in Philadelphia
which led off in this trade. The Lehmans gave to the business an
important impetus. Caleb North, an early druggist, gave way to
Thomas Cave, and Cave & Schaffer for many years were among
the principal drug houses of Philadelphia, with A. S. & E. Roberts
and others. Among the earliest to engage in the wholesale drug
business in this city were the descendants of one of the oldest
apothecaries in Philadelphia, the representatives of Christopher
Marshall, who, a hundred years ago, kept his apothecary shop in
Chestnut street, between Second and Third. It was Christopher
Marshall, Jr., a son of the original Christpoher, who, during the
Revolution, scandalised Friends by taking the patriot side, and
was " turned out of meeting" for his unquakerly behavior. It was
the same Christopher who, while an active member of the " Com-
mittee of Inspection and Safety" of Philadelphia, kept a minute
diary of the daily transactions occurring in the city, the historical

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 125

value of which is recognized hy every student of American history
as very great. Christopher Marshall was succeeded at the old
stand, No. 56 Chestnut street, hy Charles Marshall ; and a son of
the latter, Charles Marshall, Jr., established himself in the whole-
sale business, at No. 810 Market street, near Eighth, about the
year 1814, having removed there from No. 226 Market street.

It was with this Charles Marshall, Jr., at No. 310 Market street,
that George W. Carpenter was entered as an assistant, in the year
1820, for the purpose of learning the drug business. He was then
eighteen years old, having been born at Germantown, in the county
of Philadelphia, on the thirty-first day of July, 1802. He was
educated at the old Germantown academy, that venerable estab-
lishment which gives the name to " School House Lane," one of
the most beautiful of our suburban avenues. At this school he
attained the rudiments of a classic and substantial education, w^hich
fitted him in after life for the scientific pursuits to which he devoted
his spare time.

His salary at Marshall's was small, and he had no hereditary
fortune to help him along, but he was prudent and saving, and in
a few years had accumulated sufficient to justify him in under-
taking business on his own account. He had also laid up for him-
self a much more valuable capital in a scientific reputation, which,
when he entered into trade, brought him at once friends and valu-
able customers. Shortly after entering the store of Mr. Marshall,
he became acquainted with the distinguished naturalist, Thomas
Nuttall, who was at that time a resident of Philadelphia. Nuttall
was a simple hearted enthusiast, whose devotion to natural science
was unconquerable, and whose frank and genial character won for
him admiration and esteem. The friendship of such a man natu-
rally developed young Carpenter's taste for natural history, and in
a short time his studies were bent in that direction.

While yet an assistant in Marshall's store George W. Carpenter
was elected an associate of the Academy of Natural Sciences — an
institution of which every American may be proud — an institution
which ranks among its members eminent men — an institution
which has the most extensive scientific museum in the United
States, and in some departments is better stored with rare speci-
mens than any museum in the world. Mr. Carpenter was a regu-
lar attendant of this society, and while enlarging the sphere of his
knowledge he made many valuable acquaintances. Mineralogy
became his favorite study, and he devoted his time to the collec-

126 BIOGRAPHIES OF

tion of such specimens as were to be procured within the field of
his visits. His cabinet soon became large, and was continually
increased by his own acquisitions and by exchanges. Professor
Cleveland, in his valuable treatise upon mineralogy, availed himself
of the extensive cabinet of Mr. Carpenter, and his descriptions
were in many cases relied upon by that eminent philosopher.
" Silliman's Journal of Science and Art" was also enriched by Mr.
Carpenter's contributions. But mineralogy was with Mr. Carpen-
ter a pastime. In his attention to that science he did not neglect
the more important studies connected with his business. It was
his duty to understand the qualities and uses of the drugs which
he handled daily, and he applied himself so faithfully to the study
of pharmacy, that from a student he soon attained to proficiency,
which entitled him to the position of a professor. He contributed
a number of papers upon various medical subjects to the " Ameri-
can Journal of Medical Sciences," then edited by Dr. Nathaniel
Chapman. His first book, " Carpenter's Essays on Materia Medica,"
soon passed to a second edition, and it has since become a text
book.

• With these advantages to assist the young shopman, he entered
into business for himself with a fair prospect of success. It was
in the year 1828 that he opened at No. 301 Market street, next
door to the corner of Eighth street, north side, the small drug
store in which, with a limited capital, the results of his savings, he
launched out upon the sea of business. But, in doing so, he found
numerous eager friends. His policy in the management of his
concern was the most judicious that could have been adopted to
secure success. He resolved to keep the best quality of drugs, and
to sell none of an inferior nature. He gave to his business his close
personal attention. Knowing that in a country as large as ours,
embracing vast districts thinly settled, and affording but small in-
ducements to the physician, there were certain diseases of perio-
dical appearance, which required only the prompt application of
simple medicines, he applied himself to the preparation of a set
of family medicines for home use, which might be employed in case
of emergency, without the necessity of regular prescription. By
this means Mr. Carpenter's medicines were introduced throughout
the South and West. They were found effectual and reliable, and
there were thousands of families who, on the prairies or in the
forest, needed no other attendant than the far-distant druggist,
whose admirable medicinal preparations were to them as useful as

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 127

could have been the prescription of a regular doctor difficult
to have been made up at the nearest village, many miles away.
Carpenter's "Medicine Chest Dispensatory," a popular treatise on
the properties of the medicines most commonly used, with a con-
cise description of diseases, and directions for treatment, was in-
tended for the use of parties who could not procure the attendance
of physicians, and it has been a most important means of relieving
pains and suffering in thousands of cases.

From the moment when George W. Carpenter went into busi-
ness for himself, in 1828, until the day of his death, his success was
extraordinary. Eiches flowed in upon him with an undeviating
current. In eight years he had accumulated enough, beyond all
necessities upon account of his capital, to purchase a farm in the
upper part of Germantown, which, under the influence of his taste
became one of the most splendid country seats in the United
States. The taste and elegance shown in this mansion are too well
known to need particular detail. The place was, during Mr. Car-
penter's life, open at all times to visitors, and thousands are fami-
liar with it. One of the features of " Phil Ellena," for this was the
name given to the place by Mr. Carpenter, in honor of his wife,
was a mineralogical cabinet and museum, a choice and valuable
collection.

A Germantown boy, it was the pride of Mr. Carpenter to be
useful as a Germantown man. He forsaw the splendid future of
this quiet village, and put his spare profits into the purchase of
Germantown property wherever he could find an eligible invest-
ment. The quiet and sleepy burghers, who had not the foresight
of Mr. Carpenter, gladly availed themselves of his liberal offers,
little dreaming that the prices which he paid would in a few years
be increased fifty and a hundred fold. Long before his death, Mr.
Carpenter was the owner of over five hundred acres of ground in
Germantown, and he bought whenever an opportunity presented
itself. The present value of this property, in comparison to its
cost, is immense. Before he died, Mr. Carpenter was the owner of
over four hundred houses in the city and county of Philadelphia,
the income from which was very large, and the expenses heavy ;
yet with all these immense interests to manage, and the care of
his extensive drug business upon his mind, so methodical was he
that he rarely allowed a day to pass- without having all his affairs
thoroughly posted up until the last moment.

Mr. Carpenter was one of best friends that the Philadelphia,

128 BIOGRAPHIES OF

Germantown and Norristown Railroad Company ever had. He
went into the management when the Company seemed to be help-
lessly bankrupt. With others, he devoted his time to the resusci-
tation of its credit and the restoration of its reputation. These
efforts were so successful that the creditors have all been satisfied,
and the stock, which at one time was worth only seventy-five
cents per share in the market, is now selling at fifty-nine dollars,
and but little for sale at that price.

Mr. Carpenter was a Commissioner to organize the Pennsylvania
Central Eailroad Co., and for many years a Director. So exten-
sive were his operations, that at one time he was a director in six
railroad companies, one bank, one insurance company, and a mem-
ber of several private societies, beside being the executor and ad-
ministrator of several estates, with his own immense interests to
take care of.

Mr. Carpenter early in life adopted several rules which helped
him along in life — some of these we may concisely state thus :

1. To rise early. He was always up between 4 and 5 o'clock
in the morning, and did almost a day's work before other people
were awake.

2. To employ method and system in everything, whether of
study, pleasure or labor.

3. To never undertake any enterprise without being thoroughly
prepared for success as well as failure.

4. To purchase for |cash, instead of credit, causes the purchaser
to be prudent and careful, and not to overload himself with stock,
besides being an advantage in the discount for prompt payment.

5. To go into business entirely upon credit is dangerous, and
likely to swamp the young beginner.

6. Never sell to a person who purchases entirely on credit.
To meet his payments he will, in eight cases out of ton, be com-
pelled to sacrifice goods for which he promised to pay full prices.

Upon these principles, George W. Carpenter acted, and when,
on the seventh of June, 1860, he was called upon by death to leave
his affairs, we will venture to say his accounts were posted, and
that he left to his family a clear record of his worldly career, free
from doubt or intricacy.

For many years before his death, Mr. Carpenter was assisted in
the drug business by Win. C. Henszey, a gentleman whose know-
ledge of the trade was gained in the establishment, and who wor-
thily succeeded to a partnership. Mr. Henszey was brought up

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 129

in Mr. Carpenter's establishment, and was first employed in 1833.
He was admitted as a partner in 1842, and is now the senior mem-
ber of the firm.

ROBERT WALST.

THE Wains are of an old and well known Pennsylvania family.
If there is any merit to be ascribed to the fact that one can trace
his ancestry for five or six generations, the Wains may boast of
that distinction. But as the Wains are of Quaker stock, and pride
of birth is not a vice of Friends, the fact is only worthy of mention
as being somewhat notable in a country in which the majority of
inhabitants have very confused ideas of the social positions which
were held by their grandfathers.

Nicholas Wain, the first of the family that came to America, be-
longed to an English family of respectability, who resided near
Settle, in Yorkshire. As early as 1654 the Wains espoused the
doctrines of the Society of Friends. Nicholas was an early com-
panion of William Penn, and when the Quaker founder devised the
plan of his colony in the wilds of the West, Nicholas Wain was
one of the trusty friends who resolved to seek America with him.
He came to Pennsylvania in 1682. Having been a purchaser in
England of one thousand acres, he located his ground near Penn's
Manor, at Bristol. He was a representative of the county of
Bucks in the General Assembly of 1683, a position which he occu-
pied until 1695, when he removed to Philadelphia. Holding other
offices of trust and honor, his life was spent usefully until his death,
in the year 1721.

A grandson of this Nicholas Wain, was Nicholas Wain, the third
son of Nicholas and Mary Wain, who was born at Fair Hill, near
Philadelphia, on the nineteenth of September, 1742. His father
died in 1750, and he was reared by his mother, formerly Mary
Shoemaker, and his uncle, Jacob Shoemaker. He was educated
at Friends' school, at Fourth and Chestnut streets, in Philadel-
phia. On arriving at the proper age he commenced the study of
the law, under Joseph Galloway, afterwards notorious for his tory-
ism and treason during the Revolution. Nicholas practiced in the

130 BIOGRAPHIES OF

courts of Chester county as early as 1763, and before he was
twenty-one years of age. But not satisfied with his acquirements
he withdrew from practice, and went to London, where he was
entered at the Inner Temple. After a year's study at this foun-
tain of the law he returned to Philadelphia, and practiced for
several years. But the law was not to his taste, and it is said
that after having gained an important cause for a client, who, ac-
cording to his judgment, ought to have lost it, he determined to
withdraw from a profession which occasionally demands services
which his conscience declared to be wrongful. He devoted himself
henceforth to the propagation of the principles of his sect, and be-
came an eminent preacher among Friends. He traveled exten-
sively upon religious errands, and preached throughout America
and Europe. The career of this good man was closed in 1813, on
the twenty-ninth of the ninth month, when he had passed his
seventy -first year.

Eobert Wain, a great-grandson of the original Nicholas Wain,
and a nephew of Nicholas Wain the preacher, was born in Phila-
delphia, in the year 1765. Being descended from wealthy parents,
he might have spent his life in inglorious ease ; but his education
early taught him that industry was the best safeguard of virtue
and happiness. Himself and his brother, Jesse Wain, prefered
mercantile pursuits, and they acquired the necessary knowledge
of trade in commercial houses of eminent standing. In the year
1785, when Robert Wain was but twenty years old, he was in busi-
ness for himself in Front street, between Arch and Race ; whilst
Jesse Wain was similarly employed upon his own account in Yine
street, betweeen Second and Third. The brothers were not satis-
fied with their separate fortunes, and a short time afterward they
entered into partnership. In 1791 the firm of Jesse & Robert
Wain was located at No. 57 South Wharves.

The commercial prospects of Philadelphia were at this time ex-
ceedingly promising, and the foreign trade of the port exceeded
that of any other in the United States. Jesse Wain had his resi-
dence at No. 133 South Water street, and Robert Wain at No. 46
South Front street. In 1800 Robert Wain lived at No. 136 South
Front street, and Jesse at No. 115 South Third street. Jesse and
Robert Wain went largely into the shipping business. They com-
menced with the West India and English trade, but as time passed
on, they gradually concentrated their attention upon the East
India and China trade. In this traffic, they engaged largely, and

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 131

at one time were scarcely surpassed by Stephen Girard in the com-
prehensive character of their commercial enterprises.

In the good old times, when the business of politics was respect-
able, the efforts of the adherents of the various parties were unlike
those of the " leaders" in this unfortunate age. The desire then was
to get the " best men;" now the effort seems to be to choose the worst.
The integrity, fine business capacity, and intelligence of Robert
Wain, marked him as one who was worthy of the confidence and
trust of his fellow citizens. He was elected to the State Legisla-
ture for several years, and in 1798 was elected to Congress, as a re-
presentative of the city of Philadelphia, a proud distinction at that
time. Being a Federalist, Mr. Wain happened, during the contests
which marked the latter end of the administration of John Adams,
to be on the weak side, but he discharged his duties with fidelity,
and gained the respect of his friends and opponents. Leaving Con-
gress at the end of his term, Mr. Wain returned to Philadelphia,
to become the honored trustee of many civic interests. He was a
member of Councils for many years, and at one time President of
the Select Council. He was President of the Chamber of Com-
merce, of the Mercantile Library Company, and of the Philadel-
phia Insurance Company; a Director of the Bank of North Ame-
rica, of the Pennsylvania Hospital, and of the Philadelphia Li-
brary Company, and a Trustee of the University of Pennsylvania.

During the last war with England, Mr. Wain turned his atten-
tion to domestic manufactures. He built a cotton factory upon his
property near Trenton, New Jersey. It was, for its time, an ex-
tensive establishment. He took, also, a large interest in the devel-
opment of the iron business, arid was a heavy stockholder in the
works at Phoenixville, in Pennsylvania. He was a friend and ad-
vocate of a protective tariff, and wrote some essays and treatises
in reply to the theories of the free-traders.

As a Quaker, Robert Wain maintained the principles of his an-
cestors. When the Hicks' schism disturbed the peace of the So-
ciety, he took strong ground on the Orthodox side, and during the
controversy he published " seven letters to Elias Hicks," in which
the tenets of the new apostle were warmly attacked.

When, in the year 1836, Robert Wain, then in the seventy-first
year of his age, died, he left as an example to his successors, a
character, as a merchant, both honorable and useful.

The firm of Jesse & Robert Wain was dissolved some years before
the death of Robert, by the demise of the senior partner. The

132 BIOGRAPHIES OF

business passed into the hands of Jacob S. "Wain, likewise a de-
scendant of the first Nicholas Wain, who was brought up in the
counting-house of his relative. Jacob was born in 1776. He was
a man of brilliant intellect and thorough education. He was versed
in science and law, the latter being with him a favorite study. He
served the state and city in their councils, and held many offices of
trust, responsibility and honor. He died in the year 1850, after a
short illness.

The business of the Wains has descended from Jacob S. Wain to
S. Morris Wain & Co. — the firm being composed of S. Morris Wain,
Wm H. Pile and C. W. Cushman. They have given up the ship-
ping business, as ship owners. They are importers and commis-
sion merchants, and are located at No. 128 South Delaware avenue.
The high character of the house established by Jesse and Eobert
Wain, and continued by Jacob S. Wain, has descended to able and
consciencious representatives. S. Morris Wain & Co. are rated
among the most influential and successful of the merchants of Phi-
ladelphia.

ALEXANDER HENRY.

ALEXANDER HENRY was born in the North of Ireland, in the
year 1763. His father was respectable and well established, but his
death, when the young Alexander was but two years old, wrought
an important change in the circumstances of the family. There
were five children who were orphaned by this event, the youngest
of whom is the subject of our sketch. An elder brother took
charge of the interests of the boy, and brought him up with the
intention of giving him an university education, as a means of
securing him admission to one of the learned professions. In con-
sequence of this kindness, the boy was enabled to acquire such an
advance upon the ordinary studies of youths of his own degree
that he experienced the beneficial results throughout his life. The
intention of his brother was interfered with, however, by the death
of the tutor of Alexander, which incident disarranged the plans
which had been determined upon in the family. Alexander, who
had now arrived at an age in which he was entitled to have some

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 133

voice in the settlement of a question of the utmost importance to
himself, already felt dissatisfied with the prospects which were be-
fore him. His tastes were not such that a professional life seemed
to him to be a great object to the accomplishment of which he
ought to dedicate his energies. His thoughts inclined to trade,
and he fancied that in the life of a merchant he discovered the ele-
ments of a congenial occupation, and the certainty of respect, final
success and competence. But there was a difficulty in establishing
himself in business in the North of Ireland, which resulted from
the political condition of the couutry. The British domination
over Ireland was severe, and the encouragement of Irish enterprise
was repressed, as much as was possible, by adverse English laws
and by hostile English influence. There was no space for an
increase of business or for the enlargement of commerce. The
local demand for merchandise was circumscribed by the local
wants. The population of the North of Ireland, instead of being
constantly swelled by new comers and by the natural increase
among families, was diminishing by emigration and the want of
stimulus to improvement. To an ambitious youth, like Alexander
Henry, home, with all its familiar attractions, was not the place
for enterprise or success in business, and, therefore, as thousands
of his countrymen have since done, he turned his hopes to Ame-
rica. His mother could only give him an outfit and her blessing.
A brother resolved to try his fortune with him ; but, after having
made every preparation, his resolution faltered, and he discovered
that there was a tie at home which he could not break. The
" girl" whom he would have "left behind him," he could not leave.
Love proved stronger than the hope of success abroad, and the
young man relinquished the adventure and allowed his brother to
go alone, whilst he solemnized at the altar the vows which were to
make him happy.

In the year 1783 Alexander Henry left Ireland, to seek the land
of promise. In comparison to the style in which thousands of his
countrymen have since sought the friendly asylum of the United
States, he came in comfort and endowed with importance. He
was a cabin passenger, and what was better, the consignee of a
stock of dry goods — a matter which gave him position and import-
ance on board of the ship, and was a valuable means of introduc-
tion to strangers when he reached his destination. He arrived at
Philadelphia, and having disposed of the goods under his charge
sought employment. He had with him valuable letters of intro-

134 BIOGRAPHIES OF

election, and these procured for him a small clerkship in a mercan-
tile house, at an annual salary of $250. This trifling sum was but
the beginning. In a short time it was wonderfully increased in
amount. The young Irishman applied himself to his business with
a diligence, ready tact and success which were surprising. He
soon succeeded in convincing his employer that they had taken in
an assistant of much more than ordinary capacity. They found
employment for his talents in a more responsible sphere than a
clerkship, and in a short time a special branch of the busines was
established, of which Alexander Henry was made the superintend-
ent, at a salary of $1,300 per annum. In this position he was
equally fortunate, not only gaining the good-will of his employers,
but laying up such portions of his earnings that he soon began to
consider what he should do with his capital. He felt justified in
undertaking to go into business upon his own account, and believed
that he could command sufficient confidence among the merchants
of the North of Ireland to render the commencement of a commis-
sion business a prudent undertaking. He accordingly addressed
his friends in England and Ireland, soliciting consignments, and
was soon honored by gratifying proofs of the confidence which
was felt in his integrity. Invoices rolled in, and in a short time
he found himself at the head of a successful business. In the year
1790 he was established at No. 17 South Second street ; but his
consignments increasing, he removed to a more successful locality
for the wholesale trade. He rented the store No. 42 South Front
street, and removed there about the year 1792. In 1793 he in-
creased his facilities by entering into partnership with Mr. James
Boggs. The firm of Henry & Boggs continued at No. 42 South
Front street until the year 1800. The store was then removed to
No. 225 Market street, where, in a short time, the parties dissolved
their connection. Mr. Henry remained at No. 225, where he had
also his residence. Mr. Boggs entered into a new firm, Boggs &
Davidson, which was established at No. 229 Market street, next
door but one to the old store. The situation was between Sixth
and Seventh streets, considerably West for those times, but a popu-
lar place of business in consequence of its proximity to the head-
quarters of the Western trade, which was then chiefly performed
by wagons.

In 1805, Mr. Henry removed to No. 192 Market street, between
Fifth and Sixth, and occupied the house next to that which had been
the residence of General Washington, whilst he held the office of

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 135

President of the United States. The property was spacious and com-
fortable. It extended through to Minor street, upon which avenue,
at No 25, Mr. Henry afterwards established his counting-house.
After seventeen years faithful application, in which his integrity
and prudence had been most successfully applied to the manage-
ment of his commision business, as well as to the direction of his
own adventures in the importation of British and India goods, Mr.
Henry found himself, in 1807, perfectly independent, and justified
by his good fortune in retiring from trade, and devoting the re-
mainder of his life to those pursuits which were congenial to his
tastes. He accordingly resolved to relinquish active participation
in business.

He had, while yet an active merchant, sent to Ireland for his
nephew, Alexander Henry, Jr. The habits of the youth were ex-
cellent. He proved himself to be possessed of admirable commer-
cial qualities, and so won upon the confidence of his uncle,
that the latter determined to place him upon the foundation
which he had already securely built. Alexander Henry, Jr.
& Co., succeeded to the business at No. 192 Market street,
whilst the original of the name confined his attention at his
counting-house, No. 25 Minor street, to the winding up of his af-
fairs. A few special matters of new business occupied his atten-
tion between 1807 and 1818 ; but in the latter year he addressed a
circular to all his correspondents, apprising them of his determina-
tion to relinquish an active participation in commercial affairs.
This resolution he was compelled to partially relinquish by subse-
quent events. Alexander Henry, Jr., was sent to England, where
there was an opportunity for extensive mercantile operations.
His uncle freely supplied him with capital, and as a result, the
Manchester house of Alexander Henry is now one of the most ex-
tensive and influential in England. It was, therefore, necessary
for the subject of our sketch to partially resume business as a mat-
ter of prudence, arid as a correspondent and agent of his nephew,
and also to furnish the ready means of establishing in life his own
son, John S. Henry, who afterwards took in hand the business at
No. 192 Market street.

Having by early success achieved for himself a handsome for-
tune, the great pleasure of Alexander Henry, for nearly thirty
years of his life, was to dispose of 1ns surplus in such a manner as
to render it useful to other?. He was" a large hearted, generous
man. He had a liberal disposition and a kind heart, and never was

136 BIOGRAPHIES OF

deaf to the call of affliction. He was a friend and assistant to the
needy and the distressed. His ear was ever open to the narratives
of the needy, and his hand was ever ready to solace their afflic-
tions. He used his opulence with a due regard to the best interests
of those who applied to him. The merchant struggling against
bankruptcy, to whom a present loan might be the means of pre-
serving his mercantile honor, found in Alexander Henry a ready
friend, who was ever willing to assist those who deserved it. The
widow reduced to despair, the young clerk whose hopes of meeting
with employment were unsuccessful, found a true friend and coun-
sellor in Alexander Henry. His private benefactions are known
to have been extensive. In generosity and affability he had few
equals. No one, however humble his situation, applied to him
without receiving from his words and manner the comfort and
satisfaction which ever must flow from the slightest intercourse
with the Christian gentleman.

Mr. Henry was distinguished also in what we may call " public
charities," those benevolent efforts which call for open assistance,
and which are aided at all times by the examples which individuals
afford to each other. His name is to be found upon almost every
subscription for a worthy object which was originated during the
latter part of his life. He was always expected to subscribe to
every project, moral, religious or benevolent, which called for
assistance from citizens, and he never refused to give aid to
a worthy object. He was one of the founders, in 1817, of the
" Philadelphia Sunday and Adult School Union," over which he
was President until 1824. In the latter year the society was
merged into the "American Sunday-School Union."

Mr. Henry was elected the President of the latter, and held that
office uninterruptedly until his death. He was also the President
of '• The Board of Education of the Presbyterian Church," Presi-
dent of "The House of Eefuge," and President of "The Magdalen
Society," beside being a manager of many other benevolent, reli-
gious and literary institutions.

He died at his house, No. 254 Arch street, on the thirteenth of
August, 1847, leaving behind him a spotless reputation, and causing
that sincere regret which pervades every community upon the de-
mise of an unselfish man.

Mr. Henry married about the time that he entered into business.
His son, Thomas Charlton Henry, D. D., was born in September,
1790, and accomplished his theological studies at Princeton College.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 137

He became the pastor of the Second Presbyterian Church, in
Charleston, S. C., and died there in 1827. He wrote "Letters to
an Anxious Inquirer/' and an " Inquiry into the Consistency of
Popular Amusements with a Profession of Christianity." He was
an effective and brilliant preacher. A daughter of Alexander
Henry married Silas E. Weir, auctioneer and commission merchant.
After the death of the latter, Mrs. Weir gave her hand to the Eev.
John Chambers, pastor of the Independent Presbyterian Church
in this city. She died some months ago. The male branch of the
family is worthily represented by Alexander Henry, our present
Mayor, who is a son of John S. Henry, and has proved himself by
his integrity of character and industrious attention to the duties
of his position, to be a model magistrate, and worthy of the posi-
tion of chief officer of the great city ; and another son, T. Charl-
ton Henry, wool merchant, No. 10 South Front street, is an up-
right, unostentatious and estimable gentleman.

JOHN PEICE WETHEKILL.

HEREDITARY succession in business pursuits is not in this country,
as in Europe, almost a matter of course. The son of the laborer
may become a lawyer, doctor, or preacher; and the sons of the
lawyer, doctor or preacher may turn out to be merchants, surveyors,
or sailors. In Europe the father hands down to the son the shop,
the warehouse, or the factory. Generation after generation follow
the same business with a fidelity to caste only to be excelled by the
Hindoo. In this country one son may succeed to the business of
his father, but the chances are even that he will abandon it, and
before his death try something else.

The Wetherill family, for four generations, have been manufac-
turers and venders of drugs and chemicals. Accident threw them
into this business, but choice has confirmed them in it. Samuel
Wetherill, the grandfather of John Price Wetherill, was the son of
Christopher Wetherill, who settled in New Jersey as early as the year
1682, near the town of Burlington, where he gave to Friends the
ground upon which their meeting-house is built. Samuel Weth-
erill, his son, was born near Burlington, in April, 1736, but

138 BIOGRAPHIES OF

he came to Philadelphia at an early age. His occupation
was a carpenter, an employment which he fo lowed until the
rising disputes with Great Britain turned his attention to new
pursuits. At the breaking out of the Revolutionary War, Samuel
Wetherill, the carpenter, took a strong interest on the patriot
side ; an interest which led him to such length that the Orthodox
Quakers, who, in addition to their dislike of wars and fighting,
were intensely toryish in their sympathies, disowned him. Samuel
Wetherill was a shrewed, practical man, and he early foresaw that
the great want of America was independence of England in the
matter of supplies derived from manufactures. He was one of the
promoters and managers of " the United Company of Philadelphia,
for the Establishment of American Manufactures," which was
formed in the year 1775. This association did much good, but
Wetherill added to his weight and assistance as a member thereof,
his personal assistance in the cause. He embarked his whole soul
in the business. He set up at his dwelling-house in South alley,
between Fifth and Sixth streets, which was on the lot of ground
extending from Market to Arch street, once called Hudson's square,
a manufactory of jeans, fustians, everlastings and coatings. In
order to prepare these properly, it was necessary that they should
be dyed. There were no dyers in Philadelphia at that time equal
to the work, and as a matter of necessity, Samuel Wetherill was
compelled to undertake this branch of the business. Furthermore,
the proper dyestuffs were scarce, and to carry out his plan, the
carpenter turned weaver, was compelled to turn chemist, in order
to prepare the necessary coloring stuifs and dyes to finish them.
This circumstance no doubt explains the reason why Samuel Weth-
erill abandoned carpentering, and weaving, for the manufacture of
chemicals, and it shows why the family are manufacturers of drugs
and chemicals to this day. Wetherill was one of the few Quakers
who were Whigs, and he did not scruple about entering into a con-
tract with Congress to furnish cloth for the uniforms of the patriot
troops. This was an unpardonable offence in tory eyes, and for
the violation of rule, Samuel Wetherill, with other " fighting Qua-
kers,'' was deprived of his " birthright." These disowned men
afterwards petitioned the Legislature for relief, a consequence of
which was the determination to build a meeting-house for them-
selves, and the citizens of Philadelphia furnished them with funds
to purchase the lot at the southwest corner of Fifth and Arch
streets, upon which was erected the Free Quaker Meeting House.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 139

A grant of the lot on the east side of Fifth street, below Prune,
for a burial ground, was also made by the State, and for many years
the Free Quaker Society, composed of such men as Samuel Wethe-
rill, Colonel Timothy Matlack and others, who had stood up for
their country in preference to their sect, worshipped there. Samuel
Wetherill became one of the preachers. In civil life he was a Yice-
President of the Yellow Fever Committee of 1793, a member of
City Councils, and a member of the Watering Committee. He
died in the year 1816.

His son, Samuel Wetherill, Jr., was the active man of the concern,
and assisted his father in all business matters. The enforced ex-
perience which was pressed upon them during the revolution, con-
centrated their attention upon the manufacture and sale of chemi-
cals, and they went into the drug business. In 1785 Samuel
Wetherill & Son were located in Front street above Arch. Here,
for many years, " Wetherill' s drug store" was an old landmark,
and the place at which sons and grandsons were brought up to the
business. The Wetherill's were the pioneers in the manufacture of
white lead. They established it before the year 1790. They erected
extensive white lead works near Twelfth and Cherry streets, which
were burnt down in 1813, but afterwards rebuilt.

John Price Wetherill was a grandson of Samuel Wetherill, and
son of Samuel Wetherill, Jr. He was born in Philadelphia, on the
seventeenth of October, 1794. He was, at an early age, an enthu-
siastic student, and gave to chemistry all the powers of his mind.
He became a member of the Academy of Natural Sciences in 1817,
and was its Yice-President for many years. In 1827 he became a
member of the American Philosophical Society. With other learned
and scientific societies he had an extensive membership. He was
elected a member of the Geological Society in 1832. In 1837 he was
chosen an honorary member of the Boston Society of Natural His-
tory. In 1844 he was elected a member of the Mineralogical
Society of St. Petersburg. In 1848 he was elected a member of
the American Society for the Advancement of Science, and in 1848
he was elected a member of the New Jersey Society of Natural
History. Inheriting the tastes of the "Fighting Quakers," John
Price Wetherill was also a military man. He was the Captain of
the Second City Troup for several years, and the title by which he
was generally known, " Colonel John Price Wetherill," was legiti-
mately obtained.

Whilst, however, devoting his time to scientific affairs, rendering

140 BIOGRAPHIES OF

himself a superior chemist, and maintaining the supremacy in the
drug business, which the Wetherills had kept up since the Revolu-
tion, it was as a public man that John Price Wetherill was best
known to his fellow-citizens. He was elected to the Common Coun-
cil of Philadelphia in 1829, being the third Wetherill thus honored.
In 1832 he was made a member of Select Council, in which body
he served until his death, a period of nearly twenty-four years.
In that position he exercised more influence than any of his con-
temporaries. A firm Whig, and a devoted friend of Henry Clay.
His uncompromising fidelity to his party gave him an influence
which his strong will, activity of mind, and indomitable resolution
enabled him to maintain. He was in his purposes, as in his per-
sonal appearance, opposed to shame. He disdained ceremony and
hollow form, and was devoted to simplicity and substance. He was
uncommonly industrious, resolute and persevering. What he took
hold of he held on to, and never relaxed his grasp until his purpose
was accomplished. There was in his character a feature of re-
markable energy and determination. Once he assumed a position
he was unbending and stern; neither argument, opposition nor
ridicule could move him. He rarely abandoned a position, but
fought on until the last. In his public career he made some mis-
takes. As Chairman of the Watering Committee, before consoli-
dation, his opposition to the just claims of Spring Garden and Ken-
sington, that they should be allowed the use of the Schuylkill
water at the same rate as city consumers, led to the building of
opposition works in these districts, and produced a decision from
the Supreme Court which nullified the monopoly of the water for
which the city had paid dearly. This was a misfortune it was
thought at the time. But the consolidation of the city and districts,
the actual necessity that the Spring Garden works have since
proved themselves to be, have long since obliterated all feeling
upon the subject. In the course taken by Mr. Wetherill he was
undoubtedly honest, but in error. Time has long since obliterated
all feeling in consequence of the error.

John Price Wetherill died in July, 1853, after a short illness, con-
tracted whilst acting as a member of the committee to receive
President Franklin Pierce on his visit to Philadelphia.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 141

THOMAS SPARKS.

THE word " plumber," in these modern times, conveys to the
mind of our people ideas essentially different from those which
would have attached to it seventy-eight years ago, when Thomas
Sparks was born. A plumber, as we understand it, is a worker in
lead, but in a very circumscribed degree. His business is almost
entirely confined to the fixing up of apparatus connected with
hydrants and water pipes, to which he has latterly joined the iron
and brass work connected with the introduction of gas into dwel-
'lings and houses. In the year 1785, when Thomas Sparks saw
the light in the city of Philadelphia, a "plumber" was a maker of
leaden vessels. The arms of his trade, derived from the venerable
Plumbers Company of London, were a mallet, sable and two plum-
mets azure, with two soldering irons between a cutting knife and
a shave hook, with the motto, " In God is all our hope."

In the year 1797 there could not have been more than two or
three plumbers in Philadelphia. They made plates, waiters, mugs
and flagons, occasionally a leaden coffin, as the last resting place
of some member of a wealthy family, and in addition the leaden
work for ships and vessels, mercantile and naval.

Of these plumbers, one of the busiest was John Cousland, who,
in the year we have named, lived in South or Cedar street, between
Front and Second. The introduction of the Schuylkill water into
Philadelphia, in 1799, gave to the plumbing business a great im-
petus, and Cousland moved, in 1801, to Farmer's How, which run
east from Dock street, below Second, in the exact position now
occupied by Godley's Row, upon Granite street. About the same
time there was another plumber in the city, John Bishop, who
lived at No. 194 Pine street. These gentlemen formed a partner-
ship about the year 1803. "With this firm Thomas Sparks became
an apprentice, probably as soon as it was established, as he was
then seventeen years old. He was an earnest and faithful young
man, and served Cousland & Bishop so well that they took him
into partnership the day after he had arrived at age. The firm
had their principal establishment at No. 49 South Wharves, and it
is probable that the admission of Thomas Sparks into the firm was
due to the fact that they determined to add the manufacture of
shot to their business.

142 BIOGRAPHIES OF

On the fourth of July, 1808, the corner-stone of the Southwark
shot tower, in John street, between Front and Second, was laid by
the firm of Cousland, Bishop & Sparks, and the building was pressed
forward rapidly to completion. Thomas Sparks paid particular
attention to this branch qf the business, and in a short time
the patent shot of the firm became celebrated throughout the
country. So long as this article was used by sportsmen and hunt-
ers, there seemed to be no difficulty about the propriety of the
manufacture in the firm. But when the war of 1812 broke out,
the firm then being Bishop & Sparks, the senior partner, who was
a consistent member of the Society of Friends, felt conscientious
scruples as to the rightfulness of continuing a manufacture which
the United States now demanded should be turned to the produc-
tion of munitions of war. John Bishop, therefore, withdrew from
the firm, and retired from business. He still lives a quiet and
peaceful life in Burlington county, N. J., having reached his eighty-
eighth year.

Thomas Sparks, therefore, continued the business for several
years alone. In 1818 he took into partnership his brother, Rich-
ard Sparks, and the firm continued at 'No. 49 South Wharves, as
Thomas and Richard Sparks, the shot tower operations being in
full play. It was necessary that they should reside near the tower,
and accordingly Thomas had his house at No. 476 South Front
street, and Richard at "No. 478. This partnership did not last very
long. Richard Sparks fell a victim to the yellow fever in the year
1821, and for many years Thomas Sparks continued at No. 49
South Wharves, and at the shot tower, without a partner. In the
year 1838 he took in with him his nephew, Thomas Sparks, Jr., a
son of Richard. The business was then conducted under the firm
of Thomas & Thomas Sparks, Jr., at the old stand, which from No.
49 South Wharves had become No. 49 South Delaware avenue.

During his active and useful life Thomas Sparks held some offices
of public trust. He was a commissioner of the district of South-
wark for many years — a firm Democrat, but at the same time an
honest and independent one. He always supported the Demo-
cratic ticket when the ticket contained the names of worthy men ;
but he would not vote for a bad man merely because he had been
nominated by a party convention. In this integrity of principle
Mr. Sparks followed a line of conduct which should be a rule of
action w^ith all good men. He was one of the commissioners ap-
pointed by the commonwealth of Pennsylvania to superintend the

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 143

erection of the Eastern Penitentiary, in connection with \KoberJ;
Yaux, John Bacon and other eminent citizens, and was President
of the Board. He was a director of various railroad and insurance
companies, and for many years the President of the old fashioned,
reliable and admirably managed institution, the Southwark Bank.
The integrity and prudence which characterized that bank in the
time when Thomas Sparks presided at the directors' board, have
descended as legacies to the present officers, and are faithfully fol-
lowed and remembered.

On the first of February, 1854, Mr. Sparks relinquished active
business — a preparation, as it seemed, for his final departure from
this world of care. He died May 15, 1855, at his residence, No.
278 South Third street, above Spruce, universally regretted as a
representative of the honor and good character which have pre-
vailed among the manufacturers of Philadelphia, and given them a
reputation throughout the country. He had never been married,
and his large fortune, the result of honest industry — for he was a
self-made man — was mainly bequeathed to his two sisters, (now
Mrs. H. W. Flickwir and Mrs. W. C. Donaldson,) and other rela-
tives, and to his nephew and former partner.

Thomas Sparks, Jr., who succeeded his uncle at No. 49 South
Delaware avenue, was born in the year 1817, at his father's resi-
dence, South Front street. At the age of sixteen years he was
taken into the store of his uncle, and instructed in the details of
the business which his father and uncle had established. The
latter was perfectly willing to put the young man in the place of
his father when he reached the proper age, and upon his attaining
his majority he was accordingly taken into the firm. Since he
bought his uncle out, in 1854, he has conducted the large opera-
tions of the business with care and integrity. He has been identi-
fied with many public enterprises. He is Yice-President of the
Southwark Bank, and is one of its largest stockholders. He is
Treasurer of the Pennsylvania Salt Company, in which he has taken
a lively interest for many years. He has been a director of insu-
rance companies of substance and success. He was one of the pro-
jectors of the Philadelphia and Darby Passenger .Railway Com-
pany, a very useful improvement.

As a liberal citizen no better man can be found than Thomas
Sparks, Jr. For objects of charity, and improvement he gives not
only hundreds, but thousands of dollars. He has never withheld
assistance from any object which has been worthy of care and en-

144 BIOGRAPHIES OF

couragement. Since the outbreak of the rebellion no one has been
more hearty and enthusiastic in support of the government. He
has shown this not merely by words, but by deeds. He has given
freely to every plan of benevolence designed for the comfort and
assistance of our suffering soldiers. He has been ready to aid in
fitting out troops, and has given enough for this single purpose to
assist very materially toward equiping a regiment. Philadelphia
has many such patriots, but among them few can excel in devoted
loyalty, readiness, and free and generous contributions, Thomas
Sparks, Jr.

MATTHEW CAEEY.

As THESE sketches are devoted to " the merchants and manu-
facturers of Philadelphia," we had some hesitation as to whether
our present subject was strictly within the limit. But when we
consider that a printer is, in truth, a manufacturer of books and
newspapers, and that a bookseller, who buys and sells books, is as
much a merchant as the man who buys and sells dry goods, or any •
other material, our scruples are relieved. Matthew Carey was a
manufacturer of books, in the most literal sense of the word, for
he not only wrote extensively himself, but he printed and sold
what others had written ; so that his case fully satisfies the most
rigid requirements of our readers, if any of them should be inclined
to hold us to a strict accountability. In presenting the claims of
his career to attention and respect, we are performing a task which
is pleasant, and which we trust will be profitable to our readers.

Matthew Carey was born in the city of Dublin, on the twenty-
eighth of January, 1760. His father had been an army contractor,
and had in that capacity amassed considerable wealth. He was
enabled to give to each of his five sons a liberal education, which
not only comprised the useful English branches, but embraced
French and Latin. At the age of fifteen the father of Matthew
Carey permitted him to make a choice of his future employment,
out of twenty-five trades. He selected the profession of a printer,
with which, at that time, was associated, by those who could com-
mand the capital, the vocation of the bookseller. This union now

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 145

combines in the book publisher, who is not a general printer, but
prepares and sells those works in which he has a special interest.
The father of Matthew did not particularly admire the selection
of his son, and opposed it as strongly as he was able without using
coercion. But young Carey was firm, and his parent finding re-
monstrance useless, withdrew his opposition. The boy was placed
in the office of an eminent Dublin printer, where he assiduously
devoted his time to the acquirement of his profession, and was
noted as a diligent and promising youth. Being of a literary turn
of mind he attempted authorship at the early age of seventeen
years, in a treatise entitled " An Essay upon Dueling," which was
published in the Hibernian Journal. This was followed, in 1779,
by a pamphlet upon the necessity of repealing the penal code
against the Roman Catholics. The advertisement announcing this
treatise was " spicy and sensational," and it occasioned much
alarm. The Irish Parliament, then in session, denounced the
intended publication, and offered a reward for the apprehension of
the author. Mr. Carey's father sent him to Paris, to escape a
prosecution, and whilst there he made the acquaintance of Frank-
lin and Lafayette. Returning to Ireland after the excitement in
relation to the Roman Catholic pamphlet had subsided, Mr. Carey
established, in 1783, the Volunteer Journal, devoted to Irish rights
and Irish interests. In this paper he was boldly fearless, and the
publication soon attracted the attention of the British government.
An article, published April 5, 1784, brought down upon the pub-
lisher the indignation of the Irish government. Matthew Carey
was arrested and brought before the Parliament at Dublin, where
he was subjected to examination. He refused to answer some of
the interrogatories propounded to him, and for his obstinacy was
imprisoned until May, 1784, when, Parliament having adjourned,
he was liberated. Being still subject to prosecution for libel, his
friends advised his withdrawal from the country. His thoughts
and hopes directed him to the NeW World, and in accordance with
his resolution he left Ireland, September 7, 1784, on board the ship
America, Captain Keiler, bound for Philadelphia.

At this port he arrived November 1, 1784, with very little means,
and basing his hopes of support upon remittances expected from
Dublin, the proceeds of the sale of the Volunteer establishment.
At that time the Marquis de Lafayette was in Philadelphia, and
hearing of Mr. Carey's arrival he sent for him. Inquiry was made
of the young Irishman concerning his prospects, and he frankly

146 BIOGRAPHIES OF

informed the General that upon receiving funds he intended to
establish a newspaper. Lafayette interested himself in his behalf
with the leading men of Philadelphia, and what was more to the
purpose, sent him next day four hundred dollars. Carey had not
solicited nor expected a loan, and he was profoundly impressed
with this generous act. Upon his offer to secure repayment, La-
fayette intimated that he could best do so by extending assistance
thereafter, when in his power, to others in distress and upon the
same terms — thus making this loan an instrument of good to many,
inasmuch as the only requirement was that they, when in afflu-
ence, should extend their assistance to others. Mr. Carey solemnly
fulfilled this trust in after years, and he took special delight in
seeking out and relieving Frenchmen in distress. Besides this, he
afterwards paid Lafayette in full.

With the small capital thus strangely acquired Matthew Carey &
Co. established the Pennsylvania Herald, the first number of which
was published January 25, 1785, in Front street, between Market
and Chestnut. In this paper he introduced the then novel feature
of publishing reports of the debates in the House of Assembly — a
circumstance which secured to the journal immediate attention
and assisted the circulation. The Herald did not last very long ;
but during its continuance Mr. Carey managed to get into a con-
troversy with Colonel Eleazer Oswold, of the Independent Gaza-
teer, which led to a duel, in which Craey was wounded so severely
that he was confined to his house in consequence for sixteen
months. In the meanwhile he was in partnership with one Stew-
art, as Carey, Stewart & Co., printers, at 'No. 22 North Front
street. Upon his recovery he joined with several persons in the
establishment of the Columbian Magazine, an illustrated serial,
which in excellence was ahead of all the cis- Atlantic periodicals of
the day. But the expenses of this work were heavy, and the pro-
fits were to be shared among too many persons. This fact led
Carey to withdraw from the concern, and he established, upon his
own account, Carey's American Museum, a periodical which ac-
corded with the tastes of the public at that time, and which even
yet is of considerable value to historical students. The American
Museum was published for six years. At the end of that time, and
in the year 1793, Mr. Carey relinquished the publication, and
established himself at No. 118 Market street, as a " printer, book-
seller and stationer."

During the fever of 1793 Mr. Carey was a member of the Com-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 147

mittee on Health, and history is indebted to him for a clear and
interesting account of the appearance and progress of the epidemic
in that year.

Cobbett made Carey one of the subjects of his unsparing attacks,
and the latter fought the testy Englishman with gallantry. He
retorted upon him a satyrical effusion, " The Porcupined, a Hudi-
brastic Poem," the novelty of which was that the greater part of
the strong language which it contained was Cobbett's own, quoted
from his attacks upon others, and now turned upon himself. Carey
was the promoter of a plan for the establishment of a " Sunday
School Society in 1796, an institution of which Bishop White was
elected President He brought out, in 1802, a quarto edition of
the Bible, the type of which, as stereotyping had not yet be-
come common, was kept standing for a long time to supply the
demands for new editions. In 1801 Mr. Carey wrote several essays
upon the propriety of uniting the booksellers and printers of the
United States in measures necessary for the preservation of their
interests, and in imitation of the German book fairs. The first
meeting was held in the city of New York, and an association was
established, which was kept up four or five years, during which
time it exercised a very beneficial effect upon the trade. In 1803
Mr. Carey removed his shop and printing office, from No. 118
to 122 Market street, where he remained for ten years. In the
meanwhile his active pen and voice were busy in discussing and
suggesting measures of public benefit. He was one of the first
persons in the United States to call attention to the inequalities in
taxation, by which real estate was compelled to bear nearly the
whole burden, whilst personal property escaped contribution. In
the discussions which took place in the United States upon the
policy of rechartering the first Bank of the United States, Mr.
Carey bore an active part in writing pamphlets and communica-
tions for newspapers. He favored a recharter.

During the war with Great Britain, which commenced in 1812,
Mr. Carey was impressed with feelings that the warm partisan
discussion of the friends and enemies of the war were injurious to
the best interests of the country. He therefore projected his most
successful book, " The Olive Branch, or Faults on Both Sides." It
was a calm and impartial review of the follies and errors of both
parties, so clearly stated that conviction followed the appeal to the
common sense of his countrymen. This volume had an extraordi-
nary circulation. It passed through ten editions, and besides the

148 BIOGRAPHIES OF

Philadelphia editions, it was reprinted at Boston, Middlebury,
Yermont, and Winchester, Virginia. It was an important and
useful work. This was followed, in 1818, by " Vindicse Hibernicae,"
which was devoted to a vindication of the people of Ireland from
the slanders of English writers of what is called "history."

In 1819 Mr. Carey came out as a pamphleteer upon the question
of the protection of American industry. He took strong ground
in favor of the system, and wrote voluminously upon it. Between
1819 and 1833 he wrote and published no less than fifty-nine
diiferent pamphlets upon this subject, numbering in the aggregate
two thousand three hundred and twenty-two pages. His industry
was immense, and his influence wide-spread and respected. In 1832
he again came before his countrymen in opposition to the nullifi-
cation doctrine set up by the state of South Carolina. He was an
able opponent of the detestable theme of state rights, which of
late years have been used to inflame the minds of the people of
the South, and to bring the conspiracy of 1837 to a head in 1861.

Mr. Carey was indefatigable in his literary pursuits. He un-
doubtedly wrote more than any man of his day. He was con-
stantly at work at some political, economical or patriotic subject,
and he never allowed his faculties to rust in idleness.

In 1814 his shop and printing office were removed from 122
Market street to No. 121 Chestnut street, on the north side. In a
short time the store at No. 124, on the south side, was also occu-
pied by him. In 1818 he took his son, Henry C. Carey, into part-
nership with him, and No. 126, at the southeast corner of Fourth
and Chesnut, was added to No. 124. Shortly after this time Mr.
Carey retired from business, which devolved upon his two sons.
Henry C. Carey entered into partnership with Isaac Lea about the
year 1821. Carey & Lea afterwards confined their attention spe-
cially to the publication and circulation of their own publications.
Edward L. Carey, another son of Matthew Carey, succeeded to the
general bookselling business at the corner of Fourth and Chestnut
streets, and he took into partnership with him Abram Hart. Carey v
& Lea occupied the lower part of the building on Fourth street. E.
L. Carey and A. Hart did a large business as publishers and book-
sellers. The death of Mr. Carey left Mr. Hart sole proprietor of
the trade. He had been lucky and successful, and gave up the
establishment to Mr. Parry. The firm of Parry & McMillan was
not successful, and was, after a few years, dissolved, and thus

PHILADELPHIA MEKCHANTS. 149

ended the valuable bookselling business which Matthew Carey
nursed by his care and industry into a valuable trade.

Mr. Carey died September 16, 1839, in the eightieth year of his
age. His death was mourned as a public calamity. He was a
faithful citizen, and from his career is to be deduced the great
lesson that industry and integrity are the safeguards of fortune
and honor.

DAVID FEEED.

OF the crowd of hopeful lads who annually find their way from
their rural homes into the thronged and busy metropolis, how
many discover that they have entered upon a race in which the
chances of their ultimate defeat are as ten to one. If they happen
to be endowed with a courage not easily daunted, uncommon in-
telligence and facility in winning influential friends, they may suc-
ceed, even if they are without pecuniary capital. But the majority
soon become sick of the fierce rivalry and constant demand upon
their energies, and yearn for the quiet, steady pursuits of the
farm, where they are at least certain of food, clothing and shelter,
as the reward of physical and by no means anxious toil. We
never see one of these young adventurers in the streets of our
city without wondering what sort of fancies have lured him from
his home, and speculating upon the career that is before him. Per-
haps, at the old homestead, he has grown weary of the monoto-
nous and unexciting labor, though surrounded w^ith every comfort,
and has dreamed of becoming one of those great merchants whose
names are weighty in the mart, and who reside in princely man-
sions. But he knows nothing of the thorny paths these men have
struggled over, and the wear and tear of body arid brain they
have experienced upon the road to fortune. Nor has he heard of
the thousands who, in attempting to overcome the same difficul-
ties, have fallen by the way. Only a sad and bitter trial of the
reality of commercial life in a large city can teach these country
boys the fearful task that is before them, if they are resolved to
plunge into the strife. To all such we have some encouraging
examples to oifer, which may serve to cheer their hours of gloom

150 BIOGRAPHIES OF

and disappointment, by showing them what they may accomplish
by honest perseverance and judicious enterprise. One of these
examples shall be David Freed, the venerable flour merchant.

Mr. Freed was born in Montgomery county, Pennsylvania, in
the year 1792. He was bred to rural pursuits, but in 1808, when
he was only sixteen years of age, he determined to mingle in the
bustle and turmoil of city life, and seek his fortune in a business
career in Philadelphia. He had a hardy robust frame, industrious
habits, and considerable self-reliance. Obtaining a situation in a
grocery store, he was soon initiated into the toil and anxieties of
daily trade. Among those who were boys in humble employment
about this time, and who have since become prominent in the com-
mercial world, were Alexander J. Derbyshire, Henry Budd, James
Steel and Hugh Craig, of whom we have already given biographi-
cal sketches. These gentlemen remember the youth of Freed, and
take pleasure in recalling instances of his steady devotion to busi-
ness and manifest resolution to work his way upward to ease and
independence. In 1812, when there was much apprehension in
the public mind that the British forces would attempt the capture
of Philadelphia, Freed, who was filled with patriotic ardor, joined
the rifle corps, commanded by Captain Uhl, and went to camp
Dupont, where he performed tedious and wearisome duties
throughout the uneventful campaign. At this period the total
amount of funds at the command of the young volunteer, con-
sisted of a small sum in silver coin, which he accidently discovered
remaining in a pocket of some old clothes. After the excitement
of the war fever had cooled young Freed returned to business. It
is still mentioned by his intimate friends as a noteworthy instance
of the small beginnings of men of subsequent distinction, that
when Freed commenced, he bought a single barrel of flour, and
wheeled it home. Previous to this he formed a partnership in the
grocery business with Eichard Austin. They took up a lot on the
east side of Fourth street, below Vine, and built a store. Here
the firm prospered until Mr. Freed's partner became dissipated,
and this unfortunate circumstance caused a separation. Mr. Freed
left the store. Two years afterwards we find him engaged in the
flour business, at the corner of Third and Noble streets. Here he
remained until 1829, when he returned to the old store, and con-
tinued retail dealing in flour there until 1836, at which period he
was enabled to virtually withdraw from active participation in
business pursuits.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 151

Mr. Freed was personally active in the retail trade during the
protracted term of twenty-eight years. Such was his untiring de-
votion to the business, and his popularity, that his sales by retail
averaged for several years twenty-five thousand barrels per an-
num. He was a careful and an economical manager, with all his
enterprise. His profits were large, and they were so judiciously
invested that the aim of pecuniary independence, which he had
proposed to himself at the start, was attained while he was still
comparatively young. One feature in his business policy was ob-
served by all persons who had dealings withxhim : he always paid
promptly, according to his engagements, and never allowed him-
self to be dunned for a bill. By the early adoption of this course,
and a persistent adherence to it under all circumstances, Mr. Freed
never had a load of debt to carry or to vex his mind, and always
knew precisely \vhere he stood. But though the subject of this
sketch had realized a competency from personal activity in trade,
he did not give up his connection with mercantile aifairs. In 1838
Mr. Freed purchased the interest in an old established flour store,
in Market street near Thirteenth, for the exclusive benefit of his
son and sons-in-law, giving them his valuable services and means,
solely for their advancement. Shortly afterwards the wholesale
house of Freed, Ward & Freed was founded. In 1849, at the sug-
gestion of Mr. Freed, the son and sons-in-law bought a portion of
the estate of Paul Beck, on Market street above Eighth, and im-
proved the property. The partners in this concern are Mr. Samuel
L. Ward — recently Treasurer of the Corn Exchange Association —
Mr. Joseph M. Freed and Jacob Umstead — clever and estimable
gentlemen and energetic merchants, who are calculated to main-
tain and extend the reputation of the firm. Mr. Ward is quite as
popular as any other man engaged in the same line of trade, and
has been honored with many trusts of the highest responsibility.
Mr. Freed is entitled to great credit for the establishment of a house
which has been so successfully managed upon his own upright,
straight-forward and exact system of doing business, and having
implicit confidence in the upright and prudent management of the
latter gentleman, has allowed his name to appear in the firm to the
present day, without any pecuniary advantage to himself.

Mr. D. Freed is now seventy-three years of age. His declining
days are made pleasant and comfortable by the possession of a
competence, which enables him to live in good but not ostenta-
tious style, at No. 508 North Sixth street. His career has fulfilled

152 BIOGRAPHIES OF

every anticipation that may have been formed in his boyish days.
He began life as an humble toiler, and has never been too proud
for employment of any honest description. From the smallest
kind of a commencement he struggled on hopefully, manfully —
paying as he went — living within his income, and laboring early
and late, with one object kept steadily in view.

Mr. Freed has never taken any active part in political move-
ments, as far as we are informed — he has had no ambition in that
direction. He has always thought that for him, and others of his
habits and tastes, " the post of honor is a private station." He
possesses considerable practical knowledge of men and things, is
full of reminiscences of the old mercantile days of Philadelphia,
and is represented as a cordial, communicative companion. " Take
him for all in all," he is a fine example of what ordinary talents for
trade, honorably directed, can accomplish in the struggle for mer-
cantile success.

CHARLES OAKFORD.

THE story that the holy St. Clement, whilst performing a pious
pilgrimage, eased his weary feet by placing loose fur in his shoes;
that he discovered at the end of his journey that the hair had be-
come felted into a regular cloth by the motion, heat and perspira-
tion, and that from thence he deduced the inference that wool and
furs might be felted into bodies — from which invention arose the
art of making hats — was a legend of wide circulation among the
early felt mongers. Even in our own time the Hatters' Society
of Philadelphia bore upon its banner a painting of the pious St.
Clement, with appropriate insignia and emblems. But the good
St. Clement could "never have imagined the revolution which the
manufacturing of hats has experienced even within the memory of
many now living. The fur hat, the castor, the roram, the light
beaver, have disappeared. The dress hat is now a pasted article,
the most ornamental part of which is not produced by the beast,
but by the worm. The silk hat has totally exterminated the fur
hat for dress and fashionable wear. The cutting knife, the hurl,
the bow, the plank and kettle, and the coloring kettle, are ex-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 153

changed for the scissors, the pot of shellac, the iron and the brush.
Dress hats are glued, not made ; and were it not that the popular
mind inclines to the soft Kossuth and slouch hat for business and
pleasure wear, the art of hating, as it existed when Charles Oak-
ford commenced business for himself, would be totally lost.

The capital with which this young hatter set up as a " boss," on
the twenty-seventh of September, 1827, was merely six years and
ten months experience, gained during his apprenticeship, and five
dollars and thirty-seven and a-half cents in cash. When it was
known among his acquaintances that the young hatter was thus
about to try his luck in trade, there were fortunately a few friends
who were ready to give him orders. On the first day that he set
up for himself he received orders for four hats, at four dollars each.
They were to be made with wool bodies, napped with muskrat
and coney fur. He purchased for his first manufacture six musk-
rat skins, at thirty-seven and a-half cents each, four Saxony wool
bodies, at fifty cents each, and a quarter of an ounce of coney fur,
for seventy-five cents. Thus five dollars of his small capital was
already employed. With the balance he bought an apron, knife and
whetstone. Having thus invested all he had in the world upon
the faith of the sixteen dollars which he was to receive for his
work, he made a contract with John Gillingham, who carried on
business in Front below Spruce street, to stiffen the bodies, for one
dollar and ten cents each — making his investment in material and
credit nine dollars and seventy-seven and a-half cents. ]V[r. John
Land, in Second below Lombard street, offered to the young work-
man permission to use his shop in making up the hats. Oakford
cut the fur from the skins with his crescent shaped knife, bowed
it into a smooth felt, applied it to the bodies, and having secured
the coloring and trimmings, took the finished hats home on the
next Saturday night, receiving his sixteen dollars as the reward of
his industry. After paying Mr. (rillingham four dollars and forty
cents, and two dollars -end fifty cents for his board, he had a ba-
lance of nine dollars and ten cents with which to commence busi-
ness in his second week as a " boss." Fortune was more favor-
able to him than at first. He received orders for four hats at four
dollars each and two hats at six dollars each, being the immense
sum of twenty-eight dollars. He still had two ounces of muskrat
fur, so that his expenditure for material was assisted byj^is eco-
nomy. He applied himself diligently, and in due time had his
hats finished, at a cost of six dollars and sixty cents. He was en-

154 BIOGRAPHIES OF

abled again to pay his board, and had eighteen dollars and ninety
cents left as clear capital.

This was the commencement of Charles Oakford's fortune, and
as he was ambitious, faithful and not above his business, orders
flocked in upon him, until it was impossible for him to make up,
with his own hands, all the work that was offered him. It was
necessary that he should have a workshop. The kindness of Mr.
Land had been very great to him, but it was too much to desire a
continuance of it, if it were possible for Oakford to relieve him.
He, therefore, found his best friend where every honest and affec-
tionate young man is sure to find it — in his mother. The old lady
consented to give up her kitchen to be used as a hatter shop.
Charles obtained a kettle and tools from his kind friend, Mr. Gil-
lingham, and, with one workman, engaged in business more ar-
dently than ever. But while he had his "plank shop," it was
equally necessary that he should have a place for preparing his
furs. He shortly afterwards hired a room at No. 35 Lombard
street, whe're he put up his hurls and finishing benches, and was
prepared to continue his business in all branches save one. This
was the coloring — a peculiar, somewhat scientific and dirty part
of the business. But there was no difficulty about this. David
Jones, who for twenty-five or thirty years had been in business as
a hatter, at the corner of Second street and the first alley above
Race street, had an extensive shop, and devoted more attention to
the coloring business than any other hatter of his time. He took
in coloring work from the city hatters generally, and young Oak-
ford had no difficulty in arranging with him for the coloring of the
rough bodies.

Shortly afterwards he arrived at the dignity of what the hatters
in those days called " a front shop." A shoemaker, who had occu-
pied a little one story building, twelve feet front and eight feet
deep, at No. 87 Lombard street, vacated the premises, and in this
little " cubby hole" the future occupant of palatial stores, to be
fitted up at the expense of thousands of dollars, opened his first
shop. It was on the fifteenth of November, 1827, that the import-
ant sign — "CHARLES OAKFORD, HATTER" — was raised -over this
humble establishment, so that in six weeks the young manufac-
turer had prospered greatly, and witnessed many changes in his
career. .»

Oakford was energetic and worthy. Such a thing as pride was
foreign to his nature. He established for himself certain rules, by

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 155

which he determined to conduct himself through life. One was
never to be too big in self-importance to labor himself. Another
was, to be strictly honest and faithful to his customers, and de-
serve, by the excellence of his goods, new patronage when the hats
which he had made were worn out. He was not too proud to
make, or finish, or to do anything necessary in the performance of
his business. Hence, when it was necessary to convey a load of
hats to David Jones, to be colored, he blocked them himself, secured
the brims by stout cords, and then loading his wheelbarrow with
the material, wheeled them to the coloring shop. By doing this
he secured the delicate nap from being chafed and rubbed — disas-
ters to which they were often subjected in the hands of careless
porters or boys.

At No. 37 Lombard street Charles Oakford continued until Au-
gust, 1828, when he removed to No. 30, on the opposite side of the
street, in a larger and more secure place, where, upon taking an
account of stock, he found himself worth $560, and entirely free
from debt. He rented a factory and went into business more ex-
tensively. No. 30 Lombard street was perhaps as unpromising a
location for a retail hatter as could have been selected. The street
was dull, it was scarcely a thoroughfare, as it extended only to
Front street. It was not opened to the wharf until several years
after Oakford left it. Yet Oakford did, apparently, a thriving
business there. He increased the number of his journeymen, and
took two apprentices. When asked the secret of his success, he re-
plied, " by making good hats, being attentive to my customers, and
taking care not to forget the advice of the shoemaker from whom
I rented my shop, who said, 'Charley, never hold a penny so close
to your eyes as to lobe sight of a dollar.'" These rules he carried
out on an occasion, perhaps trivial in itself, but which evidenced
the character of the man. A journeyman brought him one day
a finished hat, which was slightly blemished; Mr. Oakford ob-
served the defect. "Pooh," said the other, "not one man in a
thousand would notice it." "Well, said Oakford, "let us have a
hat for that one man, it may bring a thousand customers, which
the little blemish, if detected, would certainly keep away."

After two years of industry, Mr. Oakford considered himself
sufficiently well established to take unto him a partner — one of
those fair and good creatures who make a man's home happy, and
incite him to prudence and industry. He was married on the second
of June, 1829, in a quiet, humble way, but he was able to stock his

156 BIOGRAPHIES OF

house plainly, but comfortably, with furniture suitable to his situ-
ation. He was free from debt, had a good custom business, and a
name in trade constantly improving and extending. In the spring
of 1830 he was surprised, and we need scarcely say delighted, by
the reception of an order for $10,000 worth of hats from John Dar-
rieux and Lewis Clapier, the one a next door neighbor, the other a
merchant of the neighborhood, both of whom had watched the
prudent and thrifty course of this young man, and formed a favor-
able estimate of his honesty and industry. These gentlemen had,
by their commercial knowledge, discovered that there was an open-
ing for a large exportation of hats to Mexico, and they took ad-
vantage of it. Oakford had, on the very day when Darrieux had
apprised him of his intention to give him the order, accidentally
invited him to walk in his shop and have his hat ironed. This little
compliment settled the matter in the mind of his neighbor, who,
while his hat was being ironed off, spoke of an order for one thou-
sand hats. Clapier subsequently came into the contract with him.
But these gentlemen were sensible that Oakford had not the credit
to command the quantity of materials necessary to complete so
large an order. They, therefore, proved to him the advantage of his
previous well won character, by offering to go security for all his
purchases ; and furthermore, to advance him the money necessary
to pay his hands ; and this, without security from him of any kind
but his own character. Oakford had six weeks to complete the
contract. He put all his energies to work, and had it completed two
days before the time, received his money, paid his bills, and on the
last day of the contract took his dinner, with the certainty that all
his debts had been paid, that he owed no man a dollar on account
of the Darrieux and Clapier contract, and that he had the profits
of his industry in his pocket. This happy adventure seemed to be a
new lease upon Oakford's good fortune. He devoted himself faith-
fully to business, and although in as obscure a location as No. 80
Lombard street, by sharp attention to the improvements in his
business elsewhere, he managed to make himself an oracle as to
the novelties of the trade and a leader of fashion.

In 1833 he commenced making brush hats, of fine Eussia fur,
with all the nap brushed out of the body. These hats were light,
peculiar in appearance, and calculated to strike the sensibilities of
fashionable people. Oakford sold the first one to Frank Peters,
who was at that time a young man looked upon as a leader. The
brush hat became speedily " the ton/' and Oakford reaped the ad-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 157

vantage thereof in numerous orders. Black beaver bonnets for
ladies were also an important manufacture with him at this time.

In the spring of 1835 Oakford removed from No. 30 Lombard
street to No. 210 South Second street, opposite the new market.
In March, 1839, he rented the store No. 78 South Third street,
more in the centre of fashion, and kept up both establishments
until 1840, when he relinquished the Second street store. In Sep-
tember, 1843, he removed to No. 104 Chestnut street, an old stand,
which had been occupied since 1829 by A. Russel. In 1847, Oakford
being stimulated by the effort of Beebe & Costar, of New York, to
establish the fashionable hat store of Philadelphia, determined that
native mechanics should not be outdone. Three thousand dollars
were expended in fitting up his store in a splendor of style hitherto
unattempted in the hatting business, and which was in remarkable
contrast to the first Oakford store of 1827, at No. 35 Lombard
street. His daring was well repaid, He took at once the cream
of fashionable custom. " The Oakford hat" was a sine qua non at
the West End, and after he opened his new store his business
increased, in four months, fifteen thousand dollars over all pre-
vious figures.

In 1850 he went into the wholesale business, and soon sent his
hats over the whole country. But the tide of business was going
farther West; and when, after the burning of Barnum's Museum,
Joshua Francis Fisher determined to erect upon the old Clymer
and Harrison property the handsomest buildings of a business
character, up to that time, built in Philadelphia, Charles Oakford,
ever alive to improvement, contracted for one of them. He opened
on this site the most elegant hat store ever seen in Philadelphia, on
the eighth of June, 1353. At this place he remained until the con-
tracts for the erection of the Continental Hotel, at Ninth and
Chestnut streets, rendered it evident to his enterprising mind that
he would be compelled to seek a location there. He opened two
stores there, and it was obvious that hotel business was likely to
be different from a strict hat business, he added to his stock such
articles as were likely to be called for by the temporary sojourn-
ers of the Continental, who would most probably be his best cus-
tomers.

His career of usefulness was cut short, however, in November,
1862, by death. He left to his sons a good name and a good busi-
ness. They have shown their reverence for the first by keeping
up the name of Charles Oakford as the principal one in the firm;

158 BIOGRAPHIES OF

and as for the business, having had the advantage of the example
of an honest, enterprising, industrious parent, to teach them, how
to walk through life, they will not forget the honorable lessons
which they have learned from Charles Oakford.

Most men have two characters : one which distinguishes them
in business, and another, sometimes widely different, which they
have socially. We have in this sketch confined ourselves solely to
Mr. Oakford's business character. He had a social reputation
most popular and nattering. He was a genial, pleasant, witty
man; accomplished and versatile, the life of a circle of friends,
admired by all, and a hearty good fellow. But even in his plea-
sures, the prudence which distinguished him in business restrained
him. He was never carried away by those who surrounded him
into excess, and he avoided the rocks upon which too many men,
fitted to adorn society, have struck.

DENNIS KELLY.

Or the thousands of emigrants who, from various causes, annu-
ally seek a home upon our shores, there are few, comparatively, of
the whole number, who ever attain to any distinction. The prin-
cipal cause of this is the propensity which most of them have to
settle in, and do but little more than loiter about, large cities — the
laboring man, like Micawber, vainly hoping that among so many
people something will tnrn up whereby he may be benefited.
Many of those who come with a little capital, trust by embarking
in business to succeed, but find out, when too late, that they are
dealing with a people of whose practices and manners they have but
little knowledge. Their first efforts failing, they settle down into
an apathy at once startling and pitiable — startling, that men re-
main idle in a country where untilled fields and ungathered har-
vests suffer for the want of helping hands; pitiable, because of the
contentment with which they endure, or rather enjoy, hardships,
which oftentimes amount to squalid misery, and which indicate
that they have reached the goal of their ambition. This lack of
an independent spirit and want of energy is one of the great rea-
sons why the lists of crime are annually so fearfully swelled ; yet

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 159

the fault, in most instances, is hardly chargeable to the man — the
difficulty lays in childhood's culture — for the spirit inculcated in
early youth inevitably follows one through life. Happily, this pic-
ture has its relief. The proud and honorable position acquired by
the few seems to atone for the fault of the many, and causes even
the misanthrope to look with a more lenient eye upon the short-
comings of the other, and no one has contributed in a larger de-
gree to the accomplishment of this than the subject of our sketch.

Dennis Kelly was born in the county Donegal, Ireland, in the
year 1779. At an early age death deprived him of his father; thus
the mental culture and care of the boy devolved upon his mother,
a woman in every way fitted to the charge. In his childhood days
it was her care to instill into his mind the germs of those great
truths and maxims which have become fully developed in the
grown man. At a proper age she placed him in a linen manufac-
tory, to learn the art of that peculiar trade, the county of Donegal
being celebrated for the extent and fineness of its linen manufac-
tures. After attaining his majority he married, and to support
himself and wife worked at his trade. About this time the hand
of death took from him his mother, who died breathing blessings
upon a son who wTas always dutiful to her, and praying that He,
before whom she was shortly to appear, would protect and guide
her boy through the trials and vicissitudes of life.

In April, 1806, he left his native land and took passage for this
country, arriving in Philadelphia on the eighteenth of the follow-
ing June. It was his intention to go at once to the West — at least
not to make his home this side of Pittsburg. In those days the
two great cities of Pennsylvania were not bound together by the
iron band which now unites them, and a journey to this point by
the cumbersome Conestoga wagons, with their sturdy teams of
horses, the remembrance of which is still vivid in the minds of our
oldest citizens, was considered a momentous if not a perilous un-
dertaking. It was mere chance that caused Mr. Kelly to alter his
plans and cast his lot among us. The wagon in wrhich he, with
his wife and child, had taken passage, had gone but a few miles
from the city, when Mrs. Kelly alighted and positively refused to
go any further, upon account of the profanity of one of the men
who was a passenger with them. All the promises of the driver
to keep the man quiet, coupled with the expostulations of the
remaining passengers, failed to induce her to alter her decision.
This profanity, whilst positively disgusting to the lady, was no

160 BIOGKAPHIES OF

less unpleasing to her husband, who willingly acquiesced in her
wishes, and the pair, with the infant in the mother's arms, retraced
their steps. Night soon coming on, they were compelled to halt,
and early next morning Mr. Kelly procured a place for his wife
and succeeded in obtaining work on a milldam which was then in
course of construction, and situated near where he now lives.

The loss of the price of his passage to the West was one he could
ill afford, and presenting himself to the agent of the transportation
company he stated the case to him, and demanded the restoration
of his money. His request, however, was at first denied; but after
some argument, in which Mr. Kelly convinced the manager that
he could not spare so much money from his slender means, a com-
promise was effected, by which he received back one-half the
amount paid. Going back, he rented an old house in Haverford
township, which is still standing, and moved to it his family, with
what few effects he had brought from the old country, and then
industriously going to work, resolved for the time being to abide
his fate. This job completed, he was not slow in procuring an-
other • and thus for the next two years he honorably supported
his family by the sweat of his brow. It is too often the case with
day laborers that, when the day's work is over, they give them-
selves up to idleness, and care not for to-morrow ; but not so with
Dennis Kelly. He knew he had a great task before him • he ap-
preciated fully that he was in a strange country, and that he was
surrounded by people different in customs, in habits and avoca-
tions from those he had left. To study their character, to make
himself conversant with their ways, now became the employment
of his leisure moments. How he succeeded in this, after events
will fully demonstrate. But here, let us state, as a remarkable
fact — and one which we verily believe no other man can point to —
that every spot which Dennis Kelly ever labored upon, after his
arrival in this country, he now owns.

In 1808 there was a large demand in this country for the article
known as bagging. Mr. Kelly having, by strict economy, saved a
small sum, and by his knowledge of the manufacture of linen, felt
himself competent to produce the article wanted. Beginning in a
small way, his efforts were crowned with success; and the demand
not only continuing, but increasing, he resolved to increase his
facilities for its manufacture, but only to increase his business as
his means accumulated, and always to keep within them. This
resolution he steadily adhered to, and this, in a great measure.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 161

accounts for his success. During all the financial troubles with
which the country has been convulsed from that day to this, Mr.
Kelly was never in the least involved ; so far from it, that he was
always ready, and universally did, step forward to relieve his more
unfortunate neighbors. In the manufacture of bagging Mr. Kelly
was successful and with the capital thus accumulated he was en-*
abled, upon the breaking out of the war of 1812, to materially
assist the government, in manufacturing the much wanted and
scantily produced goods for the clothing of the army. In this
branch so faithfully and honestly did he perform his contracts, that
his goods were in constant demand, and of the whole lot furnished
by him, not one piece was ever rejected.

The war over, Mr. Kelly found his increase of capital far beyond
his most sanguine expectations. But the wealth thus so quickly
acquired, had not the effect upon him which it too often has upon
others. He was not in the least elated, but to his friends he was
the same Dennis Kelly still. Wealth gave to him one privilege,
that of gratifying an elegant taste. He was always an ardent
admirer of nature, and delighted in seeing nature's objects as near
perfection as possible, and to make an improvement in this direc-
tion he now turned his attention. The horses in this section of
the country were all of the heavy, ungainly appearance common
at that day, and unfitted for anything but heavy draught. To
improve the breed, and produce a horse equal to any of the famed
animals of the old world, Mr. Kelly now set himself diligently to
work, believing as he did, that the climate, the pasturage, and the
common wants of society would warrant it. As an inaugurative
step he imported the celebrated thorough-bred stallion « Daniel
O'Connell," a horse noted alike for his beauty and high breeding.
The great demand for the services of this fine animal proved con-
clusively that his owner had not been mistaken in his calculations.
He was afterwards sold, at an unusually high figure, to a British
officer then stationed in Canada.

This importation was followed by that of the no less renowned
horse " Langford," a successful prize winner upon the English turf,
and also by a number of high pedigreed brood mares. From the
time Mr. Kelly took the first step to make these improvements,
the value of the unwieldy horses began to depreciate, and they
soon became out of date, while, in -their stead sprung up a race of
horses light built, strong and enduring; horses with which the
farmer or teamster could do his days work, and on Sunday hitch
21

162 BIOGRAPHIES OF

them to the carriage and spin off to church at eight miles an hour
with ease.

The business of raising horses was in those days an honorable
profession, but beginning to fall into the hands of sharpers, and
men akin to the modern jockies, Mr. Kelly relinquished a pursuit
which, until then, was almost wholly confined to gentlemen of
wealth and high personal character, of whom rare representatives
may be found at the present day, prominent among them may be
mentioned Mr. A. Maillaird, of New Jersey, and Mr. R. Atcheson
Alexander, of Kentucky.

Not willing to give up wholly the breeding of cattle, by which
the country of his adoption was so largely benefited, Mr. Kelly
now turned his attention to beef cattle. Into this he entered with
his usual spirit, and it was not long before he was surrounded by
a herd of " short horns" that invariably carried of the first pre-
mium wherever exhibited. Many of our readers doubtless recol-
lect the splendid bull of his importation, "Lord Barrington" (with
his pedigree to the eighth generation), which has on several occa-
sions been exhibited and admired at the Agricultural Fair at Powel-
ton. Amongst his present herd may be found not only the descend-
ants of this fine animal, but also many others of the finest blood in
the country.

To gratify his tastes in this respect Mr. Kelly did not neglect
his business as a manufacturer, but continued his mills even at sea-
sons when producing cotton goods was far from being remunera-
tive. He always was a man noted for his benevolence, and to stop
in the dull season would deprive his operatives of work, and con-
sequently entail distress upon them; this his kind heart could not
endure; but at all times, let prices be high or low, he kept his mills
running and his operatives employed. With a sagacity that would
do credit to men deeply versed in the increase of the value of land,
Mr. Kelly, rather than build up a gigantic business, which, to the
best of calculators, oftentimes results in total ruin, preferred to
invest his accruing wealth in real estate in his own neighborhood,
which he felt assured would in a short time become of immense
value. As his profits acumulated he bought land adjacent to him,
until at present he owns in one tract upwards of eight hundred acres,
and that, too, situated at from four to seven miles from Market
street bridge, upon which no less than six cotton and woolen mills
are erected, all now in the full tide of operation, and generally con-
ducted by men whom his generosity has set afloat.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 163

To the deserving Mr. Kelly has ever been a substantial friend,
his liberality having established several young men in different
branches of business, in Market street and other localities in this
city, most of whom are now eminently successful. In all his
dealings with his fellow-man he would never accept more than six
per cent, for the use of his money, and the sums given as free gifts
to those he wished to assist are almost incredible. There are sec-
tions of country in the West thickly populated by the recipients
of his bounty, and there the name of Dennis Kelly is a sure pass-
port to hospitality. It was always his delight to hunt up deserving
men from his own country, and to counsel them as to the best
means for their advancement, which, in his opinion, was to go
West, settle, and grow up with the country. Those who had not
the means' to carry them there, he not only supplied with for tra-
veling expenses, but also enough to start them in life after reach-
ing their destination. Truly, to the needy and deserving he has
always been a substantial friend, and there are hundreds at this
day who mention the name of Dennis Kelly only to bless him, and
to point him to their children and friends as a specimen of God's
noblest work — an " honest man."

Mr. Kelly now sits, in the evening of life, surrounded by a large
family of children, grand children and great-grand children ; and
as the shades of night thicken around him the gloom is dispelled
by the consciousness of a well-spent life, while the pangs of ap-
proaching dissolution are mitigated by the knowledge that he has
strictly complied with the divine decree, " Do unto others as you
would be done by." And soothing to him, indeed, must be the re-
flection that the dying mother's prayer has ascended to the throne
of Grace, that it has followed him through life, and will be attend-
ant upon him at his death.

ALEXANDER YOUNG.

AMERICA owes to Ireland a large proportion of her physical and
a very considerable part of her-^mental wealth. This is a fact
which is tacitly acknowledged by every thinking mind, though
prejudice may prevent its being boldly asserted as it ought.

164 BIOGKAPHIES OF

Though we receive from the shores of the green isle thousands of
men who are more useful for their muscle than for their intellec-
tual quality; and though, like all other foreign nations, Ireland
has sent us many non producers among her emigrants, yet still the
truth remains, that the genius, energy and sturdy independence of
Irishmen has added to the wealth of our republic. Poets, orators,
scholars, merchants, manufacturers and capitalists of Irish descent
are found in every city in the Union ; and in their genial sympa-
thies for humanity, their love of progress and equality, the nation
has found one of its strongest bulwarks. The proverbial warmth
of Irish hearts is no less characteristic than Irish shrewdness and
tact ; and while in our almshouses we can find a due representa-
tion of the Celtic race, yet you will also find them high on the
ladder of fortune, and prominent in all enterprises that help to roll
the car of commerce and civilization along, and which assist in the
great march of humanity as it moves on its ameliorating and tri-
umphant progress. We can, therefore, give a cheer for Ireland,
before proceeding to sketch the career of a son of Erin who has
won " credit and renown" in the city of Brotherly Love.

Alexander Young, the subject of this sketch, is one of the many
emigrants who prove how nobly America fosters her adopted sons,
and encourages industry and enterprise. He can proudly claim
the honorable title, a self-made man — one who, from the humblest
fortune, has raised himself to wealth and position in the commer-
cial community.

He was born in Donegal county, on the twenty-sixth of August,
1798, and landed in this country on the fifteenth of July, 1821,
quite a youth, but one full of that energy and perseverance that
will carve a way to fortune over any stumbling block. Having
some knowledge of the malt distillery business, and desirous of
learning the art of extracting whiskey from raw grain, he went
into J. W. Dower's distillery, on the Schuylkill, between Race and
Yine streets. He gave for this instruction fifty dollars in cash,
and his services for many months. Having keen observation,
with strong purpose, our young emigrant soon obtained a thorough
knowledge of the details of the business, and determined to try his
own fortune as a distiller. After working in a subordinate position
for one year, he had saved money sufficient to purchase a small
still, and commenced business for himself.

After keeping up his still for a year, Mr. Young went into part-
nership with John Maitland, and for two years they carried on

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 165

together the business, producing a very pure and excellent kind of
" malt whiskey," which to this day retains its then worthy celeb-
rity. From molasses they also at one time distilled New England
rum. They were the first firm that discovered the process by
which an immense increase of spirit was obtained from the grain,
having produced fourteen quarts of pure whiskey from fifty-six
pounds of grain.

In 1825 there stood at the corner of Fourth and South streets a
large building used as a " theatre ;" but as the tide of population
swept away towards the western and northern part of the city,
it was closed for its original use and rented to Pat. Lyons, another
distinguished Irishman, who used it for a hay press. In the fall
of 1825 John Maitland took this building, and at a cost of twenty
thousand dollars fitted it up for a distillery, and then, with Young
as foreman, started on a larger scale .than their former business.
For twelve years they continued in this way, making important
discoveries and improvements in the business, and founding, as it
afterwards proved, one of the largest and richest establishments of
our city.

In 1837 John Maitland's son, William J. Maitland, went into
partnership with Mr. Young, and these two continued the business
together until the death of Maitland, in 1847. Although success-
ful, the business had not paid enough to make the deceased part-
ner a man of wealth.

Upon the death of his partner Mr. Young bought out the estab-
lishment for twenty thousand dollars — the sum which John Mait-
land had first expended upon it. Ten years later the first partner
also died, but he had not at that time any connection with Mr.
Young. As soon as the establishment came entirely under the
control of Mr. Young, he at once commenced to enlarge and im-
prove it, spending in a few years over sixty thousand dollars on
the building and machinery, and adding every improvement and
extension that could add to the value of the establishment or the
facilities for the business.

In the meantime the old distillery of J. W. Dower was changing
hands. In 1828 the first owner died, and it was then purchased
by John & Archibald Smith, and later by Samuel Smith, who sold
it to Freeman & Co., from whose hands it passed into those of Z.
Locke, its present occupant.

Mr. Young is, perhaps, the only distiller who can truly claim
that he makes his whiskey from pure, sound grain. He purchases

166

BIOGRAPHIES OF

only the best rye, barley, corn and wheat — purchases and sells
only for cash — and distills with hops and pure water. So careful
is he ahout the latter article, that he has had an artesian well dug
upon his premises, which throws up seventy gallons a minute of
the purest water for distilling purposes.

On the eighth of October, 1822, Mr. Young married; and on the
loss of his first wife was again married, June 8, 1830. His present
family consists of five sons and two daughters, and he has lost one
son and one daughter. He resided at the time of his first mar-
riage within a square of his distillery, but in 1840 he removed from
there to his present residence, No. 702 Passyunk road.

His present business is on the largest scale, as he annually turns
out three hundred and eighty thousand gallons of pure liquor. On
the first of September, 1862, he had on hand five thousand barrels
of whiskey, valued at two hundred thousand dollars at least ; and
as this is about his average stock, and the article has since ad-
vanced more than one hundred per cent., the calculating mind will
readily find out the value of his stock. Much of this liquor is kept
for many years, but while it gains immensely in quality by time,
the loss from evaporation is very heavy. An experiment was
made by the late Eobert Newlin, who nailed up a sixteen gallon
cask. At the end of nine years, upon his son's majority, the cask
was opened ; only eight gallons of liquor was left, but the quality
was remarkably fine.

Mr. Young is a man so indifferent in his dress, and so unassum-
ing in his appearance, that but few, on a casual acquaintance,
would believe him the founder of the large fortune he now pos-
sesses. His own energy and industry have carried him forward,
in the country of his adoption, to wealth and position, and his
honesty has made his staple celebrated as much for its purity as
excellence in other respects.

The reader must not think that in sketching the career of Mr.
Young, we are noticing an isolated case of this character. There
are very many natives of Ireland who have begun at the wheel-
barrow, and by perseverance, tact and shrewdness, have worked
their way to positions of eminence and influence. We can at pre-
sent recall, among cases of a somewhat similar character, the
names of the following Philadelphians who have made their mark
in the business world by their own force of character : James Mc-
Henry, Robert Steen, Hugh Craig, Dennis Kelly, Andrew C. Craig,
Samuel Kiddle, William Divine and John Macrae. If the varying

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 167

fortunes of men like these could be told with the plain simplicity
of truth, the reader would be amazed to see how much can be ac-
complished by pure intellect, accompanied by a stout heart, even
if the adventitious influences by which other men rise are absent.
There are lessons of honesty, encouragement and hope for the
aspiring in such lives, which would do immense good in commer-
cial, and, in fact, in all other circles where real merit is recognized,
and where the value of a man consists in the intrinsic worth of his
character, irrespective of the outward marks of station.

JOHN WELSH.

WHEN John Welsh, a lad of sixteen years of age, left his youth-
ful home in Newcastle county, Delaware, and came to the great
city to enter upon an apprenticeship to a merchant, he stepped upon
the threshold of trade in her new mansion. The exhausting con-
test of the Eevolution, some of the incidents of which young Welsh
must have remembered, had prostrated commerce and annihilated
credit. The successful management of business had passed in a
degree from the hands of the merchants who had conducted it
previous to 1775 — new men had taken the helm, and new interests
were springing into competition. The old colonial government
had passed away. The confederacy was a bond which tied the
the new states together, but did not unite them. Different rules
and laws prevailed at different points upon the Atlantic seaboard,
and foreign commerce was managed from Charleston to Boston by
varied regulations and laws. Under circumstances like these, John
Welsh, the country boy, entered upon his strange duties in the
year 1786, in the counting-house of Joseph Russel, an eminent flour
merchant, at the corner of Penn and Pine streets. Russel did a
large and profitable shipping business, and the house was a most
excellent one in mercantile character and standing. Here the
young clerk obtained his first insight into the science of trade, and
here he acquired his first lessons in those principles of mercantile
honor which rendered his life useful to his fellow citizens, and a
proud memory to his family.

In Mr. Russel's employment Welsh served faithfully, and after

168 BIOGRAPHIES OF

his indenture had expired he finished his education in the manner
usual in those days, by a voyage as supercargo, which he made to
Port au Prince. Eeturning to the United States, Mr. Welsh, an
active young man of twenty-three years of age, entered, in the
year 1793, the counting-house of Eobert Ealston, at No. 90 South
Front street. Here he took his final degree in mercantile profi-
ciency. Clerks, in those days, were not like some of the present
fast race of billiard-playing, whisky-drinking, horse-hiring, catfish-
suppering upstarts who adorn our mercantile houses. They were
modest, unobtrusive, honest young men, who were not above their
business. Mr. Welsh frequently told the anecdote of his having
been sent, with a quill behind his ear, from the counting-house to
Mr. Ralston's farm, near where Spring Garden now intersects
Tenth street, to drive home the cows ! Think of that, young gentle-
men who smoke cigars and indulge in profanity in the halls of the
" Continental." Such was mercantile clerkship in the good old
times.

In the year 1794 Mr. Welsh undertook to launch out in business
on his own account, and established himself at No. 91 South Water
street, near the drawbridge. Here success attended him. His ven-
tures increased, his credit became established, and he was in good
time a thriving merchant. His operations extended so much, that
in three years he was compelled to seek a more suitable location
for the shipping business, having a wharf front. He removed to
the store No. 22 South Wharves, which extended through to South
Water street, and then was numbered forty-seven. It may show
how simple were the household tastes of those days when we
relate that at this time Mr. Welsh lived in a modest brick house,
at No. 31 Union street. Brown stone mansions and extravagance
were not the follies of the business men of Philadelphia of the
year 1797.

Whilst thus gradually rendering himself opulent, Mr. Welsh did
not neglect his duties as a citizen. He was one of the projectors
of the Philadelphia Bank. That institution was a voluntary asso-
tion of subscribers, who undertook to carry on banking business
as a partnership, and without a charter. The application to the
Legislature for a charter was violently opposed by the Bank of
Pennsylvania, the directors of which institution thought that the
financial field was sufficiently occupied by the United States Bank,
Bank of North America and itself. The Bank of Pennsylvania offer-
ed the Legislature two hundred thousand dollars if it would refuse

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 169

the charter to the new rival. On the other hand, the Philadelphia
Bank made various propositions beneficial to the state if it would
grant the coveted authority. The Legislature of 1802 yielded to
the influence of the old banks. The controversy was settled in
1804 by the passage of an act chartering the subscribers to the
Philadelphia Bank, on the payment of one hundred and thirty-
five thousand dollars in cash, and upon their undertaking to loan
the state one hundred thousand dollars in cash whenever required,
at five per cent, interest, for ten years. The Commonwealth was
also to be allowed the privilege of subscribing to a large number
of shares of the stock of the Philadelphia Bank at par. In this
bank Mr. Welsh was elected a director, a position which he held
until his death. The bank was opened at No. 104 Chestnut street,
between Third and Fourth, with George Clymer as President.
About the same time Mr. Welsh associated with Thomas Fitz-
simons, Stephen Dutihl, Bohl Bolen, Samuel Meeker, Griffith Evans,
and others, in establishing a new Insurance Company — the Dela-
ware Insurance Company of Philadelphia. Of this institution
Thomas Fitzsimons was President. He had long held a position
in Philadelphia of influence and respectability, having been for
many years a member of Congress, an office in those days of high
honor, integrity and responsibility. In this company Mr. Welsh
was elected a member of the first Board of Directors.

By industry, prudence and integrity, Mr. Welsh soon succeeded
in establishing himself a name. His aifairs were so prosperous,
that in the year 1806 he was able to retire from business. Substan-
tially he did withdraw, although he kept his counting-house at 22
South Wharves, and was interested in commercial questions.
American commerce was very much restricted by the contending
European powers, which were engaged in a gigantic struggle for
the mastery. Decrees and orders in council, confiscation and
seizures by the belligerents discouraged trade, and rendered the
business of the American shipper extra hazardous. To these un-
favorable influences the home policy of the United States Govern-
ment added further discouragements, by frequent embargoes and
measures which unsettled confidence. Mr. Welsh could afford to
lay idly by during this season of depression. His counting-house
received him during a portion of every day, but the greater part
of his time was spent more agreeably at his residence, No. 42
South Sixth street, and at a later period at 146 Chestnut street.

After the war of 1812 had settled the relative positions of the

170 BIOGRAPHIES OP

•»

United States and England, and the fall of Napoleon gave peace
to Europe, Mr. Welsh was ready to plunge deeply into business
again. He was once more a large and widely respected shipping
merchant. His vessels were well found and well manned, and his
name was known and respected in many parts of the globe.
During successive years Mr. Welsh prosecuted successfully his
mercantile career. He was the soul of honor — and as a man he
was a sincere Christian and a generous philanthropist. His hand
and his purse were ever ready in assisting the needy, and by many
who yet live he is remembered for his generous deeds.

Mr. Welsh, in the latter part of his life, gave up much of his
business to his sons, but he kept up an interest in mercantile
affairs until within a short time of his death. When the last hold
upon business was relaxed, he said sadly to his aged wife, "now I
have no ship." She replied, "and shortly you will have no wife."
To which, in melancholy comment, he answered, " then soon I
shall have no self." These words were prophetic. Within two
weeks after the death of Mrs, Welsh her husband joined her in the
unknown world beyond the grave; He died on the fifth of March,
1854, at the age of eighty -four years. /

Mrs. Welsh was a Miss Maris, a sister of Eichard and William
Maris. One of these gentlemen was a member of the firm of Maris,
Evans & Welsh, afterwards Maris & Evans, which house finally
was merged in that of Joseph B. Evans & Co. The other brother
was a member of the firm of Maris & Thompson. Mrs. Welsh was
an exemplary woman — gentle, affectionate and benevolent; a kind
mother and devoted wife. She was a communicant and a member
of the Baptist Church, in which, for about a quarter of a century,
she sat under the ministrations of Dr. William Staughton, Dr.
Holcombe, and others. One of her daughters married Dr. William
E. Horner, another David Lapsley, and a third Joseph H. Dulles.

The sons of John Welsh were brought up under his charge in a
manner which insured them future usefulness and business qualifi-
cations. Gradually he relinquished to them interests in the busi-
ness, thus insuring to them a correct guidance and a finished mer-
cantile education. In 1834 these sons formed a new firm, under
the title of Samuel & William Welsh, at No. 50 South Wharves.
The present firm is composed of Samuel Welsh, John Welsh, and
William Welsh, with whom was associated, February 1, 1857, John
Welsh, Jr., a son of William Welsh. They are largely interested
in the West India trade, importing for others on commission, but

EDMUND A.SOUDER

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 171

not on their own account. They issue no paper ; they pay a heavy
amount of duties into the Custom House, perhaps more than any
other firm in the city.

"William Welsh gives freely for church matters, to "church ex-
tension" and other good objects. Samuel Welsh is a valuable citi-
zen. His fondness for the fine arts renders him a useful member
of the Pennsylvania Academy. John Welsh takes an active part
in politics. He has been an active member of Councils, and a
Commissioner of the Sinking Fund. All these brothers have been
or are now bank directors, and they are ever to be found promi-
nent in forwarding any enterprise which is for the benefit of the
city of Philadelphia. Among our respected citizens, no family has
more influence, or is more widely respected than the Welshes.
Their aims are wise and intelligent, their actions beneficial and
just.

EDMUND A. SOUDER.

THE coasting trade of our city has been developed upon a gigan-
tic scale. The vast fleet which enter the Delaware from the
various ports of the atlantic states, and bear away valuable car-
goes of " black diamonds," and the vessels that bring hither lum-
ber and other articles to exchange for our manufactures, and the
produce which here finds a great central depot, fully compensate,
in the estimation of many persons, for the absence of foreign ships.
We are indebted for the rapid growth of this coastwise commerce,
to the fact of this being the port of the coal regions, which are
inexhaustible in wealth; and, in the second place, to the untiring
efforts of commission merchants to promote intercourse with the
seaboard states. The citizens of New England, especially, have
been induced to enter into commercial relations with us, and the
results have been an extensive and mutual profit. 'No man has
labored more faithfully and successfully than the gentleman whose
name forms the caption of this article. To Edmund A. Souder be-
longs the credit of opening the trade between this port and the

172 BIOGKAPHIES OF

towns of Eastport and Calais, Maine; and to his exertions also, we
owe, in a great measure, the trade with St. Johns, New Bruns-
wick.

Mr. Souder was born in Philadelphia in 1805. His father, Mr.
Thomas M. Souder, was an energetic business man, but one whose
free and generous disposition rendered him the victim of pretended
friends. While in the heyday of prosperity the elder Souder
resolved that Edmund should obtain the best education that the
city could afford at that period, and accordingly the boy was sent
to the academy, which then flourished under the tuition of Messrs.
Wylie and Engles. But misfortune overtook the parent, and the
son's studies were destined to be abruptly terminated.

A considerable estate was lost through the practice of rather in-
discriminate endorsement, and Mr. Souder was induced to devote
his energies to the transportation business, for the purpose of re-
plenishing his purse. He opened a store at No. 312 Market street.
It was in 1820, when only fifteen years of age, that young Souder
entered this establishment, and was introduced to the arduous and
exacting pursuits of trade. The change from the school to the
counting-house is frequently trying to ambitious and energetic
youth; but this lad appears to have had the faculty of concentrating
his mind upon whatever duty he was called to perform. Throughout
his career we find him self-reliant, confident of his OAvn resources,
and endeavoring to improve every opportunity presented, whether
congenial to his tastes or otherwise. The elder Souder was en-
gaged in trade with the interior and West. Transportation was
then very expensive, the only facilities being conestoga wagons
and the roughest roads. A year's experience in this business satis-
fied the son, and at the expiration of that time he succeeded in
obtaining a situation in the shipping and commission house of Mr.
John T. Hadaway, No. 29 South Wharves. Mr. Andrew C. Bar-
clay occupied a portion of the same building, and it is a fact
worthy of mention, as showing the industry and intelligence of
young Souder, that he contrived to keep the books of BOTH firms
at the same time. Two years afterwards Mr. Hadaway died; Mr.
William Brown rented the same store, and Souder became the
principal clerk and book-keeper for that gentleman. Here the
young man completed his business education. He cultivated habits
of precision, punctuality, unwearied industry, and strict integrity.
He studied this particular department of trade with a determina-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 173

tion to master all its details, and fit himself for future operations
upon his own account. He labored to establish a reputation which
would be the basis of future credit.

In 1828 Mr. Brown failed, and the clerk was appointed to wind
up and settle the affairs of the house. This task was accomplished
to the entire satisfaction of the creditors, and then Mr. Souder
found himself adrift again, with small means, and no influential
friends upon whom he could rely for assistance. It demanded con-
siderable nerve to resolve to start business under such circum-
stances. Mr. Souder had no capital beyond the small amount of
money he had saved during his clerkship. To this, however, he
added the sum of two hundred dollars, which he succeeded in bor-
rowing from a relative for twelve months without collateral secu-
rity. Thus equipped, he determined to embark upon the great sea
of trade on his own account. He commenced the commission
business in the counting-room of No. 25 South Wharves, which was
owned by the Messrs Pritchett. "Nothing is denied to well-
directed industry." Mr. Souder was more successful than he had
anticipated. Within a remarkably short period he had not only
obtained the esteem and confidence of many merchants in this
community, but of several houses in New York and Boston. In
May, 1830, he formed a partnership with Mr. Abraham G. Walters,
and under the title of Walters & Souder the firm transacted a
heavy business at No. 23 South Water street. Mr. Souder's enter-
prise not only resulted in putting money in his own pockets, but
was of permanent advantage to his native city. In 1833-34, he
visited the Eastern States, and succeeded in opening the trade
between Philadelphia and the towns of Eastport and Calais,
Maine, which has continued to increase in value ever since. Taking
his means into consideration, the young merchant could not suffer
by comparison with any of the leading business men of that
period.

Mr. Souder was strictly economical in the management of his
affairs. It is stated that during the first three years of his busi-
ness career he kept the books of the concern, and was frequently
obliged to labor in the counting-house until two or three o'clock in
the morning, in order to keep the accounts posted. No assistance
was employed until the increasing prosperity of the firm was known
to warrant the expenditure. Mr. Souder, it will therefore be seen,
has discovered no royal road to fortune. Hard wTork, rigid eco-
nomy and intelligent enterprise, were the agencies upon which he

1T4 BIOGRAPHIES OF

depended for ultimate success. The firm of Walter & Souder con-
tinued their business with satisfactory results at No. 23 South Wa-
ter street until 1837, when the locality known as the "Draw-
bridge," on the North side of Dock street, near Delaware avenue,
was improved by the erection of a block of commodious and sub-
stantial stores by the city, and the firm became the lessees of the
store No. 3 Dock street. In this location the affairs of the house
were managed with great skill, and it enjoyed uninterrupted pros-
perity. At length Mr. Walter's health declined. The burthen of
the business fell upon Mr. Souder ; but he was fully equal to the
onerous task ; and when, in 1848, his partner was compelled to re-
tire, the concern continued as profitable and prosperous as ever.

In 1854 Mr. Archibald Getty was admitted to a partnership in
the house; and in 1861 his son, Stephen T. Souder, was taken
into the firm. The firm is now styled Edmund A. Souder & Co.
As ship owners and commission merchants they have a reputation
inferior to none in Philadelphia, and may be pointed out as worthy
of the highest esteem for their modest pretensions, fidelity in all
engagements, enterprise and public spirit. During the various
financial panics that have occurred this house has never asked for the
renewal of any obligation, large or smallj and for many years past
it has never requested any person to call twice for a Mil admitted to
be due. It is not good luck that explains the continued and sub-
stantial prosperity of the firm ; it is able and sagacious manage-
ment, for which the head of the concern has always been distin-
guishable.

Mr. Souder has been a politician ; that is to say, he has held offi-
ces of public trust. In 1844 he was elected to a seat in the Com-
mon Council of the old city proper. That body included some of
the most useful and respectable of our citizens — such as seldom
consent to serve in that capacity at the present day. Mr. Souder
took an active part in the discussion of municipal affairs ; but was
always more of a business man than a talker. Subsequently he
was elevated to a seat in the Select Chamber, where he was ad-
mitted to be an influential member. He advocated and voted for
the municipal subscription which ensured the completion of our
great Central Railroad, and labored with much success to secure
private subscriptions to the stock of that magnificent enterprise.
Since the passage of the Act of Consolidation Mr. Souder has de-
voted his attention entirely to the business of the house which he
founded and raised to an honorable position among the mercantile

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 175

concerns of our city, and the different institutions of which he was
called to serve as a director or manager.

The subject of this sketch is affluent. He has achieved fortune
and social distinction by the practice of the virtues that mark the
true merchant and the public spirited citizen ; by relying upon his
own resources; by toiling early and late; by the judicious economy
of means; by the far-sighted extension of commercial operations;
and, by rendering to every man his due. " Take him for all in all,"
we must regard Edmund A. Souder as one of those members of
the mercantile community whom Philadelphia could illy afford to
lose.

ARCHIBALD GETTY.

AGAIN on our list of honored merchants we find the name of one
of Ireland's sons who has crossed the Atlantic to win his way to
independence. The open arms extended by our country to all
whose enterprise will tempt them from home and friends in the
old world, clasp closely around their adopted son ; and but rarely
do we find the emigrant quitting his adopted residence for the land
of his nativity. In the equal struggle — the broad, free arena — the
many doors leading to wealth and position, the cordial welcome
and helping hand so frankly extended, the wanderer sees his re-
compense for any homesick yearning or pain of parting ; and, on
the other hand, the hospitable refuge for Europe's overplus popu-
lation meets the reward of her openhanded welcome in the honor-
able names swelling her lists of adopted sons — the stalwart heroes
guarding her flag, and the wealth poured out by the liberal hands
of her naturalized citizens upon her public works and institutions.

Archibald Getty, the subject of this sketch, was one of these
emigrants whose name now stands high on the record of Phila-
delphia merchants. He was born near Belfast, in Ireland, in the
year 1822, and eight years later emigrated and came to Philadel-
phia. Of his youth we have no record, save that he was educated
in this city. In the year 1839, having to seek some means of live-
lihood, he went into the earthenware store of Samuel Asbury &
Co., where he remained until 1844. During that year he entered

176 BIOGRAPHIES OF

the large china store of Tyndale & Mitchell, and was book-keeper
there until August, 1848, when he again made a change to take a
book-keeper's position in the establishment of E. A. Souder & Co.

This firm found the services of their book-keeper so valuable
that, in 1852, he was taken into the concern as a partner, and still
remains there. Being an active business man, and devoted to the
interests of the firm, he has contributed largely to build up its
coastwise and foreign shipping ; the firm now being among the
largest ship owners in the country.

During the progress of the present unhappy rebellion the firm of
E. A. Souder & Co. have chartered more vessels to government
than any other in the country, winning invariably the warmest
commendations for the honorable and handsome manner in which
they have fulfilled every engagement made in their contracts. When
the country again resumes her peaceful avocations, the disgrace
which must cover the dishonorable proceedings of those base spe-
culators who have made mammoth fortunes by fraudulent filling
of government contracts, will show out more clearly, by the strong
light of contrast, the brightness of such honorable examples of
patriotic efforts to aid the government by open and honorable pro-
ceedings, such as those of E. A. Souder & Co.

Mr. Getty is a member of the Presbyterian church; was at one
time a Sunday-school teacher, (Hugh Craig was one of his pupils,)
and in politics stands as an old line Whig.

In his public capacity we find him connected for many years
with the Reliance Insurance Coompany as one of its directors, and
in 1862 acting as President of the Corn Exchange Association.

In 1845 Mr. Getty was married, and has now three children to
inherit his wealth and honorable name. He is one of the bright
examples of a self-made man, with which our country is filled ; who,
commencing business without a dollar, is now the owner of wealth,
a well earned and honorable reputation ; and by a steady course of
untiring industry, social morality and unwavering integrity, has
won for himself a proud position on the list of our Philadelphia
merchants, Still in active business, occupying a responsible post
in the Corn Exchange and other organizations, a valuable member of
society, and a good man, we trust he may be long spared to our city.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 177

THEODOEE H. VETTERLEI^".

THE " History of Chestnut Street," in the goodly city of Phila-
delphia, has been written, and well written, by Casper Souder, Jr.,
assisted by those indefatigable local antiquarians and polished gen-
tlemen, Messrs. John McAllister, John A. McAllister and Thomas
McAllister, the opticians, who have held so prominent a place on
that thoroughfare since 1796, when their business was established.
But we think the chronicles of Broad street would present a pic-
ture of Philadelphia of interest almost equally as varied. The
southern end of this wide and noble avenue begins at the Delaware
river, and passes at first through marshes, then comes a series of
truck gardens, which extend up to within sight of the Baltimore
Depot, at Broad and Prime streets, the truck fields gradually giv-
ing place to building lots and the Southern Boulevard. From
Prime street up we have railroad tracks along the street, and on
each side rise churches, express depots, coal yards and manufacto-
ries. At Locust street the splendid Academy of Music, built mainly
by our munificent merchants, rises ; then comes the world famous
Academy of Natural Sciences, with its unparalleled collection of
animate and inanimate treasures ; then we see one of the finest
hotels which has ever helped to draw trade to this city — the La
Pierre; then comes Harmer's, renowned for sociability; andShinn's,
famous as a political head quarters. A little further up we see the
warehouses of Craig & Bellas, James Steel & Co., S. L. Witmer,
Baker & Hopkins, P. Stemad & Co., Jos. Bryan & Co., Allman &
Wenger, George Cookman, and others; then a railroad depot, now
turned into a huge military hospital. Then come another series
of railroad depots, coal yards, transportation and produce houses,
followed by a collection of foundries, planing mills, lumber yards,
and Baldwin's world famous locomotive factory. Where Eidge
avenue crosses Broad street diagonally, and Coates street also
intersects Broad, a large market house and Rowland & Ervien's
extensive flouring mill are the new features ; and after this point
is reached Broad street changes its character. Palatial private
residences, inhabited by prominent merchants, are seen every
square or two. Among them are the residence of Mr. Anspach,

178 BIOGRAPHIES OF

built by the late Mr. Stiles, who used his wealth to beautify this
portion of the city (Green Hill) in the matter especially of shade
trees. After Mr. Stiles' death this beautiful residence, standing
white amid its statue adorned garden, was used as a school, the
teachers being nuns. A Mr. Davis then purchased it ; and it next
fell into the hands of Mr. Anspach, who has added to its charms as
a place of residence. Mr. Anspach "suspended," and the property
was twice offered at auction, and we believe is now owned by J.
Edgar Thompson, Esq., President of the Pennsylvania Railroad
Company.

Crossing Poplar street, a large and striking looking house, at
the southwest corner of Girard avenue, attracts the eye. It is
built solidly of brick, with gables, bay windows, niches, and many
peculiarities of architectural grotesqueness. It has fine grounds
about it, and is luxuriously fitted up. It was built by Mr. J. S. Sil-
ver, coal dealer, and sold by him to its present occupant, Mr. T. B.
Peterson, the famous publisher of Chestnut street. Crossing Girard
avenue, and keeping along the western side, we once more enjoy a
boulevard, whose well grown trees expand along the sides of the
broad pavement, making a gothic arch above the head of the pe-
destrian.

On Sundays and holidays this boulevard is thronged by thou-
sands of promenaders, who gaze with delight at the residences of
the merchant princes along the street, and watch the flying vehi-
cles of those who dash along on their way to " coffee and cakes"
at the Falls, to the romantic drives along the Wissahickon, or to
the beautiful lands around Germantown, for Broad street is a
famous route to these attractive regions in summer, while in win-
ter the sleigh bells never cease from daybreak to midnight. But
we must ''drive in" ourselves if we would reach the goal of the
present article.

Just above Thompson street we see the brown stone fronts and
the elegant iron fences enclosing the residences of Michael Bouvier
and Edwin Forrest, the tragedian. The former erected his man-
sion for his own occupancy, while the latter purchased his from
ex-sheriff Lelar, who erected it. The locality we are describing is
quite prolific in mansions erected by former sheriffs of Phila-
delphia county. The splendid mansion, No. 1426 North Broad
street, a square above Mr. Forrest's, was built by ex-sheriff Deal ;
it is now owned by Mr. Swain, of the Public Ledger, while Mr.
Deal also built No, 1424, now owned and occupied by George Si-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 179

mons, the jewelry manufacturer; and ex-sheriff Magee erected the
splendid residence No. 1422, which we are about to describe. It
is owned and occupied by Theodore H. Yetterlein, one of the most
extensive tobacco manufacturers and dealers in the country, and
whose successful career is a marked example to enterprise, en-
ergy, tact and conservative power of retaining every advantage
gained.

Mr. Yetterlein's beautiful mansion stands on Broad street, with
a genial southerly exposure towards Master street, which serves
to ripen the rich flowers and fruits in the grounds which lie on
that side of the house. It was built in the year 1856, by ex-sheriff
Magee, who designed it for his own use. The financial crisis of
1857, however, compelled Mr. Magee to retrench, and he wisely
began with changing his residence to a less expensive mansion.
When Mr. Yetterlein purchased this elegant house, he added to its
already extensive garden twenty-five feet of adjoining ground,
making a front of one hundred feet to a lot of one hundred and
sixty feet deep. At an immense cost this was laid out in terraces
and flower beds, filled with rare and beautiful plants. A large green-
house and prettily ornamented carriage house and stable stand in
the back ground, fronting on Carlisle street. The material of the
house is finely cut brown stone, fronting East and South. It is
three stories high, with basements and garrets. A heavy and
highly ornamented balcony on the front meets a long flight of stone
steps, leading to a deep arched-way entrance on Broad street. On
the South side a broad bay window and a conservatory relieve the
great mass of brown stone wall The front room of the basement
is Mr. Yetterlein's smoking and reception room, back of which are
the larder and wine cellar. Over these is a very large parlor, fur-
nished magnificently with rosewood, velvet and brocatelle, the
piano forte inlaid with pearl and the walls covered with elegant
paintings. Passing the conservatory through a grand, wide hall,
we find the refreshment and dining room, fitted up conveniently
and tastefully. On the second and third floors are sitting rooms
and bed chambers luxuriously furnished, and over the garrets a
large observatory completes the arrangements. It commands a
view of the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers, and the blue outlines of
Jersey, under some peculiar atmospheric influence, appear like
chains of mountains, adding considerable to the fine easterly view.
Mr. Yetterlein has spared no expense to make his family as happy
as wealth can make them ; and if carriages, sleighs, horses, goats,

180 BIOGRAPHIES OF

donkeys, music and flowers, and all that makes up the enjoyment
of the wealthy, can satisfy them, then they have nothing to
desire.

Mr. Yetterlein commenced business on his own account on the
failure of Essenwein & Co., in whose house he had been a book-
keeper. He then went into partnership with John A. Warner,
about the year 1842, and they established themselves at Second
and Callowhill streets; after a career of some four or five years
they separated. Mr. Yetterlein then resumed business in Second
street, below Callowhill, where he remained until 1864, when he
opened the handsome warehouse, Not 111 Arch street, under
the' firm of Yetterlein & Co., with a branch in New York
under the style of T. H. & B. Yetterlein & Co. His present
partners are his brother,, and Thos. Theirman, who manage the
house in New York. By steady steps the business has been built
up, and now, at the age of about fifty-four years, Mr. Yetterlein
is in possession of an ample fortune, with a constantly increasing
revenue. At the opening of his career he occupied a modest resi-
dence in Lombard street, between Third and Fourth; he then
moved to Callowhill street, between Front and Second; subse-
quently he occupied a residence on Franklin above Coates, from
whence he conveyed his household goods to the palatial mansion
we have described on Broad street. He has shrewdly worked the
amazing tobacco trade, which has been a source of inexhaustible
wealth to thousands of prudent and enterprising merchants, as
may readily be surmised when we remark the growth of this vast
interest. The statistics prepared by the Secretary of the Treasury
show that the exports of tobacco from the United States became
eight times more valuab e in 1861 than they were forty years ago,
when the record begins. In the former year 66,858 hogsheads,
worth $12,341,901 were exported, while in 1861 the exports were
valued at $94,866,736. Of this trade Philadelphia has had a very
fair proportion, and the house of Yetterlein & Co. has built itself
up in at least as rapid a ratio as the growth of the trade, and the
basis of his future has at least as solid a foundation.

Mr. Yetterlein has a rather large family, with grace and beauty
predominating on the female side, and a bright quick intelligence
manifesting itself early among the boys. His eldest daughter,
Bertha, a most estimable lady, married Mr. Stephen T. Souder, a
young man of wealth and active enterprise, son and partner of the
well known merchant, Edmund A. Souder, in the spring of

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 181

1862. The fete on that occasion, after the impressive wedding in
Christ Church, gave a delightful idea of the hospitality of Mr. Vet-
terlein, and made, for that one rainy evening, a genial glow of
good feeling ; warmth, light, music and pleasure spread itself over
the entire neighborhood.

It is now twenty-eight years since Mr. Yetterlein emigrated
from Germany and entered upon his career in Philadelphia. He
was without friends, without relatives, or any of those extraneous
aids by which men climb to fortune, and had to rely on his own
energy and perseverance for success. His stipend on entering the
business house of Messrs. Essen wein & Co., was but four dollars
per week, and from that basis he has accumulated the handsome
competency which we trust he may long live to enjoy, and make
others enjoy, by acts of liberality which are thoroughly character-
istic of the man.

THOMAS P. COPE.

THE tenacity with which English families, and families of English
descent, cling to ancestral honors, is well shown in the name of the
subject of this sketch. Born in the year 1768, on the twenty-sixth of
August, of Quaker parents, at a time, too, when middle names were
uncommon, the pride of his mother in her stern old progenitor, the
Cromwellian John Pym, led to the insertion of that patronymic
between what were called the Christian and surnames of her son.
His father, Caleb Cope, of Lancaster, was a descendant of Oliver
Cope, one of the original emigrants to Pennsylvania, a respected
Frisnd, whose non-combatant principles kept him quiet during
the Eevolution, even if his political bias had not done so. Perhaps
it was a congeniality of views which made him the host of Captain
John Andre, the afterward celebrated Major Andre, whilst the
latter, in 1776, was a prisoner on parole, and in Lancaster. Andre
and Despard, afterwards the Colonel Despard of the Gordon rebel-
lion, shared the hospitalities of the Copes. While there, the artis-
tic talent of John Cope, an elder brother of Thomas Pym Cope,
attracted the attention of the accomplished English officer, and he
gave him some instructions, and even offered to sell out his com-
mission arid take him to England to accomplish his education ; an

182 BIOGKAPHIES OF

offer which was declined. At this time Thomas P. Cope was a
boy of twelve years of age. He saw much of the versatile Andre,
who occasionally condescended to wile away the tedious hours of
a prisoner of war by participating in his boyish sports.

The education of the young Cope was very good for the time in
which he lived. He was well instructed in English, and was pro-
ficient in German, and had even grounded himself in Latin to a de-
gree which gave to his mind in future years a classic bent, and
rendered him clear and tasteful in his thoughts and style. In the
year 1786 Thomas P. Cope, then eighteen years of age, came from
Lancaster to Philadelphia, to engage in the struggle of life. He
entered the store of his uncle, Thomas Mendenhall, which was situ-
ated at Nos. 19 and 21 North Second street, at the corner of Pew-
ter Platter alley, and opposite Christ Church. Mendenhall resided
at ~No. 28 Strawberry alley, and in this humble mansion, as it would
now be thought, Thomas P. Cope resided during *the whole of a
greater part of the time when he was an apprentice to his uncle.
In four years he had not only thoroughly mastered the details of
business, but had shown so much tact, activity and integrity, that
his uncle took him into partnership. The firm of Mendenhall &
Cope continued but a short time, and was dissolved after two
years. Young Cope had not, up to this time, the dignity of being
a householder; but we find him, in 1793, residing at No. 3 North
Second street, a few doors below his store. The next year he re-
moved his dwelling to No. 196 Arch street, where he resided for
several years.

In 1793 came the first visitation of that dreadful scorge, the yel-
low fever, which the Philadelphians of that generation had ever
experienced, and in the course of its baleful ravages Thomas P.
Cope was prostrated by the epidemic. Having a sound constitu-
tion, uninjured by vice or excess, he succeeded in shaking off the
fetters of the grim monster, and was restored to health in time to
be of eminent service to those whose turn it was to become af-
flicted.

Mr. Cope went through a similar sad experience in 1797, at which
time he was appointed, in conjunction with William Young, book-
seller, to dispense the public charity, under the direction and au-
thority of Hillary Baker, the Mayor of the city. Mr. Cope was at
the time a member of the Board of Guardians of the Poor, and he
was one of the few members of that body who did not in the season
of danger desert their posts.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 183

In 1803 we find Mr. Cope once more in partnership. The firm
of Cope & Thomas held forth in the old stand, No. 19 North Se-
cond street, and were extending their business. The senior partner
resided at No. 191 Walnut street, a situation which he soon ex-
changed for a better house, at No. 36 North Fourth street, in which
he lived for many years.

Whilst thus engaged in the legitimate course of his business, he
laid the foundation of that goodly line of packets to Europe, which
have ever since been a feature of the commerce of Philadelphia.
His first ship was built in 1807, not as a packet, but for the pur-
pose of general freight business, on the account of himself and
others. To this pioneer in his adventure in ocean trade he gave
the name of " Lancaster/' in honor of his native town. It was a
small vessel of only two hundred and ninety tons, but it was a
very successful and lucky ship, making good voyages and bringing
in successful returns.

Mr. Cope, on one occasion, tested his faith in this vessel very re-
markably. At the time of the breaking out of the war with Great
Britain, in 1812, the Lancaster was upon the high seas, bound to
Philadelphia, coming from Canton, with a very valuable cargo of
teas, silks and India goods. The seas swarmed with British
cruisers, and the underwriters asked full war risk premiums, even
as high as seventy-five per cent. Mr. Cope did not feel disposed to
pay so much, but his partner deemed that prudence was most ad-
visable. Mr. Cope, satisfied that he could lose his entire interest
without involving himself, gave to his partner permission to insure
his half, whilst for the other Mr. Cope determined to take the risk
himself. The result justified his judgment. His partner " made
assurance doubly sure," but Mr. Cope took the risk, and was gra-
tified shortly afterward by witnessing the Lancaster coming full
sail up the Delaware, despite of the king's cruisers, her captain
first hearing the news of the declaration of war when he came
upon shore. This was probably the foundation of the well known
policy of the Copes, never to insure their ships ; they believing
that from the savings of money which would go for premium they
could realise enough to build more ships than they should lose. In
the long course of their mercantile experience we believe that they
have lost but one large ship; and that, after having by many years
of prosperity saved enough, by non-payment of insurance pre-
miums, to build half a dozen such vessels.

In 1810 Mr. Cope removed from No. 19 North Second street to

184 BIOGRAPHIES OF

the North west corner of Walnut street and Delaware avenue, where
the house has ever since been established. It was from this point
that in 1821 sailed the first vessel of the first regular line of packets
to Liverpool, of which line the lucky Lancaster was the pioneer
ship. It was followed by the Alexander, Algonquin, Mononga-
hela and Montezuma, all of which were small ships in comparison
to those which have succeeded in the line. The Tuscarora, a later
addition, was but 379 tons burthen. Mr. Cope always had a fancy
for the preservation of the original Indian names, and as the line
increased the ships Allegheny, Saranak, Wyoming, Tonawanda
and others have been added ; the only exception from this policy
being the ship Thomas P. Cope, which, we presume, was named
by his sons.

The success of this line of packet ships during the forty-two
years that it has been in operation, has been very great. It has
been a constant and certain means of intercourse between Phila-
delphia and Europe, It has outlived all competitors. The Welsh
line of Liverpool packets, consisting of the ships Manchester, Sa-
rah Ralston, Plato and Philadelphia, established soon after Cope's
line, lasted but a few years. The Philadelphia, Liverpool and Sa-
vannah line, comprising the Florida, Julius Caesar, Colossus, Cou-
rier and Delaware, when first established; and later, the Arab,
Ann and John Wells, made a strong effort under Thos. E. Walker
& Co., but the ships were eventually withdrawn. Cope's line of
packets preceded all of them, and has succeeded all of them.

Mr. Cope held, during his life, many situations of public trust,
commencing as a Guardian of the Poor. We find him, in about
1799 or 1800, in the City Councils, a promoter and advocate for the
introduction of the Schuylkill water into the city — one of the most
important measures for the health and prosperity of the citizens
ever devised. In 1807 he was elected to the State Legislature,
where he forwarded internal improvements and lent his voice and
vote to every proper scheme for the advantage of Pennsylvania.

He was a strong advocate for the construction of the Delaware
and Chesapeake Canal, which work he forwarded by all his influ-
ence, and had the happiness to witness its success. He was equally
enthusiastic as a friend of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company,
and foresaw the immense advantage that it would be to the state.

He was one of the founders and an active friend of the Mercan-
tile Library Company, of which institution he was for many years
President. He was also one of the first members of the Board of

PHILADELPHIA MEECHANTS. 185

Trade, its first President, and the only President of that institu-
tion until his death, a period of twenty-one years. He came into
political life once more as a member of the convention to revise
and amend the constitution of Pennsylvania, which met in 1837,
and he was considered one of the most useful and intelligent mem-
bers of that important body. Stephen Girard, who knew well his
worth, made him one of the executors of his will; and subsequently
he became the President of the Board of Commissioners of the Gi-
rard Estate and a Director of the Girard College for orphans.

On the twenty-second of November, 1854, this honorable mer-
chant and good man died, leaving behind him an unspotted repu-
tation attained during eighty-eight years of active life in Philadel-
phia, and extending over the memories of three generations. To
the young merchant ambitious of an useful career, no better model
for life and business character could be chosen than Thomas P.
Cope.

The brothers of Thomas P. Cope — Israel Cope and Jasper Cope
— came to Philadelphia from Lancaster shortly after him. They
entered into business about the year 1800, and at one time were in
Second street, above Market, nearly opposite the store of Thomas.
They afterwards went into Market street, above Fourth, at JSTo.
165, and remained in co-partnership together during their long
mercantile career. They were in the silk business. A brother of
Thomas Israel and Jasper resides in Lancaster county.

Israel and Jasper Cope were succeeded by Caleb Cope and Mar-
maduke C. Cope, which house finally was merged in that of Caleb
Cope & Co., a firm which engaged largely in the dry goods trade.
The difficulties in which this old established house were involved
by some of the junior partners are well remembered.

Thomas P. Cope was twice married. One of his daughters — a
most estimable lady — who married Job B. Tyson, is long since
dead. John, a son, died before his father.

The business of Thomas P. Cope has descended to his grandsons,
who conduct their affairs under the title of Cope Brothers. Fran-
cis Cope, the most active member of this firm, is a sterling busi-
ness man — enterprising, energetic and liberal. He is an estimable
citizen, whose hand and purse are alike ready to assist worthy ob-
jects and to alleviate the distressed.

186 BIOGRAPHIES OF

THOMAS DKAKE.

THE mention of the name of Mr. Drake brings the entire his-
tory of the manufactures of the city of Philadelphia. He has been
instrumental in adding greatly to its products in certain classes of
textile fabrics, and he has seen its manufactures grow from a very
small proportion of their present extent to their existing amount.
Few persons are aware of the proportion of the capital and labor
of this city which is invested in manufactures. The operations in
that line are conducted quietly, without much flourish or parade,
and the outside world knows little of the teeming wealth which is
poured forth from the manufactories which make so marked a fea-
ture in the topography of the City of Brotherly Love. We say
so marked a feature, and if the reader will go from Kensington to
Moyamensing, from Southwark to the old District of Penn, and
gaze at the tall buildings, and still taller chimneys which mark
this class of establishments, he will be fully convinced of the
truth of our remark. By the last reports which have come to
hand we learn the following astonishing facts relative to the manu-
factures of this city. There are in this city : —

Manufacturing establishments,

Capital invested, -

Value of raw material,

Males employed, - - -

Females employed,

Value of productions,

6,244

$74,486,791

$73,662,872

70,281

30,245

$141,138,835

The extent to which water and steam power are used in manu-
facturing in Philadelphia is immense. We can give some idea of
it by choosing out a table showing the power employed in the one
article of textile fabrics. The table is as follows : —

STEAM ENGINES.

Number. Horse Power.

In city, . . . .286 6,624

In vicinity, .... 71 2,362

Total, . . .357 8,986

WATER POWER.

Number. Horse Power.

In city, . 52 1,074

In vicinity, . . . . 66 2,175

Total, 118 3,249

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS.

187

MACHINERY, LOOMS AND SPINDLES.

Cotton Spindles. Cotton Cards. Wool Spindles. Wool Cards.
In city, 155,533 737 64,482 419

In vicinity, 197,669 857 38,462 380

Total, 353,202

In city,
In vicinity,

Total,

Total cotton spindles,
Total wool spindles,
Total silk (in city), .

Aggregate,

1,594

Power Looms.
9,693
5,923

15,616

102,944

799

Hand Looms.
4,598
153

4,751

353,202

102,944

12,750

468,896

Of textile fabrics, the manufacture in the city of Philadelphia is
classified as follows : —

Number of establishments,

Capital,

Eaw material,

Males employed, .

Females employed,

Value of products,

525

$8,795,226

$12,584,440

9,670

9,731

$23,561,568

In these tables no account is taken of the large number of fac-
tories in Delaware, Chester and Montgomery counties, Pennsylva-
nia, and in New Jersey, whose products seek a market in Phila-
delphia. Were these establishments added, we could double the
figures given in the foregoing exhibits. We could justly do so too,
because, in a majority of instances, the owners reside in Philadel-
phia, and rely upon that city as the mart for the sale of their pro-
ducts.

But to return to the subject of our sketch. Mr. Thomas Drake
is an Englishman by birth. After he came to this country he was
employed in his youth in a factory at Steubenville, Ohio, where
were manufactured the first lot of the goods called Kentucky
jeans, which have since been so prominent in the trade reports of
our cities. In the year 1837 Mr. Drake became ambitious of a
wider sphere of action than that afforded by this western town,
and he came to Philadelphia. Here he soon began business on his
own account as a cotton manufacturer, and after a short period he
built himself a small manufactory at Manayunk, where he turned
out cotton jeans, and other similar goods. From the time he began
business he was noted for making a superior article, and soon won
for himself a reputation for integrity which was unsurpassed.

188 BIOGRAPHIES OF

His goods also increased in favor among business men, and the
lapse of years has rather added to than taken away from their
good opinion. In a few years, by close economy, Mr. Brake
amassed a sum which sufficed to build a factory at Naudain and
Twenty-first streets, in this city, and here he continued to manu-
facture goods which commanded the very best prices up to the
beginning of the present war. During the past ten years he had
also taken advantage of his increase of means to build a large
cotton factory at Twenty-first and Pine streets, where he manu-
factured in large quantities print cloths, an article which, up to
this time, had been only manufactured in the New England States.
This was a profitable branch of his business, and Mr. Drake vigo-
rously prosecuted it until the opening of the war caused him to
draw in his resources and see where he stood.

We may inform the reader, if he is ignorant, that Mr. Drake
had at this time amassed a princely fortune, every dollar of which
was won by his own unvarying efforts and undeviatirig energy.

Mr. Drake has been, up to his retirement, one of our most suc-
cessful manufacturers. He had no trivial pretension ; he has been
strictly upright and fair in his dealings, and in every transaction
he has evinced cool and unerring judgment. He never failed to
meet an obligation, and prided himself on never giving his note.
Since his retirement he has built himself a splendid mansion in
Germantown, where his hospitality is as favorably known as his
integrity has been in his innumerable past business transactions.

Mr. Drake was also extensively engaged in the manufacture of
woolen goods, and a large portion of his princely fortune was
made by fortunate investments in real estate and coal stocks.
Although socially an agreeable man, he is singularly taciturn, and
his great success is to be attributed to his devoted and untiring
efforts in a single direction. The wealth of the subject of this
sketch exceeds a million of dollars.

Mr. Drake was the first to commence the manufacture of jeans
in this country. He was the pioneer in the business, just as Benja-
min Bullock, Esq., was the pioneer in our immense wool trade.
The first lot of wool sent from Ohio to the seaboard was trans-
ported from Pittsburg to Philadelphia in the old conestoga wagons,
and consigned to Mr. Bullock. It was only a few hundred pounds
—now we receive millions of pounds from the same state. Mr.
Drake was the "leader" in the business. How many have ac-
cumulated fortunes by " following their leader ?"

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 189

Among the most prominent of our cotton manufacturers we
notice the names of William Divine, John P. Crozier, his son
Samuel Crozier, Archibald Campbell, Charles Kelly, Thomas H.
Craig, Samuel Riddle and David Trainor. The most of these men
are rich, very rich, and in many instances built up their collosal
fortunes from the smallest imaginable beginnings.

In a book entitled "Old Merchants of New York," is a good
story of how the merchants of the olden time followed their leader.
It is as follows :

" Thomas H. Smith, of New York, who did a business of millions
annually, built an enormous tea store in South street, up by Dover.
It extended through to Water, and was a hundred feet wide. It
was the wonder of the city when it was built. The docks near it
were named India wharf. Smith also built famous stores at Perth
Amboy, and had his tea ships land their cargoes there. The
travelers to Philadelphia by the old route must often have wonder-
ed what those immense brick stores were doing in such an insigni-
ficant place as Perth Amboy. Thomas H. Smith, besides being
the greatest tea merchant of his day, was also the greatest spree-
ite of his day. He was the president of a club called ' The Fire
Club/ It held its meetings in Franklin Square, on the corner of
Dover street. Boys have a mode of amusement called ' Follow
your leader.' This was adopted by the club of which Smith was
president. Many men who are now aged and respected men, or
dead, belonged to the ' Fire Club.' They gave grand suppers, and
their entertainments were very expensive. They would invite a
guest to these suppers, explain the rules, and if he refused to join,
or could not carry out the idea, the fine was one dozen champagne.
These fines were occasioned by a refusal to follow their leader. On
one occasion a great cotton merchant from New Orleans was a
guest. He agreed to all the conditions. It was late in the evening,
in the dead of winter. The ice in the East River was floating up
and down with every flood or ebb of the tide. ' Follow leader/
shouted Smith, and out of the warm luxurious club-rooms poured
the members of the club. Out of the Square, around the corner
into Dover street. ' Follow leader,' and on rushed Smith, the
president of the club, with thirty men behind him, down Dover,
past Water, past Front, into South, and thence on to the pier.
One of Smith's ships lay at the dock. A lighter lay inside of the
main wharf. The ice was loose and dashed up around the vessels.

190 BIOGRAPHIES OF

' Follow leader,' exclaimed Smith, as he plunged from the dock
into water. Some drew back, but others followed the leader,
who succeeded in getting out of the ice water on to the lighter, and
from thence to the dock ; and shouting ' follow leader,' he led off
with frozen clothes up Dover and into the room of the Club.
Plunge, plunge, plunge, one after another, and so on until all had
successfully accomplished the terrible and dangerous feat. The
southern cotton merchant was last. Some of the regular club
members remained until they saw him reach the dock again safely,
and there they left him shivering. He did not remain long. As
he walked up from the dock, he noticed a large store open in
South street. He entered. It was a wholesale and retail ship
store. ' I have met with an accident — give me a glass of cognac,
hot, with sugar and water/ It was done, and he drank it. ' Do
you keep gunpowder ?' he asked. Receiving an affirmative reply,
he bought and paid for half a keg, and then took his way to the
club room. At the door were standing two members of the club,
one of whom exclaimed, ' Brave southern stranger, you have pass-
ed the ordeal safely. You are now leader, and we are deputed to
place the club under your command, if you choose to exercise
your sacred privilege/

" ' Thanks, my friends, I shall do so, but I will not ask you to go
out of the room this cold night. Let us drink!' and as he entered
the room he sought a side closet where hung his cloak. There he
placed the keg, and then returned and took a seat at the long solid
mahogany table. President Smith called the club to order. The
stewards for the night opened a dozen champagne amid shouts,
calls and songs of the most stirring character. 'Order, come to
order!' exclaimed President Smith. When order was partially re-
stored, he said : ' members of the club, our guest has passed the
icy ordeal. He has now the right of becoming leader for the
balance of the night, or until a failure in our sacred rights. What
says he?'

"The cotton merchant took from his bosom a bundle of tow, and
laid it on the table. All eyes were fixed upon him. ' I accept the
command. I will lead now. Wait until I give the word, and then
do as you see me do/ By this time he had spun the tow into a
a string, that would reach from the table to the grate. He placed
a tumbler on one end of the tow, to hold it on the table, and then
passed the other to the pan under the grate, and made that fast
with a piece of coal from the coal scuttle. Not a word was spoken.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 191

All felt that something unusual was to occur. Cotton merchant
now deliberately went to the closet, and returning with the keg,
took his seat. Then he went to work and removed the hoops until
he could take out the head of the little keg. Not a soul moved.
Then he took a very little of what appeared to be black sand in
his hand, walked to the fire, and flung it in. The considerable ex-
plosion that followed started all. 'Powder, by Jupiter/ exclaimed
Smith. Cotton merchant took the end of the tow line from the
glass, and pushed it down deep into the powder in the keg, and
then reseated himself. ' Now, Mr. President, and members of the
club, I wish you to hear what I have to say/

" l You have tried my pluck. I come from a hot climate, and you
have made me go through an icy ordeal. It is my time now, but
I will not be so cruel. I will give you afirery ordeal to go through.
If you stand it you will never need more wine; and if you do not,
the fines will amount to a small fortune, and you will have wine
enough to last your club a year. Look at me.' He walked to the
fire, kicked off the coal lump, and placed the other end of the tow-
line in the red hot coals. Then he walked back, and as he brought
his fist down upon the table, said in tones of thunder as he sat
down, ' Keep your seats, and thus follow your leader/ The fire
curled up in fitful spouts from the burning tow — it burnt over the
grate pan, and began to crawl along the carpet. It had eighteen
feet to go. Sixty and odd single eyes watched the burning train.
One rose from his seat, then another; finally one exclaimed, ' we
shall all be blown to old Nick,' and made for the door. The panic
increased. Down stairs the club members plunged, like a flock of
sheep. Even old Smith, the President, was among the first to bolt
from the room. Before the tow-line had burned as far as the table
all were gone but the cotton merchant. As soon as he saw that he
was alone he placed his foot upon the burning tow, and extinguished
it. Then he opened the window and emptied the keg into the
snow, and again resumed his seat. He waited long for the return
of the club members; one by one they did come back. There cot-
ton sat, until Smith took his seat as president. 'Now call for the
fines,' he said, and a severe lecture he gave them for their follies
and real cowardice."

192 BIOGRAPHIES OF

SAMUEL COATES.

AMONG the merchants of Philadelphia who united the traditions
and experience of the ante-revolutionary period, with the stirring
activity and commercial excitement which followed the establish-
ment of peace, Samuel Coates for many reasons deserves mention.
He was in some sense a representative man, who kept up during
his life, in business matters, a full show of what commerce and
business had been in Philadelphia, in the good old time. He repre-
sented that class of merchants, of whom there were in former times
a large number in the city, who made business not only a means of
support merely, but enabled them to contribute largely to objects
of philanthropy and public benefit. After the signature of Samuel
Coates might properly have been written "philanthropist and
merchant." For although as a business man he was faithful and
discreet, yet during many years of his life, business was with him
of secondary importance to the prosecution of plans which were
for the benefit of others.

The Coates' are an old Philadelphia family. Thomas Coates, the
grandfather of the subject of this sketch, came to the city in 1684,
from Leicestershire, England. As usual with the men of means of
that day, he became a landholder in the infant colony. But being
also of business education, he became a merchant, being cotem-
porary with Samuel Carpenter and other enterprising citizens of
young Philadelphia. The father and mother of Samuel Coates
died whilst he was yet a child, and they left but small means. But
the boy found a friend in his uncle, John Eeynell, and he was taken
into his family. Under the generous care of this patron, he was
carefully educated in the English branches, and reaeived a very fair
classic instruction, which controlled his tastes in after life. Eeynell
directed the thoughts of his protegee to mercantile pursuits, and
he was secured an excellent business education. The confidence
of Eeynell in the solid qualities and prudence of Samuel Coates,
was such, that in the year 1768, Samuel being then but nineteen
years old, he was furnished with a small capital, and trusted to
carry on business for himself. For three years this very young
merchant conducted his own affairs. The experiment was in every

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 193

way satisfactory, and in 1771 he was removed to a larger sphere,
being taken by his friend Eeynell as a partner. This connection
was soon rendered of but little practical value by the events of the
American Revolution, and after lingering through several dull
years of the struggle, it was closed, in 1782, by the withdrawal of
John Reynell, leaving Samuel Coates in possession of the business.
A partnership of short duration was then formed by Samuel Coates
with his brother, Josiah Langdale Coates, but the latter soon with-
drew from the connection, and in 1785 we find that Samuel was in
business alone in a building at the northwest corner of Front and
Walnut streets, (still in existence,) and Josiah, as a grocer, in
Church alley, between Second and Third streets. In 1791 Samuel
was located as a merchant at 82 South Front street, at the corner
of Walnut street, which was the place of his business for many
years afterwards. He died in and was buried from this place.

After the close of the Revolution Mr. Coates devoted himself to
the establishment of a business with New England. Newburyport,
Mass., was at that time a place of active trade, and Coates opened
a correspondence with Moses Brown, and the Bartlett brothers.
Among other houses with which he had transactions, extending
over many years, were Benjamin Willis of Portland, Maine, and
John A. Curtis Bolton, of Savannah, Georgia.

The fearful epidemic of 1793 found Samuel Coates among the
few citizens of means who remained in the city. He was ap-
pointed, together with Benjamin W. Morris and George Rutter,
upon an assistant committee to the principal committee of citizens.
It was the duty of this sub-committee to seek out and recommend
suitable objects for relief. The boundaries of its jurisdiction was
from the south side of Walnut street to the north side of Spruce
street. During the continuance of the epidemic Mr. Coates was
earnest, useful and faithful. His duties at this time seem to have
directed his attention to matters of kindness and usefulness to his
fellow men; although before that time he had become connected
with some important institutions. He was elected a manager of
the Pennsylvania Hospital, in 1785, in the place of George Mifflin,
deceased. Of this institution he became an active and conscien-
tious supporter, serving in various offices, devoting his time to its
prosperity, and never failing in readiness to answer every demand
for his assistance. His fellow managers testified their sense of his
services, in 1812, by electing him President of the Board, which
office he was afterwards compelled to resign, upon account of phy-

194 BIOGRAPHIES OF

sical infirmity, after forty-one years of unremitting attention to
the interests of the Hospital. His portrait, by Sully, is in the
possession of the institution, and honor well merited by his many
years of devotion to the interests of the afflicted.

A service nearly as long as that given to the hospital was ex-
tended by Samuel Coates to the body entitled " The Overseers of
the Public Schools, founded by charter in the town and county of
Philadelphia;" which body was the ruling authority managing
what were called "the Quaker Schools," so long located on Fourth
street, below Chestnut. Mr. Coates was nominated and appointed
to be an "Overseer" in 1786, and resigned his position in 1823,
after a service of thirty-seven years.

In 1800 he was elected a Director of the first Bank of the United
States, and served in the Board with Thos. Willing, the President,
Elias Boudinot, Samuel Breck, Archibald McCall, Wm. Bingham,
Robert Smith, Isaac Wharton, Thos. Ewing, Jeremiah Parker, and
others. The first Bank of the United States was managed on very
different principles from the second. It was one of the few bank-
ing corporations in the country which ever wound up successfully
on the expiration of the term for which it was chartered; all its
debts were paid; the stock was paid in full, and in the end — about
1811 — every stockholder, beside his annual dividend, received
$197.42 for every $100 invested. Mr. Coates' ideas of banking
were prudent, and if followed at this day could not result in any-
thing but a successful issue. His maxims on the subject were as
follows :

1. A bank cannot bear the shadow of suspicion.

2. A bank is created to facilitate commerce, and has nought to
exist for any other purpose. [When these opinions were uttered,
manufactures had not become as important as they now are. The
addition of "manufactures" to "commerce" would at this time
meet the theory of Mr. Coates.]

3. The proper check on the imprudent management of a bank
consists in a decline of the market value of its stock.

4. No reasonable man will give money for the stock of a bank
at any price at all, if it be used for any other purpose than faci-
litating commerce [or manufactures.]

5. Or if it be at a place that is not commercial [or a manufac-
turing centre].

6. Or if its capital is out of proportion to the business of the
place,

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 195

7. Or if it meddles with politics.

8. Or if there be a, politician in the board of directors.

These apothegms were vindicated by Mr. Coates when the second
bank of the United States was chartered. He refused to subscribe
for its stock, and said that its capital, $35,000,000, was, in 1816, " out
of all proportion to the business of the country, and out of all rea-
son." He said "that nothing but trouble would come out of it,"
and history has shown that he understood exactly what he was
endeavoring to impress upon others.

Mr. Coates was Treasurer of the Philadelphia Library Company
from 1784 until 1824, when he withdrew, in consequence of age
and infirmity.

His career as a merchant was influenced by his philanthropic
exertions. His business, at one time prosperous, was neglected,
and dwindled away ; and when he finally gave up his affairs, he
had but sufficient to pay his debts and leave a small competence,
where he could have realized a handsome fortune, had he devoted
to himself that attention and service which he gave to others.

Mr. Coates was married in 1775 to Lydia Saunders, by whom
he had four children : John Eeynell Coates, Hannah Coates, Joseph
Saunders Coates, and Lydia Coates, and three who died in infancy.
After a union of thirteen years his wife died, in 1789. In 1791 he
married Amy Homer, by whom he had three children : Samuel
Horner Coates, Benj. Homer Coates, and Eeynell Coates — the two
latter afterwards becoming physicians. B. H. Coates now resides
at the northwest corner of Seventh and Spruce, and Reynell Coates
resides at Camden, N. J.

Samuel Coates died June 4, 1830, at the age of eighty-one
years, nine months and twenty-two days, after a life which was,
perhaps, more useful as a citizen than as a merchant; but after a
career which was honorable and useful in his public and private
relations.

CHARLES S. BOKER.

THE business of banking is, in this country, an accidental pur-
suit, which rarely demands the attention of persons who are

196 BIOGRAPHIES OF

charged with financial trusts before they are inducted into posi-
tions which involve grave responsibilities. In Europe, the private
banker is usualy brought up to his profession, and instructed in
its doctrines and practices at an early age. He grows up to under-
stand that banking is a science, and learns every day the important
lesson that rash self-confidence cannot be permitted to control inte-
rests which are vast and important. But in the United States the
prevalence of corporations, and the advantages to be gained from
associate effort in the employment of capital, have made public
banking all popular, and have, therefore, in a measure reduced the
science of finance to an accomplishment which is to be acquired
only when necessity actually arises. How much this system has
contributed towards the instability of American banks ; howT many
of the disasters which have in times past overwhelmed the banks
and the community are to be ascribed to a policy which makes
the most popular stockholder a director, and the most popular
director president of the ban ij how many blunders have been
made by city bank officers who have come from the counting-
house or factory into the director's room ; and, how many serious
and expensive mistakes have, in the country, been made by bank
presidents who have left the plough to take their seats at the head
of the board, we shall not stop to inquire. There have been serious
losses by the loose system of bank organization which has been
prevalent throughout the country ; and yet, it is fair to say that
there have been occasions when, among a number of stockholders
there has been happily found one man by whom financial princi-
ples seemed to be perfectly well understood, and who has wielded
the interests entrusted to him with care and success.

In presenting the name of Charles S. Boker, we shall instance a
case in which one who had previously conducted commercial
affairs, closed his life by a long and successful financial career at
the head of one of our institutions, which by previous mismanage-
ment had been brought to the verge of insolvency.

On the nineteenth of January, 1797, Charles S. Boker was born
in the city of Philadelphia, at No. 98 South Water street, where his
father, Aaron Boker, a tailor, carried on his business. When
Charles was about four years old his father removed from Water
street to No. 134 South Front, where he still pursued his sartorial
occupation. This avocation was shortly after given up, arid in
1807 Aaran Boker was an " iron monger" at No. 12 South Second
street, and still later a general "merchant" at the same place.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 197

The means of Aaron Boker were not extensive, and all that he
could do for his children was to ensure them the rudiments of a
good English education. To obtain this benefit Charles was sent,
at a proper age, to "Benny Tucker," a schoolmaster well known
to the people of the last generation, and still remembered by some
who are yet living. Mr. Tucker had been a merchant before the
year 1800, but having been unsuccessful in business, necessity made
a teacher, an occupation which his fine" acquirements rendered easy
to him. At No. 98 Arch street Master Tucker governed his young
pupils, and there young Boker obtained all the education which
the schools ever gave him.

At the age of fifteen he was inducted into the busy scenes of
active life, and he commenced his experience in his father's store..
Three years later he assumed greater responsibilities in another
establishment, and in consequence of the absence of the head of
the house was entrusted with the sole management of the busi-
ness. From the year 1815 until the year 1821, Mr. Boker directed
the interests entrusted to him, and in that time he attained a
promptitude of decision, and an excellence of judgment which were
of the utmost importance to him in after years. He first went into
business upon his own account at No. 32 Church alley, and there
established a " domestic coffee warehouse." He tried that experi-
ment for four years, and then relinquished the pursuit. In 1825
he was established at No. 12 North Fourth street, in a " leghorn
store." In 1828 he was in the -same business at No. 27 North Se-
cond street, and he remained there for nine years, by the end of
which time, he added to the leghorn and straw hat business
the shoe business, which now seems to be indissolubly united to
the former. As his customers increased, and his profits accumu-
lated, Mr. Boker made various investments from time to time.
Among other enterprises to which he appropriated his money, the
purchase of bank stock attracted his attention. To this circum-
stance is to be attributed his connection with the Girard Bank,
which association afterwards became of vast importance to him-
self and to the institution. Holding a large quantity of stock, he
was soon chosen by his fellow members to discharge the responsi-
ble duties of director. A faithful attention to the duties of that
situation, and a close observation of the method in which business
had been carried on in the bank gave him so many advantages,
that in the hour of trouble he was considered by his associate

198 BIOGRAPHIES OF

directors the most proper person in the board to assume the ma-
nagement of its financial affairs.

We do not intend to write a history of the Grirard Bank at this
time. It is only necessary to say that its misfortunes dated from
an early period after its charter. Its officers were either good na-
tured or imprudent. They made large and injudicious loans, and
in a few years the means of the institution was very much restrict-
ed. When, therefore, the extraordinary commercial revulsions
happened which shook the firmest banks in the Union, the " Gi-
rard" had no strength of its own to resist the pressure. In the
course of these financial troubles the bank had not only to suspend
payment, but to make an assignment. It was at this period of
gloom, when the stockholders had abandoned all hope, that Mr.
Boker was called upon to pilot the shattered bank to some safe
part of the strand, where, whilst abandoning ship and cargo, the
crew might escape from the wreck. It was a forlorn hope that he
undertook to lead. An entire- recovery of the stock and capital
was deemed impossible; all that was asked of the new president
was that he should prevent the losses from increasing. It was a
gloomy task which he undertook, but he resolved if possible to
lighten the prospects of all who were interested. He applied him-
self assiduously to the business of the bank. He succeeded in ex-
tricating a portion of the capital. He managed to surmount the
legal difficulties which surrounded the subject, and after the bank
had been given up as irrevocably dead it was miraculously revived,
and placed once more in the current of business.

Nor was this all. Under the steady management of Mr. Boker
the bank regained gradually the confidence of the community.
Business came back to it ; its capital slowly increased, and still
managed by the same care and fidelity, it has assumed as solid a
position as many institutions which have had much better luck
during their corporate existence.

On the tenth day of February, 1858, Mr. Boker died, surviving
his beloved wife but five weeks. Grief for the loss of one who had
been for many years his counsellor, companion and friend, has-
tened his last sickness, and sent him to rejoin the blessed one in
another world.

PHILADELPHIA MEECHANTS. 199

THOMAS MIFFLIN.

IN a period of general excitement, (June, 1868,) when the
State of Pennsylvania is, for the first time in eighty-six years,
made the scene of hostile invasion — upon a day, too, sacred
to great memories — and a time when our own merchants are
shouldering their muskets to meet the invaders of the soil,
it wTill not be improper to slightly vary from the general plan
of these papers, by a sketch of a Philadelphia merchant, who
gave up the counting-room for the battle-field, laid down the pen
and took up the sword, and after a series of eminent service in the
field, became equally renowned in high position as a statesman.

Thomas Mifflin was a descendant of an old Philadelphia family
which was attached to the society of Friends. At the time of his
birth, in the year 1744, it could scarcely have been imagined that
the quiet Quaker child, so straight laced and sedate, would ever
become a Major General in an army, or the Governor of his native
state. His parents designed him for the quiet pursuits of peaceful
life, and they superintended the education which they supposed
would be useful to him. After preliminary studies at the Quaker
school, he was entered as a student at the College of Philadelphia,
wThere he went through the usual course, acquiring a respectable
knowledge of the classic languages, which accomplishment was of
much importance to him in after life. At a proper age he was
placed in the counting-house of William Coleman, of Philadelphia,
a man whom Dr. Franklin said "had the coolest head, the best
heart, and the exactest morals of almost any man he ever met with."
At the age of twenty-one years young Mifflin, having fully accom-
plished himself in those mercantile principles and practices which
were to be learned in Coleman's counting-house, was sent by his
father to Europe, in order to improve his mind and enlarge his
ideas, by the results of foreign travel.

On his return to Philadelphia, Mr. Mifflin entered into business
with a brother, and put into practice the prudential maxims which
he had learned in his boyhood. His bent of mind, however, was
strongly turned toward public affairs, and his talent and manners
recommended him to his fellow-citizens as a fit trustee of the public

200 BIOGKAPHIES OP

interests. He had taken some part in the discussions in regard to the
policy of the British government, which were arousing the feelings
of the colonists, and his efforts were always upon the patriotic
side. His opinions entitled him to the respect of his fellow citi-
zens, and accordingly, in 1772, he was elected a Burgess Represen-
tative of the city of Philadelphia, in the General Assembly of
Pennsylvania. His course in the Legislature met with the appro-
val of his constitents, and once more, in the succeeding year, he
was again returned to represent the city, having a colleague in Dr.
Benjamin Franklin. In 1774, his energy, eloquence and steadfast
devotion to the rights of the people, were rewarded by his election
to the first Continental Congress.

In April, 1775, news of the battle of Lexington was received in
Philadelphia. There was great excitement — a town meeting was
called in the State House yard — Mifflin was one of the principal
speakers. His efforts were directed not only to rousing the feel-
ing of the people, but to producing important consequences. He
said, (and the advice might be repeated at the present day,) " Let
us not be bold in declaration, and afterwards cold in action. Let
not the patriotic feelings of to-day be forgotten to-morrow, nor
have it said of Philadelphia that she passed noble resolutions and
afterwards neglected them." This advice he followed up by sug-
gesting the formation of companies and regiments, and the intro-
duction of daily drills. His fellow citizens followed his advice,
and the young Quaker was introduced to military life by being
elected Major of one of the new regiments. But his active spirit
was unsatisfied with the mere routine of the city militia. The seat
of war was at that time distant from his home, but resolved upon
active service, he sought the American camp at Boston. His first
field service was at the skirmish at Lechmire's Point, where he
had command of a party which repelled the British regulars with
bravery and success.

After this, he took upon himself the discharge of the duties of
the Quartermaster General's Department, which had been pre-
viously undertaken by General Stephen Moylan, but which, under
the management of that officer, had become very much confused.
It required a mercantile mind to properly conduct this important
branch of the army organization, and, in General Milflin, the right
man for the place was found. He was soon after commissioned 'a
Brigadier General.

In 1776, matters looked very gloomy throughout the United Co-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 201

lonies, and the patriot cause was so much despaired of, that calls
upon the country for troops were answered coldly and unwillingly.
The state of Pennsylvania was deficient in her quota, and as a
means of rousing the people, Gen. Mifflin, with his fine manner
and eloquent tongue, was sent through the state to address the
people in town and county meetings, and to arouse their slumber-
ing patriotism. In this mission he was very successful. He was en-
thusiastically received, and he accomplished much towards blowing
up the dying embers into a blaze. For this service, and for his
devotion to the cause, he received from Congress, in February,
1777, the commission of a Major General. He was still attached
to the Quartermaster's Department, and, having a very responsible
position, and the clashing interests of the States and Congress to
harmonize, he fell under the censure which scarcely any occupant
of this department can escape. Congress, for a time, withdrew
its confidence from him. A committee of inquiry was appointed
to examine his conduct in the Quartermaster's Department, a com-
mittee which made no inquiry or report, and the injustice of whose
appointment was finally atoned for by the passage of a resolution
of thanks, by Congress, in 1780, to Gen. Mifflin, for his " wise and
salutary plans of retrenchment of the general expenses."

The greatest blot upon Gen. Mifflin's military career was the
part which he took in the " Conway Cabal," to displace Gen. Wash-
ington, and appoint Gen. Gates Commander-in-Chief. This con-
spiracy failed in its object, and although Gen. "Washington never
liked those who were engaged in it, he generously stifled his own
feelings, out of regard to the public interests, upon the subsequent
employment, by Congress, of the officers conspicuous in the plot.

After the conclusion of the Revolutionary War, Gen. Mifflin was
elected, in 1783, a member of Congress, and in November of that
year he became the President of that body, and had the honor of
receiving from Gen. Washington the resignation of the great power
with which he had been invested. He was a member of the Penn-
sylvania Legislature in 1785, and in 1788 was a member of the
Supreme Executive Council of Pennsylvania, of which important
body he soon became President, and Governor de facto of the
State. After that he was elected a member of the Convention to
form the Federal Constitution, and took a leading part in that
august body. Immediately afterwards he was appointed to the
Convention to form a new Constitution for the state of Pennsyl-
vania, and he was elected its President. To this succeeded his

202 BIOGRAPHIES OF

highest civil honor. He was the first Governor of Pennsylvania
elected under the Constitution, and he held this seat by three suc-
cessive elections, from 1790 until 1799, passing through, in that
time, the anxieties of the epidemics of 1793, 1798 and 1799, the
responsibilities thrown upon him by the " Whiskey Insurrection"
of 1794, and also.the war with France of 1799. Having faithfully
discharged these great duties, and having returned to private life,
but few months were vouchsafed to him for that enjoyment. He
died at Lancaster, the twenty-fourth of January, 1800, being then
a member of the Legislature of Pennsylvania.

He was the only merchant who in Pennsylvania ever attained
to the glory of the epauletts or to high civil honors. As such, his
name is worthy of remembrance, and his example should at this
time be considered a proud inheritance by those merchants and
business men who are called upon to protect and defend their native
state and native city.

SAMUEL BISPHAM.

WE only begin to appreciate the immense value of the trade of
Philadelphia when we descend to details, and estimate the amount
of each item that goes to swell the enormous aggregate. When
we find that of groceries alone our city now sells to the Western
country about fifty millions of pounds per annum, and to the South
many millions of pounds more, and consider that this is but a
single wave of that great stream of internal commerce of which
the busy metropolis is the fountain head, we gain a tolerable con-
ception of the mighty interests involved, and the multiplied source
of our wealth. The wholesale grocers of Philadelphia now occupy
a commanding position among the business men of the Union.
Taking advantage of the peculiar facilities enjoyed by this city
for the concentration and distribution of the various articles that
enter into this branch of trade, they have steadily widened the
circle of their transactions, cultivated intimate relations with
dealers in the most distant part of the country, and exhibited tact
and energy that could not fail to ensure a large and very profitable
traffic.

Among them may be found men of unsurpassed ability as mer-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 203

chants, and also public-spirited citizens, who manifest a lively
interest in every project that promises to advance the prosperity
and influence of the community in which they live. Several of
our leading grocers furnish remarkable examples of indomitable
industry, steady self-reliance and sagacious management, and we
select one of their number as the subject of the ensuing biographi-
cal sketch.

Samuel Bispham is known to the majority of our business men
as the head of the house of Samuel Bispham & Sons, wholesale grocers
and commission merchants. But the antecedents of the successful
merchant and respected citizen, may not be so familiar to those
who are so ready to honor him on account of the high social sta-
tion he has attained. He was born in the year 1796, in a house
located on Market street, below Second. His father was a hatter,
and in moderate circumstances. In 1798 Philadelphia was visited
by that terrible scourge the yellow fever. A panic pervaded the
city; all who could find means to leave the infected locality de-
parted in haste, as if death were in pursuit. The elder Bispham
took his family to a farm near Moorestown, New Jersey, where he
remained until his demise in 1808. While yet a small child, young
Samuel was sent to market with produce, and we are informed
that it was while vending butter, eggs, &c., in the midst of the
bustle of Market street, that he adopted a resolution to become a
merchant. He seems to have possessed a natural aptness for trade.
The death of his father threw the poor lad on his own resources,
and in the year 1808, he succeeded in getting a situation as errand
boy in the grocery store of Mr. William Carman, on Market street,
above Front. There he remained until the year 1810, when he
went to the grocery store of Mr, John Snyder, on Market street,
below Ninth. At this period the trade between Philadelphia and
the Western country commenced to assume importance. The
traffic was carried on by means of the great lumbering conestoga
wagons, and transportation was extremely slow and expensive.
Among the prominent houses at that time were Henry Pratt,
Simon & Hiram Gratz, Paul Beck, Levi Taylor, Guyer & Diehl,
Clark & Greiner, Eobert Fleming, Homer & Wilson, Matthew
Baxter, Samuel & Aaron Denman, Hamilton & Wood, Robert To-
land, and Peter Lex. Mr. Snyder was engaged in this trade, and
young Bispham had ample opportunities for learning its mystery
and appreciating its difficulties, while serving an apprenticeship as
book-keeper and salesman. Always nursing his ambition to achieve

204 BIOGRAPHIES OF

to high position in the business world, the young man economized
his earnings and cultivated habits of attention, promptitude and
industry, so that when, in 1815, he determined to try his own
wings, he had a small capital, excellent qualifications, and consi-
derable experience to strengthen his confidence.

He chose for a partner Mr. Jacob Alter, a gentleman still living,
and ranking as one of our most u solid" citizens. The firm opened
a store at Ko. 825 Market street. They entered vigorously into the
trade with the interior and the West, and were so successful that it
was said there was scarcely a house upon the great road between
Philadelphia and Pittsburg, in which the firm of Alter & Bispham
was not known • their traffic even extended to some points beyond
the western boundary of Pennsylvania. The young merchants
Were industriously pursuing the path of fortune, when a crisis in
monetary affairs suddenly threatened to darken their prospects
and overwhelm them with ruin. From 1819 until 1821 inclusive,
the commercial depression was wide-spread and disastrous; the
country customers of Messrs Alter & Bispham made but few pay-
ments. During this gloomy period, and while the affairs of the
firm were in a desperate condition, Mr. Bispham determined to go
upon a tour of collection in person. He was compelled to go upon
horseback by the necessities of the time, and thus, alone, he jour-
neyed as far as Pittsburg. The traveler who now accomplishes the
sanle distance within twelve hours, will smile upon learning that Mr.
Bispham did not reach his final destination until about three weeks
after he left Philadelphia. But the result of this arduous tour were
eminently satisfactory. Upon reaching Pittsburg Mr. Bispham
found that he had collected a sum sufficient to meet all the obliga-
tions of the firm. The money was immediately forwarded to Phi-
ladelphia, and with this timely assistance the house was enabled
to maintain a good standing, whilst almost every other firm on
Market street was prostrated or totally ruined. Mr. Bispham's
reputation for energy and business talent was greatly enhanced
by this astonishing performance.

Alter & Bispham continued to prosper and to enlarge their
sphere of business operations until 1830, when the senior partner
retired, and Mr. Bispham took the business entirely under his own
control. During the fifteen years of their association, these enter-
prising merchants were distinguished for their rigid fidelity to all
engagements, successful management and liberal spirit. Mr. Alter
subsequently became interested in coal lands, and from these he

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 205

now receives a very heavy income. In 1833 Mr. Bispham pur-
chased the building now designated at No. 629 Market street, be-
low Seventh, and moved his establishment to that structure, where
he has remained until the present day. In 1851 Mr. Samuel A.
and John S. Bispham was taken into partnership, and the style of
the firm was changed to Samuel Bispham & Sons, as it is still
known.

The subject of this sketch is now about sixty-eight years of age.
His life has been one of toil and intelligent enterprise. He is
the oldest grocer in Philadelphia, having been engaged in this
branch of trade about fifty-one years. Of all the grocery houses
that existed here at the time Mr. Bispham began business 'upon his
own account, not one is left. Mr. Bispham is the patriarch, the
chief representative, and the luminous example in his department
of traffic. The dreams of the poor boy while selling Jersey pro-
duce in our commercial avenue have been more than realized.
Honest application, determined energy, skilful management, and
unswerving integrity have, in this instance, been duly honored and
largely rewarded.

Mr. Bispham has been too much absorbed in his private affairs
to allow of his participating actively in movements of public con-
cern. He has never "dabbled in the dirty pool of politics,"
although he is careful to exercise the privilege of a freeman in sup-
port of what he conceives to be conservative principles and con-
servative men. He has been a Director of the Bank of Penn
Township, to which institution he was one of the original subscri-
bers. He has also faithfully discharged his duties as a member of
the Board of Managers of the Schuylkill Navigation Company,
and a Director of the Reliance Insurance Company, in both of
which he is largely interested. But his modesty and retiring dis-
position have deterred him from accepting positions of public trust
which he could have commanded at any time, Religiously he is
tolerant, and free from any shade of sectarian bigotry. He is also
a generous and charitable man; one who gives to the poor with a
bountiful hand, without having his donations trumpeted in the
street, or glaring from the columns of the press. Socially, he is
very genial and pleasant, and his conversation evinces great prac-
tical sense, quiek observation and cautious judgment. No Phila-
delphian's name has been current in business circles for a longer
series of years, and we know of none that can claim a greater de-
gree of respect.

206 BIOGRAPHIES OF

LAWEEJSTCE PETEESON.

IN certain characteristics which help to make up the character
of a successful merchant, the late Lawrence Peterson stood promi-
nent among his brethren, and at his death the community suffered
a severe loss — a loss which has not yet been made good, so far as
our experience extends. Mr. Peterson was a native of Philadel-
phia, and was born in 1816. In early years he struggled with pe-
cuniary difficulties, and manly breasted the tide of life which
seemed then to set against him. When a youth he entered the
silk and dry goods establishment of John M. Whitall, in Market
street, east of Third, near the site of the old Commercial Bank.
Here he rose, as his abilities became tested, and formed associa-
tions which made him prominent and unusually successful in after
life. Subsequently he became a member of the silk house of Yard,
Gillmore & Co., taking the financial department of their extensive
business, and managing it with great skill until his death in
1862. This firm was located for many years in Market street.
Subsequently they removed to Third street, below Arch, where
they remained until a few years since, when their warehouse was
badly damaged by fire. They then removed to their present loca-
tion, in one of Dr Jayne's beautiful marble-fronted stores on the
north side of Chestnut street, above Sixth. They were the first
wholesale silk firm which moved into Chestnut street. Mr. Peter-
son had the arrangement of the new Chestnut street store made
under his own eye ; but the firm had hardly got into the successful
tide of their operations there before Mr. Peterson was carried
away by consumption, his death taking place at midnight of April
1, 1862. Since that period Mr. Gillmore, another partner of the
same firm, has also deceased.

Mr. Peterson's talents as a financier were remarkable. They
enabled him to outride all financial storms, and would have quali-
fied him for success in public life, if his taste had led him in that
direction. Few men were so intelligent and comprehensive in re-
gard to everything which entered into the questions which are
ever settling themselves in regard to the business of the whole
country. He never confused one with whom he was conversing

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 207

on these subjects with the technics of political economy; but with
a singularly transparent clearness he would state all that any one
knew touching the principles and facts of the whole matter, and
frankly point out the precise point where his information stopped.
We have known him, months before a given result in regard to
business occurred, clearly to state it as the inevitable development
of causes then in operation. We have known him to state the
minute as well as general principles that would regulate the busi-
ness of a fall or spring season not yet reached. He had, in short,
a thorough business talent ; a judgment singularly sound, and an
acuteness that saw through all false appearances to the bottom of
the actual facts of every case. While industrious to a fault, over-
tasking his delicate constitution, and thoroughly attentive to his
business, Mr. Peterson was unambitious beyond that point. Never
was anything more orderly and even elegant than his store, his
house, his grounds, and everything with which he was concerned.
But beyond this he seemed disinclined to go. He took but little
part in politics, in public institutions or entertainments, and even
confined his social life to within a limited circle. Yet he was well
qualified for enjoyment and success in all these ways. Of a rather
slight build, elegant figure, with a keen eye, a bright mind and a
kindling intellect, he was one never seen without attracting atten-
tion. His opinion carried weight with it. His presence had in
it a peculiar charm. Mr. Peterson was a singularly brave man ;
in the entire battle of life his moral courage was most conspi-
cuous. He "took the responsibility/' habitually, and in the
fine language of an English writer, " seized the purposes of
others and threw them forward in his own direction." Nobody
ever dreamed, after knowing him even for a short time, that Law-
rence Peterson would flinch from anything, and when his mind
was made up, no one that knew him well ever thought of trying
to alter it.

For a number of years, Mr. Peterson contended with the disease
which finally carried him off; but he fought it so resolutely that
his friends hardly thought he would ground arms to it at last.
Nearly a score of years since, he went in company with a robust
and hearty friend to have his life insured. The insurance agent
declined to take the risk of Mr. Peterson's life, but insured his
robust friend. Within a year the latter died, while Mr. Peterson
lived to tell the story eighteen years afterwards, in the parlor of
his elegant residence on Girard avenue. In religion he was a Pres-
byterian. He connected himself with the Presbyterian Church in

208 BIOGRAPHIES OF

Arch street, then under the care of Dr. Skinner, from which he
went to the Clinton street church, under Drs. Todd, Parker and
Darling; and at last, settling himself in a beautiful place on Green
Hill, he joined the latter congregation. His piety was not demon-
strative. He abhorred — the word is not too strong — all cant ; he
could bear no shadow of humbug; he could listen to nothing but
the truth on all subjects, theoretical and practical. He was the
same in his religion, which he supported not only in sentiment but
by liberal and frequent pecuniary contributions to all objects con-
nected with the denomination to which he wras attached. At his
death he was sincerely mourned by the entire neighhorhood, and
at his funeral, at Laural Hill, four distinguished clergymen them-
selves lowered the coffin into the grave, to testify their deep respect
for his memory.

Lawrence Peterson was a brother of Charles J. Peterson, the
accomplished author and editor of Peterson's Magazine. Theophi-
lus B. Peterson, the head of the publishing house of T. B. Peter-
son & Brothers, and a most estimable gentleman, is also his bro-
ther, the firm having originally consisted of T. B., George, (since
deceased), and Thomas. The entire family possesses business ta-
lents of the first order, and have been remarkably successful. The
volumes issued by T. B. Peterson & Brothers, are known and read
in every household in the land, and their business seems to increase
with each year. They issue not only light literature, but editions
of standard works which adorn thousands of libraries in all parts
of the country ; and in analyzing the characteristics of Lawrence
Peterson, we think we give a very fair idea of the peculiarities of
the entire family. Having been mainly the architects of their own
fortunes, the bold, strong traits of their disposition have been
brought into clear relief, and we confess that we like to describe
those robust mental traits by which men rise to eminence in any
walk of life.

We cannot close this notice without referring to Mr. Whitall,
who is a most successful merchant. He was born near Woodbury,
~N. J., and was formerly captain of the ship " New Jersey," owned
by the late Whitton Evens, engaged in the West India and East
India shipping business. Mr. Evans failed, and died in rather in-
digent circumstances. Mr. Whitall afterwards engaged in mer-
cantile pursuits, and is said to be quite wealthy. He is now of the
firm of Whittall & Tatum, Nos. 408 and 410 Eace street, largely
engaged in the glassware trade, and have extensive glassworks in
New Jersey.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 209

BENJAMIN W. RICHARDS.

IN the long succession of Mayors of the City of Philadelphia,
extending from the year 1701 until 1863, the proportion of mer-
chants is small. Before the Revolution, when men of business
talents were required, and the Recorder was the law officer of the
city, there were many mercantile men who were elected to the
office of Mayor. Among them may be specified Richard Hill,
Mayor in 1709, William Fishbourne in 1721, Clement Plumstead in
1736 and 1750, and Thomas Willing, elected in 1765. For the last
forty years the lawyers seem to have preference in the Mayoralty,
there being during that time but three Mayors not lawyers by
profession, viz: — Robert Wharton, Joseph Watson, and Benjamin
W. Richards. It is manifest that in these times a good lawyer is
better suited for the Mayoralty than a civilian, who, whatever his
administrative capacity, must be ignorant of many legal doctrines
which, in the conduct of municipal affairs, need frequent and
prompt application.

Benjamin W. Richards was the last merchant Mayor of the city
of Philadelphia, and to the very successful public and private
career of that gentleman we shall devote this sketch. Mr. Rich-
ards had the advantage of being born to the possession of wealth,
which placed him, at the proper time, in position to use his talents
to advantage. He first saw the light at Batsto Iron* Works, Bur-
lington county, New Jersey, in the year 1797. His father, William
Richards, was the proprietor of the extensive furnace and forges
at that place. He was a man of wealth and social influence in
New Jersey, and an extensive land owner. He had the means to
ensure to his son a splendid education, and the natural aptitude of
young Benjamin enabled him to make rapid progress in his studies.
He was sent in his early boyhood to New Brunswick, where he
was placed under the charge of the Rev. Mr. Dunham. He pro-
gressed rapidly under the instructions of that gentleman, and was
at the Freshman age perfectly qualified for admission to the col-
lege at Princeton. Here he was an earnest student, and graduated
with all the honors when he was nineteen years old. At that time
he was distinguished by his religious principles, his interest in that

210 BIOGKAPHIES OF

subject having been awakened by the preaching and instruction
of the Rev. Dr. Alexander. He was desirous of studying for the
ministry, and was ready to prepare himself for the important
office. But his health being delicate it was considered important
that he should take means to recruit his constitution. His seden-
tary life had weakened his strength, and traveling was prescribed
as the best restorative. He accordingly left Batsto for the South-
ern states. Through this region of country he traveled extensively
on horseback, stopping at towns and partaking of the hospitalities
of the planters. From the South he struck towards the "West, and
he traversed many parts of the country which were then wild and
uncultivated, but which are now the garden spots of the Union.
When he returned to his home, in the year 1818, he had thoroughly
renovated his health, and his body had assumed those splendid
proportions which in after years distinguished him as one of the
finest looking men in our city. It was then determined that he
should embark in mercantile pursuits; and although he had never
had the experience or training deemed necessary for the successful
business man, he had capital sufficient to command a connection
with those who had acquired a full knowledge of the principles of
trade by patient service.

Upon his coming to this city the opportunity was not long
wanting. He formed a partnership with Jesse Grodley in the year
1819, and the firm of Grodley & Eichards was established at No. 53
Market street, at which place Mr. Grodley had been previously
located. In this firm Mr. Eichards continued for about three years.
How much longer he would have remained with Mr. Grodley it is
not now necessary to enquire. His course of life was altered by
one of those important events which exercise a great influence
upon the destinies of every man. In his social intercourse with
the best society in the city, he met with a beautiful and amiable
young lady, the daughter af Joshua Lippincott, of the firm of J.
& W. Lippincott & Co., auctioneers and commission merchants.
He was fortunate in winning the esteem and love of this lady, and
his marriage soon afterwards brought him into a situation which
induced him to change his business interests. He was admitted a
member of the firm of Lippincott & Co. about the year 1823.

This house was at that time one of the largest and most success-
ful auction and commission establishments of Philadelphia, and as
that business has a history, some allusion to it will be interesting.
Before the American Eevolution the office of " Yendue Master" of

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 211

the city of Philadelphia was considered a proprietary franchise,
which was conferred by the executive authority of the colony
upon special favorites. When the opposition to Great Britain had
assumed such formidable proportions that the proprietary authority
was abolished, there were numerous persons who were ready to
avail themselves of the absence of all laws regulating auctions and
auctioneers. It was soon discovered that these voluntary vendue
masters were injurious to the public interests. Being under no re-
straint they were convenient means for the disposal of stolen goods,
and the frequency of their sales was considered an evil by shop-
keepers and merchants, whose customers were attracted from the
regular course of trade to the vendue rooms. This evil was in due
time repressed by the re-establishment of regulations for the license
of vendue masters, and at a later time, when peace was re-establish-
ed, laws were passed providing for the licensing of a certain number
of auctioneers in the city and county of Philadelphia. Later
legislation has thrown the business opsn to any one who will pay
for the license and engage to make faithful returns of the commis-
sions on sales which were exacted by the state. The firm of J. £
W. Lippincott, which was superceeded by Lippincott & Blchards,
was in direct descent, if we may use that term in a business sense,
from the oldest of these post-revolutionary auction houses. In
the year 1797 Peter Benson was a regularly licensed vendue master
of the city of Philadelphia, established at 'No, 74 South Third
street. In 1799 Samuel Yorke, who had been brought up by
Eichard Footman, a famous vendue master in his day, went into
partnership with Benson as auctioneers, and the firm was Benson
& Yorke. They were established at 39 North Front street. When
Mr. Benson retired from business, about 1802, Joshua Lippincott
became a partner with Samuel Yorke, and Yorke & Lippincott
continued the business at No. 51 North Front street. Mr. Yorke
made money in this connection, and the fine row of houses — con-
sidered very splendid in their time — extending from Washington
Square to Eighth street, on the south side of Walnut street, and
still called " Yorke Kow," was built from his profits in this busi-
ness. When Mr. Yorke died, Joshua Humes succeeded to his place
in the firm, and Humes & Lippincott was established.

In 1822 Joshua & William Lippincott carried on the business at
No. 34 South Front street. About the year 1823, Benjamin W.
Richards became a member of the company, and shortly afterward,
by the retirement of William Lippincott, the firm became Lippin-

212 BIOGRAPHIES OF

cott & Eichards — being composed of Joshua Lippincott, and his
son-in-law Benjamin W. Richards. When the senior member of
the firm retired from business, Mr. Eichards associated with him
Joseph Bispham, about the year 1836, and the firm of Eichards &
Bispham was kept up until the death of Benjamin "W. Eichards in
1852. His son, Benjamin W. Eichards, Jr., succeeded him, and
shortly afterward the firm of Eichards & Miller was established.
The latter has since been dissolved, and Samuel C. Cook carries on
a business which has been continued and transferred from the time
of Peter Benson until the present period, during the changes of
sixty-six years.

Mr. Eichards having had a fine education, and possessing strong
natural talent, soon became distinguished in public affairs. He
was nominated for the Legislature as early as 1821, upon an inde-
pendent ticket, but was defeated. He was, however, a few years
afterwards, elected to the State Senate from the city, and in 1827
to the House of Eepresentatives of Pennsylvania by the Demo-
cratic party. His care, attention and talent in these positions at-
tracted the confidence of his constituents; and, in 1829, when the
office of Mayor was made vacant by the resignation of George M.
Dallas, he was elected to fill the vacancy. Mr. Millnor succeeded
him for the official year 1829-30. Mr. Eichards was elected for
the full term 1830-31.

He was so far suceessful that an association was formed by Na-
than Dunn, John J. Smith, Frederick Brown, Isaac Collins, and
himself. They bought the beautiful country seat at Laurel Hill,
which had last been occupied by John J. Eodriguez, and establish-
ed there the celebrated "Laurel Hill Cemetery," which, as apiece
of property, now divides an immense revenue among its very few
owners.

As a member and Manager of the Deaf and Dumb Asylum, and
as one of the founders of the Blind Asylum, Benjamin W. Eichards
has proved his benevolence of heart.

In literary institutions he was equally active. He was a member
of the American Philosophical Society, and a Trustee of the Uni-
versity of Pennsylvania, and he was one of the first Directors of
the Girard College elected by the City Councils.

The Girard Life and Trust Company was an institution of which
Mr. Eichards had a large share in developing the system and po-
licy. This company was in some respects a novelty. Life insu-
rance had been well understood, and concerning that branch of the

PHILADELPHIA MEKCHANTS. 213

business there was little to be settled beyond the exercise of that
prudence and promptitude which are necessary at all times for
success. But thsre was engrafted upon this corporation, by the
exertions of Mr. Richards, something new in corporations, a power
to execute trusts and act as fiduciary agents, a sort of confidence
which before that time could only be conferred by individuals upon
individuals. A corporation trustee was a novelty, but the success
in establishing this company, the integrity of its management,
and the promptitude and satisfactory method employed in its busi-
ness soon drew towards it a large interest. The Judges of the
Orphans' Court, Common Pleas, and District Court of Philadel-
phia county were satisfied with the honesty and fairness of this
corporation, of which Mr. Richards was President, from the time
of its organization until his death. Large sums of money in the
jurisdiction of the Court were ordered to the care of the Company.
These vast and important trusts have been faithfully performed
during the lifetime of Mr. Richards, and since, under the excellent
management of Thomas Ridgway, Esq., and the " Girard Life and
Trust Company" remains amid the wreck of mushroom rivals,
solid, profitable and enduring.

BULLOCK:.

THE wool trade in Philadelphia, from very small beginnings, has
increased to a magnitude of the first importance. Fifty years ago,
it had scarcely an existence as a separate branch of business — now
the annual sales in this city alone are counted by millions of
pounds. The money value of this product has also advanced im-
mensely. Common wool, which before the commencement of the
rebellion never brought more than frOm thirty-three to thirty-five
cents per pound, now sells readily at eighty cents per pound.
The simple addition of the sum, in the transactions of a leading
wool house, reaches an aggregate which is to be computed by mil-
lions of dollars. As a pioneer in this branch of business, the ca-
reer of Benjamin Bullock will furnish some useful details, and
serve to demonstrate the value of perseverence and steady in-
dustry.

214 BIOGRAPHIES OF

Benjamin Bullock was born at Yeadon, near Bradford, in Eng-
land, in the year 1796. His parents were poor, and tie enjoyed
but limited opportunities in acquiring an education during his
youth. At an early age he was placed as an apprentice with a
grocer, at Bradford, and served his time faithfully. Upon arriving
at full age, unlike most young men, he determined to remain in
the old shop. He continued there under small wages, and had no
opportunity to accumulate savings of any great amount. For
twelve years he served faithfully his employer, and continued with
him until the latter died. This event happened about the year
1818, and as testimony of his satisfaction with his faithful assist-
ant, his master left him a legacy of twenty pounds. This small sum
was the commencement of the fortune of Benjamin Bullock. It
placed him in possession of a larger amount of money than he had
ever had before, and it enabled him to put into execution a plan
which it may be reasonably supposed he had long meditated, viz. :
emigration to the United States.

In the year 1815, this young Englishman, then about nineteen
years of age, left the land of his nativity, to seek his fortunes in a
strange country. He was accompanied by Mr. John Hurstler, who
afterwards opened a wool store at No. 36 Church alley. They
were recommended to the care and attention of Joshua Long-
streth, then in fair standing as a merchant in this city. The latter
kindly favored the emigrants with his advice and services. Mr.
Hurstler went into business, as we have said; he had capital. But
Benjamin Bullock, after paying his passage money, had but little
left for business purposes. He resolved to labor and to wait. A
situation was procured for him with Henry Korn, then in business
as a weaver of woolen laces and fringes, and a manufacturer of
military goods, on Third street, above Market. Mr. Bullock com-
menced his career of industry in the United States in Mr. Korn's
establishment as a wool-comber. His experience as a grocer in
England could not have assisted him much in this occupation, but
he was ingenious and observant, and soon became proficient in all
the details of his new calling. So well did he profit by his prac-
tical lessons, that having saved some money, he felt encouraged in
undertaking another branch of the wool business, in a small way.

In 1822, Benjamin Bullock and Anthony Davis associated them-
selves in partnership, as Bullock & Davis, and commenced the bu-
siness of wool pulling, in Front street, above Poplar. Their suc-
cess in this enterprise was so great, that, in 1823, they were en-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 215

couraged to take the store No. 32 North Third street, where they
established themselves as dealers in wool, in connection with M.
Barker, Esq., as agent at Pittsburg, still maintaining their own
wool pulling factory in Front street. Their first invoice from the
West was a lot of three hundred pounds, and their whole sales, for
the first year of their business, was aliout five thousand pounds.
The first consignment of wool from the West was sent to this house.
The extraordinary manner in which this traffic has increased, may
be imagined from the fact .that the successors of Benjamin Bullock
have alone received, used and sold, during eight months of the
present year, (1864,) five millions of pounds of wool.

When Bullock & Davis commenced as wool dealers, in 1822-3,
the principal manufacturers of woolen goods in Philadelphia and
its vicinity, were Dennis Kelly; William Fisher, of German town;
James Kershaw, of Blockley ; James Schofield, of Delaware county;
Jos. Brook, at Eockhill, near Manayunk; and Bethuel Moore, at
Conshohocken. All of these, except Dennis Kelly, are now dead.

By a transition which seems natural, Bullock & Davis, from buy-
ing and selling wool, became manufacturers of woolen goods.
They entered upon this branch of business, in the year 1837, keep-
ing in operation at the same time their wool pulling factory, on
Front street, and their warehouse on Third street. They worked
the " Spruce Street Factory/' near the Schuylkill river, which es-
tablishment is now owned and run by William Divine, who was
the foreman of Bullock & Davis at this mill. Mr. Divine has since
become wealthy, as a mill owner and manufacturer, and now owns
and runs two of the finest mills in the southwestern part of the
city. After the firm of Bullock & Davis relinquished the " Spruce
Street Factory," they transferred their work to the "William
Penn Factory," at Spruce street wharf, on the SchuyMll, about
the year 1840.

In 1841 or 1842, Bullock, Davis & Co., dissolved partnership,
George Simpson being at that time a member of the firm, having
been previously admitted. Mr. Anthony Davis, the retiring part-
ner, lived in honor and respect until 1862, in which year he died.

In 1842, the firm met with its first misfortune. It was obliged
to temporarily suspend payment, in consequence of the failure of
Bancroft & Co., which was indebted to it about $100,000. The en-
ergy of Mr. Bullock enabled him to surmount this misfortune, and
make such arrangements as enabled the house to continue in busi-
ness. Fortunately for all interested, the failure of the Bancrofts

216 BIOGRAPHIES OF

i x

and others was not a permanent one. They recovered from it,
and subsequently paid every dollar of their indebtedness, and are
now quite rich.

In 1842, Charles W. Croasdale was associated with Mr. B. Bul-
lock, although he was not generally known as a partner until
1851. In the latter year, George Bullock, a son, was admitted to
the firm, which was continued as Benjamin Bullock & Co. In
1855, there was a dissolution of partnership, caused by the mis-
conduct of Mr. Croasdale, who had used the name of the firm for
his own purposes, and been guilty of other irregularities. Mr.
Croasdale afterwards became insane, and died in 1856.

A new firm was now formed, consisting of the father and his
two sons, George and Benjamin Bullock, Jr. In the meanwhile,
the manufacturing business of the house was extended. Mr. Bul-
lock bought the " Franklin Mill," in Haydock street, near Front,
and afterwards established a very large factory at Conshohocken,
Montgomery county, which is the largest but one in Pennsylvania,
employing at the present time over two hundred hands.

On the fourth of June, 1859, Mr. Benjamin Bullock died, in the
sixty-third year of his age, having been an occupant of the store "No.
32 North Third street for more than thirty-seven years. He was
an excellent and highly respected citizen, a man of probity and
influence, whose career is a striking example of the advantages of
our institutions. Arriving here at an age which to many who have
not succeeded before, seems hopeless for the commencement of new
enterprises, he was enabled by persevering industry and good ma-
nagement, notwithstanding his losses in business, to leave to his
children a handsome sum, and the more precious legacy of a good
name.

The surviving sons, members of the old firm, wound up their
business, and in time were ready to form a new combination. The
firm of Benjamin Bullock Sons, established in March, 1863, is com-
posed of Benjamin Bullock, George Bullock, Joseph Bullock, Wil-
liam Bullock, and James Bullock. The only remaining son, An-
thony B. Bullock, has been in business in Cincinnati, Ohio, for
nineteen years, but has no interest in the Philadelphia house. Ben-
jamin Bullock Sons now occupy the extensive warehouses Nos. 40
and 42 South Front street, and No. 9 Letitia court.

Benjamin Bullock Sons have, since the commencement of the
rebellion, been largely engaged in manufacturing woolen goods.
The Conshohocken and Haydock street factories are worked by

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 217

them to their full capacity. They make fifty thousand yards of
government kerseys per week. Since the beginning of the war
they have furnished the United States three millions of yards of
kerseys — enough to reach to England — also an immense number of
blankets, and three hundred and fifty thousand yards of blue
cloths. Prices have naturally advanced considerably since 1861 ;
3-4 kerseys, which formerly brought 69 cents per yard, are now
selling at $1.17; army blankets, formerly worth $2 and $2.25 each,
now bring $3.45.

The firm has the advantage of succeeding to a large capital ac-
cumulated by the father, but they have also made much money
during the war — not by extraordinary prices, not by defrauding
the government or the soldiers — but by fair profits, which upon a
small business would not show, but which upon transactions of the
magnitude of those of Bullock Sons, rapidly swell to thousands
upon thousands of dollars. Whilst it is true that they have made
largely by the war, it is also true that they have given freely.
Every charity which has been projected for the benefit of the sick,
wounded and suffering soldiers, has been benefited largely by their
contributions. Every effort to equip troops has been responded to
liberally by them with their voices, their influence, and their dona-
tions. What they have made they have used as trustees to be
liberally paid back to every Cause which is for the benefit of the
country and the perpetuity of the Union.

JOHN B. AUSTIN.

IT is the boast of our country that it has more self-made men
than any other land. In the War of Independence, the voice most
potential in our national councils was that of the shoemaker of
Connecticut, Eoger Sherman. The mere clerk of the West Indies
became the organizer of our government, and the founder of our
financial system, in the person of Alexander Hamilton. Since that
period the greatest and best of our statesmen and generals, the men
who have possessed the largest share of the public confidence,
have been those who have toiled upwards from the school of ad-

218 BIOGRAPHIES OF

versity, and have made themselves famous by dint of honorable
exertion. Look at the mill boy of the Slasher, and the factory
boy in the person of Millard Fillmore; and now we have to
chronicle the career of a man, who, from humble beginning, has
made himself one of the most eminent and successful financiers in
Philadelphia.

John B. Austin is now the President of the Southwark Bank.
He was born in this city. Being of an adventurous disposition, he
went to sea, for the purpose of finding excitement for his restless
spirit, and seeing foreign lands. His ability, as illustrated in a
number of voyages, soon won him the position as second mate of
a vessel. Indeed, it was evident in his case, as it has been in many
others, that those who are born to command or counsel, will not
long remain a hand in the ranks of any service.

Austin returned to this city while yet a minor. He had ma-
naged to acquire a thorough knowledge of book-keeping during
his varied experiences, and he now obtained a situation in the
Southwark Bank, as assistant book-keeper. In this position his
character for fidelity, industry and talent, was so far established
that he was promoted to the post of discount clerk; from this
situation of responsibility he was elevated successively to the
offices of general book-keeper and cashier's clerk. In all these po-
sitions he was remarkable for identifying himself with the interests
of the bank, and laboring strenuously for the advancement of its
rank among the monied institutions in the public esteem. While
Mr. Austin held the position of cashier's clerk, he was offered more
lucrative offices in other banks, whose directors had a high appre-
ciation of his abilities; but he had a thorough understanding of
the old proverb, that a "rolling stone gathers no moss," and was
so intensely devoted to the prosperity of the " old ship," that he
could not be persuaded to leave the institution. Some misunder-
standing having occured, in which Mr. Smith came in conflict with
Mr. J. Sparks, the President, that gentleman was induced to re-
sign, so that the subject of this sketch might be retained, and he
was then promoted to the responsible position of cashier. Mr.
Smith, the former cashier, having been elevated to the presidency
of the bank. Not long afterwards Mr. Smith " shuffled off this
mortal coil," and the directors, with a wisdom that might have
been emulated in other instances without disadvantage, promoted
the cashier, Mr. Austin, to the presidency. During the general
excitement attending the run upon the banks, a week or two

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 219

before the suspension of the Bank of Pennsylvania, Mr. Austin's
firm and decided course secured for him, the esteem and admiration
of our bank officials, many of whom were older in years and ex-
perience.

At a meeting of the cashiers, held to consider the condition of
the Allibone institution, he boldly, and in unequivocal language,
demonstrated the rottenness of that concern. This opinion was
delivered at the time when a number of the oldest banking insti-
tutions were straining every sinew, so to speak, to maintain the
credit of the Bank of Pennsylvania. Mr. Austin's course may
have made him enemies among the corrupt supporters of the
fraudulent institution, but it won him a high place in the general
esteem, and subsequent developments proved the truth of every
assertion he had made. It had been well for the cashiers if they
had adopted his advice, and resolved upon some decisive action, to
prevent the disastrous consequences of the explosion.

The bank over which Mr. Austin presided has the entire confi-
dence of the people of the lower portion of the city, as well as of
the community generally. It is conceded, we believe, that the
prosperity of the institution is due to the energy, sagacity, pru-
dence and firmness of its president. A thoroughly self-made man,
educated in the harsh school of adversity, rising from post to post
by sheer force of merit, he is the best ideal of what a bank presi-
dent ought to be. Mr. Austin is still a young man, comparatively,
but he may be proud of the position he has already achieved in
the public esteem, and we expect from him still more brilliant
things. Socially, he is a man whose company is always desirable.
Politeness comes to him as a natural trait, which he displays to
everybody who has any connection with him, either in the way of
business, or in the affairs of private life. Such a man is an honor
to the city in which he resides.

One of the prominent features of the management of this truly
successful institution, has been the determination on the part of its
president and directors to discount for that class of our commu-
nity who most need it; for instance, a mechanic's note received
for services rendered, or materials furnished, placed before them,
has invariably received attention, to the exclusion of other parties
better able to dispense with accommodation. The working class,
particularly, have been benefitted by this admirable arrangement.
The capital of this bank is $250,000. The salary of the president
is $2,500 per annum.

220 BIOGRAPHIES OF

There is another feature in this institution; one which might be
introduced into other banks with equal profit to all concerned. It
is the division of a portion of the surplus profits of the institution
among its officers. We understand that if the profits of this bank,
at the expiration of every six months, exceeds ten per cent, upon
the capital stock, every officer in the institution receives for that
term an increase of twenty per cent, on the amount. This course
operates as an incentive to cashiers, tellers and clerks, to devote
their entire time and individual energies to advance the best inte-
rests of the concern. The cashier of the Southwark Bank is Mr.
Frank Steele. He is still a young man, but one of much expe-
rience. After having been employed in the Farmers' and Mecha-
nics' Bank for a period sufficiently long to acquire a considerable
knowledge of finance, he was elected to the position he now holds
on account of his genuine ability and urbanity of bearing. Mr.
Steele is calculated to become a very popular cashier. He has
hosts of friends, and is generally esteemed and admired by all
persons who come in contact with him in transacting business at
the bank. It may be well to mention here, that Mr. Steele is a
graduate of the Central High School. He is one of many brilliant
young men who have been educated by our admirable system of
public schools, and who are now making a prominent figure in the
community, shedding lustre upon their education, and bearing tes-
timony to the wisdom of the system itself. Mr. Steele is a gentle-
man of real ability in financial matters, and a worthy associate
of Mr. Austin in the management of the affairs of the Southwark
Bank. The numerous manufacturers, master mechanics, and
others, who have their men to pay every Saturday, have spoken
in praise of his anxiety to extend to them every accommodation.
Even during the crisis, those who were pushed for cash obtained
it at this institution, in consideration of their being regular depo-
sitors or customers. As long as the bank has such officers, it must
enjoy a deserved popularity.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 221

HORATIO A. FITZGERALD.

THE provision trade of Philadelphia does not occupy that rank
in the general estimation which its importance entitles it to hold.
Pew of our citizens seem to be aware of the enormous develop-
ment attained by this branch of the business, and even many pro-
minent merchants and financiers, whose position should lead them
to display a degree of interest in the matter, are lamentably igno-
rant of the statistics of the trade. It is a remarkable fact that
there has been but one failure among the provision dealers within
the past ten years, and yet the paper of these houses does not
rank as high, and will not sell as well as the notes of dry goods
houses which have not one-fourth of their capital, and which are
often exposed to much greater risks. When we consider the extent
of the trade in provisions, and learn that most of the sales are
made for cash, with only occasional transactions upon a credit of
from thirty to sixty days, we confess that we can offer no other
explanation of such a singular distinction than that of a lack of
information in reference to this department of commerce. A few
figures will show that the provision business is one of our most
important interests, and one that promises to add very largely to
the wealth of the city. The following is a statement of the amount
of salted meats and lard received here from Pittsburg by the
Pennsylvania Central Railroad during the past five years : —

Salted Meats. Lard and Lard Oil.

In 1854, •' - - - 35,099,277 Ibs. 9,363,167 Ibs.

1855, - - - - 32,417,180 " 7,984,457 "

1856, - - - - 24,560,670 " 10,126,195 "

1857, - - - - 34,704,577 " 7,155,977 "
1858-, - - ' - - ' - 39,360,027 " 10,752,224 "

This table includes only the amount received from Pittsburg
DIRECT. In addition, the receipts from way stations on the same
route, as well as from Baltimore and various points in the interior
of our own state, by the Reading and North Pennsylvania Rail-
road, and the Schuylkill and Delaware divisions of the Pennsylva-

Cows.

Hogs.

Sheep.

Total.

13,350

78,000

61,000

227,750

11,530

60,300

132,500

264,530

12,900

103,350

240,700

418,928

14,700

95,700

342,000

514,800

17,125

166,600

277,600

543,315

11,153

115,226

272,168

436,102

10,575

127,964

324,560

562,944

4,214

199,179

269,020

554,778

4,650

206,000

229,300

572,470

6,950

174,370

275,100

559,525

222 BIOGRAPHIES OF

ma canals, were very heavy. The receipts of cattle during the
past ten years were as follows : —

Beeves.

In 1854, - --- 73,300

1855, - --- 55,200

1856, - --- 61,978

1857, - --- 62,400

1858, -.-- 81,990

1859, - --- 87,555

1860, - --- 99,845

1861, - - - - 82,365

1862, - --- 87,520

1863, - - - - 103,150

Notwithstanding the immense business indicated by these figures,
we have strong reason to believe that this branch of our trade is
still in its infancy, and that many years will not elapse before it is
doubled in value.

One of the most striking consequences of the growing prosperity
of all interests in Philadelphia, is the influx of enterprising men
from New England and New York. While we have full confidence
in the energy and ability of our native merchants and manufactu-
rers, we think an occasional " infusion of fresh blood" has a whole-
some tendency. The gentleman whose name forms the caption of
this article is a native of the Empire State. Mr. Fitzgerald was
born in Orange county, the garden district of New York, in 1816.
Although still comparatively a young man, and possessed of ample
means, he began life in an humble way, and owes his fortune en-
tirely to his own indomitable industry and peculiar talents for
trade. Having received a fair education, he entered a grocery
store in New York in the capacity of clerk, being then but seven-
teen years of age. The courage and self-reliance of the youth
were exhibited in a remarkable manner only a year afterwards,
when he bought out the concern and set up for himself. But he
only continued in this business a single year, at the expiration of
which time the pursuit of health induced him to seek the fresh air
of the country.

It was in 1837 that Mr. Fitzgerald returned to New York, where
he accepted a situation as clerk in the house of Ely, Hoppock &
Co., provision packers and dealers, located on Sullivan street.
Here he began to acquire that experience which laid the founda-
tion of his future fortune. Circumstances led Mr. Fitzgerald to
quit this firm, and he entered a dry goods house, but his talents,
character and services were so highly valued by his former em-

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 223

ployers that they solicited him to return, and he complied, resuming
his previous position as clerk. He appears to have advanced rap-
idly, in knowledge of the business, for in 1841 he was admitted to
a partnership in the firm. In 1844 the firm was dissolved, and Mr.
Fitzgerald came to this city. At that period the provision trade of
Philadelphia was not very extensive. The receipts of pork, bacon
and lard from the West were trifling. Our railroad connections
was incomplete, and the bulk of the products of the Western states
went to New York. But Mr. Fitzgerald had sufficient sagacity to
perceive that such a state of things could not endure. He saw
that a new spirit of enterprise was awakened here, and rightly
calculated that those who were first in the field to take advantage
of the creation of a particular branch of trade in a new locality,
would be able to take at the flood that tide which is sure to lead
on to fortune. He was equipped with an ample stock of experience,
and was confident in his own resources. The opening was attrac-
tive, and Mr. Fitzgerald was the man to improve the opportunity.
He formed a partnership with Mr. T. Van Brunt, and the firm was
known as Van Brunt & Fitzgerald. The store was located at No.

6 South Water street, but the greater portion of the business was
transacted at the smoking and packing establishment, on Front
street, below the G-ermantown road.

The firm was eminently successful. Their exertions contributed
to raise the reputation of our city for curing and packing provi-
sions, and gave an extraordinary stimulus to that department of
trade.

In 1854 the partnership was dissolved, Mr. Fitzgerald having
purchased the interest of Mr. Van Brunt j but the business was
continued with constantly increasing profit until March, 1858, when
Mr. Fitzgerald, having accumulated sufficient wealth to satisfy even
a greedy ambition, and feeling the necessity of repose and relaxa-
tion, withdrew entirely from active pursuits of trade. The ener-
getic man did not limit himself to the opportunities of a single
house while advancing with rapid strides upon the road to worldly
independence.

It is only inferior characters who can " have too many irons in
the fire." The man of steady nerve and active intellect can manage
a host of things without diminishing the care bestowed upon any
one of the number. For three years Mr. Fitzgerald was the silent
partner in the house of J. H. Michener & Co., and for eight years
he had an interest in the establishment of J. Van Brunt. All of

224 BIOGRAPHIES OF

his investments proved profitable, and Mr. Fitzgerald was enabled
to retire from business at the age of forty- two years, with ample
means of rendering his leisure easy and luxurious. Yeryfewmen
in this country have more reason to be proud of their success in
life than Mr. Fitzgerald.

It is his boast that he began his career without a cent, and that
he realized by steady industry and sagacious management a liberal
fortune by the time that the majority of other men are still strug-
gling with the cards of trade, and uncertain whether they will ever
reach the goal of fortune. The character of this achievement in-
dicates the qualities that distinguish the man. He appears to have
adopted in early life the scriptural council — "Whatever thy hand
findeth to do, do with all thy might." Having determined to rise,
the poor clerk kept his eye steadily fixed upon the object to be at-
tained. Choosing a particular branch of business, he devoted his
energies to obtaining a complete mastery of it, in all its ramifica-
tions. Opportunities are seldom wanting to him whose vigilance
is sleepless. Mr. Fitzgerald was quick to see where a good field
for his abilities was presented, and prompt to take advantage of the
occasion. Indefatigable labor, studious care, and courageous en-
terprise accomplished the rest. Mr. Fitzgerald resides in an
imposing mansion of bro vvn stone, situated on Broad street, in the
midst of a locality which promises to be the centre of wealth,
fashion, and splendor. Not all of those who occupy such palaces
have as good a claim upon a luxurious existence. Riches are only
honorable when earned by the toil of thought or the sweat of the
brow, and those who are born to "the golden spoon" are often but
little more worthy of respect than the ass whose "back is with
ingots bowed." The citizen that knows he has nothing but
what has come to him through his own exertions, is the man who
can truly appreciate the surroundings of comfort and magnificence.
By his labor he has won the privilege of rest and recreation. By
his efforts to develope a particular department of trade, he has
conferred a vast advantage upon the city of his birth or adoption.
By the nobility of his example, he has stimulated hundreds to
strive to do likewise. Few envy such a man the possession of
wealth; all are glad of his success, for the obvious reason that he
has deserved to be successful.

Mr. Fitzgerald is a man of varied information, liberal heart, and
amiable manners. He has every quality essential to the adorn-
ment of the social position he has so proudly achieved. If New

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 225

York has any more such contributions to make to our stock of self-
made men, we shall welcome them most cordially to the city of
Brotherly Love.

JOHN TRUCKS.

THE daily newspapers of May 1, 1863, in Philadelphia, contained
the following announcement in the notices of deaths : —

TRUCKS.— On the evening of the 30th ult., after a short illness, JOHN TRUCKS, in the
fifty-ninth year of his age.

The relatives and friends of the family are respectfully invited to attend his funeral, from
his late residence, No. 12 North Seventh street, this (Tuesday) afternoon, fifth inst., at three
o'clock. To proceed to Woodlands Cemetery.

The career of John Trucks is another example to be added to
those already given in these sketches, which shows how honor and
competence may be won by those whose origin is humble, if they
have the great qualities of integrity and industry to guide them
aright.

John Trucks was born in Easton, Northampton county, Pennsyl-
vania, in the year 1804. His father died while he was very young,
and he was the only child by the first marriage. His mother
was in comfortable circumstances until her second marriage,
eight years afterwards. Becoming reduced she removed to Phila-
delphia, about 1815. When but a boy, about twelve years of age,
he entered the grocery store of Allen & McCartney, at 'No. 10
North Fifth street, to learn the business. No. 10 North Fifth
street was near Market street, and not far from the Sorrel Horse
Tavern, on the opposite side, an inn which did a large country bu-
siness, and which furnished to Allen & McCartney many valuable
customers.

In the year 1823, John Trucks having reached the age nineteen,
determined to try his fortunes in the great West. He went to
Pittsburg, where, not finding any encouragement, he engaged
passage on a flat-boat, and so floated slowly down the Ohio and
Mississippi until he reached New Orleans. In that great city he
was without friends or acquaintances, and after vainly seeking for
employment for some days, he determined to return to Philadelphia.
He engaged passage on a homeward bound ship, but when a few
days out of port, was stricken down with the yellow fever. He

226 BIOGRAPHIES OF

received but little attention, his presence on board being considered
an omen of ill-luck, and the heartless captain, desirous to get rid
of him, put into Norfolk. He was taken to the hospital, where he re-
mained until he recovered sufficient strength to write Mr. Allen,
the surviving partner of the firm of Allen & McCartney. On his
return to Philadelphia Mr. Trucks found himself poorer than
when he had left the city. The day of his arrival was marked by
the burial of Mr. Allen. He then managed the business for the
widow for one year. About this time, Mr. William Adams pur-
chased the store, who having a high opinion of the integrity and
business capacity of Mr. Trucks, took him in partnership. This
copartnership was very successful, and made money rapidly. Mr.
Adams declared that he never achieved good fortune until he took
Mr. Trucks in with him.

In 1833 Mr. Adams relinquished business, and John Trucks con-
tinued it alone. Mr. Adams retired to his country residence in
Mantua village, where he lived for some years, dying at the ripe
age of eighty-two. Mr. Trucks carried on both the retail and
wholesale business until 1848, when he relinquished the former
entirely. In the meanwhile there were various changes in North
Fifth street. Mr. Trucks purchased No. 17, on the opposite side
of the way, and removed thereto. Commerce street had been
cut through the sorrel horse property to Fourth street, and large
stores were built upon the street. By these changes Mr. Trucks
became located at the Southeast corner of Fifth and Commerce
streets. .

In 1847, Mr. Trucks associated in partnership with him Wm. L.
Boggs. The latter came into the store on the nineteenth of June,
1833, as an apprentice.

The firm of John Trucks & Co. was enlarged in 1853 by the ad-
mission of a son of Mr. Trucks, and it became Trucks, Son & Boggs.
In 1855 Mr. Boggs withdrew, and the firm was continued as John
Trucks & Son, until 1857, when the senior partner retired. The
business has since been conducted by William Trucks, John Trucks,
Jr., and Joseph Parker, the latter a nephew of Mr. Trucks, under
the style of William Trucks & Co.

Mr. Trucks was an old line Whig, and first became a member of
the City Councils from Locust Ward, in 1841. Previous to that
period he was a Trustee of the Philadelphia G-as Works, and was
a strenuous advocate of the reduction of the price of gas from $3.50
per thousand cubic feet to $2. He declared that the city could

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 227

afford to sell at $1 per thousand and make money. In Councils he
was earnest and attentive, a valuable member of committees, and
independent in his views and votes. He was one of the very few
councilmen who sided with Charles Grilpin in the strong opposition
he made to the city subscription to the stock of the Pennsylvania
Railroad Company.

He was for some years a Director of the Commercial Bank, and
for one year/- of the Schuylkill Bank. He was a man of sound
judgment, keen and thrifty, but very prudent. He kept out of wild
speculations, and made his money by careful and judicious invest-
ments.

Mr. Trucks married Eliza, daughter, of Thomas Brown, of Phi-
ladelphia. He was a faithful, affectionate husband, and devotedly
attached to his family. He was ever a fond and dutiful son to his
mother, who still survives him. His large circle of friends and
acquaintances mourn the loss of one who was ever valued and
loved for his industrious habits, and high principles of honor.

CHARLES MASSEY, JR., AKD MANUEL EYRE.

THE firm of Eyre & Massey, for more than forty years, com-
manded in Philadelphia the respect and confidence of persons in
business, and of citizens generally. It occupied during that time a
very prominent situation among our largest mercantile houses, and
it was in the development of the shipping interests of our port one
of our most important commercial firms.

This eminent establishment sprang from the house of Pratt &
Kintzing, in which Charles Massey, Jr., and Manuel Eyre were
both clerks. After they had fully accomplished themselves in the
principles and practices of trade, it was natural that they should
determine to try the adventurous course of business themselves,
and it is not surprising that these graduates of the same house
finally united in partnership, as they must have had by frequent
intercourse and association an intimate knowledge of each other.
It was some years, however, before this union was effected, and
the separate history of each partner has its own story.

228 BIOGRAPHIES OF

Charles Massey, Jr., was the son of Samuel Massey, an old
Philadelphia merchant, and he was born April 14, 1778, in the
City of Philadelphia. His uncle, Charles Massey, was, at the time
of his birth, and for many years afterward, a biscuit baker at No.
19 South wharves. His nephew, the subject of our sketch, was
named in compliment to him, and in order to distinguish the uncle
and nephew, the name of Charles Massey, Jr., which he preserved
during life, was kept up by the subject of our sketch \png after his
uncle had sought " that undiscovered country from whose bourne
no traveller returns."

Charles Massey, Jr., was a great-grandson of Samuel Massey, an
Irish Quaker, who emigrated to Pennsylvania in 1699, before the
death of William Penn. Samuel Massey devoted his attention to
the commerce of the infant colony, and was a shipping merchant
in a good business for the time. His son, Wight Massey, succeeded
him, and during what may be called the middle period of the
colony of Pennsylvania, while yet strictly under colonial impedi-
ments, he did as large a business as a merchant as the jealous re-
strictions of British statutes would permit. He was successful in
accumulating property. Among other curious matters, it may be
noted that he owned the lot of ground Northwest corner of Arch
and Broad streets, ninety-nine feet on Arch street, and three hun-
dred and six feet on Broad street. Cherry street now passes
through the lot. This somewhat extensive piece of ground was
leased by Mr. Massey, in 1749, to Eobert Paxon, for seven years,
at the annual rent of $10.67 per annum.

Samuel Massey and Charles Massey were sons of Wight Massey.
The former was the father of Charles Massey, Jr. He was edu-
cated at the Quaker school in Philadelphia, and at a proper age
was placed in the counting-house of Pratt & Kintzing shortly after
that partnership was formed. He remained in that establishment
from 1795 to 1799. In the latter year he formed a partnership
with his brother, William Massey, and Thomas Shoemaker, under
the firm of Massey & Shoemaker. They were located at No. 24
South wharves, but shortly afterwards removed to the storehouse
of Charles Massey, Sr., at No. 19 South wharves. Here they re-
mained until 1803, at which time the firm of Massey & Shoemaker
was dissolved, and the firm of Eyre & Massey was formed. The
new firm remained here for about three years, when they removed
to No. 25 South wharves, a building numbered afterwards by the
changes on the river front, No. 28, and latterly No. 27.

PHILADELPHIA MEKCHANTS. 229

Manuel Eyre was a son of Colonel Manuel Eyre, of revolutionary
memory, a resident of Kensington, and an active patriot during
"the times that tried men's souls." Mr. Eyre, Sr., was a ship-
builder. During the Eevolution he built ships and galleys for the
State of Pennsylvania, and was patriotic in field service. His son
inherited splendid physical powers and determined energy. He
was a fine-looking man, being fully six feet in height, well pro-
portioned, and of a dignified carriage. He was somewhat distin-
guished in public life during the continuance of the firm of Eyre
& Massey, having been a member of the City Councils and a Di-
rector of the United States Bank in 1816, and again of the Penn-
sylvania Bank of the United States in 1836. He died in 1845, and
by his decease the old firm of Eyre & Massey was dissolved.

Eyre & Massey were engaged extensively in the shipping busi-
ness. They owned twenty vessels, and did a large trade, foreign
and domestic. One of their ships, "The Globe," made twenty-nine
voyages in twenty years, eight of them being to China, and many
of them being more than a year in duration. Their vessels were
known in almost every principal port of Europe and Asia, besides
the United States and West India islands. The firin had business
with the following extensive list of foreign ports : Archangel, Ton-
ningen, Hamburg, Amsterdam, Antwerp, Havre, Bordeau, Bay-
onne, Lisbon, St. Ubes, Oporto, Cadiz, St. Lucas, St. Sebastian,
Gibraltar, Malaga, Barcelona, Corruna, Marseilles, Island of Sar-
dinia, Genoa, Leghorn, Palermo, Cette, London, Liverpool, Lon-
donderry, Plymouth, Falmouth, Madeira, TenerifF, Cape de Yerde
islands, Yera Cruz, Alvarado, Jamaica, St. Jago de Cuba, Havana,
New Providence, St. Domingo, St. Thomas, Guadaloupe, St. Croix,
Curacoa, Laguayra, Maracaibo, Cayenne, Pernambuco, Bahia, Eio
de Janeiro, Santos, Eio Grande, Paraguay, Buenos Ayres, Monte-
video, Yalparaiso, Irico, Coquimbo, Copiapo, Lima, Guayaquil, Pa-
nama, Sandwich Islands, Java, Sumatra, Manilla, Canton, Calcutta,
and Madras. This extensive list of ports embraces the names of
very many with which the merchants of our day have no inter-
course. Added to these the home ports of the United States with
which they traded, would show that the firm of Eyre & Massey
held extensive mercantile intercourse with all parts of the world.
This splendid commerce was prosecuted with a continued course of
good fortune. Eyre & Massey never lost a vessel, and all they suf-
fered from the perils of the sea during the forty-two years was a
few partial losses of cargoes. They were equally lucky as insurers,

230 BIOGRAPHIES OF

having made underwriting a part of the business of the house.
This they frequently did without restriction as to the ports to he
visited, insuring certain vessels by the year, whatever voyages they
might make.

Mr. Massey was a puhlic spirited citizen, largely trusted in our
civic affairs. He was a member of the Select and Common Coun-
cil during several years. He was Chairman of the Committee of
Councils which regulated the opening of Delaware avenue in 1834,
according to the provisions of the will of Stephen Girard.

The business of Eyre & Massey was suifered to decline after the
death of Mr. Eyre, in 1845, but it was nominally kept up by Mr.
Massey for some years afterwards. He has, however, long since
retired from business, and in his eighty-ninth year may be con-
sidered almost the only living memorial of the merchants of Phila-
delphia when our port was the principal shipping mart of the
United States.

ELLISTON PE^KOT AND JOHN PEROT.

To unite in one sketch the biography of two brothers would be
in many cases a difficult task. Even in the same family the tastes
of the children frequently vary so widely, that, except in the com-
mon tie of parentage, there is no sympathy between them. The
sons grow up to separate in the journey of life; whilst one may
be a sedate clergyman, another will turn out a rough, adventurous
sailor • whilst one becomes a merchant, another never rises above
the condition of a carter. Up to a certain point, a sketch of the
career of one child may answer for all, but beyond that there is a
wide divergence. But in the course of life of the founders of the
Perot family there are not such difficulties. Elliston Perot and
John Perot endured their longest separation, and went through
their most stirring adventures in boyhood. Manhood brought
them together, and for sixty-two years they trod the pathway of
life side by side, whilst they had the satisfaction of beholding their
children and their children's children marching with them.

Elliston Perot, the elder of these brothers, was born in the island
of Bermuda, on the sixteenth of March, 1747. John Perot was
born in the same island on the third of May, 1749. At the age of

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 231

seven years, for the advantage of a better education than the West
Indies afforded at that time, the young Elliston was sent to New
York, where, under the guardianship of his uncle, Elliston Perot,
then Controller of His Majesty's customs, it was hoped that he
would gain the benefits of liberal instruction. He was sent to
school at New Eochelle, but before he had completed the course of
studies appointed for him, his uncle died, and he was sent back to
Bermuda. In that island he remained until he was of age. In
the meanwhile he had placed his hopes upon success in a mercan-
tile career, and hoping for a wider sphere of usefulness, he revisited
New York, and commenced business there.

In the 'meanwhile John Perot had grown up in Bermuda, being
advanced as far in his education as the limited means of that island
allowed. In 1769 he made his first foreign voyage in a trip to
Virginia, where, with his uncle John Mallory, in Isle of Wight
county, he spent nearly three years, making voyages, meanwhile,
to the West Indies. In the year 1772 he made his first voyage from
Bermuda to Philadelphia, and saw in this city a very desirable
place of residence, the advantages of which must have made an
impression upon his mind. He returned to Dominica with a vessel
well loaded with choice merchandise. Up to this time the interests
of the two brothers had been divided, but now they were about to
be united, with the most important consequences to both.

In the year 1772 they entered into^artnership under the firm of
Elliston & John Perot, in the island of Dominica. For six years
they carried on business there, but finding that the profits were
not as extensive as they expected, they were induced to remove to
St. Christopher. At that place they found trade dull, and in a
short time they transferred their interests to the Dutch island of
St. Eustatius. For three years they tested the mercantile advan-
tages of that location. In 1781 a British fleet and army, under
command of Admiral Eodney and General Vaughan surprised and
took- possession of the island, to tl^e astonishment of the inhabi-
tants, who were ignorant of the existence of hostilities between
Great Britain and Holland. Among the victims of these summary
proceedings Elliston & John Perot were severe sufferers. They
were seized as prisoners of war, and all their property was taken,
confiscated and sold. They were detained under guard some
months. When they were liberated, John Perot came to Phila-
delphia, where he arrived in the year 1781. Here he soon was
admitted to the best society, and was so well received and appre-

232 BIOGRAPHIES OF

elated, that in 1783 he led to the alter Mary Tybout, daughter of
Andrew Tybout, hatter, a well-known and highly respectable citi-
zen, a resident of .Chestnut street, above Second.

Meanwhile Elliston Perot had gone to England in the hope of
obtaining satisfaction and reparation for the outrages of Eodney
and Yaughan. We need hardly say that British justice towards
British subjects was, in those days, a matter depending not upon
right, but upon Court favors. The Perots had been unjustly de-
spoiled in St. Eustatius by both naval and army officers, but they
never recovered anything from the Government. Elliston was
trifled with during three years of endeavor, during which he
visited Holland, Ireland and France, but he did not effect a resti-
tution from the English ministry. Growing tired of the injustice
of the English officials, he left London, in 1784, and repaired to
Philadelphia. Here he met his brother, and upon consultation they
resolved to try their fortunes here. They were not entirely penni-
less. They still had means; and accordingly the second firm of
Elliston & John Perot was established in property bought by
themselves at No. 41 North Wharves, below Arch street, and
alongside of an alley running out to what was called Perot's wharf.

John Perot, possibly by virtue of his wife's influence, was an
Episcopalian, and a member of St. Paul's church; but Elliston
saw reasons for favoring the principles of the Society of Friends.
He was admitted a member of Meeting in 1786, and on the ninth
of January, 1787, he married Hannah Sansom, only daughter of
Samuel and Hannah Sansom, at the Bank Meeting House, North
Front street. He established himself in his dwelling house at No-
45 North Front street, nearly opposite the Water street store. In
1789 Elliston built for himself a handsome residence at No. 299
Market street, but John remained with his family at No. 108 Arch
street until the year 1795, when he removed to No. 279 Market
street, ten doors below his brother's house. In 1803 he again re-
moved to No. 251 Market street, but two years afterward he ob-
tained a location at No. 297 Market street, adjoining the house of
his brother, in which affectionate proximity the brothers and
partners remained with their families until death separated them.

The business of Elliston & John Perot was extensive. They
enjoyed unlimited confidence abroad; their correspondents were
numerous and their consignments valuable.

After many years of successful venture, they were gratified by
the advent of their children and their gradual engagement in

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 233

mercantile careers. About the year 1816 Sansom Perot, the son
of Elliston, engaged in business with Mr. Eidgway, at No. 39£
North Water street, next door to his father's and uncle's store ;
and Perot & Williams, of which James Perot, a son of John Perot,
was senior partner, was established in the old store at No. 41 North
Water street. The firms of Perot & Eidgway, and Perot & Wil-
liams were soon dissolved, and the cousins, James & Sansom Perot,
formed a partnership and occupied the greater part of the store
No. 41 North Water street, the old gentlemen confining themselves
to the settlement of former business, not seeking for new customers.
At the same time, it may be proper to note in this family history,
that Francis Perot, son of Elliston Perot, became a brewer, and
with his brother, William S. Perot, carried on for many years the
extensive brewery at No. 120 Yine street and No. 107 New street.
About 1820 there were added to the active members of the Perot
family Charles and Edward, sons of John ; and Joseph, son of
Elliston. Joseph and Charles established themselves as merchants
at No. 39 North Water street, under the firm of C. & J. Perot.

The business of the old firm of Elliston & John Perot was finally
closed, in 1834, November 28, when Elliston Perot died. His aged
brother withdrew from business, leaving the management of affairs
to the young people. He survived his brother nearly seven years,
dying January 8, 1841, in the ninety-second year of his age, full
of honor and universally respected, having by himself, his brother
and children, illustrated, from the ^Revolutionary times almost to the
present era, the advantages of probity and attention to business.

As time advanced the Perot family was enlarged by the appear-
ance of new members in the mercantile world. Elliston Perot, the
second, established himself as a merchant in Church alley, in 1847.
James P. Perot, senior partner of Perot & Hoffman, located at No.
41 North Wharves. He is the only fighting member of the family.
He was wounded and taken prisoner in the battle at Sheppards-
town, while acting Adjutant of the Corn Exchange Eegiment, and
was Lieutenant-Colonel of the 49th Eegiment, called out for the
emergency in 1862. T. Morris Perot, dealer in drugs, was
established, about 1850, at No. 19 North Fourth street. Perot &
Hoffman were succeeded by James P. Perot & Brother. Perot &
Senat were in business, in 185(5, at No. 80 Chestnut street, and J. S.
& E. L. Perot are now at No. 36 North Delaware avenue. The
latter are young and energetic men, enjoying the confidence and
esteem of the mercantile community generally.

234 BIOGRAPHIES OF

EGBERT MORRIS.

THE start upon a voyage in the midst of a storm may not be in
accordance with our notions of ordinary prudence. We call such
a step rather foolhardy than demonstrative of courage. But when
such a start is made, and we observe the daring navigator breast
the fearful gale and foaming waves, ride out the storm and move
safely out upon the smooth untroubled seas, we cannot restrain our
admiration ; and so is it when it is proposed to begin a new busi-
ness, or inaugurate a new enterprize, at a period of financial diffi-
culty. The mass sneer at the proposition, speak of the projectors
as lacking judgment, and prophesy a disastrous failure. But when
the thing is accomplished, when the managers of the new concern
have succeeded in proving their ability to surmount all trials and
ride out the storm, the reluctant lips are constrained to utter
praise. Such an enterprize was the Commonwealth Bank, and
such a financial navigator is Robert Morris.

The name of Bobert Morris is intimately associated with the
financial history of this country. But it is not the great purse-
holder of the war of independence who will now claim our atten-
tion. Bearing the same name, we have a genial, upright and able
gentleman, long a prominent member of the editorial fraternity,
and now President of the Commonwealth Bank.

Mr. Morris was born in Philadelphia, and while he was yet in
his minority he became attached to the Pennsylvania Inquirer in
an editorial capacity. In this position Mr. Morris soon won for
himself a high reputation and a very numerous circle of friends.
His graceful and elegant leading articles, and his many essays
upon solid subjects, gave the Inquirer the character it has ever
since maintained — -that of a calm, conservative and pure-toned
family newspaper, which, while keeping square with the progress
of the age, is not absorbed in one idea, or misled into radicalism
of any description. A number of the essays which have appeared
in the Inquirer were recently collected and published in handsome
style, under the title of " Courtship and Matrimony, with other
Sketches from Scenes and Experiences in Social Jjife." Without

PHILADELPHIA MEKCHANTS. 235

being a work of genius, calculated to dazzle the public mind, this
volume possesses merits which will secure for it a cordial reception
in many a household. It may not fascinate, but it cannot fail to
improve the heart and instil truth into the mind. It is the crown-
ing work of Mr. Morris' very useful and commendable career^ as
an editor, which has extended over a quarter of a century.

As the editor of a Whig and American newspaper, Mr. Morris
was naturally something of a politician ; but as it was impossible
for him to descend to the low arts and associations which are now-
a-days essential to success in the political arena, he has never been
a very prominent figure there, and, we believe, has never but once
been fortunate enough to taste the sweets of office. He has con-
tented himself with the vindication and advocacy of his partizan
rights in the columns of the Inquirer. This he has accomplished
without the slightest touch of rancor, and with a firmness in the
treatment of his opponents which is worthy of general imitation
among politicians.

We now come to Mr. Morris' financial career. Though brief, it
has been uncommonly brilliant and satisfactory. The institution
over which he was chosen to preside went into operation in No-
vember, 1857, in the midst of a crisis and suspension of specie
payments. The movements of the new concern were watched
with much anxiety. Many, even among its friends, anticipated a
speedy failure. Mr. Morris certainly had a grave responsibility
resting upon his shoulders. He was expected to navigate a new
institution into the safe haven of the public confidence, at a time
when a financial hurricane was sweeping over the country, and
the popular mind was filled with apprehensions of still further dis-
asters. The President bent all his energies to the difficult task.
The policy he adopted excited much astonishment. During those
days of trouble the bank received nothing but specie on deposit,
and issued none but their own notes, so that at that period it was
the only banking institution paying coin. The bank passed through
the crisis successfully, and the worthy President was warmly con-
gratulated upon the sagacious management he had displayed. The
new institution has always secured the public confidence, and is
considered in a thoroughly reliable condition. Its Directors are
among our most intelligent, reliable and popular citizens.

Few literary men succeed as financiers. The combination of
practical sagacity with a talent for elegant expression is rarely
found } but Mr. Morris unites to an agreeable fancy and a fine flow

236 BIOGKAPHIES OF

of language, a practical line of thought which can turn with ease
from the editorial desk to the calculation of the counting-house.
He has already demonstrated that he combines tact and talent to
an extraordinary extent ; and, we need scarcely observe, that when
these qualities are joined in the same individual, he is sure of suc-
cess in almost every walk of life.

Socially Mr. Morris is a very amiable and agreeable gentleman.
Affable, courteous and unostentatious, he is calculated to win
friends wherever he goes. His conversation is always pleasing
and instructive, abounding with that wisdom which has been
gained by a long and varied experience, during which the best
faculties of a solid mind have been endeavoring to improve his
fellow man. As an editor, no man connected with the Philadelphia
press was more accessible or more unpretending. As a politician,
no one within the limit of our acquaintance was more generous to-
wards opponents, or more modest in the maintenance of his con-
victions. As a financier he has already made his mark by the
exhibition of extraordinary skill under the most difficult circum-
stances. In all the relations of private life he is an exemplary
gentleman. To those who are not acquainted with Mr. Morris
this may seem the language of unmitigated eulogy ; but the truth
will not allow us to alter a word.

Although not now connected with any public journal, the dispo-
sition for literary pursuits still exists, and within a short time
Mr. Morris has written a domestic play, entitled "Temptation,"
and a series of Songs for the Loyal, which way be seen at the
well-known music store of Messrs. Lee & .Walker, of this city.
The play which we have read is beautifully written, and the songs
are equal in poetic spirit and enkindling patriotism to anything
of the kind that has been produced since the commencement of
the Southern Eebellion. Among the most stirring and exciting are
" Getty sburgh," and " The Christian Commission." '' My Love is on
the Battle Field" is quite a gem, and is deservedly a popular favo-
rite. With our best wishes for the continued health and prosperity
of our esteemed friend, we close this brief sketch, not for lack of ma-
terial, but because the subject of our notice is too well known in
this community to require any elaborate biography or eulogy at
our hands.

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 237

RODNEY FISHER.

•" IT is with sincere regret," says the Commercial List of September
20, 1863, "that we record the death, in this city, on the thirteenth
instant, in his sixty-sixth year, of Rodney Fisher, a very well
known and highly respected citizen of Philadelphia, who was in
truth, to use the words of a cotemporary, ' a relic of a past gene-
ration, identified with many business and fiscal movements of im-
portance here.'" By every family tie and early association, the
deceased was also closely and honorably connected with the history
of our country, being a grandnephew of Caesar Rodney, the signer
of the Declaration of Independence, and grandson of Colonel
Thomas Rodney, who, during the Revolutionary War, led the van
in the famous march from Trenton to Princeton, on " the awful
night/' January 1, 1777, when he was Wounded. The subject of
our sketch was son of John Fisher, late United States District
Judge, of the State of Delaware, at Dover, where he died, April
23, 1823.

In early life, Mr. Rodney Fisher, who was born at Dover, Dela-
ware, in 1798, entered the navy as midshipman, but being more
attracted by commerce, for which his mind was peculiarly adapted,
soon left the service and entered the employ of the well known
Edward Thompson, of Philadelphia, who was at that time at the
head of " the China trade" in this country. He was, subsequently,
for a long time, in the Bank of the United States, and in its ser-
vice resided for nearly a year in England, in company with the
well known Samuel Judson, having previously traveled extensively
as agent for that institution in this country, conducting for it many
highly important negotiations.

Returning to China, Mr. Fisher became partner with " Me Vicar
& Co.," one of the first English firms in Canton. He resided, at
different periods, many years in, the East, and was, both in China
and India, connected with some of the leading commercial trans-
actions of his time, and intimately acquainted with many of the

238 BIOGRAPHIES OF

first men, both natives and foreigners, who distinguished them-
selves in the important series of diplomatic and military events
which attended the opening of China to the world. Having re-
markably varied powers of observation, and a very retentive
memory, Mr. Fisher retained a fund of anecdote and description,
drawn from his extensive travels, such as few men possess. He
had known China and its trade as they were in " the old time," in
" the days of the Hong Merchants," when life in every respect was
more strongly marked than at present, and while the laws and
strange customs of the East maintained a vigorous struggle with
those of Europe. In addition to what he learned from observation,
Mr. Fisher also possessed an extensive fund of very valuable know-
ledge relative to the history of the Revolution, which he had
drawn from his many relatives who had taken a prominent part in
the war, and the diplomacy of our Eepublic, while it was yet
young j and this knowledge he had cultivated by much reading of
what had been written on the subject.

He returned to the United States and to his family in the year
1845, and resided in Philadelphia to the day of his death. He had
married many years before his return a daughter of Thomas Cal-
lender, a well known merchant of this city. Of his children, one
daughter is at present the wife of Mr. Charles Godfrey Leland,
while another, who died at Paris, in France, but little over three
years ago, was married to Mr. Edward Bobbins, of this city.

The loss of this child was, unfortunately, not the only bereave-
ment which Mr. Fisher was called on to mourn, since but a few
weeks before his death, his already rapidly failing health received
a shock from hearing that his only son, Caesar Bodney, First Lieu-
tenant in the United States regular service, First Cavalry, had
been mortally wounded at the battle of Aldie, Ya. We may be
pardoned for stating in this connection, in the words of his captain,
K. S. Lord, " that Lieutenant Fisher fell while doing his duty in
the bravest and most gallant style." " He acted," said an eye-
witness, " most heroically, leading his company in a charge which
has not, I believe, been equalled during this war." Unfortunately,
the first news received by Mr. Fisher relative to his son was to the
effect that he would soon be cured of his wounds, and it was while
waiting for his return that the father suddenly learned the sad
truth of the death.

Mr. Fisher had been many years a Director in the Bank of Com-
merce, in this city, and was, for some time previous to his death,

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 239

its Yice President. On receiving intelligence of his decease, the
following resolutions were passed by its Board of Directors :

BANK OF COMMERCE, PHILADELPHIA, September 15, 1863.

At a special meeting of the Board of Directors, held this day, the President communicated
to the Board the decease of Rodney Fisher, Esq., late Vice President of this Bank.

On motion, the following was adopted:

Whereas, This Board has learned with deep regret of the death of their late fellow-
member, Eodney Fisher, Esq.,

Resolved, That we have sustained in him the loss of a worthy and amiable member, who
has been connected with this institution as Director, and lately as Vice President of the
same.

Resolved, That, as a mark of our deep regard and respect for his memory, we will attend
his funeral, and that a copy of these resolutions be transmitted to his family with the sincere
condolence of this Board.

The above is a copy from the minutes.

J. A. LEWIS, Cashier.

Such is the brief sketch of an honorable merchant of the old
school, who flourished during a period when the world's truest
history was, in a great measure, embraced in the lives of its men
of business, and who was personally connected with many of the
first commercial transactions of the time, or with the men who
managed them. It should not be forgotten that in every relation
of private life Rodney Fisher was a man of more than ordinary
merit, and that he will long be remembered in a wide circle of
friends, as one whose kind and honest heart formed the true basis
of all the courtesy and refinement of a true gentleman.

JOSEPH B. SHEWELL.

JOSEPH B. SHE WELL was a son of Thomas She well, a prominent
merchant of this city, by his second wife, Hannah Brown, and he
was born in Philadelphia, October 13, 1822. He was educated at
the famous academy of John H. Willitts, at Carpenters' Hall. His
first introduction to business was in 1840, when he entered the
hardware house of Carr & Keim, Commerce street. After a trial
of a year he found the business did not suit him and he became a
clerk in the house of Sperry & Wright, produce dealers, in South
Water street. Here he remained until 1843, the firm having
changed in the meanwhile to Sperry & Randolph. At the dissolu-
tion of the firm of Sperry & Randolph he was gladly engaged as a

240 BIOGRAPHIES OF

clerk by Mr. Nathaniel Potts, of No. 30 North Water street, and
subsequently by Earp & Young. With this latter firm he remained
until May, 1847. At this period he was in his twenty-fifth year,
and he had an ambition to try his own fortunes in the world. He
therefore leased the second story of the store No. 3 South Water
street, occupied in the first story by William. Newell. He opened
his office there as a merchandise broker. The first year of this
experiment was a trying one to him, and the second was but little
better. But as his business prospects became brighter, which
they did during the third year, he was compelled to secure other
accommodations for his customers. He rented a large office at No.
21 South Water street, where he remained until he entered into
partnership with John D. Tustin, on the twelfth of February,
1849. They established themselves at No. 21 South Water street,
in the second story of George M. Fleming's store. From this
location they removed, in less than a year, to No. 24 South Water
street, where they remained until 1855, and then changed their
headquarters to No. 34 South Water street. In the year 1860
Tustin and She well removed to No. 126 North Front street; from
which situation they again changed their location, at the com-
mencement of the year 1862, to No. 206 Market street, On the
ninth of July, 1863, the firm was amicably dissolved, Mr. Shewell
retaining the stand, and Mr. Tustin removing to Front street,
below Market.

The dissolution with John D. Tustin was premonitory of the
final cessation of the interest of Joseph B. Shewell in worldly
affairs. He was at the time of closing the partnership in ill health,
having contracted a heavy cold, in November, 1862, while upon a
visit to New York. This misfortune developed the latent seeds of
pulmonary consumption, which finally removed him from this
world of trouble on the twenty-eighth of January, A. D. 1864. He
died at his residence in Germantown, and was buried in the Ger-
man Baptist (generally known as the "Keyser Burial Ground,")
on Monday, February 1.

Mr. Shewell married, October 1, 1850, Catharine Clemens Backus,
daughter of Frederick E. Backus, Esq., a most amiable lady, who,
with four children, mourn the loss of a kind husband and affec-
tionate father.

Mr. Shewell was endeared to a large circle of friends by his
noble traits of character. He was the soul of honor, and in all
things endeavored to act up to the golden rule. In religion,

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 241

although a member of the Protestant Episcopal Church, he was a
firm believer in the final restoration of all men from sin to holiness.
He was a warm admirer of the writings of the late Elhanan Win-
chester, whose name was so widely known as a preacher of this
doctrine. In business matters, Mr. Shewell enjoyed a general
popularity for his good judgment in matters connected with his
own department of trade. There was no better judge of the
quality of provisions in Philadelphia. His opinion was appealed
to frequently in matters of dispute upon such topics, even by the
oldest and most experienced produce merchants. His well known
integrity and experience were guarantees that his decision would
be fair and satisfactory. For punctuality in keeping his engage-
ments Mr. Shewell was particularly noted. A short time before
his death he told a friend that he had only once in his lifetime been
too late for the cars.

During the present troubles of our country the heart and hopes
of Mr. Shewell were earnestly given to the patriot cause. He sus-
tained the Union by his voice, and his purse according to his means,
and in September, 1862, he volunteered for the defence of the State,
and partook of the fatigues and dangers of the Corn Exchange
Regiment.

As a member of the Masonic Order Mr. Shewell was noted as a
bright brother, having taken the highest degrees. He paid much
attention to Masonic history, and had made it his study during
many years.

As a merchant and gentleman, as a friend and citizen, Mr.
Shewell was a model man. He leaves behind him, as a legacy to
his children, a reputation honorable and commendable, unspotted
by any vice, a reputation such as it is, is the hope of the true
Christian, that he may leave to his posterity.

PERSONAL PROSPERITY OF MERCHANTS.

WE propose in this article to take a general view, in a moral
aspect, of the objects and end of mercantile pursuits, as affecting
the personal condition of the individual. The great aim of mer-
cantile life is wealth. In most other pursuits fame— a desire to be

242 BIOGRAPHIES OF

distinguished in political, literary, or the scientific walks of life, is
the main object, and wealth only incidental and collateral. But
with the merchant getting money is the chief object of his pursuits,
and fame is incidental to his wealth and talents, and the grand sum
total of all his labors finally result in financial success or failure.
The countless vicissitudes of trade which regulate commercial life
are so intricately interwoven with all the relations and ramifica-
tions of society — depending on so many contingencies and nice
dependencies, that financial success or failure may be truly said to
be the result of surrounding, collateral, unforeseen and unavoidable
causes, rather than the mere personal efforts, misfortunes or faults
of the individual. It is energy and attention to business which
almost universally secures success, but it is not always the absence
of these essential qualities which induce failure. It has been wisely
said by the great moralist, Dr. Johnson, " That with due submission
to Providence, a man of genius has been seldom ruined but by
himself" This is true as regards the physical status and personal
character of the man, for these being founded upon moral princi-
ples, correct deportment, attention to health, and innate rectitude
of purpose, depend on the man himself, and not on those circum-
stances and contingencies of trade which follow fortune's smiles —

" Forever changing like the changeful moon."

But bankruptcy, or in common parlance, financial failure, is not
the worst fate that can overtake the merchant. This is a condition
which may result, as it does almost universally, (the contrary, we
are happy to say, for the honor of Philadelphia merchants, as a
class, is the exception to the general rule,) from entirely innocent,
unavoidable, and, very frequently, meritorious causes. This is a
common fate, however remote it may be, ever possible to overtake
the merchant whose business requires him to trust to the success
or failure of others, who, in turn depend on

" A mighty stream of tendency,''

Ever changing with the ceaseless ebb and flow of trade in the
wants and caprices of society.

It is well known in mercantile circles that with but few excep-
tions, success rarely follows more than the first or second genera-
tion of the families engaged in the pursuits of commerce. If the

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 243

first generation is successful, an ample patrimony renders the
second generation either unfit, through the soft appliances of luxury,
for such arduous pursuits, or gives them ample means for elegant
leisure, or of following some other occupation more congenial to
the tastes of the pampered pets of affluence, who may be —

" Though equal to all things, for all things unfit-
Too wise for a merchant, too proud for a wit."

Hence it is that the mercantile ranks are continually changing in
the personnel, as well as in the various alternations in the lights
and shades of fortune's smiles and frowns.

If we look at the leading commercial houses in our large cities,
we will find, as a general rule, that the most successful and promi-
nent merchants of the day were recruited into the ranks of com-
merce from some quiet village or farm in the country. They came
to the city from their native hills and valleys, with robust frames,
vigorous constitutions and active intelligent minds, with hearts
filled with the teachings and precepts of rural life, and the simple
rustic manners of their country home. Many of them with no
patrimony but a parent's blessing, and the Bible — a mother's keep-
sake— to guide them from the snares and temptations which beset
the unwary in the untried paths of city life. Boldly pushing their
little bark out on the stream —

" The shot of accident, and the dart of chance,"

puts them in the ranks of the ancient and honorable " guild of ye
merchants companie."

Success rarely fails to attend men who commence life from such
beginnings in large cities, where the field for enterprise is so
various and extensive. Whilst they maintain that greatest of all
earthly blessings, " a sound mind in a sound body,"

"They bear a charmed life, and must not yield."

But while such men as these succeed, whose

" Joys are lodg'd beyond the reach of fate,"

there are thousands who, though they commence life under the
same auspices, with the same hopes, the same determination and
equal talents, yet fail to reach that fortunate goal of their youthful
ambition.

244 BIOGRAPHIES OF

But their failure may not be bankruptcy, to which, through the
various currents in the whirl of trade, they are rendered

"Subject to all the skyey influences;"

but it may be of a more melancholy nature, in the loss of health
and even of reason itself. Assiduous toil, unremitting cares, and
an inordinate grasping avarice, may disappoint their cherished
hopes and precipitate them into an untimely grave, or drive them
into the yawning jaws of that living tomb, the mad house, over
whose sombre hopeless portal are inscribed those dreadful words :

"All hope abandon, ye who enter here."

This is no fancy sketch. "Would to heaven, for the sake of
humanity and all the buried hopes of the victims of self-immola-
tion on Mammon's golden altar, it were only such. But, alas ! it
is too true, many who entered the race of mercantile life with the
brightest hopes and presaged the fairest promise, are now inmates
of the mad house, or hopelessly demented through over-taxed ex-
ertion of the brain in the single, selfish, inordinate pursuit of speedy
wealth Melancholy instances of this kind may be found in our
midst, of men almost yet

" In the morn and liquid dew of life,"

victims and maniacs to the love of gold. Men who come from the
country to the city, where their industrial talents soon raised them
by degrees from subordidate positions to be partners or heads of
firms, and with the opening prospect of wealth before them and
within their grasp, the fatal appetite for gold, as soon as fairly
tasted, seized upon them with inexorable power, devouring every
other impulse of better nature, and dragging within its insatiable
vortex health, happiness, and even reason itself.

In the Insane Asylum in this county there are inmates bereft
of their reason, or languishing in hopeless imbecility, whose malady
was brought on by extreme labor to become speedily rich. Con-
stant labor, night and day, with the mind continually strained to
its highest tension, brooding with ceaseless anxiety over antici-
pated profits or conjectured losses, with no rest or relaxation, must
sooner or later wear out the body and affect the mind. And these
effects are soonest felt by those of the most active and nervous

PHILADELPHIA MERCHANTS. 245

temperaments, very many of whom, to feed the unnatural excite-
ment of the brain, and to keep the body for the time up to the
work, are compelled to resort to stimulating drink, and a con-
trolling appetite, through an apparent necessity to support their
labor, being acquired, they escape the Scylla of the mad-house to
be wrecked in the Charybdis of the pot-house.

This inordinate striving in our day and country for speedy
wealth is a great moral evil — like a canker-worm destroying the
fruit of fairest promise, it cuts off its votary ere half his days are
run, or clouds his life with mental darkness — " the heaviest stone
which melancholy can throw at a man." Or, if the victim live
and tottering reason maintain a place in his sordid brain, his heart
becomes obdurate, hardening like the idol of his worship, and
forever brooding o'er his heaps, his days and nights

"With av'rice, painful vigils keep;
Still unenjoy'd the present store,
Still endless sighs are breath'd for more."

Man's destiny has a higher and nobler aim and end than seeking
wealth at the sacrifice of health and reason.

Dr. Johnson said, that " there are few ways in which a man can
be more innocently employed than in getting money"; and Strahan,
his friend, remarks, that " the more one thinks of this the juster it
will appear." But this, however deep the philosophy may be,
must mean that just and reasonable pursuit, which should be sub-
ject to the proper demands of nature and society for the necessary
and rational enjoyments and duties of life. The same high autho-
rity says, in speaking of the vanity of wealth—

"Oh, quit the shadow, catch the prize,

which gold could never buy,

The peaceful slumber, self-approving day,
Unsullied fame and conscience ever gay.''

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Winslow, Stephen Noyes

Biographies of successful
Philadelphia merchants

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