Cass County, Indiana - Chapter 24: Local Men of State or National Fame, 1913

In this chapter will be mentioned Cass county men who have held official positions outside of the county, both military and civic, with a brief statement of the nature of the service and a short biographical sketch unless mentioned elsewhere; if so, attention to that fact will be called. Cass county has been honored by the residence within its borders of six generals of the War of 1812 and other wars. Gen. John Tipton, a sketch of whom appears on another page; General Hyacinth Lassalle, who moved with his family to Logansport in 1833, died in 1843, and lies at rest in the old cemetery ; Gen. N. D. Grover, a pioneer who moved to Cass county in 1829, and died in 1875 ; Gen. Richard Crooks, a pioneer of Bethlehem township, where he died in 1842, a sketch of whom appears under that township; and Gen. Walter Wilson, who was bom in Kentucky in 1782 and moved with his parents to Old Port Vincennes. In 1811 he was sent by General Harrison on a mission to the Indian Chief Tecumseh, engaged in the battle of Tippecanoe, November 7, 1811, and was promoted to the position of colonel for bravery in that fight, and in the attack on the Mississinewa town commanded the left flank and gained the title of general. He was a member of the territorial legislative council in 1810 and a member of the first legislature after the organization ^f . the state in 1816. In 1828 he moved to Cass county and purchased a farm on the north bank of Eel river, opposite Riverside Park. In 1831-2 he represented Cass and Carroll counties in the legisla'ture. He died in 1838 and was buried on his farm where a monument marks his grave to this day.- His son, Wm. Wilson, was postmaster during the war and his grandsons, W. W. Wilson and Byron Wilson, are still residents of our city ; also a granddaughter, Mrs. Anna Chandler. Gen. Richard Henry Pratt, born in New York, 1840, came with his father, Richard S. Pratt, to Logansport, 1846, served in the Ninth Indiana and Second Indiana Cavalry and was promoted to a captaincy. In 1867, on the recommendation of Schuyler Colfax, he was appointed a lieutenant in the regular army; promoted to be colonel of the Fifteenth U. S. Cavalry and did service in quelling the Indian outbreaks in the West. He organized the Indian school at Carlisle, Pennsylvania, where the government is educating Indian boys and has O'^er 1,000 in attendance. General Pratt was superintendent of this school for twenty-five years and was retired in 1903 and promoted to the rank of brigadier general by act of congress. General Pratt was married and has one son and two daughters married, with twenty-one grandchildren. Mrs. Pratt is dead and the general is now living in Philadelphia.

Clinton township, was born in Connersville, Indiana, September 24, 1830 j came with his parents to Cass county in 1836. In 1853, moved to Minnesota, became colonel of the Eighth Minnesota Regiment, and was commissioned a brigadier general and commanded a brigade in Qeneral Sherman's army in the Carolinas. He died in Minneapolis October 2, 1897, and lies at rest beside his honored parents in the family lot in Galveston cemetery, Cass county.

Gen. John Tipton, an. extended notice of whom will be found on another page, was senator from 1831 to 1839, and died in Logansport, April 5th, soon after the expiration of his term of oflSce.

Dr. G. N. Fitch was a representative in the lower house of congress from 1851 to 1852 and senator from 1858 to 1861. He was born in New York in 1909 ; died in Logansport, 1892. He was educated in New York, came to Cass county in 1834 with his father, Dr. Frederick Fitch, and lived and practiced medicine in Logansport until his death. During the Civil war he raised a regiment, the Forty-sixth Indiana, and acted as its colonel for some time. From 1844 to '47 Dr. Fitch was professor of theory and practice in Rush Medical College, Chicago, when he rode on horseback to Michigan City and crossed the lake on a boat to Chicago. He was a tall man of commanding appearance, a forcible speaker and fluent writer. He was united in marriage to Harriet Satterlee, by whom he had one son and two daughters ; the latter became Mrs. A. Coleman and Mrs. Charles Denby. All are now dead.

David Turpie represented Indiana in the U^ S. senate from 1887 to 1899. He studied law with D. D. Pratt in 1849 and practiced at the Cass county bar from 1867 to 1872. Later he moved to Indianapolis, where he died in 1909. His second wife was Alice Patridge, a Logansport girl. Senator Turpie was a profound lawyer and a logical speaker. See chapter on Literature for complete biography.

Daniel D. Pratt was elected to the lower house of congress in 1868, but before he took his seat, the legislature sent him to the senate in 1869. After the expiration of his senatorial term in 1875, General Grant appointed him commissioner of internal revenue. Senator Pratt was a large man with a strong voice, a forcible speaker, and became a leader in the U. S. senate. He died in 1877. For complete sketch, see chapter on Literature.

Dr. G. N. Fitch, 1851 to 1853 ; WilUam D. Owen, from 1885 to 1891 ; Frederick Landis, from 1903 to 1907 - ^all of whom are noticed elsewhere. And Charles B. Landis, a brother of Frederick, was a member of congress from the ninth district for ten years, from 1897 to 1907, Schuyler Colfax, although a resident of South Bend, represented this congressional district, the old ninth, from 1855 to 1868, when he was elected vice-president of the United States.

Col. L. W. Carpenter, of the Fourth Ohio ; a practicing physician of Logansport from 1877 to 1888; was born in Ohio, 1834, and died in Seattle, Washington, 1908.

Dr. Max F. Hoffman was elected secretary of state in 1868. He was a native of Germany, served as surgeon of the Ninth Indiana, and later of the One hundred and Twenty-eighth Indiana Regiment during the Civil war, after which he located in Logansport, resi(fing at 214^^ Sixth street, when he was elected secretary of state and moved to Indianapolis, where he died in the early seventies. He had a family and one son now resides in Indianapolis.

Judge Daniel P. Baldwin (see chapter on Literature for sketch), who acceptably filled the oflBce of attorney general from 1881 to 1883, was a scholarly man, and a forcible speaker ; he died suddenly at his home, corner of Seventh and Market streets, December 13, 1908. W. W. Thornton, also a native Cass county man, was deputy under Mr. Baldwin.

Thomas H. McKee for many years was clerk or assistant clerk of the house or senate, and is now warden of the federal prison in Washington, D..C.

Perry S. Heath, a printer on the Pharos, 1877 to 1879, was first assistant postmaster general in McEinley's first administration, 1897, and at present is a Washington correspondent for the metropolitan press.

Ross Hazeltine, son of James R. Hazeltine of West Broadway, has been in the consular service for a number of years, being stationed at different ports in South America and Europe, and is still an efficient officer in the diplomatic service; is now stationed in Western A&ica.

Hyacinth Lasselle, Jr., editor of the Logansport Telegraph, was appointed in 1849 to a lucrative position in Washington and held the same for many years and died there some years later.

John M. Wright, son of Williamson Wright, held a federal office in Washington for over twenty years, from 1874 to 1894. He died at Lincoln, Indiana, about 1900.

Judge John W. Wright, son of Rev. John Wright, and a prominent attorney at Logansport, was Indian agent in the West for a number of years after the war. He idled in 1889.

Major Daniel Bell was government surveyor in locating the boundary line between Indiana and Illinois in 1822. He was among the earliest settlers of the county, landing at the mouth of Eel river, March 27, 1827, and erected the first log cabin in the town of Logansport, on the nortn side of the Wabash river, near the present location of the Wabash passenger station. In 1830 he erected a cabin on the north bank of Eel river, where he lived for a short time when he moved to (Georgetown, this county. After the death of General Tipton, his brother-in-law, in 1839, he moved to Logansport and took charge of his domicile, that then stood near the Panhandle shops. In 1845 he moved to Jackson township.

where he resided until his death, November 7, 1874, the sixty-third anniversary of the battle of Tippecanoe in which he bore an honorable part, and rests in the Sprinkle graveyard, near Lincoln, in this county. Daniel Bell was born in Washington county, Pennsylvania, March 7, 1788, and soon after his parents moved to Kentucky and in 1811 settled in Cory don, Indiana, where he enlisted in Capta^ Spencer's company and was engaged in the Indian wars and at Tippecanoe where Captain Spencer fell. He was married in December, 1811, to Nancy Spencer, daughter of Captain Spencer, at Corydon, Indiana, and in the spring of 1827 became a resident of Cass county. His son, Lewis Cass Bell, born February 11, 1829, was the first white child, to grow to manhood, born in Cass county. He was a Union soldier and died July 11, 1911, in the hospital of the Soldiers' Hpme at Santa Monica, California. He is survived by a sister, Mrs. Nancy Speese-Jackson, of Danville, Indiana, and two children, Delos P. Bell, of Kokomo, and Mrs. Inez Caffee, of Marion.

Joseph Dague has been a United States oflBcial in the pension department at Washington since 1882, where he still resides although he claims Cass county as his residence. He was bom in Washington county, Pennsylvania, 1841, came to this county in 1846, with his parents Samuel and Phebe (Conrad) Dague, and located in Adams township where he was educated. From 1863 to 1870, he with Colonel Bringhurst, owned and published the Logansport Journal, He was united in marriage to Margaret Fancher, of Logansport, who still survives. They have no children.

Logansport has stood high in the commercial world. James Cheney, father of Mrs. John C. Nelson, and former resident of Logansport, was eminently successful in the financial world. He died in Fort Wayne in 1903, but is buried in Mt. Hope cemetery, and his grave is marked by the largest private monument in the county.

George W. Stevens, who was brought up in Logansport by his uncle, E. T. Stevens, and married a Logansport girl, daughter of James S. Wilson, became president of the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad, and now lives in Richmond, Virginia.

L. F. Loree, former Pennsylvania employee in Logansport, whose wife was a Taber, and brought up in Logansport, has risen in the railroad world and was president of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Company.

Edward F. Kearney, for many years in the Panhandle offices in this city, has filled a number of official positions in railroad circles and has recently been elected to the vicq-presidency of the Missouri Pacific and Iron Mountain system of railroads.