Preceding pages

Volume Map

Following pages

[Pages 109-110]
      William Henry White. A tradition handed down in the family of William Henry White relates that the family is descended from one of two brothers who came from Wales during the colonial period of Virginia, one of whom was drowned in landing from the ship on which they came, and the other brother settled in Gloucester county, Virginia, where he married a Miss Robbins, and had issue. The emigrant ancestor of Gloucester county thus became the founder of this particular White family in Virginia.
      (I) William White, a descendant, was born in Norfolk county, Virginia. He served in a cavalry company from Norfolk county, Virginia, in the war of 1812. He was a merchant, a Whig, and a member of the Methodist church. He married Lovey Wilson, nee Old, the widow of Miles Wilson, in Norfolk county, Virginia. they had several children, namely: William, of whom more hereafter; Cyrena, John R., Edward Park, Littleton W.
      (II) Dr. William (2) White, son of William (1) and Lovey (Old-Wilson) White, was born in Norfolk county, Virginia, in the year 1824.He was educated for the medical profession and was a physician at Portsmouth, Virginia. He was a Whig in politics, a member of the Virginia secession convention in 1861, and afterward colonel of the Fourteenth Regiment of Virginia Infantry, Armstead's brigade, Pickett's division. He participated in Pickett's famous charge at Gettysburg, July 3, 1863, and was severely wounded in three places, but recovered. He married Henrietta Turner, daughter of William and Mary (King) Turner, in King William county, Virginia. She was born there in 1826, was descended from the Turners of the "Grove,* an estate near the Piping Tree ferry on the Pamunky river in King William county, Virginia, during colonial days. Issue of Dr. and Mrs. William White: Hilah F., born April 6, 1845, married Judge John M. White, of Charlottesville, Virginia; William Henry, of whom more hereafter; James Turner, born July 6, 1853, in Norfolk county, Virginia.
      (III) William Henry White, son of Dr. William (2) and Henrietta (Turner) White, was born April 16, 1847, in Norfolk county, Virginia. He received his elementary instruction in the private school of Heath Jones Christian, at Richmond, Virginia; then attended the Virginia Military Institute, at Lexington, Virginia, in 1864 and 1865; in 1865-66 and 1866-67, the University of Virginia, but did not take a degree for want of time to complete the course. His educational work was interrupted by the state of war then prevailing, and while at the Virginia Military Institute he served with the corps of cadets from that institution at the battle of New Market, Virginia. He studied law and began to practice, April 17, 1868, at Portsmouth, Virginia.
      He was elected commonwealth attorney for Norfolk county in 1869, and removed to Norfolk City in 1870; was elected commonwealth attorney for Norfolk City in 1871. He was United States district attorney for the eastern district of Virginia, 1893-97, during President Cleveland's second administration. In 1873 he formed a partnership to practice law with Judge Theodore S. Garnett, under the name of White & Garnett, which continued until 1903, and shortly after the last mentioned date he formed another co-partnership under the firm name of White, Tunstall & Thom, attorneys-at-law, which continued until January 1, 1907, when Mr. White retired from the firm. He was general counsel for the City Gas Company, of Norfolk; the Old Dominion Steamship Company, and of the Norfolk & Southern Railroad Company. He became president of the Richmond, Fredericksburg & Potomac Railroad Company. January 1, 1907, also of the Washington Southern Railway Company at the same time, and soon afterward moved to Richmond, Virginia, to assume his official duties. Mr. White married (first) Lucy Landon Carter Minor, daughter of Dr. Lewis Willis and Eloise (Innerrarity) Minor, November 4, 1869, at Norfolk, Virginia. Her father was a physician, and prior to the civil war he was fleet surgeon in the United States navy, but later he became fleet surgeon in the Confederate States navy. Issue of Dr. Lewis Willis Minor, namely: Lucy Landon Carter, of whom above; Lewis Willis Jr.   Mr. White married (second) Emma Gray, daughter of Benjamin C. and Susan E. (Reid) Gray, March 10, 1880, at Richmond, and her father was sometime a member of the Virginia state assembly from Richmond. Issue of Benjamin C. Gray, namely: Alfred, Ida, Fanny, Hattie, Benjamin, Mary, Emma, of whom above. Issue of William Henry and Lucy Landon Carter (Minor) White, namely: 1. Eloise I., who married O. G. Hinton, of Petersburg, Virginia, and had five children, to wit: Orlando, Eloise, Hildah, William Henry, Robert. 2. William Henry Landon, born at Norfolk, Virginia; graduated at the University of Virginia; studied medicine, and in 1913 was a practicing physician at Knoxville, Tennessee; married Ida Ellis; no children. 3. William Henry Jr., born at Norfolk, Virginia; was graduated from the University of Virginia, B. L., and admitted to the Virginia state bar at Norfolk, where he practiced law; married Mary Royster, of Norfolk, Virginia; and they have two children: Mary S., and Emma G.
      In recent years Mr. White has been associated with a number of social and business organizations. He is director of the Norfolk National Bank, at Norfolk, Virginia; the Norfolk Bank for Savings and Trusts; the Merchants National Bank; the Old Dominion Trust Company, of Richmond, Virginia. He is a Democrat in politics. He attends the Protestant Episcopal church, of which his family are members, though he is not a communicant of any church. He is a member of the Delta Psi and of the Phi Beta Kappa, college fraternities; also a member of the Lotus Club, of New York the Virginia Club, of Norfolk, and of the Westmoreland Club and the Commonwealth Club, of Richmond, Virginia.

[Pages 110-111]
      Joseph Augustus White, M. D. In 1880 Dr. White located in Richmond, a young man of thirty-two years, thoroughly prepared for the practice of his profession by many years of study in the best medical schools of the United States and Europe, eight years of practice in his native city of Baltimore, Maryland, and fresh from a professorship in Washington University Medical College. In the years that have since elapsed he has risen to the topmost round of the professional ladder and has achieved a national reputation as a specialist in diseases of the eye, ear, nose and throat.
      (I) Dr. White descends from colonial forbears, long seated in Frederick county, Maryland. His great-grandfather, Abraham White, of that county, recruited a battery of artillery during the revolutionary war and was commissioned a major of artillery at Williamsburg, Virginia, in 1780.
      (II) John White, son of Abraham White, was born in Baltimore, Maryland. He was a merchant, and a soldier in the war of 1812, serving in the Fifth Maryland Regiment. He was a Whig in politics, and a member of the Roman Catholic church. His eldest son, Charles L. White, was a prominent clergyman of that denomination, pastor of St. Matthew's Church in Washington, D. C. He had a second son, Ambrose A., and daughters, Mary and Elizabeth.
      (III) Ambrose A. White, son of John White, was born in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1808, died there in 1885. He spent his business life in Baltimore, engaged in the coffee trade as importer and wholesale dealer, being senior member of the important firm, White & Elder. He was a communicant of the Roman Catholic church, and a man of influence in his city. He married, 1833, Mary Hurley, a merchant of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 1814, died 1893, daughter of Thomas Hurley, a merchant of Philadelphia, born in Ireland. Thomas Hurley married Ann L. Carroll, one of the noted beauties of Philadelphia, her portrait by Sully, now in the possession of Edward H. White, of New York proving her right to the title. Ambrose A. and Mary (Hurley) White were the parents of eight sons and three daughters.
      (IV) Dr. Joseph Augustus White, son of Ambrose A. White, was born in Baltimore, Maryland, April 19, 1848. After passing through preparatory schools, he entered Rock Hill College, Ellicott City, Maryland; then attended Loyola College, Virginia, Maryland, and Mt. St. Mary's College, Emmitsburg, Maryland, receiving from the latter institution in 1867 the degrees of A. B. and A. M. He had ddecided upon the profession of medicine as his lifework and after completing his classical education entered the medical department of the University of Virginia of Maryland, whence he was graduated M. D. in 1869. He then pursued courses of medical study abroad at the Ecole de Medicine, Paris, France; the University of Freeburg un Bressgan, Baden; Heidelberg and Berlin. Returning to the United States in 1872, he began practice in Baltimore, continuing until 1880, also filling the chair of opthalmology in Washington University Medical College, in that city. In 1880 he located in Richmond, Virginia, where he has advanced to the highest rank in his profession. He is an authority on diseases of the eye, ear, nose and throat, and is now professor of opthalmology in the Medical College of Virginia. He is president of the American Laryngological, Rhinological and Otological Society, the largest association of ear, nose and throat specialists in the entire world, and is also a member of a number of prominent medical societies, and in many of them holds official position. He has lectured and written extensively on his specialties, and is well known in the profession all over the United States. He has devoted his whole life to the service of his fellowmen and has held no position outside the professional societies, nor engaged in any business.
      He is a member of the Westmoreland and Commonwealth clubs, of Richmond; the Deep Run Hunt Club, and the Country Club of Virginia. through his patriotic ancestor, Major Abraham White, he deserves membership in the Sons of American Revolution, and for several years was president of the Virginia Chapter. In politics he is a Democrat, and in religious belief a Catholic.
      Although nearing the age when men think of retirement, Dr. White is as earnest a student and as deeply immersed in research and investigation of cause, remedy and treatment of disease, as when forty years ago he began practice. His life has been a blessing to his fellowmen and "finis" is not yet written on his work for humanity.
      Dr. White married, December 27, 1877, in Montgomery, Alabama, Sophia Berney, born in that city in 1856, daughter of James Berney, M. D., and his wife, Sophia (Saffold) Berney. She is one of the eight children: John, Saffold, Chollet, James, Mary, Phillippa and Sophia. The sons of Dr. White all died in childhood; they were: James Berney, Joseph Edward and Joseph Augustus. The daughters were: Mary Edith, married Stuart Bowe and has a daughter Edith; Sophia Berney, married George Lee Mason, and has a daughter, Sophia Berney.

[Pages 111-113]
      John Murphy. The eventful career of John Murphy, of Richmond, Virginia, began when he landed on these shores, but undoubtedly he inherited the elements of character which have contributed to his marked success from his antecedents, and the early environment of his native land. He was born February 15, 1842, in county Cork, Ireland, and his parents, Peter and Margaret Murphy, were descended frm the native inhabitants of that locality.
      County Cork is generally considered to have been instituted by King John; it was but sparsely settled before the sixteenth century, when among others to whom the crown granted lands within the county were Sir Walter Raleigh and Edmund Spenser, the poet, who received forty thousand acres and thirty thousand and twenty-eight acres of land respectively. After 1602 these lands, together with other large estates, were colonized by English settlers, hence the later population of county Cork became more or less hybrid race, consisting of the English element engrafted upon the native Irish stock. It was from these elements that the family of Murphy sprang, and the dominant influence of this antecedent history gave the elements of character to John Murphy, which enabled him to succeed under the averse conditions of life during the early years of his career in this country.
      He was at Richmond, Virginia, when the civil war began and the cause of the Confederacy appealed to him. In April, 1861, he enlisted for one year in Company F, Fifteenth Regiment of Virginia Volunteers, and was sent to the front under General MacGruder in the eastern part of Virginia. In the following year he re-enlisted in Letcher's battery, Pegram's battalion of artillery; was in the seven days fighting around Richmond, and was slightly wounded in the battle of Malvern Hill, July 1, 1862. He participated in Lee's first invasion of Maryland, and was seriously wounded at Warrenton Springs on August 21, 1862; but in 1864, after his recovery, he joined Morgan's cavalry, at Wytheville, in southwestern Virginia, where Morgan's troop was being re-organized. Soon afterward he was captured at the battle of Floyds Mountain, near Dublin, Virginia, and sent to Champ Chase, Ohio, where he was held a prisoner until the close of the war.
      When he was discharged from prison, he learned that his parental home and all that was dear to him had been destroyed in the famine and flame swept city of Richmond during the last days of the war, so with the lure of promise in the great west before him, and the devastation of war behind him, he joined the westward bound tide of emigration to that Mecca, and sought to rebuild his broken fortune there, like many other soldiers of the Confederacy. He gladly accepted the first offer of employment made to him, which was to drive a stage coach for Holiday & Carlisle, who owned and operated a line of stage coaches that formed part of the "Overland Express" from Missouri to California. After a few month's service, his employers offered him the position of general manager of their supply train at a salary considered large for those days; however, a love for his adopted home city of Richmond still lingered in his heart, and in 1866, he returned there. He found the city, figuratively speaking, arising phoenix-like from the ashes of her ruins. He did whatever came to hand in the effort to rehabilitate the family's lost fortune, and by 1872 he had earned and saved enough money to establish himself in a small mercantile business. It was on the site of the present Murphy Hotel, and in few years more he was able to purchase the property, and in 1886 built the first hotel structure which bears his name, consisting of some thirty rooms. From time to time the structure has been enlarged, until at the present time (1914), it is the largest hotel and most widely known hostelry in the state of Virginia. This magnificent hotel consists of three buildings, containing five hundred guest rooms, fronting on Broad, Eighth and Grace streets. The buildings are connected by magnificent bridges arranged as sun parlors, thereby combining convenience, health and comfort.
      Mr. Murphy's business success, particularly in hotel management, has been phenomenal; he has been a liberal patron of every movement, in recent years, that had for its object the business and commercial advancement of Richmond, and he is widely known for his genial hospitality, charities and patriotism. Himself a Confederate veteran, who has ever allied with the memorial organizations of the "Lost Cause," he is nevertheless fraternally, on the best of terms with the Grand Army of the Republic organizations north of Mason and Dixon's line. In 1896 he was chosen commander of R. E. Lee Camp of United Confederate Veterans, which is the most prominent Confederate veteran organization in the state, and served for eighteen years as a member of the board of directors of Lee Camp, Soldier's Home. He is a consistent member of the Roman Catholic church. During the years of his prosperity he has dispensed charity with a free hand to many worthy young men whom he has assisted to secure an education and to financial success, and also he has ever had an enthusiastic interest in the welfare of child-life round about him.
      In politics Mr. Murphy is a stanch Democrat, and he takes an active interest in local politics. He was made a director of the Virginia State Ggricultural Society in 1890, and for two years served as its vice-president; in 1898 Governor J. Hoge Tyler appointed him a member of the board of directors of the Virginia Penitentiary; he has been a director of the Broad Street Bank, of Richmond, since it was founded in 1902; likewise of the Old Dominion Trust Company; and despite great demands upon his time by his own business interests, he is actively identified with numerous business and social organizations. He is a member of the Royal Arcanum, of the Catholic Knights of America, the Independent Order of Heptasophs, and of the Ancient Order of United Workmen. His remarkable success often elicits inquiries from persons who seek his advice; to such he recommends, in general, that they eschew all intoxicating liquors and vicious company, and that they first own their own homes, and avoid all financial speculations, policies, doubtless, that have contributed to his own remarkable success.
      Mr. Murphy married (first) Jane McCabe, of Richmond, Virginia, in 1868; and married (second) in 1903, Louisa O'Connor, of Charleston, South Carolina. Issue of first marriage: Nellie J., Edward F., Madeline McCabe, Alice E., John Jr., George D., Robert E. No children by second marriage.

[Page 113]
      Charles Wilbur Mercer, M. D. The Mercers on coming from Scotland first settled in Hampden-Sidney College, Pennsylvania, from whence came John Mercer, great-grandfather of Dr. Charles W. Mercer, of Richmond, Virginia, settling in Middlesex county, Virginia. His son, Isaac J. Mercer, was born in Middlesex county, in 1824, died in Richmond, June 4, 1908. He was a lumberman and a lumber dealer in established business at Richmond, where at the time of his death he was the oldest dealer in the city. He was a Baptist in religion and a Democrat in politics. He married, October 8, 1850, in Richmond, Josephine Virginia Arselle, of French descent. Children: Caroline Virginia, born August 9, 1851, married W. J. Young, and resides in Richmond; Charles Augustus, of whom further; Isaac Morton, born June 28, 1857, a minister of the Gospel, now pastor of the Baptist church at Rocky Mount, North Carolina; William Florence, M. D., born February 13, 1862, specialist in diseases of the eye, ear and throat, practicing in Richmond; Walter Cabell, born May 10, 1865, professor of music in the public schools of Richmond; James H., born January 2, 1874, sheriff of Henrico county, Virginia, and Hugh C., deputy clerk of the circuit court, Virginia.
      Charles Augustus Mercer, eldest son of Isaac J. and Josephine V. (Arselle) Mercer, was born in Richmond, Virginia, June 12, 1853. He prepared for the profession of dentistry and is now one of the oldest dentists practicing in Richmond. He is a member of the Baptist church and a Democrat. He married Nannie Vaughn Robertson, born in Richmond, September 8, 1856, died May 15, 1913. Children: Charles Wilbur, of whom further; Eugene Garnet, born September 3, 1881, now a civil engineer in Richmond; Caroline Gertrude, born September 3, 1883, married J. Chalmers Bristow, and resides in Richmond; Isaac John, born November 6, 1886, now an optician living in Petersburg, Virginia; Edwin Dunn, born December 26, 1888, now a salesman of Chicago, Illinois; Morton, born July 11, 1891, now clerk in the Merchants National Bank, Richmond; Cabell T., born August 28, 1893, now a student at the Medical College of Virginia.
      Dr. Charles Wilbur Mercer, eldet son of Charles Augustus and Nannie V. (Robertson) Mercer, was born in Richmond, Virginia, April 3, 1880. His elementary and preparatory education was obtained in Richmond public schools and McCabe's University School; his professional training at the Medical College of Virginia, whence he was graduated Doctor of Medicine, May 10, 1904. He practiced five years in Blackstone, then in 1910 took a post-graduate course in the polyclinic department of Tulane Medical College, at New Orleans, Louisiana, after which he located in Richmond, specializing in orthoepedic surgery. During the interval from his graduation, May 10, 1904, until his location in Blackstone, in May, 1905, Dr. Mercer was a resident physician at the City Hospital and ambulance surgeon of the city of Richmond. He is a member of the American Medical Association, the Southern Medical Association, the Richmond Academy of Medicine, and the Medical Society of Virginia. He is well established in practice in Richmond, one of the rising young practitioners of that city. He belongs to the Masonic Order and the Junior Order of American Mechanics. In religious faith he and his wife are Baptists.
      Dr. Mercer married, at New Orleans, Louisiana, December 18, 1907, Kathleen Owen Sherwood, born in Washington, Georgia, November 4, 1884, oldest child of Ralph Sherwood, business supervisor of the Life Insurance Company of Virginia, in New Orleans, and his wife, Mary Rembert Colley, of Georgia. She has younger sisters, Margaret Colley and Inez Sherwood; brothers, Ralph Eugene and Rembert Leavenworth Sherwood.

[Pages 114-119]
      Early Family. According to Philip McDermott, M. D., in his "Families in Ireland from the Eleventh to the Sixteenth Century" the name Early is derived from the Celtic Maolmocheirghe, translated meaning "Early Rising," Maol signifying a king or chief of the Early Rising. O'Hart in "Irish Pedigrees" says: "In Ireland and Scotland each family had its own chief under Tanist law; these chiefs constituted the ancient nobility in sister counties down to the reign of King James I." He also says: "O'Maolmocheirghe, Early is considered a sufficient full translation. this translation was due to the legislation of the English invaders of Ireland, who compelled the Irish to adopt English surnames together with the English language." The coat-of-arms of the Early family: Gules a chevron between three birds, argent. Crest: A dexter arm erect perpendicular, the arm holding a gem ring or, stone Gules. Motto: Vigilans et tenex.
      The founder of the Early family who settled in tidewater section of Virginia was a descendant of ancestry in Ulster province. John Early is recorded in York county, Virginia, in 1661. John Early, of Mulgrave, October 4-8, 1676, received a commission as an officer in one of the five companies of foot soldiers in h is majesty's regiment of guards employed in the expedition to Virginia, Captain Herbert Jeffreys, commander-in-chief.
      Jeremiah Early, son of Thomas and Elizabeth Early (presumably grandson of John Early, of York county) was born in Middlesex county, Virginia, December 9, 1705, died in 1787. Tradition says that his father, Thomas Early, was lost at sea, and that he became the ward of Thomas Buford, of Lancaster county, Virginia, whose daughter, Elizabeth, he married in October, 1728. The two families of Buford and Early moved toward the mountains through Spottsylvania county, and settled in Orange county. Here, in 1735, Jeremiah Early purchased land from Robert Lundy, and in the same year purchased land on the north side of the Staunton river, and is registered as Jeremiah Early, planter of St. Mark's parish. In 1740 a road was ordered run through his plantation with the least prejudice to it. In 1741 he was serving as grand juryman in Orange county, but in 1748 when the county of Culpeper was cut from Orange his plantation lay in the new county. Between 1753 and 1758 he served in the French and Indian war. His will, written in 1786 and probated in 1787, mentions eight children by name, but divides his personal property in nine proportions.
      Children of Jeremiah and Elizabeth (Buford) Early: 1. John, born 1729, died 1773; married Theodosia White. 2. Jeremiah, see forward. 3. Sarah, married William Kirtley, and removed to Boone countyh, Kentucky. 4. Joshua, born 1738; married Mary Leftwich, and was the father of the famous Methodist bishop, John Early, and of Captain Joshua Early Jr., killed in the war of 1812. 5. Joseph, served as first lieutenant in the revolutionary war, 1776; elected a member of the Virginia legislature in 1783; married Jane ———. 6. Jacob, married Elizabeth Robertson; moved to Clarke county, Georgia. 7. Ann, married Joseph Rogers; moved to Bryant's Station in 1782. 8. Hannah, married Captain John Scott; moved to Fayette county, Kentucky. 9. Joel, married Lucy Smith, of Culpeper county, Virginia; moved to Wilkes county, Georgia.
      Colonel Jeremiah (2) Early, son of Jeremiah and Elizabeth (Buford) Early, was born in 1730, died in 1779. He served in the French and Indian war as lieutenant, was captain of the Bedford militia in 1758, colonel of militia in 1778, held the commission of high sheriff; and was a justice of the peace of Bedford county from 1759 to 1779. He married (first) Sarah Anderson, (second) Mary Stith. He had a large family among which were: Jacobus, the eldest, a captain of militia in 1781; John, a delegate to the Virginia convention in 1778 for ratifying the constitution; Jubal, see forward.
      Jubal Early, son of Colonel Jeremiah (2) Early, married Mary Cheatham, and died leaving her with two young sons, Joab, see forward, and Henry, who were placed under the guardianship of Colonel Samuel Hairston.
      Colonel Joab Early, son of Jubal and Mary (Cheatham) Early, was born in Franklin county, Virginia, in 1791. He was a man of considerable prominence in his community, and at different times in his life held all the important offices in his county, serving as sheriff of Franklin county, member of the Virginia legislature, and colonel of militia. In 1845 he removed to Putnam county and purchased considerable fruit and farming land on the Kanawha river. Later, at the close of the war between the states, he went to the home of his son, Robert H. Early, in Lexington, Missouri, where he passed away in 1870, and being a Mason was buried with Masonic honors. He married, 1812, Ruth Hairston, born 1794, died 1832, daughter of Colonel Samuel and Judith (Saunders) Hairston (see Hairston line). Children: Samuel Henry, see forward; Mary Judith; Jubal Anderson, see forward; Robert Hairston, Elizabeth J., Anne Letitia, Ruth Hairston, Elvira Evelyn, Richard and Joab, twins.
      Captain Samuel Henry Early, son of Colonel Joab and Ruth (Hairston) Early, was born in Franklin county, Virginia, January 22, 1813, died in Charleston, West Virginia, March 11, 1874. He received an excellent education, attending the Patrick Henry Academy in Henry county, and William and Mary College in Williamsburg, Virginia. After a course in a law school at Fredericksburg he was admitted to the bar and began legal practice in Franklin county. He did not, however, devote himself entirely to the practice of law but branched out in various other directions. For a few years he was postmaster of Coopers, Franklin county, Virginia; engaged in the manufacture of salt at Kanawha Salines, and while engaged in that business he invented and patented a pump for salt and oil wells to prevent injury from gas; farmed in Kanawha county; in 1853 went to Lynchburg to live, and at that time was interested in agricultural pursuits in Bedford county, Virginia, and also in Texas; when the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad was building, he secured a contract to furnish railroad ties, which he supplied from his coal lands in Boone and Lincoln counties, West Virginia. During the war between the states he serv ed in the Wise Troop, Second Virginia Cavalry; later was commissioned lieutenant on the staff of his brother, General Jubal Anderson Early, and afterward was promoted to the rank of captain. After being wounded at Gettysburg he was appointed assistant conscripting officer at Lynchburg. In September, 1864, he was authorized by special order to organize a scouting force for temporary service and to "adopt such measures for the transmission of information as emergencies may require." Immediately upon the receipt of the news of the evacuation of Richmond he was sent with special dispatches to President Davis (then at Danville) to apprise him of the fact, and zealously executing his orders he covered the ground on horseback in a few hours. He carried back to General Lee an important letter from President Davis, which has never been published, but is now in the possession of the Early family. Captain Early was a public-spirited man, ever ready to help in any enterprise that might benefit the community in which he resided, and was always held in the highest esteem by his fellow citizens. He was a man of fine physique and commanding stature, being over six feet tall. He was very fond of outdoor exercise, especially the chase, spending much of his time in the mountains of the western counties of Virginia hunting deer. It was whole on one of these hunting trips that he took a severe cold, which resulted in pneumonia, from which he failed to recover and passed away at the age of sixty-one years.
      Captain Early married at Lynchburg, Virginia, in 1846, Henrianne Cabell, born August 2, 1822, died May 31, 1890, daughter of Dr. John Jordan and Henrianne (Davies) Cabell (see Clayton, Davies and Cabell lines). Children: 1. A daughter, died in infancy. 2. John Cabell, born 1848, died 1909; married, 1876, Mary W. Cabell, daughter of Dr. Clifford Cabell, of Buckingham county, Virginia; children: i. Evelyn Russell. ii. Samuel Henry, born 1880, died 1897. iii. Clifford Cabell, lieutenant in Fifteenth United States Infantry; he was drowned, September 13, 1914, in Lake Mariano, New Mexico, while endeavoring to rescue his friend and companion, United States Commissioner J. A. Young, of Gallup, New Mexico, who was unable to swim, when their boat was overturned; his remains were brought to his home by his brother, Lieutenant Clifford C. Early. v. Henrianne. 3. Ruth Hairston, resides in Lynchburg, Virginia. 4. Henrianne Cabell, died 1896. 5. Mary Judith, resides in Lynchburg, Virginia. 6. Joab, died young. 7. Jubal A., died young.
      Lieutenant-General Jubal Anderson Early, second son of Colonel Joab and Ruth (Hairston) Early, was born in Franklin county, Virginia, November 3, 1816, died at Lynchburg, Virginia, March 2, 1894. He received a good education, enjoying the benefit of the best schools in his region of the country, and was well grounded in the dead languages and elementary mathematics. He was appointed to the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York by President-General Jackson through the agency of Hon. N. H. Claiborne, member of Congress from his district, in 1833, and graduated in 1837. His highest standing in any branch, during military studies at West Point, was in military studies at West Point, was in military and civil engineering, in which he stood sixth in his class, and his general standing at graduation was eighteenth. Among those graduating in his class were: General Braxton Bragg, Lieutenant-General John C. Pemberton, Major Generals Arnold, Elzey and William H. T. Walker, and a few others of the Confederate army; and Major-Generals John Sedgwick, Joseph Hooker, William H. French, and several brigadier-generals of minor note in the Federal army. Among his contemporaries at West Point were: General Beauregard, Lieutenant-General Elwell, Major-General Edward Johnson, and some others of distinction in the Confederate army; Major-Generals McDowell and Meade, and several others in the Federal army. On graduating he was appointed second lieutenant in the Third Regiment of Artillery, and was assigned to Company E. He served in the Seminole war, 1837-38, under General Jessup. He went through the campaign from the St. John's river south into Everglades, and was present at a skirmish with Indians on the Lockee Hatchee, near Jupiter Inlet in January, 1838. This was his baptism of fire, hearing for the first time the whistling of hostile bullets.
      In the fall of the year 1838, having resigned from the army, he commenced the study of law in the office of N. M. Taliaferro, Esq., an eminent lawyer of Franklin county. During the Mexican war he was appointed major in a regiment of volunteers from Virginia, and was mustered into service, January 7, 1847. During his military service he was a strict disciplinarian, but was never harsh in his treatment of his men, and was always respected and loved by them. After the war he returned to his law practice, which soon became considerable, and he was one of the best lawyers in his section of the state.
      He sat in the state legislature in 1841-42, and was commonwealth attorney from 1842 to 1852 except during 1847-48, when he served in the Mexican war as before stated. In 1862 he was a member of the Virginia convention called to determine the true position of the state in the impending conflict, and at first earnestly opposed secession, but was soon aroused by the aggressive movements of the Federal government to draw his sword for the defense of his native state and the Confederate cause. He was commissioned colonel of the Twenty-fourth Regiment of Virginia Infantry, and with this rank commanded a brigade at Blackburn's Ford and Manassas, in the latter battle making a successful onslaught upon the Federal right in flank which aided in precipitating the rout which immediately followed. He was promoted brigadier-general to date from that battle. At Williamsburg he led the charge of his brigade upon the Federal position, and was wounded. In the Manassas campaign of 1862 he commanded a brigade of Ewell's division of Jackson's corps, participating in the same around Pope and the defeat of the Federal army in the final engagement.
      In the Maryland campaign and at Sharpsburg, after the wounding of General Lawton, he took command of Ewell's division, and also skillfully directed it at a critical moment against the Federal attack at Fredericksburg. In January, 1863, he was promoted major-general, and during the Chancellorsville campaign was left with his division and Barksdale's brigade, about ten thousand men, to hold the heights of Fredericksburg, where he made a gallant fight against Sedgwick's corps. At the opening of the president campaign he was entrusted by Ewell with the attack upon Winchester, which resulted in the rout of Milroy and the capture of four thousand, and thence he marched via York toward Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, until recalled from the Susquehanna river, which he had reached, to the field of Gettysburg, where he actively participated in the successes of the first day's fighting, and on the second day made a desperate assault on the Federals, gaining vantage ground which he was unable to hold singlehanded. At the opening fight in the Wilderness, in temporary command of Hill's corps, he successfully resisted the Federal attempt to flank the army of General Lee, and at Spottsylvania Court House in the same command he met and defeated Burnside. Again he struck that commander an effective blow at Bethesda Church in the movement to Cold Harbor, and after the battle at the latter place he made two attacks upon General Grant's right flank.
      On May 31, 1863, he was commissioned lieutenant-general and soon afterward detached upon the important duty of defending the Confederate rear threatened by Hunter at Lynchburg. He promptly drove Hunter into the mountains and then marched rapidly down the Shenandoah Valley, crossed into Maryland and defeated Wallace at Monocacy, and with a force reduced to about eight thousand men, was about to assault the defences at Washington when the city was reinforced by two corps of Federal troops. Retiring safely into Virginia, he was on active duty in the valley in order to injure the Federal communications and keep as large a force as possible from Grant's army. Finally Sheridan was sent against him with an overwhelming force. against which Lieutenant-General Early made a heroic and brilliant resistance at Winchester, Fisher's Hill and Cedar Creek. He then established his army at New Market, and after Sheridan had retired from the valley he fell back to Staunton. When the army surrendered, he rode horseback to Texas, hoping to find a Confederate force still holding out. Thence he proceeded to Mexico, and from there sailed to Canada. Subsequently returning to Virginia he resumed his law practice for a time, but in his later years spent a third of the year at New Orleans.