History of Buchanan, (Botetourt County) Virginia United States of America

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Biographies:

Mary Johnston, author, was born at Buchanan, Botetourt county, Va., Nov. 21, 1870; daughter of Maj. John W. and Elizabeth (Alexander) Johnston; granddaughter of John Nash and Eliza (Bell) Johnston; great granddaughter of Andrew and Anna (Nash) Johnston, and great2 granddaughter of Peter Johnston, who came to Virginia from Scotland in 1737. He was a man of wealth and influence in the colony and was the donor of the lands on which Hampden-Sidney college was built. Her father was a lawyer, served in the civil war as a major of artillery in the Confederate army and was president of the Georgia Pacific railroad, which he built. She was educated chiefly at home under governesses, and in her father's library she became familiar with the early colonial history of Virginia, on which subject she based her first two books. She removed with her parents to Birmingham, Ala., in 1886; and later resided for four years in New York city. After her mother's death in 1888 she presided over her father's household, and made her writing surbordinate to her home duties. She is the author of: Prisoners of Hope (1898); To Have and To Hold (1899). Her first book had a remarkably wide circulation, and the advance sale of her second book, 50,000 copies, was immediately followed by a phenomenal demand. In two months from the date of publication more than 150,000 copies had been sold, and the young writer received for her work unqualified praise from leading critics.

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

William Alexander Obenchain, educator, was born in Buchanan, Va., April 27, 1841; son of Thomas Jefferson and Elizabeth Ann (Sweetland) Obenchain. His mother was a lineal descendant of William Sweetland, captain of the ship James trading between London, England, and New York, 1678-79, who settled in Salem, Conn., before the beginning of the eighteenth century, and the family intermarried with the Van Meterens, an old Knickerbocker family, and with the Bordens and Becks. On the paternal side he descended from Reinhold Abendsch?n from the Palatinate, Germany, who settled in Berks county, Pa., in 1749, and from the Goulds of New England. William was graduated at the Virginia Military institute with the first honors of the class of 1861. He served as instructor in light artillery at Camp Lee, Richmond, Va., April, 1861; was appointed 2d lieutenant of artillery in the Confederate army; was transferred to the corps of engineers in September, 1861, contrary to his wishes; was ordered to the Department of the Cape Fear, N.C., under Gens. S. G. French and W. H. C. Whiting, and to the Army of Northern Virginia in 1864. He served on the right flank of the Confederate army at Petersburg, and subsequently constructed the defence between the Newmarket and Williamsburg roads, where he was promoted captain of the corps of engineers by General Lee, for "efficiency and meritorious conduct." He was professor of mathematics and of civil and military engineering in the Hillsboro Military academy, N.C., 1866-68; professor of mathematics and commandant of cadets in the Western Military academy, under Gen. E. Kirby Smith, at Newcastle, Ky., 1868-70, and professor of German and French and commandant of cadets in the University of Nashville, Tenn., 1870-73. He engaged in civil engineering and the real estate business in Texas, 1873-78, became professor of mathematics in Ogden college, Bowling Green, Ky., in 1878, and was elected president of that institution in 1883. He was married, July 8, 1885, to Eliza Hall, daughter of Thomas Chalmers and Margaret (Younglove) Calvert of Bowling Green, Ky., author of "Sally Ann's Experience" and other short stories under the pen name "Eliza Calvert Hall." He was elected a member of the American Institute of Civics in 1887; of the American Academy of Political and Social Science in 1891; of the British Economic association in 1892; honorary member of the American Whig Society of the College of New Jersey in 1883, and one of the honorary vice-presidents and secretary of the Department Congress of Higher Education, World's Columbian exposition, in 1893. He received the honorary degree A.M. from Centre college, Ky., in 1885.

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