Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1889, volume 6).djvu/506

474 Fremont rifle regiment. He commanded it dur- ing Gen. John C. Fremont's expedition to south- west Missouri in the autumn of 18(51, and was afterward placed at the head of a brigade, accom- panying Gen. Samuel R. Curtis into Arkansas during the succeeding winter. He participated in the battle of Pea Ridge, and his appointment of brigadier-general of volunteers dated from that battle, 9 June, 1862. He was then assigned to the Department of the Shenandoah, and was subse- quently ordered to report to Gen. John E. Wool. He was at Martinsburg in September, 1862, and, when that town became untenable, retired to Har- per's Ferry, where he volunteered to serve as sec- ond in command under his inferior officer, Col. Dixon S. Miles, who was in charge of that post. When Harper's Ferry was surrendered, on 15 Sept., 1862, to Gen. Ambrose P. Hill, he became a pris- oner of war, but was released on parole. He was then placed under arrest by the U. S. government, and, at his own request, a court of inquiry was called, which found that he acted with capability and courage. He resigned in 1864, and on 18 March, 1865, was brevetted major-general of volun- teers. He has since been in business in Illinois.

WHITE, Peregrine, the first white child born in New England, b. on the " Mayflower," in Cape Cod harbor, 20 Nov., 1620 ; d. in Marshfield, Mass., 22 July, 1704. His father, William, and his moth- er, Susanna, were passengers in the " Mayflower." Peregrine became a citizen of Marshfield, Mass., where the court gave him 200 acres of land in " consideration of his birth." He was of " vigor- ous and comely aspect," and filled several minor civil and military offices in that town. During his early life he is described as " extravagant," but " much reformed in his later years, and died hope- fully." Peregrine's father died shortly after his arrival in this country, and two months afterward his mother, Susanna, married Edward Winslow. Theirs was the first English marriage in New Eng- land. She was therefore the first mother and the first bride in the country ; her husband, Edward Winslow, was its first provincial governor; and her son by her second marriage, Josiah Winslow, was the first native governor of the colony.

WHITE, Phillips, member of the Continental congress, b. in New Hampshire about 1730; d. there after 1783. He was chosen to the Continent- al congress in 1782, taking his seat 3 Dec. of that year. The only record of his appearance in that body is his vote on the motion made by Edmund Rutledge in January, 1783. " that congress having, on 20 Dec, 1782, directed the secretary of foreign affairs to transmit to the executive authority of Rhode Island an authenticated state of the several applications for foreign loans, and the result there- of, it be resolved that the foregoing motion be postponed." On the question of commitment Mr. White voted in the affirmative.

WHITE, Pliny Holton, clergyman, b. in Springfield, Conn., 6 Oct., 1822 ; d. in Coventry, Vt., 24 April, 1869. He adopted the profession of law, was admitted to the bar of Windham county, Vt., in 1843, and practised there till 1853. He was editor of the Brattleborough. Vt., " Eagle " "in 1851-2, and of the " Express" at Amherst, Mass., in 1857-'8. In February, 1859, he was ordained fastor of the Unitarian church at Coventry, Vt. Ie was a member of the Vermont legislature in 1862-'3, chaplain of the senate in 1864-'6, and at the time of his death president of the Vermont historical society. He contributed frequently to the newspapers, and is the author of a " History of Coventry " (Irasburg, Vt., 1858).

WHITE, Richard Grant, author, b. in New York city, 22 May, 1821 ; d. there, 8 April, 1885. His ancestor, John White, came from England in 1636, and was a settler of Cambridge, Mass., and Hartford, Conn., and his grandfather, Calvin (1763-1853), was rector of St. James's parish in Derby, Conn., but afterward became a Roman Catho- lic, although he did not enter the priesthood of that church. He was a Tory and just es- caped hanging by the mob because he " refused to shout ' Property and liberty ! ' " Richard Grant's father, Richard Mansfield White, intended his son for the church, but after his gradua- tion at the Univer- sity of the city of New York in 1839 he studied medicine and afterward law, and was admitted to the bar in 1845. His literary tendencies drew him from law, and he soon became a contributor to the New York "Courier and Enquirer." where his musical, dramatic, and art criticisms attracted attention. From 1845 till 1859 he was connected with this journal, and he served as its editor in l854-'9. He was a founder in 1846-'7 of " Yankee Doodle," and also a founder in 1860 of the " World." from which he withdrew in 1861. During the civil war he wrote a series of letters to the London "Spectator," signed "A Yankee," which were of much service to the National cause. For nearly twenty years he was chief of the U. S. revenue marine bureau in the district of New York, which post he resigned in 1878. He wrote for magazines, contributed articles to cyclopaedias, and edited the "Illustrated Record of the New York Exhibition of the Industry of all Nations" (1854), and " Poetry. Lyrical, Narrative, and Satirical of the Civil War" (1866). On the publication of John Payne Collier's folio manuscript emendations of Shakespeare (1852), Mr. White contributed a series of papers to " Putnam's Magazine," in which he denied the value of the emendations. The acumen and style of these articles elicited general admiration, and their subtile and vigorous criticism gave him a place among the most learned Shakespearian scholars. His publications are an " Appeal from the Sentence of the Bishoo [Onderdonk] of New York " (New York, 1845) ; " Biographical and Critical Hand -Book of Christian Art" (1853); " Shakespeare's Scholar " (1854) ; " The Works of William Shakespeare," an annotated edition (12 vols., Boston, 1857-65); "Essay on the Authorship of the Three Parts of Henry the Sixth" (Cambridge, 1859); "National Hymns," an essay, with selections from the hymns written for a prize of $600 offered by a national committee, which was not awarded' (New York, 1861); "Memoirs of William Shakespeare, with an Essay toward the Expression of his Genius, and Account of the Rise and Progress of the English Drama" (Boston, 1865) ; " The New Gospel of Peace according to St. Benjamin," an anonymous political satire (Cambridge, 1866) : " Words and their Uses, a Study of the English Language " (New York, 1870 ;