APPENDICES
http://users.ju.edu/jcalvittclarke1appendix.htm
Working Draft
December 2012
[1]
JUDGE JOSEPH CALVITT CLARKE OF NEW ORLEANS AND HIS FAMILY”
http://users.ju.edu/jclarke/jcalvittclarke1.htm
APPENDIX 1:
BENJAMIN PAGE: THE FATHER OF PHOEBE ANN PAGE
Born in 1765 in Norwich, County, Norfolk, England, Benjamin Page’s father probably was Benjamin Jagger, a surgeon of Norwich. “Jagger” presumably represents a corruption of the Flemish “de Jaghere,” or “Jacquer,” and these names were among the many religious refugees who escaped from Spanish persecution in the Netherlands by the Duke of Alva under Philip II. Between 1567 and 1573, many of these refugees settled in Norwich. His mother’s family name was Page, and when Benjamin was twenty, he began using the name, Page, instead of his patronymic, Jagger, to abide by the will of a relative, who had left him significant property.[2]
Benjamin Page received his mercantile training in the London counting house of Maltby, recorded as “Norwich manufacturers” in the London directory for 1786. He became a London merchant and opened his own counting house.[3] An indenture dated August 16, 1787, named Benjamin Jagger as a joint trustee of the rectory and church of Saint Peter Mancroft in Norwich. He was to administer funds and to buy lands for increasing the curacy of Saint Peter Mancroft.[4]
Page moved ahead in his personal life as well. On May 10, 1791 in the Church of St. Mary le Bow, Cheapside, London, Benjamin married Elizabeth Rankin, born in Cambridgeshire, England. They had five children.[5]
Seeking to increase his wealth and to put his expertise and connections to good use, the couple in 1797 immigrated to New York. One of the first importers of English goods after the Revolution, he opened a house as the American representative of the London house of Wallis, Cook & Hammond, merchants, 2 Trump Street, Guildhall. The name of “B. Page, shipping Merchant, 45 Partition Street” is in the New York City Directory in 1798. The name appears on Washington Street in 1799; at 120 Liberty Street between 1801 and 1805; and at 162 Pearl Street from 1805 to 1808, near the famous Fraunces Tavern. Page owned considerable property in New York and at Greenwich, then a separate village, where he had a summer home.[6]
Benjamin Page in 1805 donated $25 for supporting public schools in New York City.[7]
Sickness was an uncomfortable fact of life for New Yorkers, and in the summers of 1795, 1799, 1803, and 1805, yellow fever struck and killed thousands of New Yorkers. A viral hemorrhagic, the fever caused victims to develop a yellow complexion and to vomit black bile. Among the infected, was the young Elizabeth Rankin Page, who died on October 30, 1803 at age twenty-seven. She was buried in the Scottish Presbyterian burying-ground at Greenwich, and afterward was removed to the new burying-ground of the same name, farther out of town.[8]
Only three months after Elizabeth’s death, on February 2, 1804 in New York City, the Reverend John M. Mason, married Benjamin Page to the widow, Martha Harding. She had been born in 1774 and was the daughter of John Harding a wool stapler of Leicester, England. When about fifteen or sixteen, Martha was driving in the family coach with her father riding on horseback at her side. When the coachman cracked his whip at a hare, the horses frightened and he lost control. Racing toward a toll gate, which the keeper failed to open, the horses jumped over it, but hung the coach on the other side. Martha was so frightened that her hair turned white.[9] A couple of years later, she and her siblings came to the United States in 1802 aboard the General Mercer. Benjamin and Martha had seven children.[10]
The couple’s first child was John Harding Page, born November 6, 1804 at 162 Pearl St. New York, New York. Educated at what would become Bethany College in West Virginia, he devoted much of his life to benevolent work, especially to improving the moral and spiritual condition of prisoners in jail. He died on August 29, 1871 at Pittsburgh. The second child, Phoebe Ann Page, was born on May 11, 1806 at 162 Pearl Street, New York, New York, and, after having spent much of her life in Louisiana. She died on July 31, 1891 at 252 Lafayette Street in Brooklyn, New York. The third child was Richard Smith Page, who was born on June 7, 1808, and died young. Next came Mary Elizabeth Page, born October 24, 1810 at New Brunswick, New Jersey; she died on January 18, 1885 in Allegheny, Pennsylvania. The fifth child was Henry Brandt Page, born on December 7, 1812 at Holmesburg, Pennsylvania. He died with his two children, when the steamboat Yalabusha burned on the Mississippi River, near New Orleans, about 1845. It was his widow who in 1860 loaned $2,000 to the widow of J. Calvitt Clarke. The last two children were Martha Harding Page, born on April 6, 1816 at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and William Fletcher Page, born on July 12, 1819 at Pittsburgh. He died in adolescence in 1834.[11]
Despite Page’s earlier success, the Napoleonic Wars threatened international trade. President Thomas Jefferson’s embargo in December 1807 on foreign bound vessels so seriously hurt the importing and shipping business that Page closed his business in New York. In not suffering a serious loss, he was more fortunate than was his friend Benjamin Bakewell, whose export business to the West Indies was so stricken that he had to assign his rights to the company to others.[12]
In September 1808, Page, Bakewell and Thomas Kinder, one of Bakewell’s assignees, made a trip to Pittsburgh to find a business opening for Bakewell and an investment for capital diverted from the shipping business. In Pittsburgh, there was one white glass works at the southeast corner of Grant and Water streets. But lacking capital, the establishment was incomplete and its owners offered it for sale, probably without having made any glass. Page and Kinder bought the concern, and they set up Bakewell as managing partner in sole charge of the firm eventually called B. Bakewell & Co.[13]
http://users.ju.edu/jcalvittclarke1appendix.htm
Working Draft
December 2012
[1]
JUDGE JOSEPH CALVITT CLARKE OF NEW ORLEANS AND HIS FAMILY”
http://users.ju.edu/jclarke/jcalvittclarke1.htm
APPENDIX 1:
BENJAMIN PAGE: THE FATHER OF PHOEBE ANN PAGE
Born in 1765 in Norwich, County, Norfolk, England, Benjamin Page’s father probably was Benjamin Jagger, a surgeon of Norwich. “Jagger” presumably represents a corruption of the Flemish “de Jaghere,” or “Jacquer,” and these names were among the many religious refugees who escaped from Spanish persecution in the Netherlands by the Duke of Alva under Philip II. Between 1567 and 1573, many of these refugees settled in Norwich. His mother’s family name was Page, and when Benjamin was twenty, he began using the name, Page, instead of his patronymic, Jagger, to abide by the will of a relative, who had left him significant property.[2]
Benjamin Page received his mercantile training in the London counting house of Maltby, recorded as “Norwich manufacturers” in the London directory for 1786. He became a London merchant and opened his own counting house.[3] An indenture dated August 16, 1787, named Benjamin Jagger as a joint trustee of the rectory and church of Saint Peter Mancroft in Norwich. He was to administer funds and to buy lands for increasing the curacy of Saint Peter Mancroft.[4]
Page moved ahead in his personal life as well. On May 10, 1791 in the Church of St. Mary le Bow, Cheapside, London, Benjamin married Elizabeth Rankin, born in Cambridgeshire, England. They had five children.[5]
Seeking to increase his wealth and to put his expertise and connections to good use, the couple in 1797 immigrated to New York. One of the first importers of English goods after the Revolution, he opened a house as the American representative of the London house of Wallis, Cook & Hammond, merchants, 2 Trump Street, Guildhall. The name of “B. Page, shipping Merchant, 45 Partition Street” is in the New York City Directory in 1798. The name appears on Washington Street in 1799; at 120 Liberty Street between 1801 and 1805; and at 162 Pearl Street from 1805 to 1808, near the famous Fraunces Tavern. Page owned considerable property in New York and at Greenwich, then a separate village, where he had a summer home.[6]
Benjamin Page in 1805 donated $25 for supporting public schools in New York City.[7]
Sickness was an uncomfortable fact of life for New Yorkers, and in the summers of 1795, 1799, 1803, and 1805, yellow fever struck and killed thousands of New Yorkers. A viral hemorrhagic, the fever caused victims to develop a yellow complexion and to vomit black bile. Among the infected, was the young Elizabeth Rankin Page, who died on October 30, 1803 at age twenty-seven. She was buried in the Scottish Presbyterian burying-ground at Greenwich, and afterward was removed to the new burying-ground of the same name, farther out of town.[8]
Only three months after Elizabeth’s death, on February 2, 1804 in New York City, the Reverend John M. Mason, married Benjamin Page to the widow, Martha Harding. She had been born in 1774 and was the daughter of John Harding a wool stapler of Leicester, England. When about fifteen or sixteen, Martha was driving in the family coach with her father riding on horseback at her side. When the coachman cracked his whip at a hare, the horses frightened and he lost control. Racing toward a toll gate, which the keeper failed to open, the horses jumped over it, but hung the coach on the other side. Martha was so frightened that her hair turned white.[9] A couple of years later, she and her siblings came to the United States in 1802 aboard the General Mercer. Benjamin and Martha had seven children.[10]
The couple’s first child was John Harding Page, born November 6, 1804 at 162 Pearl St. New York, New York. Educated at what would become Bethany College in West Virginia, he devoted much of his life to benevolent work, especially to improving the moral and spiritual condition of prisoners in jail. He died on August 29, 1871 at Pittsburgh. The second child, Phoebe Ann Page, was born on May 11, 1806 at 162 Pearl Street, New York, New York, and, after having spent much of her life in Louisiana. She died on July 31, 1891 at 252 Lafayette Street in Brooklyn, New York. The third child was Richard Smith Page, who was born on June 7, 1808, and died young. Next came Mary Elizabeth Page, born October 24, 1810 at New Brunswick, New Jersey; she died on January 18, 1885 in Allegheny, Pennsylvania. The fifth child was Henry Brandt Page, born on December 7, 1812 at Holmesburg, Pennsylvania. He died with his two children, when the steamboat Yalabusha burned on the Mississippi River, near New Orleans, about 1845. It was his widow who in 1860 loaned $2,000 to the widow of J. Calvitt Clarke. The last two children were Martha Harding Page, born on April 6, 1816 at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and William Fletcher Page, born on July 12, 1819 at Pittsburgh. He died in adolescence in 1834.[11]
Despite Page’s earlier success, the Napoleonic Wars threatened international trade. President Thomas Jefferson’s embargo in December 1807 on foreign bound vessels so seriously hurt the importing and shipping business that Page closed his business in New York. In not suffering a serious loss, he was more fortunate than was his friend Benjamin Bakewell, whose export business to the West Indies was so stricken that he had to assign his rights to the company to others.[12]
In September 1808, Page, Bakewell and Thomas Kinder, one of Bakewell’s assignees, made a trip to Pittsburgh to find a business opening for Bakewell and an investment for capital diverted from the shipping business. In Pittsburgh, there was one white glass works at the southeast corner of Grant and Water streets. But lacking capital, the establishment was incomplete and its owners offered it for sale, probably without having made any glass. Page and Kinder bought the concern, and they set up Bakewell as managing partner in sole charge of the firm eventually called B. Bakewell & Co.[13]
Pittsburgh in 1817—columns of smoke are from the glassworks of Bakewell, Page and Bakewell[14]
After many difficulties, the firm became the first successful flint glass house in the United States and was part of Pittsburgh imposing industrial development.[15] The word “flint” marks glass with a high lead content, such as that used to make art glass and tableware. Pittsburgh’s flint productions were especially elegant in their handicraft and comparable to European manufacture. The glass left in many directions with Philadelphia receiving part, but the great outlet was down the Ohio River.[16] Presumably some of this product made its way to Shepart Abbott and Co., where William Winans Clarke clerked.
After many difficulties, the firm became the first successful flint glass house in the United States and was part of Pittsburgh imposing industrial development.[15] The word “flint” marks glass with a high lead content, such as that used to make art glass and tableware. Pittsburgh’s flint productions were especially elegant in their handicraft and comparable to European manufacture. The glass left in many directions with Philadelphia receiving part, but the great outlet was down the Ohio River.[16] Presumably some of this product made its way to Shepart Abbott and Co., where William Winans Clarke clerked.
Bakewell, Pears & Co. ad[17]
Billhead of Bakewell, Page and Bakewell, ca. 1815[18]
The firm’s excellent manufacture gained fame everywhere in the United States, in Mexico, and in many parts of Europe. The quality Pittsburgh’s glassworks impressed one visitor to the United States in 1818. He especially noted Bakewell’s, where he saw chandeliers and many articles in cut glass of “a very splendid description,” including a pair of decanters, “cut from a London pattern.” He suggested Bakewell was meeting the consumer demand for “elegant luxury” in the western states, because the rich of the East Coast were still importing from Europe, especially Great Britain.[19]
The firm’s excellent manufacture gained fame everywhere in the United States, in Mexico, and in many parts of Europe. The quality Pittsburgh’s glassworks impressed one visitor to the United States in 1818. He especially noted Bakewell’s, where he saw chandeliers and many articles in cut glass of “a very splendid description,” including a pair of decanters, “cut from a London pattern.” He suggested Bakewell was meeting the consumer demand for “elegant luxury” in the western states, because the rich of the East Coast were still importing from Europe, especially Great Britain.[19]
Bakewell Whale Oil Lamps which are blown, pressed, and engraved, 1820-1840 purchased by Corning Museum of Glass[20]
Compote, decanter, and celery vase, Pittsburgh 1825-1840[21]
Signed on the bottom of the vase[22]
Blown Three Mold Celery Vase Pittsburgh from the Bakewell, Page & Bakewell Glass Works, 1820-1840[23]
The glass of Bakewell, Page and Bakewell was so favorably known that in 1832 President Jackson ordered for his own use a set of glass, including bowls with and without stands, celery glasses, pitchers, decanters, tumblers, and wine and champagne glasses. The value of the order was about $1,500. Before this, the firm had made for President James Monroe a full set, and in 1825 the Franklin Institute of Philadelphia awarded a silver medal to Bakewell, Page and Bakewell for the finest specimen of cut glass.[24]
The glass of Bakewell, Page and Bakewell was so favorably known that in 1832 President Jackson ordered for his own use a set of glass, including bowls with and without stands, celery glasses, pitchers, decanters, tumblers, and wine and champagne glasses. The value of the order was about $1,500. Before this, the firm had made for President James Monroe a full set, and in 1825 the Franklin Institute of Philadelphia awarded a silver medal to Bakewell, Page and Bakewell for the finest specimen of cut glass.[24]
One of the vases presented to Lafayette on his trip to Pittsburgh in May 1825. The vase sold at Christie's in Paris for $267,022. Signed and dated on the base: “Bakewell Page Bakewells Pittsburgh 1825” or “1829.”[25]
Sulphide furniture knob with Benjamin Franklin. 1826-1845[26]
Meanwhile, Bakewell’s partner, Benjamin Page, faced a decline of trade because of the looming War of 1812. Page closed his import business in New York, and about 1810, Page moved to New Brunswick, New Jersey and from 1812 to 1814, he lived in Holmesburg, Pennsylvania, near Philadelphia. In the autumn of 1814, Page moved to Pittsburgh, the center of his financial interests. His home after April 1, 1821, was the house he built at the corner of Stockton Avenue and West Diamond Street in Allegheny.[27]
While in Pittsburgh between 1814 and 1832, besides attending to the glass business, he rose to prominence in other business activities and in the city’s social life. He was an original manager of the Monongahela Bridge Company. In February 1830, congregates elected Page as an original trustee of the First Presbyterian Church, and that he was active in the Sunday school work—which included teaching basic literacy. About forty people on Saturday, November 27, 1813 assembled in the spacious bar room of the Green Tree Inn at the northwest corner of Fifth and Wood streets to found the Pittsburgh Permanent Library Company. Page was elected to the first Board of Directors for three years and again in December 1816. He was also a manager of the Pittsburgh Bible Society, and prominently helped the female founders—including his wife as one of its driving forces—of Protestant Orphan Asylum of Pittsburgh and Allegheny in April 1832.[28]
On August 1, 1832 when Page was sixty-seven years old and in poor health, he withdrew from the glassworks. Despite having established himself as one of Pittsburgh’s socially prominent citizens—one of his twelve children had even married a Bakewell—he moved in 1832 to his country seat, “Beach Farm,” Branch Grove, Hamilton Country, near Cincinnati, Ohio. There he died on June 9, 1834, at age seventy.[29] He lies in Spring Grove Cemetery, near Cincinnati. His wife, Martha, died in October 1848, at age seventy-four. She was buried in Allegheny Cemetery.
Several who knew Benjamin Page have left their remembrances of him. Mrs. D. A. James, his granddaughter, said: “Benjamin Page always wore his own beautiful brown hair in a queue, and ordinarily wore an olive-green coat and a white cravat.”[30] Mrs. Campbell, a daughter of Benjamin Bakewell, described Page as “a fine-looking man, with large, bright eyes, pleasant manners, and a hearty laugh.” She added that he was religious, “long a leading member of Dr. Herron’s (First Presbyterian) church, in Pittsburgh, although Mrs. Page joined the Methodist Church shortly after their arrival in the city.” Page often took communion with his wife in her church, which embittered his relations with Herron’s church and “on that account, Dr. Herron’s session were illiberal enough to exclude him from the communion table in that church. Page then withdrew from the Herron’s church. Mrs. Campbell finished, “Mr. Page showed himself a true friend in need to my father, and offered the use of his name to extricate my father from his business difficulties in New York to a greater amount than he thought right to accept.”[31]
APPENDIX 2:
LAND PURCHASE FOR THE CLARKE HOUSE
Daily Picayune, Mar. 18, 1845.
217 Lots of Ground. Second and Closing Sale of the Kohn & Shiff Real Estate, Faubourg Livaudais.”
Will be sold at auction on WEDNESDAY, 19th March, and following days, at 12o’clack, at Banks’ Arcade, for the final division of interest, and without reserve--
16—Five Lots of Ground—designated as Nos. 2, 3, 4, 7, and 8 in square No. 174, bounded by Nayades, Apollo and Ninth streets, and the dividing line of suburb Delassize.
Daily Picayune, Mar. 20, 1845.
“The Sale of Livaudais Real Estate”
Will be continued THIS DAY, at 12 o’clock.
The squares remaining unsold are Nos. 98, 83, 99, 100, 81, 64, 82, and a portion of squares 174 and 173. The sale will commence at fractions of square 173. The sale will be continued until the whole of the property is sold, as it is the final and closing sale of the divisions of the interests of the owners. Purchasers will not again have the same opportunity of securing an interest in a property increasing in value so rapidly as the above.
Terms—One-fifth cash, balance from 6 to 24 months, without endorsers or interest.
Previous to the sale, several IMPROVED PROPERTIES will be sold, without reserve, in the vicinity of the fiver.
For further particulars apply to J. A. Beard & So., 59 Magazine street.
APPENDIX 3:
THE FIRE THAT KILLED BENJAMIN PAGE CLARKE
“City Intelligence: Dreadful Conflagration. A Fearful Loss of Life. A Sad Scene. The Dead and Dying, the Wounded and the Aflicted. Loss of Life Unknown. Loss of Property $150,000.” New Orleans Bee, Sept. 23, 1860.
Last evening, at xxx xxxxxx a fire broke out in the wholesale liquor stores of Messs. Karseadock & Co., Nos. 101 and 103 Tchocpitoulas street, between Lafayette and xxrod streets. The fire commenced in the lower story of No. 101, and soon demonstrated itself most fearfully among and with the barrels of liquor. In a few seconds the whole building was on fire, and the flames spreading widely and fiercely by the aid of a brisk wind and the ample material for their aid.
This building, No. 101, was a four-story one, and the next it, on the corner of Lafayette street, was a three story building, occupied, it is said, by Messrs. Evans & Co., commission and flour merchants. When the first gained its sway and reached the rear of store No. 101, towards Commerce street, the liquor barrels exploded, and in the force hurled the fourth story of 101 onto the roof of the corner store facing on Lafayette street to fall with a suddeness and fearful force truly astounding,, and producing consequences to be ever deplored. As there was no fire in this store of Evans & Co. This caused the wall of the store facing on Lafayette street to fall with a suddenness and fearful force truly astounding and producing consequences to be ever deplored. As there was no fie in this store of Evans & Co., many persons were engaged in saving the stock within.
Of these persons many were firemen and hired men by the insurance companies, all numbering from fifty to sixty.
When this wall fell these persons, together with some 200 or 300 others in the vicinity were in frightful danger and we regret to report at this hasty moment a large an terrible disaster to life.
At least 45 to 50 persons were buried under the fallen wall in one moment. Many of these were extricated dead and wounded, and up to this mid-day will others be sought beneath the ruins.
The following persons were found and extricated from the ruins dead, or died son after:
(...)
The persons wounded and extricated from the ruins are:
(...)
Mr. Clarke, a medical student, badly hurt.
(...)
“City Intelligence.” New Orleans Bee, Sept. 24, 1860, p.1, col. 4.
The Late Disastrous Fire--The Persons Dead and Buried—Since Saturday morning, after the night of the disastrous fire on Lafayette street, in which so many of our noble young citizen firemen and others lost their lives, our city has been in mourning, and an air of grief pervades even to this hour. Yesterday was one of deep sadness: the tolling funeral bell, the sound of the muffled drum and the solemn aires of the brass bands, together with the cortege tread and tram through our streets, served to make many a heart yield its sympathy, and many an eye shed its tear of sorrow, as the coffins bearing the young and the brave so recently in our midst enjoying life’s blessings, passed to the untimely graves. We do not remember a sadder day. The young gentlemen, sons of our leading families, were to be found in large numbers following the remains of departed friends to their last resting-place on this earth. It was an impressive sight, grateful and sad.
We witnessed too on Saturday a series of events of sorrow that made the heart sick and sad. Frantic parents and friends ran wildly around the smoking ruins, watched anxiously as the rafters and bricks were being moved for a messing relative or friend, or reported dead one. Not less than ten thousand persons crowded around those ruins from early dawn of morning to dark of Saturday evening, and as body after body was extricated from the premature grave the air was rent by the fearful cries of an anxious, grief-distracted parent, sister or brother—cries of sad impressiveness in that dense crowd, so respectful and quiet during the while.
At the First District lock-up police station, where the bodies of the victims of this conflagration were chiefly carried, there could not have been less than five thousand persons congregated throughout the day, anxious to hear of their lost and missing, dead or wounded friends.
The Coroner was present, and as the untiring police and their Chief brought each dead body and placed it for recognition in the lock-up hall, a certificate of burial was given, but the verdicts of the empanneled [sic.] jury were retained, as the Coroner purposes investigating the matter of the construction of the buildings which fell and caused this fearful loss of life.
The following is a list of those brought out of the ruins. . . .
14. A medical clerk at the Charity Hospital, named B. P. Clark, who was taken alive from the ruins, but subsequently died, at the house of his mother.
“The Calamity of Friday Night. The Gloom Yesterday. Honors to the Untimely Dead. The Funerals To-Day. Coroner’s Investigation,” Daily Picayune, Sept. 23, 1860.
The absorbing topic about town all day yesterday, was the tragic disaster at Friday night’s fire, most of the particulars of which we have already published.
As many of the firemen, hardly yet ready to leave the ruin at which so many of their best comrades were killed and wounded, were called away to the ether fire up town,(an account of which appeared in yesterday’s Evening Picayune,) returned from that fire only to gaze mournfully upon the mangled bodies of the dead at the police station, or to watch the digging away of the ruins which were known to conceal other bodies, and as their friends and relatives, reading of the disaster in the morning papers, came flying to know how many more had been killed or wounded, the scene on Lafayette street, from the ruins to the lockup, was such as has seldom if ever been witnessed in this city.
Mothers, wives, brothers, sisters, children crowded to both paces upon a common level of anxious fear; some went away rejoicing; others went away in silent grief, and some of them, especially the women, cried and sobbed from the very centre of their hearts. The scene altogether was sad, very sad.
The calamity, carrying away, as it did, some of our bravest and most courageous firemen, young gentlemen well known and esteemed throughout the city, as well as honest poor laborers who were earning their small pittance by saving property, in perfect innocence of danger, cast a very perceptible gloom over the city.
The flag of the City Hall, and the flags of the different engine houses, were flung out to the breeze at half-mast. The Douglas mass meeting, to have taken place at City Square, was postponed; neither did the Bell and Everett clubs, a procession of which was contemplated, turn out—all in respect to the untimely dead, and the grief which sobbed around the firesides, and cast a gloom over the social circles of friendship and acquaintances.
Coroner Beach yesterday empanelled a jury composed of the following gentlemen: R. L Bruce, Alfred Liscomb, J. R. Dixon, Aaron Harris and Simon Nathan. They viewed the different dead bodies at the lockup, and the Coroner furnish certificates of burial: but no verdict was rendered, it being the purpose of the Coroner to investigate the architecture of the building whose fall killed and wounded so many. I is the public opinion that the building was a mere shell, not at all fit for a warehouse in the heavy business part of the city.
We shall describe the dead in the order of their discovery, and inspection by the Coroner:
(. . .)
14. A medical student named Clark, who was taken alive from the ruins, but subsequently died, at the house of his mother, the upper part of the city.
“Died,” Daily Picayune, Sept. 23, 1860.
On Saturday morning, 22d inst., at 5 o’clock from injuries received at the fire on Lafayette street, Benjamin P. Clarke, aged nineteen years.
His friends and acquaintances are respectfully invited to attend his funeral, which will take place on Sunday Morning, 23d inst., at 10 o’clock from the residence of his mother, Mrs. J. C. Clarke, corner of Eighth and Nayades streets.
APPENDIX 4: ELLA HAMILTON AND HER SON, JOSEPH CALVITT CLARKE, IN BROOKLYN
Presumably in 1867, Joseph Calvitt Clarke, the son of Phoebe Ann and Joseph Calvitt Clarke, followed his mother to Brooklyn. On May 30, 1876 at age twenty-eight, Joseph married a twenty-one-year-old woman from the neighborhood, Ella Hamilton.
Mystery shrouds Joseph Clarke’s later years. There is a record of him Middletown State Homeopathic Hospital, a psychiatric institution in New York. He is in the 1920 census as J Clarke or JC Clarke (with the same birth information). He died in 1922, but, unfortunately, a fire destroyed all records.[32]
Meanwhile, Bakewell’s partner, Benjamin Page, faced a decline of trade because of the looming War of 1812. Page closed his import business in New York, and about 1810, Page moved to New Brunswick, New Jersey and from 1812 to 1814, he lived in Holmesburg, Pennsylvania, near Philadelphia. In the autumn of 1814, Page moved to Pittsburgh, the center of his financial interests. His home after April 1, 1821, was the house he built at the corner of Stockton Avenue and West Diamond Street in Allegheny.[27]
While in Pittsburgh between 1814 and 1832, besides attending to the glass business, he rose to prominence in other business activities and in the city’s social life. He was an original manager of the Monongahela Bridge Company. In February 1830, congregates elected Page as an original trustee of the First Presbyterian Church, and that he was active in the Sunday school work—which included teaching basic literacy. About forty people on Saturday, November 27, 1813 assembled in the spacious bar room of the Green Tree Inn at the northwest corner of Fifth and Wood streets to found the Pittsburgh Permanent Library Company. Page was elected to the first Board of Directors for three years and again in December 1816. He was also a manager of the Pittsburgh Bible Society, and prominently helped the female founders—including his wife as one of its driving forces—of Protestant Orphan Asylum of Pittsburgh and Allegheny in April 1832.[28]
On August 1, 1832 when Page was sixty-seven years old and in poor health, he withdrew from the glassworks. Despite having established himself as one of Pittsburgh’s socially prominent citizens—one of his twelve children had even married a Bakewell—he moved in 1832 to his country seat, “Beach Farm,” Branch Grove, Hamilton Country, near Cincinnati, Ohio. There he died on June 9, 1834, at age seventy.[29] He lies in Spring Grove Cemetery, near Cincinnati. His wife, Martha, died in October 1848, at age seventy-four. She was buried in Allegheny Cemetery.
Several who knew Benjamin Page have left their remembrances of him. Mrs. D. A. James, his granddaughter, said: “Benjamin Page always wore his own beautiful brown hair in a queue, and ordinarily wore an olive-green coat and a white cravat.”[30] Mrs. Campbell, a daughter of Benjamin Bakewell, described Page as “a fine-looking man, with large, bright eyes, pleasant manners, and a hearty laugh.” She added that he was religious, “long a leading member of Dr. Herron’s (First Presbyterian) church, in Pittsburgh, although Mrs. Page joined the Methodist Church shortly after their arrival in the city.” Page often took communion with his wife in her church, which embittered his relations with Herron’s church and “on that account, Dr. Herron’s session were illiberal enough to exclude him from the communion table in that church. Page then withdrew from the Herron’s church. Mrs. Campbell finished, “Mr. Page showed himself a true friend in need to my father, and offered the use of his name to extricate my father from his business difficulties in New York to a greater amount than he thought right to accept.”[31]
APPENDIX 2:
LAND PURCHASE FOR THE CLARKE HOUSE
Daily Picayune, Mar. 18, 1845.
217 Lots of Ground. Second and Closing Sale of the Kohn & Shiff Real Estate, Faubourg Livaudais.”
Will be sold at auction on WEDNESDAY, 19th March, and following days, at 12o’clack, at Banks’ Arcade, for the final division of interest, and without reserve--
16—Five Lots of Ground—designated as Nos. 2, 3, 4, 7, and 8 in square No. 174, bounded by Nayades, Apollo and Ninth streets, and the dividing line of suburb Delassize.
Daily Picayune, Mar. 20, 1845.
“The Sale of Livaudais Real Estate”
Will be continued THIS DAY, at 12 o’clock.
The squares remaining unsold are Nos. 98, 83, 99, 100, 81, 64, 82, and a portion of squares 174 and 173. The sale will commence at fractions of square 173. The sale will be continued until the whole of the property is sold, as it is the final and closing sale of the divisions of the interests of the owners. Purchasers will not again have the same opportunity of securing an interest in a property increasing in value so rapidly as the above.
Terms—One-fifth cash, balance from 6 to 24 months, without endorsers or interest.
Previous to the sale, several IMPROVED PROPERTIES will be sold, without reserve, in the vicinity of the fiver.
For further particulars apply to J. A. Beard & So., 59 Magazine street.
APPENDIX 3:
THE FIRE THAT KILLED BENJAMIN PAGE CLARKE
“City Intelligence: Dreadful Conflagration. A Fearful Loss of Life. A Sad Scene. The Dead and Dying, the Wounded and the Aflicted. Loss of Life Unknown. Loss of Property $150,000.” New Orleans Bee, Sept. 23, 1860.
Last evening, at xxx xxxxxx a fire broke out in the wholesale liquor stores of Messs. Karseadock & Co., Nos. 101 and 103 Tchocpitoulas street, between Lafayette and xxrod streets. The fire commenced in the lower story of No. 101, and soon demonstrated itself most fearfully among and with the barrels of liquor. In a few seconds the whole building was on fire, and the flames spreading widely and fiercely by the aid of a brisk wind and the ample material for their aid.
This building, No. 101, was a four-story one, and the next it, on the corner of Lafayette street, was a three story building, occupied, it is said, by Messrs. Evans & Co., commission and flour merchants. When the first gained its sway and reached the rear of store No. 101, towards Commerce street, the liquor barrels exploded, and in the force hurled the fourth story of 101 onto the roof of the corner store facing on Lafayette street to fall with a suddeness and fearful force truly astounding,, and producing consequences to be ever deplored. As there was no fire in this store of Evans & Co. This caused the wall of the store facing on Lafayette street to fall with a suddenness and fearful force truly astounding and producing consequences to be ever deplored. As there was no fie in this store of Evans & Co., many persons were engaged in saving the stock within.
Of these persons many were firemen and hired men by the insurance companies, all numbering from fifty to sixty.
When this wall fell these persons, together with some 200 or 300 others in the vicinity were in frightful danger and we regret to report at this hasty moment a large an terrible disaster to life.
At least 45 to 50 persons were buried under the fallen wall in one moment. Many of these were extricated dead and wounded, and up to this mid-day will others be sought beneath the ruins.
The following persons were found and extricated from the ruins dead, or died son after:
(...)
The persons wounded and extricated from the ruins are:
(...)
Mr. Clarke, a medical student, badly hurt.
(...)
“City Intelligence.” New Orleans Bee, Sept. 24, 1860, p.1, col. 4.
The Late Disastrous Fire--The Persons Dead and Buried—Since Saturday morning, after the night of the disastrous fire on Lafayette street, in which so many of our noble young citizen firemen and others lost their lives, our city has been in mourning, and an air of grief pervades even to this hour. Yesterday was one of deep sadness: the tolling funeral bell, the sound of the muffled drum and the solemn aires of the brass bands, together with the cortege tread and tram through our streets, served to make many a heart yield its sympathy, and many an eye shed its tear of sorrow, as the coffins bearing the young and the brave so recently in our midst enjoying life’s blessings, passed to the untimely graves. We do not remember a sadder day. The young gentlemen, sons of our leading families, were to be found in large numbers following the remains of departed friends to their last resting-place on this earth. It was an impressive sight, grateful and sad.
We witnessed too on Saturday a series of events of sorrow that made the heart sick and sad. Frantic parents and friends ran wildly around the smoking ruins, watched anxiously as the rafters and bricks were being moved for a messing relative or friend, or reported dead one. Not less than ten thousand persons crowded around those ruins from early dawn of morning to dark of Saturday evening, and as body after body was extricated from the premature grave the air was rent by the fearful cries of an anxious, grief-distracted parent, sister or brother—cries of sad impressiveness in that dense crowd, so respectful and quiet during the while.
At the First District lock-up police station, where the bodies of the victims of this conflagration were chiefly carried, there could not have been less than five thousand persons congregated throughout the day, anxious to hear of their lost and missing, dead or wounded friends.
The Coroner was present, and as the untiring police and their Chief brought each dead body and placed it for recognition in the lock-up hall, a certificate of burial was given, but the verdicts of the empanneled [sic.] jury were retained, as the Coroner purposes investigating the matter of the construction of the buildings which fell and caused this fearful loss of life.
The following is a list of those brought out of the ruins. . . .
14. A medical clerk at the Charity Hospital, named B. P. Clark, who was taken alive from the ruins, but subsequently died, at the house of his mother.
“The Calamity of Friday Night. The Gloom Yesterday. Honors to the Untimely Dead. The Funerals To-Day. Coroner’s Investigation,” Daily Picayune, Sept. 23, 1860.
The absorbing topic about town all day yesterday, was the tragic disaster at Friday night’s fire, most of the particulars of which we have already published.
As many of the firemen, hardly yet ready to leave the ruin at which so many of their best comrades were killed and wounded, were called away to the ether fire up town,(an account of which appeared in yesterday’s Evening Picayune,) returned from that fire only to gaze mournfully upon the mangled bodies of the dead at the police station, or to watch the digging away of the ruins which were known to conceal other bodies, and as their friends and relatives, reading of the disaster in the morning papers, came flying to know how many more had been killed or wounded, the scene on Lafayette street, from the ruins to the lockup, was such as has seldom if ever been witnessed in this city.
Mothers, wives, brothers, sisters, children crowded to both paces upon a common level of anxious fear; some went away rejoicing; others went away in silent grief, and some of them, especially the women, cried and sobbed from the very centre of their hearts. The scene altogether was sad, very sad.
The calamity, carrying away, as it did, some of our bravest and most courageous firemen, young gentlemen well known and esteemed throughout the city, as well as honest poor laborers who were earning their small pittance by saving property, in perfect innocence of danger, cast a very perceptible gloom over the city.
The flag of the City Hall, and the flags of the different engine houses, were flung out to the breeze at half-mast. The Douglas mass meeting, to have taken place at City Square, was postponed; neither did the Bell and Everett clubs, a procession of which was contemplated, turn out—all in respect to the untimely dead, and the grief which sobbed around the firesides, and cast a gloom over the social circles of friendship and acquaintances.
Coroner Beach yesterday empanelled a jury composed of the following gentlemen: R. L Bruce, Alfred Liscomb, J. R. Dixon, Aaron Harris and Simon Nathan. They viewed the different dead bodies at the lockup, and the Coroner furnish certificates of burial: but no verdict was rendered, it being the purpose of the Coroner to investigate the architecture of the building whose fall killed and wounded so many. I is the public opinion that the building was a mere shell, not at all fit for a warehouse in the heavy business part of the city.
We shall describe the dead in the order of their discovery, and inspection by the Coroner:
(. . .)
14. A medical student named Clark, who was taken alive from the ruins, but subsequently died, at the house of his mother, the upper part of the city.
“Died,” Daily Picayune, Sept. 23, 1860.
On Saturday morning, 22d inst., at 5 o’clock from injuries received at the fire on Lafayette street, Benjamin P. Clarke, aged nineteen years.
His friends and acquaintances are respectfully invited to attend his funeral, which will take place on Sunday Morning, 23d inst., at 10 o’clock from the residence of his mother, Mrs. J. C. Clarke, corner of Eighth and Nayades streets.
APPENDIX 4: ELLA HAMILTON AND HER SON, JOSEPH CALVITT CLARKE, IN BROOKLYN
Presumably in 1867, Joseph Calvitt Clarke, the son of Phoebe Ann and Joseph Calvitt Clarke, followed his mother to Brooklyn. On May 30, 1876 at age twenty-eight, Joseph married a twenty-one-year-old woman from the neighborhood, Ella Hamilton.
Mystery shrouds Joseph Clarke’s later years. There is a record of him Middletown State Homeopathic Hospital, a psychiatric institution in New York. He is in the 1920 census as J Clarke or JC Clarke (with the same birth information). He died in 1922, but, unfortunately, a fire destroyed all records.[32]
[33]
Born on January 1, 1855 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Joseph Clarke’s future wife, Ella Hamilton, lived there with her adoptive parents, Benjamin Franklin Bailey and Mary Hamilton Bailey, her aunt.[34] She actually was the daughter of Joseph Hamilton, Mary's brother, and was the granddaughter of Richard Hamilton, who had been a merchant seaman and privateer during the War of 1812.[35] Joseph Hamilton probably gave Ella to his sister and her husband, who lived near him in Milwaukee.[36]
After her husband’s death, Ella took a job as a companion for rich people in New York, while Benjamin Bailey and his four brothers owned a huge carpet and flooring business in Brooklyn and Manhattan.[37] She died on March 14, 1927 in Brooklyn, New York.
Ella’s natural father, Joseph Hamilton, was born on July 14, 1826 in New York City, and on September 30, 1846 in New York he married Rebecca Cramer, who had been born on September 29, 1824. They had four children, the third of whom was Ella. The family lived in his native city until 1849, when the couple moved to Milwaukee, where Joseph took charge of the mechanical department of the Milwaukee Daily Sentinel. In 1850, he started a job printing office, and shortly afterward he founded, with W. D. Wilson, the Milwaukee Daily Journal. In 1852, he sold his interest in the Journal to his partner. Two years later, he married Lavina French, and with her Joseph had another four children. In 1857, he rejoined the Daily Sentinel.[38] The United States Census of 1860 notes that Joseph Hamilton, aged 33, was a foreman printer, who owned no land and owned property worth $200. The same census named as his wife, Lavina, aged 31 and born in New York.[39]
When failing health forced him to seek more active outdoor work, Joseph Hamilton left the Daily Sentinel in 1863. For the next seventeen years, he was a general agent of the Equitable Life Assurance Society of New York, and during the last two of those years he was Inspector of Agencies.[40] He married Caroline K. Bryant on June 2, 1869 and had three more children. The Federal Census of 1870 notes that Joseph Hamilton was 44 years old, a life insurance agent, and had property worth $2,000 and personal effects worth $500. He and his wife, Carolina, aged 34, were both born in New York. They had four children, three born in New York and the last in Wisconsin. To help them, they had two domestic servants.[41]
Joseph Hamilton was active in politics and civic life. In 1874 he became a member of the Wisconsin legislature as a Republican. He was again a member of the Legislature in 1877 and received the entire vote of his party for Speaker of the House. A prominent member of the Masonic Order, he advanced to the Thirty-Second Degree of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, and he was a Deputy Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Wisconsin.[42]
After a runaway wagon killed Caroline, Joseph Hamilton married, for the last time, Augusta B. Hebard on December 25, 1876 in a Presbyterian Church in Green Bay, Brown, Wisconsin. She had been born on June 10, 1839.
In 1879 or 1880, the couple moved to Albion, Nebraska, where he settled a fine farm adjoining the town, and his home became one of the best in Nebraska.[43] For many years he served on the school board, and he served as county judge for thirteen years. About 1902, he sold his farm and moved to town to live.[44]
The 1910 Census notes that he was living with a housekeeper.
Critically ill for several days, Joseph Hamilton died at his home in Albion on Monday, March 18, 1912 and was buried three days later at Rose Hill Cemetery in Albion. His will was probated in 1913.[45]
Joseph Calvitt Clarke and Ella Hamilton had four children, all born in Brooklyn. May Louie Clarke was born on January 19, 1877 followed by Richard Hamilton Clarke born on November 23, 1879. Robert Lewis Keen Clarke, on May 28, 1884, was the third child. The last, and ultimately the most famous, was Joseph Calvitt Clarke, born on June 30, 1888.
[1]John J Audubon married Lucy Bakewell, who owned a struggling mill in Kentucky. Perhaps as a favor, Audubon painted a portrait of Benjamin Page. Meg Smeal, an amateur genealogist thinks it is in the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh. Meg Smeal, personal communication, June 30, 2009. This etching of Benjamin Page comes from Benjamin Gifford Bakewell, The Family Book. Bakewell*Page*Campbell: Being Some Account of the Descendants of John Bakewell, of Castle Donington, Leicestershire, Eng. born in 1638: Benjamin Page, born in 1765 at Norwich, Eng.: William Campbell born July 1, 1766, at Mauchline, Ayrshire, Scotland: John Harding, of Leicester (Pittsburgh: W. G. Johnston & co., 1896), between 72 and 73.
[2] Benjamin Gifford Bakewell, The Family Book. Bakewell*Page*Campbell: Being Some Account of the Descendants of John Bakewell, of Castle Donington, Leicestershire, Eng. born in 1638: Benjamin Page, born in 1765 at Norwich, Eng.: William Campbell born July 1, 1766, at Mauchline, Ayrshire, Scotland: John Harding, of Leicester (Pittsburgh: W. G. Johnston & co., 1896), 70; Joseph F. Rishel, Founding Families of Pittsburgh: The Evolution of a Regional Elite, 1760-1910 (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1990), 33.
[3] Bakewell, Family Book, 70; Rishel, Founding Families, 39.
[4] Bakewell, Family Book, 70.
[5] Bakewell, Family Book, 72. Cf. Rishel, Founding Families, 41, writes: “Benjamin Page, a Presbyterian, was excluded from communion in England and left the church. His first wife, whom he married in New York, was a Methodist. John Herron was a trustee of his Presbyterian church in Northern Ireland, but it was a Seceder sect.”
[6] Bakewell, Family Book, 70; Meg Smeal, personal communication, June 30, 2009.
[7] Bakewell, Family Book, 70.
[8] Bakewell, Family Book, 72. The fever’s cause was then quite mysterious. See James Hardie, An Account of the Yellow Fever, Which Occurred in the City of New York, in the Year 1822 to which this City Was Afflicted in the Years 1798, 1799, 1803, & 1805, With the Opinion of Several of Our Most Eminent Physicians, Respecting the Origin of the Disease, Its Prevention and Cure. To Which Is Added A Correct List of All the Deaths by Yellow Fever During the Late Season. Taken from Official Documents (New York: Samuel Marks, 1822), e.g., 12-14.
[9] Bakewell, Family Book, 81.
[10] Bakewell, Family Book, 74-75, 81. Also see Oliver Ormsby Page, A Short Account of the Family of the Family of Ormsby of Pittsburgh (Albany, NY: Joel Munsell’s Sons, 1892), 33.
[11] Bakewell, Family Book, 74-75
[12] Bakewell, Family Book, 70; Rishel, Founding Families, 39-40.
[13] Bakewell, Family Book, 70-71; Pittsburgh in 1816. Compiled by the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh on the One Hundredth Anniversary of the Granting of the City Charter (Pittsburgh, Carnegie Library, 1916); George Thornton Flemming, History of Pittsburgh and Environs: From Prehistoric Days to the Beginning of the American Revolution, 5 vols. (New York: The American Historical Society, 1922), 3: 537; Oliver Ormsby Page, A Short Account of the Family of the Family of Ormsby of Pittsburgh (Albany, NY: Joel Munsell’s Sons, 1892), 33; Sarah Hutchins Killikelly, The History of Pittsburgh: Its Rise and Progress (Pittsburgh, PA: B.C. & Gordon Montgomery Co., 1906), 133-34.
[14] http://explorepahistory.com/displayimage.php?imgId=616
[15] Bakewell, Family Book, 71.
[16] Pittsburgh in 1816; David Thomas, Travels Through the Western Country in the Summer of 1816. Including Notices of the Natural History, Antiquities, Topography, Agriculture, Commerce and Manufactures (Auburn, NY: David Rumset, 1819), 52.
[17] “Glass Manufacturing: Pittsburgh, PA: The Bakewell Legacy” at http://colonialsense.com/Antiques/Other_Antiques/Glass_Manufacturing:_Pittsburgh,_PA.php.
[18] “Glass Manufacturing.”
[19] Henry Bradshaw Fearon. Sketches of America: A Narrative of a Journey of Five Thousand Miles Through the Eastern and Western States of America! Contained in Eight Reports Addressed to the Thirty-Nine English Families by Whom the Author was Deputed, in June 1817, to Ascertain Whether Any, and What Part of the United States Would be Suitable for Their Residence. With Remarks on Mr. Brubeck’s “Notes” and “Letters.” (London: Printed for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orem, and Brown, Paternoster-Bow, 1818), 206-07; Pittsburgh in 1816.
[20] “Glass Manufacturing.”
[21] “Glass Manufacturing.”
[22] “Glass Manufacturing.”
[23] “Glass Manufacturing.”
[24] Flemming, History of Pittsburgh, 3: 538; Oliver Ormsby Page, A Short Account of the Family of the Family of Ormsby of Pittsburgh (Albany, NY: Joel Munsell’s Sons, 1892), 33; Killikelly, History of Pittsburgh, 134.
[25] “Glass Manufacturing.”
[26] “Glass Manufacturing.”
[27] Bakewell, Family Book, 70.
[28] Bakewell, Family Book, 71, Elliot E. Swift, History of the First Presbyterian Church of Allegheny: Read on July 2d and 9th, 1876 (Pittsburg: Nevin, Gribbin, 1876), 37, 48-49; Joseph F. Rishel, Founding Families, 59-60, 180.
[29] Rishel, Founding Families, 40; Bakewell, Family Book, 72.
[30] Bakewell, Family Book, 71.
[31] Bakewell, Family Book, 71.
[32] Meg Smeal says that, while her father never met him, he recalled hearing that he was sick and that there was something unusual about it. “All very hush-hush and mysterious.” She found a record of him at Middletown State Homeopathic Hospital Meg Smeal, personal communication, June 30, 2009.
[33] “Publications and Photos of Historical Interest,” http://history.tomrue.net/mpc/.
[34] Benjamin Franklin Bailey was born in 1823 in Somers (?) New York and died on February 11, 1887 in Brooklyn, New York. His father was John Bailey, born in Yorktown, New York (?) and his grandfather, also John Bailey, was born in 1617 in England. Benjamin Franklin Bailey’s mother was Millicent Wright, born on February 25, 1796 in Matinecock Latt, New York, and his grandmother was Temperence Smith, born in England. Benjamin Franklin Bailey married Mary Hamilton in 1846 in Brooklyn.
[35] See J. Calvitt Clarke III, “An Enterprising Spirit: Richard Hamilton, 1811-1819” at http://users.ju.edu/jclarke/familyhamilton.htm.
[36] Meg Smeal, personal communication, June 30, 2009. She has a letter that Joseph Hamilton wrote to his "daughter" Ella - hoping that she keep “in touch with some of his other daughters who it appears moved to NYC as well.... much confusion ensues...” She also writes:
The mystery surrounds the adoption of our great grandmother and Joseph's daughter, Ella, by his sister, Mary Williams and her husband Benjamin Franklin Bailey. This took me a really long time to figure out. Only ONCE have I found reference to the fact that she was adopted. All the rest of the times she is only referred to as their daughter. My father always insisted that she was called "Ella Hamilton Clarke," not Ella Bailey Clarke. From what I can figure out, Joseph went to Wisconsin either first or with Mary and Benjamin Bailey. They are both in the census there. Then maybe Mary wanted to have children but couldn't (my supposition). Whenever it was that Rebecca died, perhaps it was too difficult to be an only father of 4 and so somehow she was given to his sister.
[37] Meg Smeal, personal communication, June 30, 2009.
[38] History of the State of Nebraska: Containing a Full Account of its Growth from an Uninhabited Territory to a Wealthy and Important State; of its Early Settlements; its Rapid Increase in Population, and the Marvellous Development of its Great Natural Resources (Chicago: The Western Historical Co., 1882), Part 2, Boone County at http://www.kancoll.org/books/andreas_ne/boone/boone-p2.html#albionbios.
The full article on Hamilton in the History of the State of Nebraska reads:
HON. JOSEPH HAMILTON, real estate, loan and collection agent, was born in New York City July 14, 1826. He resided in his native city until 1849, when he removed to Milwaukee, Wis., to take charge of the mechanical department of the Milwaukee Daily Sentinel. In 1850, he started a job printing office, and shortly afterward he started, with W. D. Wilson, the Milwaukee Daily Journal. In 1852, he sold his interest in the Journal to his partner. In 1857, he again connected himself with the Daily Sentinel, and remained with that institution until 1863, when failing health compelled him to seek more active outdoor employment. He then engaged in life insurance and was General Agent of the Equitable Life Assurance Society of New York, in whose employment he remained for seventeen years, the last two of which he was Inspector of Agencies. In 1874, he was a member of the Wisconsin Legislature, and is the author of the law regarding State printing, which is said to be one of the most complete and thorough laws on the subject of public printing of any State in the Union. He was again a member of the Legislature in 1877, and received the entire vote of his party for Speaker of the House. Mr. Hamilton is a prominent member of the Masonic order, having been advanced to Thirty-second Degree of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite. He has been Deputy Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Wisconsin, and is well known throughout the county as a well-posted Freemason. In 1880, he removed to Nebraska and located in Albion. He has a fine farm adjoining the town, and his residence is one of the best in Nebraska.
[39] 1860 Federal Census, US Government, 1860, Page: Milwaukee Ward 1, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
[40] History of the State of Nebraska.
[41] 1870 Federal Census, US Government, 1870; Page: Milwaukee Ward 2, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
[42] History of the State of Nebraska; obituary
[43] History of the State of Nebraska.
[44] History of the State of Nebraska; obituary.
[45] History of the State of Nebraska; Death Certificate of Joseph Hamilton, Boone County Nebraska, registered # 2007, birth—14 July 1826; death—18 March 1912; birthplace—New York; occupation—Attorney at Law; died—of Pneumonia.
His obituary reads:
Joseph Hamilton died at his home in Albion, Monday, March 18th. He had been critically ill for several days, and owing to his advanced age, his demise was not unexpected. We have not the data at hand for an authentic obituary. He was born in New York. He resided at Milwaukee, Wisconsin for many years where he was engaged in the newspaper and insurance business. In 1879 he came to Boone county, locating on a fine farm adjoining Albion on the south. For many years he served on the school board. He was county judge for thirteen years. About ten years ago he sold his farm and moved to town to live. Mr. Hamilton was a member of numerous branches of the Masonic order, and was an officer of the Wisconsin Grand Lodge, where he has always retained his membership. It is expected that the funeral will take place this (Thursday) afternoon, if his daughter arrives from New York in time.
Born on January 1, 1855 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Joseph Clarke’s future wife, Ella Hamilton, lived there with her adoptive parents, Benjamin Franklin Bailey and Mary Hamilton Bailey, her aunt.[34] She actually was the daughter of Joseph Hamilton, Mary's brother, and was the granddaughter of Richard Hamilton, who had been a merchant seaman and privateer during the War of 1812.[35] Joseph Hamilton probably gave Ella to his sister and her husband, who lived near him in Milwaukee.[36]
After her husband’s death, Ella took a job as a companion for rich people in New York, while Benjamin Bailey and his four brothers owned a huge carpet and flooring business in Brooklyn and Manhattan.[37] She died on March 14, 1927 in Brooklyn, New York.
Ella’s natural father, Joseph Hamilton, was born on July 14, 1826 in New York City, and on September 30, 1846 in New York he married Rebecca Cramer, who had been born on September 29, 1824. They had four children, the third of whom was Ella. The family lived in his native city until 1849, when the couple moved to Milwaukee, where Joseph took charge of the mechanical department of the Milwaukee Daily Sentinel. In 1850, he started a job printing office, and shortly afterward he founded, with W. D. Wilson, the Milwaukee Daily Journal. In 1852, he sold his interest in the Journal to his partner. Two years later, he married Lavina French, and with her Joseph had another four children. In 1857, he rejoined the Daily Sentinel.[38] The United States Census of 1860 notes that Joseph Hamilton, aged 33, was a foreman printer, who owned no land and owned property worth $200. The same census named as his wife, Lavina, aged 31 and born in New York.[39]
When failing health forced him to seek more active outdoor work, Joseph Hamilton left the Daily Sentinel in 1863. For the next seventeen years, he was a general agent of the Equitable Life Assurance Society of New York, and during the last two of those years he was Inspector of Agencies.[40] He married Caroline K. Bryant on June 2, 1869 and had three more children. The Federal Census of 1870 notes that Joseph Hamilton was 44 years old, a life insurance agent, and had property worth $2,000 and personal effects worth $500. He and his wife, Carolina, aged 34, were both born in New York. They had four children, three born in New York and the last in Wisconsin. To help them, they had two domestic servants.[41]
Joseph Hamilton was active in politics and civic life. In 1874 he became a member of the Wisconsin legislature as a Republican. He was again a member of the Legislature in 1877 and received the entire vote of his party for Speaker of the House. A prominent member of the Masonic Order, he advanced to the Thirty-Second Degree of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, and he was a Deputy Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Wisconsin.[42]
After a runaway wagon killed Caroline, Joseph Hamilton married, for the last time, Augusta B. Hebard on December 25, 1876 in a Presbyterian Church in Green Bay, Brown, Wisconsin. She had been born on June 10, 1839.
In 1879 or 1880, the couple moved to Albion, Nebraska, where he settled a fine farm adjoining the town, and his home became one of the best in Nebraska.[43] For many years he served on the school board, and he served as county judge for thirteen years. About 1902, he sold his farm and moved to town to live.[44]
The 1910 Census notes that he was living with a housekeeper.
Critically ill for several days, Joseph Hamilton died at his home in Albion on Monday, March 18, 1912 and was buried three days later at Rose Hill Cemetery in Albion. His will was probated in 1913.[45]
Joseph Calvitt Clarke and Ella Hamilton had four children, all born in Brooklyn. May Louie Clarke was born on January 19, 1877 followed by Richard Hamilton Clarke born on November 23, 1879. Robert Lewis Keen Clarke, on May 28, 1884, was the third child. The last, and ultimately the most famous, was Joseph Calvitt Clarke, born on June 30, 1888.
[1]John J Audubon married Lucy Bakewell, who owned a struggling mill in Kentucky. Perhaps as a favor, Audubon painted a portrait of Benjamin Page. Meg Smeal, an amateur genealogist thinks it is in the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh. Meg Smeal, personal communication, June 30, 2009. This etching of Benjamin Page comes from Benjamin Gifford Bakewell, The Family Book. Bakewell*Page*Campbell: Being Some Account of the Descendants of John Bakewell, of Castle Donington, Leicestershire, Eng. born in 1638: Benjamin Page, born in 1765 at Norwich, Eng.: William Campbell born July 1, 1766, at Mauchline, Ayrshire, Scotland: John Harding, of Leicester (Pittsburgh: W. G. Johnston & co., 1896), between 72 and 73.
[2] Benjamin Gifford Bakewell, The Family Book. Bakewell*Page*Campbell: Being Some Account of the Descendants of John Bakewell, of Castle Donington, Leicestershire, Eng. born in 1638: Benjamin Page, born in 1765 at Norwich, Eng.: William Campbell born July 1, 1766, at Mauchline, Ayrshire, Scotland: John Harding, of Leicester (Pittsburgh: W. G. Johnston & co., 1896), 70; Joseph F. Rishel, Founding Families of Pittsburgh: The Evolution of a Regional Elite, 1760-1910 (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1990), 33.
[3] Bakewell, Family Book, 70; Rishel, Founding Families, 39.
[4] Bakewell, Family Book, 70.
[5] Bakewell, Family Book, 72. Cf. Rishel, Founding Families, 41, writes: “Benjamin Page, a Presbyterian, was excluded from communion in England and left the church. His first wife, whom he married in New York, was a Methodist. John Herron was a trustee of his Presbyterian church in Northern Ireland, but it was a Seceder sect.”
[6] Bakewell, Family Book, 70; Meg Smeal, personal communication, June 30, 2009.
[7] Bakewell, Family Book, 70.
[8] Bakewell, Family Book, 72. The fever’s cause was then quite mysterious. See James Hardie, An Account of the Yellow Fever, Which Occurred in the City of New York, in the Year 1822 to which this City Was Afflicted in the Years 1798, 1799, 1803, & 1805, With the Opinion of Several of Our Most Eminent Physicians, Respecting the Origin of the Disease, Its Prevention and Cure. To Which Is Added A Correct List of All the Deaths by Yellow Fever During the Late Season. Taken from Official Documents (New York: Samuel Marks, 1822), e.g., 12-14.
[9] Bakewell, Family Book, 81.
[10] Bakewell, Family Book, 74-75, 81. Also see Oliver Ormsby Page, A Short Account of the Family of the Family of Ormsby of Pittsburgh (Albany, NY: Joel Munsell’s Sons, 1892), 33.
[11] Bakewell, Family Book, 74-75
[12] Bakewell, Family Book, 70; Rishel, Founding Families, 39-40.
[13] Bakewell, Family Book, 70-71; Pittsburgh in 1816. Compiled by the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh on the One Hundredth Anniversary of the Granting of the City Charter (Pittsburgh, Carnegie Library, 1916); George Thornton Flemming, History of Pittsburgh and Environs: From Prehistoric Days to the Beginning of the American Revolution, 5 vols. (New York: The American Historical Society, 1922), 3: 537; Oliver Ormsby Page, A Short Account of the Family of the Family of Ormsby of Pittsburgh (Albany, NY: Joel Munsell’s Sons, 1892), 33; Sarah Hutchins Killikelly, The History of Pittsburgh: Its Rise and Progress (Pittsburgh, PA: B.C. & Gordon Montgomery Co., 1906), 133-34.
[14] http://explorepahistory.com/displayimage.php?imgId=616
[15] Bakewell, Family Book, 71.
[16] Pittsburgh in 1816; David Thomas, Travels Through the Western Country in the Summer of 1816. Including Notices of the Natural History, Antiquities, Topography, Agriculture, Commerce and Manufactures (Auburn, NY: David Rumset, 1819), 52.
[17] “Glass Manufacturing: Pittsburgh, PA: The Bakewell Legacy” at http://colonialsense.com/Antiques/Other_Antiques/Glass_Manufacturing:_Pittsburgh,_PA.php.
[18] “Glass Manufacturing.”
[19] Henry Bradshaw Fearon. Sketches of America: A Narrative of a Journey of Five Thousand Miles Through the Eastern and Western States of America! Contained in Eight Reports Addressed to the Thirty-Nine English Families by Whom the Author was Deputed, in June 1817, to Ascertain Whether Any, and What Part of the United States Would be Suitable for Their Residence. With Remarks on Mr. Brubeck’s “Notes” and “Letters.” (London: Printed for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orem, and Brown, Paternoster-Bow, 1818), 206-07; Pittsburgh in 1816.
[20] “Glass Manufacturing.”
[21] “Glass Manufacturing.”
[22] “Glass Manufacturing.”
[23] “Glass Manufacturing.”
[24] Flemming, History of Pittsburgh, 3: 538; Oliver Ormsby Page, A Short Account of the Family of the Family of Ormsby of Pittsburgh (Albany, NY: Joel Munsell’s Sons, 1892), 33; Killikelly, History of Pittsburgh, 134.
[25] “Glass Manufacturing.”
[26] “Glass Manufacturing.”
[27] Bakewell, Family Book, 70.
[28] Bakewell, Family Book, 71, Elliot E. Swift, History of the First Presbyterian Church of Allegheny: Read on July 2d and 9th, 1876 (Pittsburg: Nevin, Gribbin, 1876), 37, 48-49; Joseph F. Rishel, Founding Families, 59-60, 180.
[29] Rishel, Founding Families, 40; Bakewell, Family Book, 72.
[30] Bakewell, Family Book, 71.
[31] Bakewell, Family Book, 71.
[32] Meg Smeal says that, while her father never met him, he recalled hearing that he was sick and that there was something unusual about it. “All very hush-hush and mysterious.” She found a record of him at Middletown State Homeopathic Hospital Meg Smeal, personal communication, June 30, 2009.
[33] “Publications and Photos of Historical Interest,” http://history.tomrue.net/mpc/.
[34] Benjamin Franklin Bailey was born in 1823 in Somers (?) New York and died on February 11, 1887 in Brooklyn, New York. His father was John Bailey, born in Yorktown, New York (?) and his grandfather, also John Bailey, was born in 1617 in England. Benjamin Franklin Bailey’s mother was Millicent Wright, born on February 25, 1796 in Matinecock Latt, New York, and his grandmother was Temperence Smith, born in England. Benjamin Franklin Bailey married Mary Hamilton in 1846 in Brooklyn.
[35] See J. Calvitt Clarke III, “An Enterprising Spirit: Richard Hamilton, 1811-1819” at http://users.ju.edu/jclarke/familyhamilton.htm.
[36] Meg Smeal, personal communication, June 30, 2009. She has a letter that Joseph Hamilton wrote to his "daughter" Ella - hoping that she keep “in touch with some of his other daughters who it appears moved to NYC as well.... much confusion ensues...” She also writes:
The mystery surrounds the adoption of our great grandmother and Joseph's daughter, Ella, by his sister, Mary Williams and her husband Benjamin Franklin Bailey. This took me a really long time to figure out. Only ONCE have I found reference to the fact that she was adopted. All the rest of the times she is only referred to as their daughter. My father always insisted that she was called "Ella Hamilton Clarke," not Ella Bailey Clarke. From what I can figure out, Joseph went to Wisconsin either first or with Mary and Benjamin Bailey. They are both in the census there. Then maybe Mary wanted to have children but couldn't (my supposition). Whenever it was that Rebecca died, perhaps it was too difficult to be an only father of 4 and so somehow she was given to his sister.
[37] Meg Smeal, personal communication, June 30, 2009.
[38] History of the State of Nebraska: Containing a Full Account of its Growth from an Uninhabited Territory to a Wealthy and Important State; of its Early Settlements; its Rapid Increase in Population, and the Marvellous Development of its Great Natural Resources (Chicago: The Western Historical Co., 1882), Part 2, Boone County at http://www.kancoll.org/books/andreas_ne/boone/boone-p2.html#albionbios.
The full article on Hamilton in the History of the State of Nebraska reads:
HON. JOSEPH HAMILTON, real estate, loan and collection agent, was born in New York City July 14, 1826. He resided in his native city until 1849, when he removed to Milwaukee, Wis., to take charge of the mechanical department of the Milwaukee Daily Sentinel. In 1850, he started a job printing office, and shortly afterward he started, with W. D. Wilson, the Milwaukee Daily Journal. In 1852, he sold his interest in the Journal to his partner. In 1857, he again connected himself with the Daily Sentinel, and remained with that institution until 1863, when failing health compelled him to seek more active outdoor employment. He then engaged in life insurance and was General Agent of the Equitable Life Assurance Society of New York, in whose employment he remained for seventeen years, the last two of which he was Inspector of Agencies. In 1874, he was a member of the Wisconsin Legislature, and is the author of the law regarding State printing, which is said to be one of the most complete and thorough laws on the subject of public printing of any State in the Union. He was again a member of the Legislature in 1877, and received the entire vote of his party for Speaker of the House. Mr. Hamilton is a prominent member of the Masonic order, having been advanced to Thirty-second Degree of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite. He has been Deputy Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Wisconsin, and is well known throughout the county as a well-posted Freemason. In 1880, he removed to Nebraska and located in Albion. He has a fine farm adjoining the town, and his residence is one of the best in Nebraska.
[39] 1860 Federal Census, US Government, 1860, Page: Milwaukee Ward 1, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
[40] History of the State of Nebraska.
[41] 1870 Federal Census, US Government, 1870; Page: Milwaukee Ward 2, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
[42] History of the State of Nebraska; obituary
[43] History of the State of Nebraska.
[44] History of the State of Nebraska; obituary.
[45] History of the State of Nebraska; Death Certificate of Joseph Hamilton, Boone County Nebraska, registered # 2007, birth—14 July 1826; death—18 March 1912; birthplace—New York; occupation—Attorney at Law; died—of Pneumonia.
His obituary reads:
Joseph Hamilton died at his home in Albion, Monday, March 18th. He had been critically ill for several days, and owing to his advanced age, his demise was not unexpected. We have not the data at hand for an authentic obituary. He was born in New York. He resided at Milwaukee, Wisconsin for many years where he was engaged in the newspaper and insurance business. In 1879 he came to Boone county, locating on a fine farm adjoining Albion on the south. For many years he served on the school board. He was county judge for thirteen years. About ten years ago he sold his farm and moved to town to live. Mr. Hamilton was a member of numerous branches of the Masonic order, and was an officer of the Wisconsin Grand Lodge, where he has always retained his membership. It is expected that the funeral will take place this (Thursday) afternoon, if his daughter arrives from New York in time.