The Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1837-1867, 1864-03-11
Death of DR.. Edward Hitchcock O
Amherst College.

A'o'' Eu""iu AitCHcok, ~. u, L.. IL. ~.
from 1915 to 1854 President of Amherst col.
, lege, and before and after professor at tina,
institution, died of consumption at Amherst
Saturday morning, about o'clock, at the age
of 20. For two or three years his health has
been gradually failing. There have been
several periods when it was thought his end
was near. But he has as often rallied, and
though heavily weighed down by infrmities,
not so much fiom age as from natural weak
ness of constitution and long life of the
hardest labor, he has been quite regular and
enthusiastic, until very lately, in performing
his duties at the college. The death of his
wife, however. on the 26th of last May, was
heavy blow to him; and though he bore it
With truly Christian resignation, no one that
knew how much he loved her, who had been
SO long in very deed and truth, and not in
name only part of himself, sharer of his
every JOY and sorrow, will wonder that he has
so soon followed her.
Dr. Hitchcock was born in old Deerfeld,
May "A, 1893. His father was very poor
and could give him no education beyond that
Of the common school and the village aca-
deny. Private studies with the view of en-
tering college were broken mp by disease, ,and
the time thus given for meditation changed
his views from UAitarianism to Orthodoxy,
and turned his thoughts to the ministry,
which he entered after teaching in Deerfeld
academy three years and studying theology
at New Haven in the first class under DR..
Taylor. His first and only settlement in the
ministry was at Conway, where he remained
from 1921 . 1925, when again failing health
induced him to accept the professorship Of
natural history and chemistry in Amherst
college, from the prospect held out to him of
more exercise and less exhaustive labors. He
entered on his professorship after a little
preliminary study with Prof. Silliman, SEMI
or,of Yale college which institution had given
He needed but little preliminary study, how
ever. He eally had taste for the sciences,
and had studied many branches thoroughly
bv himself and with what little assistance he
could get. His favorite study was astrono-
nv, in which he was we'll versed. Natural
history. too, lotany and geology had long
elested him, and taste as Well as the pur-
suit of strong health kept him much in the
woods ard fields.
f When DR.. Hitchcock entered Amherst
college, the institution, though in operation
for several years before, was inst incorpora-
ted bv the state. and thus he has been con-
nected with ii from the Start. The college
was unpopular and poor. lr his department,
natural history and chemistry, h. had actu-
ally nothing to Go with; no specimens, no
apparatus. But he went manfuly at his
work, providing many things out of his own
means, depending on his wife for drawings
and illustrations, and during the twenty
years he he!d the professorship. it is safe to
say that mol student felt the want of anything e
if the teacher did. But to give history of
DIR. Hitchcock s connection with the college
would be to give history of the college
itself, so closely were all his thoughts and in
terests and labors connected with it. From
1915 to 1854 he was President of the college,
though the duties of that position were dis
tasteful to him, and he was glad TO give it
up to his worthy successor, DR.. Stearns.-
During his presidency he gave instruction in
, natural theology and geology, his investiga-
tioEs in science being chiefly valuable to him
for their bearing on religion and it was
through his exertions that professorship Of
natural theology and geology was perma-
nently founded,the chair of which he filled to
the day of his death, though he has for
some Years given up other duties toryounger
hands.
To the world at large DR.. Hitchcock is
chiefly known by his emnence in scientific
attainments, especially geology, in which de-
par'ment he probably had no superior in the
world at the time OF his death. He sugges-
ted and executed the geological survey Of
Massachusetts, the first scientific survey oi
an entire state under the authority of the
government in the world. He was the frs,
to scientifically examine and classify the fossil
foot prints in our Connecticut valley, and hll
chronological cabinent at Amherst contain.
specimens of all those known remains. He
> was the originator and the first President O.
the American scientific association, and ths
last Congress very properly named him as
one of the fifty incorporators and members o
the American academy of arts and sciences
y He was quite vouminous writer on scien
tiic subjects, being particularly distinguished
y by his writings on natural theology. and th'
connection Of religion and geology. H
was also deeply interested in the subject o
tenn ,2erance.
II Early in his residence at Amherst he pub
s. lished several works on that subject, SOM
1t of which were republished in England. H
e commenced his career as an author by con
IS ducting an almanac four years, before he wa
e out of his teens; and the curious in sue
J. things can Esee in the Amherst college Ii
ID brary, dingy little book published in ISL:
!" "The Downfall Of Bonaparte, a tragedy
one of the first works Of the great scientif
~ writer and expounder. In all he has pul