History of Aldie, (Loudoun County) Virginia United States of America

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James Mercer Garnett, educator, was born at Aldie, Loudoun county, Va., April 24, 1840: son of Theodore Stanford and Florentina L. (Mercer) Garnett; and grandson of James Mercer (1770-1843) and Mary Eleanor Dick (Mercer) Garnett, and of Francisco Moreno, Spanish consul at Pensacola, Fla. He was graduated from the Episcopal high school of Virginia in 1857 and from the University of Virginia in 1859. In 1861 he entered the Confederate army as a private in the Rockbridge artillery and served throughout the war as lieutenant and captain of artillery on ordnance duty. He taught school in Charlottesville, Va., 1865-67; held the chair of Greek in the Louisiana state university, 1867; was instructor in ancient languages and mathematics in the Episcopal high school of Virginia, 1867-69; and in 1869-70 studied in Germany, chiefly at the universities of Berlin and Leipzig. He was president of St. John's college, Annapolis, Md., 1870-80; principal of his university school at Ellicott City, Md., 1880-82; professor of the English language and literature at the University of Virginia, 1882-93, and of the English language alone, 1893-96; and acting professor of English in the Woman's college of Baltimore, 1896-97. He was married in 1871 to Kate Huntington, daughter of Maj. Burr Powell Noland of Middleburg, Va., and had one son, J. Mercer Garnett, Jr. He received from St. John's college the degree of LL.D. in 1874. His published writings include: Translations of Beowulf and the Fight at Finnsburg (1882, 3d ed., 1892); Translation of Elene, Judith, Athelstan, and Byrhtnoth: Anglo-Saxon Poems (1889); Selections in English Prose from Elizabeth to Victoria (1891); editions of Hayne's Speech (1894), and of Macbeth (1897); and many essays, addresses, and reviews in the American Journal of Philology, the Nation and other journals.

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

History of Aldie, (Loudoun County) Virginia

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