The Montgomery advertiser., 1903-03-27
SMITHSONS SAD LIFE
MIsFoRTUNEs OF FOUNDER OF
 SMITHSONIAN.
An Illegitimate son--Body to Be Turned Out of Grave in Italy. Wanted for ouarry-Bring-
 ing of Body to United
 States Advocated.

bert H. Grosvenor in The New York Herald.
 The birth. life and death of this great Denefactor of mankind was for him one series of misfortunes, and now even his Iesung place Is to be destroyed. AS the iilegttimate son of a duke and a noble lady who was the descendant of kings. he came in the world unwelcomed. his life was embitter ed and bIighted by the thought of his tainted birth. he died in Genoa-he never had home-without a | single kinsman beside his deathbed: his grave was dug in city far from his native land, and now his bones must be turned out of his grave in order that the city may get stone for it's harbor works Smithson felt the evil fate that pursued him, and for that very reason chose the United States to carry out his grand plan for the increase and diffusion of knowl- edge among men. At any rate, his trus- tees has faithfully protected his plan rom all misfortune and made his name known to all quarters of the globe.
 James Smithson was never reticent about the facts of his birth. He com menced his will with the declaration that I am James Smithson, son of Hugh first Duke of Northumberland and Eliz- abeth. heiress of the Hungerford of Stud ley, and niece of Charles the Proud. Duke of Somerset, etc"
 The best blood of England flowed in his veins. The blood of the Pefcys and Seymours, two of the most illustrious his- torical names of the British Islands. His mother was a lineal descendant of Henry VII. His half brother, a legitimate son of his father was that Lord Percy who | led the force which rescued the British | troops at Lexington and Concord and who later carried the dispatches to the English Governor in London, telling of the fight at Bunker Hill in which he also had taken part.
 Lord Percy. as well as his father. the | Duke, appreciated better than any other Englishman the temper and ability of l the Americans.
 Comparatively Little Known of His
 Life.
 | Beyond few facts We know compara- lively little about Smithson's life. He was born in 1765, his mother being the widow of James Macie. Under his moth- CTS name of Macie he entered Pembroke College. Oxford, from which he received the degre of M. A.. in 17s6. the year of his fathers death. At the age of 22 he be- came fellow of the Royal Society, among his sponsors being the physicist Cavendish. His researches and publica- tions relating to chemistry were many during the succeeding years. and showed much ability. All the noted men of sci- | ence of the times were his friends-Ara- go. Cavendish, Wollaston and others.
 About 17S5 he obtained permission from the crown to use his fathers name of Smithson, why we do not know.
 Much of his life was passed on the con- tinent of Europe mainly in Paris, prob ably to escape the stigma of his birth. From one contemporary we learn that he was great devotee of games of chance, and divided his time most methodically between profound studies and the gaming table.
 Where did Smithson get his money ? This is a natural question, but it Is not | easily answered. His fathers yeaSly in- come was about $250.0O0, from which, doubtless, the duke made him an allow ance. A daughter of his father left him a legacy of $l5OO0 in 1794. but the bulk of his wealth came from his mother and her son by her first marriage. Colonel Henry Louis Dickinson.
 James Smithson died at Genoa in 1S2s. His father and his half brother had been buried in Westminster Abbey, each with great pomp and splendor, but there was not single relative to cheer him in his last sickness or to follow his coffin to the grave in the small and isolated British cemetery on the heights of San Benigno 4---The cemetery where he has lain these seventy-four years is under the care of the British consul at Genoa, but the land f beyongs to the Italian government Near by is quarry from which the city gets the stone for its works. Much more stone is now needed for the extensive harbOr Improvements which have been begun and hence all the graves in the nnfn
 By the terms of Smithson's will his es- tate of over half a million dollars was to go ''to the United States of America to found at Washington. under the name of the Smithsonian Institution an establish I ment for the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men,"
 Five hundred thousand dollars was a | splendid fortune in those days. With such an endowment an institution's pow CT was then practically boundless.
 Smithson's motive in making this be- quest Is not hard to find
 He lived at a time when interest in science was increasing apace; mon were then entering upon that rapid race of dis covery, which made the nineteenth cen | tury so noted. He realized the helpless l ignorance of the period in every branch | of science, and he understood what could be accomplished by an institution whose sole object should be the advancement of knowledge.
 My Name Shall Live in Memory of
 Man.
 1 It was not with motives of bitterness 1 and revenge, but rather in a spirit of | healthy ambition. that he wrote: My name shall live in the memory of man when the titles of the Northumberlands and the Percys are extinct and forgot l ten."
 | The ban under which he lived had kept him out of the high positions to which his ambition and blood aspired. But the same spirit which had raised his father to a peerage of the realm dwelt in him | and made him determine to leave behind l him a work that would be enduring. Smithson's princely legacy came as surprise to the United States. He had never visited the country; nor had he any American friends or. so far as we know, any correspondents across the ocean. But he had greater faith in the integrity and future of the young re- public than in that of any country of the Old World.
 Congress accepted the trust in 1886, in the spirit of John Quincy Adams. who declared in the hall of Congress that of all the foundations of establishments for pious or charitable uses which ever sig preher sive beneacsnce of the foundsr. none can be named more deserving of the appreciation of mankind than this" It is now 65 years since Richard Rush brought Smithson's fortune from Eng l ,s.,4.. nfa