Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1900, volume 1).djvu/490

458 and commissioners at Albany in 1722, and per- suaded them to send a message to the eastern In- dians, threatening them with war unless they con- cluded a treaty with the English. He secured the passage by the assembly of an act forbidding the sale of goods to French traders, a very unpopular measure, and rendered himself obnoxious also by following out the instructions of the royal govern- ment in prolonging the period of the existing as- sembly until it had lasted more than eleven years, by obtaining for Horace Walpole his sinecure per- quisites as auditor-general, and by supporting the court of chancery, which he brought into further disrepute by his precipitate decisions as chancellor. On 15 April, 1728, he was removed, not so much on account of his unpopularity, as to make a place for John Montgomerie, a favorite of George II. Gov. Burnet was transferred to Massachusetts, and there became involved in a quarrel with the assem- bly by repeating the demand of his jsredecessor for a fixed salary. The assembly insisted on its char- tered right to raise and appropriate all moneys for the support of the government. The British house of commons, in answer to a petition that Massa- chusetts might be heard by counsel in the matter, passed a resolve that the proceeding tended " to shake off the dependency of the said colony upon this kingdom, to which, in law and right, they ought to be subject." Burnet was eventually obliged to recede from his position. In 1730 he was made governor of New Hampshire also. He was a man of superior talents and accomplish- ments, an honest administrator, and was impelled to some of the more objectionable features of his policy by the instructions of his superiors, rather than by his own arbitrary nature. He published astronomical observations in the " Transactions " of the Royal society, and an essay on the fulfilment of prophecies in the book of Daniel (London, 1724).

BURNET, William, physician, b. in Elizabeth, N. J., 18 Dec, 1730; d". in Newark, N. J., 7 Oct., 1791. He was the son of a physician who came from Scotland, was a graduate of Princeton in 1749, the second year of the college, and became a physician. He held at different times various offices in the state government, was elected to con- gress under the confederation in 1776, was a mem- ber of congress in 1780-'l, and surgeon-general of the eastern district of the United States from 1776 till the close of the revolutionary war. He suffered much in property by the dep«edations of the ene- my, who carried off his valuable library. He was a skilful and successful physician, of extensive practice. — His son, Jacob, jurist, b. in Newark, N. J., 22 Feb., 1770; d. in" Cincinnati, Ohio, 10 May, 1853, was graduated at Princeton in 1791, studied law in the office of Judge Boudinot, and was admitted to the bar in 1796. The same year he removed to Ohio, where he became distin- guished as a lawyer and was a leading citizen in the new settlement of Cincinnati. In 1799 he was appointed to the legislative council of the territory, continuing a member of that body, in which he took the most prominent part in the preparation of legislative measures, until the formation of a state government. In 1812 he was a member of the state legislature, a judge of the supreme court of Ohio in 1821-'8, and in 1828-'31 U. S. senator. He was chosen by the legislature of Kentucky a commissioner to adjust certain territorial disputes with Virginia. He took part in the establishment of the Lancastrian academy in Cincinnati, and was one of the founders of the Cincinnati college, and its first president, and was active in reorganizing the Medical college of Ohio. He was a delegate to the Harrisburg convention in 1839, and was main- ly instrumental in securing the nomination of Harrison to the presidency. He was the first president of the Colonization society of Cincinnati. His efforts to alleviate the distress felt by pur- chasers of western lands, on account of indebted- ness to the government which they were unable to discharge, resulted in an act of congress granting relief to the entire west, extricating the settlers from serious financial distress. The debt due to- the government amounted to $22,000,000, exceed- ing the volume of currency in circulation in the west, and threatening both farmers and speculators with bankruptcy. The people of the southwest were in the same situation : all the banks had sus- pended payment, and forcible resistance was threat- ened if the government should attempt to dispos- sess the settlers. Judge Burnett drew up a memorial to congress, proposing a release of back interest and permission to settlers to relinquish as much of the land entered as they were unable to pay for. The memorial was generally approved by the in- habitants of the Ohio and Mississippi valleys, and in 1821 congress granted relief in the form desired. In 1830 Judge Burnett secured the revocation of the forfeiture of the congressional land-grant to the state of Ohio for the extension of the Miami canal, and an additional grant that emboldened the legis- lature of Ohio to carry ovit the work. He published " Notes on the Early Settlement of the Northwest- ern Territory" (New York, 1847). — Another son,, Dayid G., Texan politician, b. in Newark, N. J., 4 April, 1789; d. in Galveston, Texas, 5 Dec, 1870, entered a counting-house in New York, and in 1806 joined Gen. Miranda's expedition to Venezue- la. He became a merchant in Natchitoches, La., in 1817, then studied law in Cincinnati, and in 1826 went to Texas, then a Mexican state, and entered zealously into the contest to wrest the state from Mexico and establish a republic. He was a mem- ber of the San Felipe convention, 1 April, 1833, and was appointed judge of the municipality of Austin in 1834. After the assumption of dictato- rial powers by Santa Anna, the convention of 1 March, 1836, issued a declaration of independence, and on 16 March, chose Mr. Burnett provisional president of the new republic. Four weeks later he fled before Santa Anna, and escaped to Galves- ton, which was made the seat of the government. On 22 Oct. he gave over the government into the hands of Houston, the constitutionally elected president. He was afterward elected vice-presi- dent, and, after the admission of Texas to the union, lived in retirement near the battle-field of San Jacinto. He remained in the south during the civil war, and at its close was elected in 1866 to the U. S. senate from Texas, but congress re- fused to admit him. After that he resided in re- tirement on his plantation near Houston.

BURNETT, Frances Hodgrson, novelist, b. in Manchester, England, 24 Nov., 1849. She was educated in her native city, where she became familiar with the Lancashire dialect and character. About the close of the American civil war her parents were impelled by pecuniarv misfortune to emigrate to the United States. They settled in 1865 at Knoxville, Tenn., and subsequently removed to Newmarket. She there began to write short stories, the first of which appeared in a magazine in 1867. In 1872 Miss Hodgson contributed to "Scribner's Monthly" a dialect story entitled "Surly Tim's Trouble," republished in book-form with other tales in 1877. In 1873 she married Dr. Luan M. Burnett, of Knoxville. and, after returning from a visit to Europe in 1875, resided in Washington, D. C.