Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1900, volume 1).djvu/271

Rh then undertook the task of abridging the debates of congress from the foundation of the government. Although at the advanced age of seventy-six, he labored at this task daily, and brought the work down to the conclusion of the great compromise debate of 1850, in which, with Clay, Calhoun, Webster, and Seward, he had himself borne a conspicuous part. The last pages were dictated in whispers after he had lost the power of speaking aloud. The work was published under the title of &ldquo;An Abridgment of the Debates of Congress&rdquo; (15 vols., New York). Having completed this work, Mr. Benton sent for several old friends to bid them farewell. Among them was the president, whom he thanked for taking an interest in his child, and to whom he said: &ldquo;Buchanan, we are friends. I supported you in preference to Frémont, because he headed a sectional party, whose success would have been the signal for disunion. I have known you long, and I knew you would honestly endeavor to do right.&rdquo; A week before his death he wrote to friends in congress requesting that neither house should take notice of his death; but congress, nevertheless, adjourned for his funeral.

After becoming senator Col. Benton married Elizabeth, daughter of Col. James McDowell, of Virginia. In 1844 she suffered a stroke of paralysis, and from that time he was never known to go to any place of festivity or amusement. She died in 1854, leaving four daughters, the second of whom married Gen. John C. Frémont. Notwithstanding the temptations to which his public life subjected him, he abstained wholly from the use of tobacco, gaming, and liquors, saying that his mother had wished it, and he should adhere to her wishes through life. Besides his works already mentioned, he published &ldquo;An Examination of the Dred-Scott Case.&rdquo; A fine bronze statue of him has been erected in the park in St. Louis. The steel portrait represents him in early life; that in the text, as he appeared in later years.

BENTON, William Plummer, soldier, b. near Newmarket, Frederick co., Md., 35 Dec, 1828; d. in New Orleans, 14 March, 1867. His father died when he was four months old, and his mother removed to Indiana in 1836. At the beginning of the Mexican war, being then eighteen years of age, he enlisted as private in a regiment of mounted riflemen, and took part in the battles of Contreras, Churubusco, Chapultepec, and the capture of the city of Mexico. On his return to Richmond, Ind., he re-entered college, finished his studies as a lawyer, was admitted to the bar in 1851, in 1852 appointed prosecuting-attorney, and in 1856 made judge of the common pleas court. When Fort Sumter was fired upon. Judge Benton was the first man in Wayne co. to respond to the president's call for 75,000 men. Twenty-four hours after he had begun to raise his company he was on his way to Indianapolis, where it was mustered into service, being the first offered by Indiana. He was soon promoted colonel of the 8th Indiana volunteers, and commanded at Rich Mountain, where he distinguished himself by personal bravery. After three months he was authorized to re-enlist and reorganize the regiment, and did so, reporting to Gen. Fremont, 14 Sept., 1861. The regiment was placed in the vanguard of Fremont's army, and served in the campaign in Missouri and Arkansas. He commanded a brigade at Pea Ridge, and was promoted to brigadier-general for gallantry. He was in the battles of Port Gibson, Jackson, Champion Hills, Black River Bridge, the siege of Vicksburg, and Mobile. At Jackson, Miss., he was wounded. At the close of the war Gen. Benton resigned his commission and returned to Richmond, Ind., to resume the practice of law. In 1866 he went to New Orleans under government appointment, where he died.

BENZONI, Girolamo, traveller, b. in Italy about 1520. He spent many years in America, and in 1565 published an account of his travels and adventures, from 1541 until 1556, entitled "History of the New Worid," translated by W. H. Smith, and republished by the Hakluyt society (1857).

BERARD, Claudius, educator, b. in Bordeaux, France, 21 March, 1786; d. at West Point, N. Y., 6 May, 1848. He was educated in his native land, and became an eminent Greek and Latin scholar. He was conscripted into the army of Napoleon, but had no taste for a military life, and his father purchased a substitute. From earliest youth his mind was given to books, and the martial ardor that animated most young Frenchmen in the days of Napoleon failed to affect him. Learning that his substitute had been killed in the Spanish campaign of 1805, he determined to remove to the United States. He arrived in New York in the spring of 1807, and soon afterward became professor of ancient languages in Dickinson college, at Carlisle, Pa., where he remained until his appointment, in 1815, as professor of French in the U. S. military academy at West Point. He held this chair until his death, a period of over thirty-three years. He was conversant with the language and literature of most of the countries of Europe, and possessed, at one time, a copy of the Bible in nearly every language into which it had been translated. He published &ldquo;Leçons Français,&rdquo; long in use at the military academy (1824), and &ldquo;A Grammar of the French Language&rdquo; (1826). &mdash; His daughter, Augusta Blanche, b. in West Point, N. Y., 29 Oct., 1824, has devoted her life mostly to teaching and study, principally at West Point, where, for many years, she has been in charge of the post-office. Miss Berard has published a &ldquo;School History of the United States&rdquo; (1854); a &ldquo;School History of England&rdquo; (1861); a &ldquo;Manual of Spanish Art and Literature&rdquo; (1868); and has edited and revised &ldquo;Goodrich's Child's History of the United States&rdquo; (1878).

BERG, Joseph Frederick, clergyman, b. at Grace Hill, in the island of Antigua, in 1812; d. in New Brunswick, N. J.. 20 July, 1871. His father was a Moravian missionary, and his early education was obtained in the Moravian schools in England. In 1825 he came to the United States and continued his studies in the Moravian school at Nazareth, Pa., where he remained a few years as professor of chemistry. In 1835 he was ordained by the synod of the German Reformed church, in 1837 licensed to preach, and became pastor of the Race street German Reformed church in Philadelphia, which relation he continued until 1852, when he became pastor of the second Reformed Dutch