The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1906-11-11
WILLIAM HENRY benson
BY J. w. DUBosE.

/ Alabama
preservation the memory and mention
of our eminent citizens when they pass
from our midst into the spirit land. We
sacrifice many of our best associations,
with too little thought of their value to
our minds and hearts, in this world. We
stand in need of memories of the good
and true, quick or gone before.
! 20, let me join the choir invisible
| OF those immortal dead, who live again
In lives made better by their presence"
A sufficient biography for example, of
George strother Gaines would become
| classic in the study of the aborigines of
Alabama the most interesting Indians
of all America. A just biography of his
nephew Francis Strother Lyon. would
discover to the students of finance prac-
teal methods, pursued by him alone,
which secured Alabama from impend-
ing disgrace and long years of suspi-
cion Unrewarded, not even the current
expenses of his labor met by the state,
he toled for us seven years. A biogra-
ply of Mr.. Lyon would instruct genera
tons remote in the growth of the state in
its Industrial, social and political life.
pass could do Citizens need constant
education in the high art of finance Mr..
| Lyons system of work, in settlement OF
| the old state banks. was financial art in
| its highest range of application. His
daily life was beautiful; his personal in
fluence unparalleled; his public service
varied and effective and limitless Yet
who knows him? Why drop him?
! In the wild rush for personal prefer
/ q M1mmOn. fore
most in the race shout back in derision
TO those left in the rear. The man of
| leisure and of thought is out of date.
That sort of boom is all drivel. Enlarge
ment of individual nature, cultivation, of
| manners, encouragement of high purpose
| and aspirations come from the ideal nur-
| tured in our hearts. Examples in life
are for good or evil. The heather philoso-
| pher likened ignorance to the experience
! of the man grown up in dark cave sud-
| denly ushered into midair to behold the
rising sun. Familiarity with light gradu-
| ally taught him to study the celestial
bodies. The sun of wisdom rises from
| the deeds of men, Those who beheld 1t
are prepared in the study of it to learn
of the mysteries of the temple of God.
Ancestry.
1t was my good fortune to know Col
onel benson many years, and l am sure
|
ten in Alabama. The uses of the press
grow hourly. Let Tvs begin, not too soon.
to make visible and permanent record of
| the nigh-nlinded men born to their gen.
GRAFTON, as this man was born, lover of
| his kind and faithful worker as God
| placed his lot.
| 1t is quite singular how WEIGH blood
rises to the surface in the lives 81
Americans. Thomas jefferson, Jefferson
| Davis, w. e. Yancey and many others
who appear in the annals of great events
| as leaders and benefactors of our peo-
pie, were of Welch descent.
! In the colonial period, three brothers,
Denson immigrated from Wales to Brit
| sh America They were Quakers, and
| naturally went TO Pennsylvania first One
of the three remained in Pennsylvania;
| a second brother sought the great uneX-
| plored country, beyond the Blue Ridge.
and settled in what became Ohio; the
| third, William, came to Virginia.
| civilians benson" appears on the roll
| of the Virginia Colonial house OF Bur
| gesses. 1t is not probable that there
were two Of the name. in so small COM
munity of men available for an office
| of such dignity, yet there Is no known
/. proof of the individual in the premises.
| The family, wherever settled We're farm
ers in the generations, down to 1861.
The eat-grandfather of Colonel VIII
liam Henry benson was William Den
| son of Virginia.
John Ely benson was his grandfather
| ana he removed from Virginia to North
| Carolina, probably some years after the
| revolutionary war.
Augustus Russell benson was born in
North Carolina In 1872. He was brought
-by. a widowed mother, at the age of Y
, years, to Hancock county, Georgia, and
! placed in the famous school of Rev. Bea-
| MAJ wi n 4 q
| distinguished Alabamians, the Yancey
| brothers.
| Augustus r. benson removed from
| Georgia to Russell county, Alabama. in
| his 18th year, in the year 1880. In early
manhood he there married Miss Ivey,
daughter of Benjamin f.. Ivey, who later
| lived in Monroe county To them We're
born fourteen children. all on his Russell
county plantation.
Cotton Planter A. r. benson, like all
| of his class, was an earnest student of
| public questions He was a wing. Ala
| bama wings were of two schools, quite
different in essentials. One was the school
of Daniel Webster-the Liberty and
union, now and forever. one and INSOFAR
able school. Cotton Planter benson did
not belong to the Webster school of wings
| but to the John Tyler school of states
rights. He did not follow the lead of
| Charles C. Iangdon. Massachusetts
| man, QOmlClleu Ill Moplie' Win IL Sitdl
newspaper to spread the Webster doc
| trines Thomas II. Watts Thomas j.
| Judge represented Mr.. Denson's views of
the relations of the state of Alabama.
| for instance, to the general government
| at Washington.
The Young Soldier.
| When the war between the northern
| and the southern confederacies broke out,
| Mr. Augustus benson sent the only two
| sons of his family, eligible, by reason
of age into the ranks of the Confederate
army. He lived until 1871, and in the fierce
| yindictiveness of the reconstruction Pc
riod. he had the melancholy satisfaction
of beholding the evidences of the original
| wisdom of his broken and fallen prin-
ciples. The infantile southern Confedera-
CIV, to whose life he pledged his all, in
supreme faith, had gone down in the
| chances of war, and in the chances of
| war alone.
John b. benson, the elder of the two
| soldier brothers enlisted in Bellamy s
battery waddelrs artillery battalion,
ARMY of Tennessee William II. benson
was then cadet in the University OF
| Alabama, The legislature of 1864 passed
| an act placing the corps of cadets at the
| service of the governor, for military pur-
| noses This act seemed to the boys a
| suggestion. Many, if not most OF them,
| volunteered in the various organizations
| already in the field. SO it was that Ca
def William benson, then in his 18TH
| year enlisted from the university, IN the
| artillery company with his brother. John
| fell i'm the three days battle between
Johnston aud Sherman at Resaea' Ga