History of Belleville, (Saint Clair County) Illinois United States of America

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Ninian Edwards, senator, was born in Montgomery county, Md., in March, 1775. He was a son of Benjamin and Margaret (Beall) Edwards. He entered Dickinson college in the class of 1792, but did not complete the course. His father's family removed to Bairdstown, Ky., in 1795, and he was elected a representative in the state legislature before reaching his majority. He was admitted to the Kentucky bar in 1798 and to that of Tennessee in 1799. He was clerk and afterward judge of the general court of Kentucky was elevated to the circuit court in 1803, to the court of appeals in 1806 and was made chief justice in 1808. He was appointed governor of the territory of Illinois by President Madison upon its organization in 1809, and remained in office till 1818 when the territory became a state. He organized volunteer rangers built stockade forts and prepared for the protection of the immigrant settlers against Indian depredations. In 1816 he was one of three commissioners appointed to treat with Indian tribes. Upon the organization of the new state government he was elected a U.S. senator and drew the short term. He served through the 15th congress and was re-elected for a full term in 1819. He resigned in 1824 to accept the appointment of minister to Mexico. Mr. Edwards reached New Orleans en route to his post when he was recalled by President Monroe, charges having been made against him by the secretary of the treasury, and he was succeeded by J. McLean, who completed his term. On his return to Illinois he was elected governor of the state and served 1826-30. His son, Ninian Wirt, was the first state superintendent of schools for Illinois, 1854. His brother Cyrus, 1793-1877, was for thirty-eight years a trustee of Shurtleff college from which he received the degree of LL.D. Another brother, Dr. Benjamin F., 1797-1877, was an original trustee of Shurtleff in 1836. He published: The Life and Times of Ninian Edwards and History of Illinois (1870); and The Edwards Papers (1884). Governor Edwards died at Belleville, Ill., July 20, 1833.

From: Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, Johnson, Rossiter, editor

Louis Kempff, naval officer, was born near Belleville, Ill., Oct. 11, 1841; son of Frederick and Henrietta Kempif, natives of Germany. He was appointed to the U.S. Naval academy from Illinois, Sept. 25, 1857, and was ordered into active service in April, 1861, serving on the Vandalia, which sailed from New York in June, 1861, to join in the blockade of Charleston, and there captured and took to New York the schooner Henry Middleton, of Charleston. He joined the Vandalia at Hampton Roads, and was appointed acting master, October, 1861. He took part in the capture of Port Royal, S.C., Nov. 7, 1861, and was ordered to the flagship Wabash, commanding a howitzer in the expedition against Port Royal Ferry, Jan. 11, 1862. He was in charge of a boat and howitzer in an expedition that resulted in the capture of Fernandina, St. Augustine, Nassau Inlet and Jacksonville, Fla., and St. Mary's, Ga., in February, 1862; was ordered to the Susquehanna in March, 1862 and took part in the bombardment of Sewells Point, Va., and the reoccupatiou of Norfolk, Va., May 10, 1862. He was promoted lieutenant, Aug. 1, 1862, and served as watch and navigation officer off Mobile, 1862-63; was detached, May 14, 1863, and assigned to the gunboat Sonoma, June 22, 1863; to the Connecticut, as executive officer, blockading Wilmington, N.C., July 9, 1863, to Oct. 8, 1864; as executive officer of the Sewanee, Nov. 15, 1864, and on the Pacific station to March 28, 1867. He was promoted lieutenant-commander, July 26, 1866; was executive officer of the Portsmouth, apprenticeship, Atlantic station, May 27, 1867, to Oct. 2, 1868; executive officer of the Independence at San Francisco, 1868-69; executive officer of the Mohican on the Siberian total eclipse expedition, June 15, 1869, to Sept. 22, 1869; on the Independence till October, 1870, when he was ordered to the Pacific squadron as executive officer of the Mohican, May 2, 1871, and detached, June, 1872. He was on the Saranac as executive officer, July to November, 18.72; on the California, flagship, as executive officer, to April, 1873. He married in 1873 Cornelia Reese, daughter of Thomas H. Selby. He was on duty at the naval rendezvous, San Francisco, Cal., 1873-74; lighthouse inspector, 1874-76; was promoted commander, March 9, 1876; was on duty at Mare Island navy-yard, March 21, 1877, to Sept. 10, 1880; commanded the naval rendezvous, San Francisco, 1880-81, and commanded the Alert on the Asiatic station, July, 188l, to July, 1882. He was ordnance officer of the Mare Island navy-yard, San Francisco, Cal., 1883-85; commanded the Adams on the Pacific station from October, 1885, to May, 1888, and at Mare Island as captain of the yard, 1888-90. He was promoted captain, May 19, 1891, was ordered as general inspector of the new double-turreted monitor Monterey, June 3, 1892, and to the command of the vessel, Feb. 7, 1893. With this vessel he demonstrated the value of the class as sea-going warships. He commanded the receiving ship Independence, 1896-98, and in December, 1898, his name was suggested to Secretary Long as governor of Guam, but he was promoted rear-admiral, and was ordered to Mare Island navy-yard, Cal., where he was commandant, 1899-1900. In April, 1900, he was ordered to the Asiatic squadron as second in command, but after the trouble at Taku, Jan. 16, 1900, in which he had refused to take part with the other powers in bombarding the Taku forts, he was made senior commander of the Asiatic squadron. At this critical moment, in the absence of contrary instruction from the government, he assumed the position that the United States was not at war with China and that he had no right to fire upon the Chinese flag or forts, but only to direct his efforts against the Boxers as a mob of insurgents. He held to this position in the face of the unanimous action of the other powers, and it was afterward claimed that had the other nations held similar views the general uprising in China would not have taken place, the legations in Pekin would not have been attacked, and the Boxers would have been put down without great bloodshed. The result of the contrary policy called for an additional naval force for the United States, and Rear-Admiral Remey was ordered to the Asiatic station, and by virtue of seniority succeeded to the position of commander-in-chief. As Remey reached the station after the occupation of Pekin by the powers, which included the U.S. marines landed from the fleet by orders of Rear-Admiral Kempff, in July, 1900, the change in commanders had no effect on the action of the U.S. government and detracted nothing from the credit of the U.S. commander during the war against the Boxers. He was stationed at Manila, P.I., in January, 1901, as senior squadron commander on board the 2d flagship Newark. He was elected an associate member of the Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers. He was retired Oct. 11, 1903.

From: Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, Johnson, Rossiter, editor

James Tyndale Mitchell, jurist, was born in Belleville, Ill., Nov. 9, 1834; son of Edward Phillips and Elizabeth (Tyndale) Mitchell; grandson of James and Ann G. (Walton) Mitchell; and a descendant of Edward Mitchell who came from England to Charleston, S.C., in 1700. He attended the public schools of Philadelphia, Pa., and was graduated from Harvard college, A.B., 1855, A.M., 1858, and from the law department of the University of Pennsylvania in 1857. He was admitted to the bar at Philadelphia in 1857; served with the emergency troops in 1862 and 1863; was assistant city solicitor, 1860-63, and editor-in-chief of the American Law Register 1861-87. He was elected judge of the district court of Philadelphia in 1871, and under the new constitution of 1875 he was transferred to the court of common pleas, which office he held till 1888, when he was elected a justice of the supreme court of Pennsylvania. He was appointed one of the three commissioners to report on the acts of the Colonial assembly not printed and to edit and publish the statutes at large from 1681 to 1800. He served as president of the council of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, vice-provost of the Law Academy of Philadelphia, a member of the American Philosophical society, member of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion, of the Sons of the Revolution, and of the Order of the Cincinnati, and president of the Harvard club of Philadelphia. The degree of LL.B. was conferred on him by the University of Pennsylvania in 1860 and that of LL.D. by the Jefferson Medical college, Pa., in 1872, and by Harvard in 1901. He edited Williamson Real Property (1872), and is the author of History of the District Court of Philadelphia (1875); Mitchell on Motions and Rules (1879); Reports on the Early Statutes of Pennsylvania (1886); Fidelity to Court and Client in Criminal Cases, an address before the Pennsylvania State Bar Association (1899), and John Marshall, an address before the Law Association of Philadelphia on the celebration of.the centenary of his installation as chief justice, Feb. 4, 1801.

From: Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, Johnson, Rossiter, editor

John Cook, soldier, was born in Belleville, Ill., June 12, 1825; son of Daniel Pope and Julia Catharine (Edwards) Cook; grandson of Ninian Edwards, governor of Illinois, 1826-33; and great-grandson of Benjamin and Margaret (Beall) Edwards, in whose home in Maryland William Wirt was brought up and educated. John Cook was left an orphan in 1827; was brought up by his maternal grandfather, Governor Edwards, and was educated by a clergyman who prepared him for Illinois college. Failing eyesight obliged him to discontinue his studies and he entered mercantile business at Springfield, Ill., in 1846. In 1855 he was elected mayor of Springfield and in 1856 sheriff of Sangamon county. He served as quartermaster of the state and on April 24, 1861, he was commissioned colonel of the 1st Illinois volunteer regiment, the first commission issued by Governor Yates. He commanded a brigade under Gen. Charles F. Smith, and after the capture of Fort Donelsen, for gallantry there, he was made brigadier-general, March 21, 1862. Governor Yates, on behalf of the people of the state, presented him a handsome sword. He was ordered with his brigade to the army of the Potomac and in the operations of that army he commanded three brigades, eleven batteries of artillery, and two regiments of cavalry. After Pope's defeat he was relieved at his own request and was ordered to report to General Pope, commanding the military district of the northwest, and on Oct. 9, 1864, he was assigned to the command of the military district of Illinois and was mustered out Aug. 24, 1865, a major-general of volunteers by brevet. He was elected to the Illinois legislature in 1868, and as chairman of the house committee on public grounds and buildings was influential in securing the appropriation for the erection of the new state capitol at Springfield. He subsequently made his home in Ransom, Mich.

From: Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, Johnson, Rossiter, editor

History of Belleville, (Saint Clair County) Illinois

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