Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1889, volume 6).djvu/585

Rh drafting committee, and prepared the form of the instrument. In October, 1789, President Washington appointed him an associate justice of the U. S. supreme court, and he remained in this office till his death. In 1790 he was appointed professor of law in Philadelphia college, which conferred on him the degree of LL. D. in that year, and in the two following winters he delivered lectures. In March, 1791, he was appointed by the state house of representatives to revise and digest the laws of Pennsylvania, and after the senate had refused to concur he continued the work as a private undertaking, but died before completing the digest. He published, besides other pamphlets, an &ldquo;Address to the Citizens of Philadelphia&rdquo; (Philadelphia, 1784), and, with Thomas McKean, &ldquo;Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States&rdquo; (London, 1792). His &ldquo;Works,&rdquo; comprising law lectures, speeches, and legal disquisitions, were published under the direction of Bird Wilson (3 vols., Philadelphia, 1803-'4). &mdash; His son, Bird, clergyman, b. in Carlisle, Pa., 8 Jan., 1777; d. in New York city, 14 April, 1859, was graduated in 1792 at the College of Philadelphia, studied law, and was admitted to the bar in Philadelphia in 1797. He was appointed commissioner of bankrupt law, and in 1802 was made president-judge of the court of common pleas in the counties of Chester, Delaware, Montgomery, and Bucks. He resigned his post in 1818, studied theology under Bishop White, and was ordained deacon in Christ church, Philadelphia, 12 March, 1829, and priest a year later, by the same bishop. Mr. Wilson was rector of St. John's church, Norristown, and St. Thomas's church, Whitemarsh, Pa., in 1819-'21. He received the degree of D. D. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1821, and that of LL. D. from Columbia in 1845. He was elected professor of systematic divinity in the Episcopal general theological seminary in 1821, which post he held for nearly thirty years. He was secretary of the house of bishops in 1829-'41. The last few vears of his life were passed in retirement in New York city. Dr. Wilson was an able theologian of the school of Hooker, Tillotson, Waterland, and other like divines of the Church of England, and prepared numerous valuable tractates for the classes under his charge. His chief publications were &ldquo;Abridgment of the Law by Matthew Bacon&rdquo; (7 vols., Philadelphia, 1811-'13), and &ldquo;Memoir of the Life of the Right Rev. William White, D.D., Bishop of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the State of Pennsylvania&rdquo; (1839). See a &ldquo;Memorial of the Rev. Bird Wilson, D.D., LL.D.,&rdquo; by W. White Bronson (1864). &mdash; James's kinsman, William, poet, b. in Perthshire, Scotland, 25 Dec., 1801; d. in Poughkeepsie, N. Y., 25 Aug., 1860. At an early age he was imbued with a passionate love of poetry, derived from his mother, who sang with great beauty the Jacobite songs and ballads of her native land. While a school-boy he lost his father, the generous merchant's death being preceded by his failure in business, and a bachelor brother's fortune in Jamaica was in some way lost to his children, for whom it was intended, so that Wilson's early life was accompanied by many deprivations, including the completion of his education. At twenty-two he became the editor of the Dundee &ldquo;Literary Olio,&rdquo; a large proportion of which, both in prose and verse, was from his pen. In 1826 he was induced by influential friends to remove to Edinburgh, where he established himself in business. In the same year he lost his young wife, and he sought relief from his great sorrow in composition. His contributions were welcomed in the &ldquo;Edinburgh Literary Journal&rdquo; and

other leading periodicals. In 1830 Wilson married Miss Sibbald, of Borthaugh, a descendant of Sir Andrew Sibbald and a niece of James Sibbald, the literary antiquary and editor of the &ldquo;Chronicle of Scottish Poetry,&rdquo; also the friend of Robert Burns. At this period the young poet's charming conversation and manners made him a welcome guest in the literary circles of Edinburgh. At the house of Mrs. Grant, of Laggan, he was a constant visitor, and she claimed the privilege of possessing his portrait by Sir John Watson Gordon, from which the accompanying vignette is copied. When thirty-two years of age Wilson removed to the United States and settled at Poughkeepsie, on the Hudson, where he engaged in bookselling and publishing, which he continued till his death, a portion of the time in partnership with the elder brother of Bishops Alonzo and Horatio Potter, and later with his son, James Grant. In the New World, Wilson occasionally contributed in prose and verse &mdash; generally anonymously &mdash; to various American periodicals, and sometimes sent a contribution to &ldquo;Blackwood&rdquo; or &ldquo;Chambers's Journal.&rdquo; Selections of his poems appeared in &ldquo;The Cabinet,&rdquo; &ldquo;Modern Scottish Minstrel,&rdquo; and Longfellow's &ldquo;Poems of Places,&rdquo; but he never issued them in a volume, or even collected them, and it was not till 1869 that a portion of his poems were published in Poughkeepsie with a memoir by Benson J. Lossing. A second edition, with additional poems, appeared in 1875, and has since been followed by a third. Willis pronounced one of Wilson's poems &ldquo;the best modern imitation of the old ballad style that he had ever met with,&rdquo; and Bryant said &ldquo;the song in which the writer personates Richard the Lion-hearted during his imprisonment is more spirited than any of the ballads of Aytoun.&rdquo; All of Wilson's sons by his second marriage served in the civil war, the eldest, with whom the idea of this work originated in 1879, attaining the rank of brigadier-general; the second fell at the head of his company at Fredericksburg, and the youngest, leaving his studies at sixteen, volunteered with several of his classmates and went to the front. &mdash; His son, James Grant, b. in Edinburgh, 28 April, 1832, was educated at College Hill, Poughkeepsie, continuing his studies in the languages, music, and drawing, under private teachers, joined his father in business, later becoming his partner. In 1855 he went abroad, and soon after his return established in Chicago the first literary paper published in the northwest, and became known as a public speaker. In 1862 he disposed of his journal and was commissioned major of the 15th Illinois cavalry, becoming soon after acting colonel of the regiment, and taking part in many engagements, and in the Vicksburg campaign. In August, 1863, he accompanied Gen. Ulysses S. Grant to New Orleans, and there accepted, by his advice, the colonelcy of the 4th regiment, United States colored