Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1900, volume 2).djvu/191

Rh director of Princeton theological seminary, and president of the board in 1858-'78.

DICKEY, John McElroy, clergyman, b. in York district, S. C., 16 Dec, 1789; d. near New Washington, Ind., 21 Nov.. 1849. He removed with his parents to Livingston county, Ky., in 1803, and, with a view to becoming a minister, studied the classics with his cousin, a clergyman, in the neighborhood, and afterward at Hardin Creek, where he was taken into the family of a person whose name of McElroy he adopted, out of grati- tude, as a part of his own. After studying theolo- gy, he was licensed to preach in August, 1814, and removed to the territory of Indiana, being the third Presbyterian minister that had settled there. His church was at the forks of White river, near what is now Washington, Daviess co. In the fol- lowing spring he went for his wife and house- hold goods, and in 1819 removed to the vicinity of Lexington, Scott co., to take charge of Pisgah and Lexington churches, of the latter of which he was pastor till 1835, and of the former till within two years of his death. He went on missionary tours, organized many new churches in Indiana, and his connection with the beginnings of the Presbyterian church in that territory caused him to be widely known in his denomination. He pub- lished a " History of the Presbyterian Church in Indiana" (1828). and was preparing a continuation of it at the time of his death.

DICKEY, Robert Barry, Canadian jurist, b. in Amherst, Nova Scotia, 10 Nov., 181 1. He studied law with Judge Stewart, of the vice-admiralty court, and was admitted to the bar in 1884. He was a Judge and registrar of the probate court for many years, was a director of the Nova Scotia Electric Telegraph company,and was consular agent for the United States at Amherst, N. S., from 1848 till 1858. He was a delegate from the Nova Scotia government to Great Britain on the subject of the Intercolonial railway in 1858, and to the Quebec union conference in 1864, and a member of the legislative council of Nova Scotia in 1858-'67, when he was called to the Dominion senate.

DICKEY, Theophilus Lyle, jurist, b. near Paris, Ky., 12 Nov., 1812 ; d. in Atlantic City, N. J., 22 July, 1885. He read law in his native state, re- moved to Ohio, liberated the slaves that he had inherited, and afterward established himself in practice in Illinois. During the Mexican war he served as a captain in Col. Hardin's regiment, and in the civil war he was colonel of the 11th Illinois cavalry, and served for two years under Gen. Grant, on whose staff he served for some months as chief of cavalry. From 30 July, 1868, till the close of President Johnson's administration he was assist- ant attorney-general of the United States. From 1876 till his death he was judge of the Illinois supreme court. See Gen. Jas. Grant Wilson's " Sketches of Illinois Officers " (Chicago, 1863).

DICKINS, John, clergyman, b. in London, England, 24 Aug., 1747; d. in Philadelphia, Pa., 27 Sept., 1798. He i-eceived a good education, partly at Eton, and came to this country before the Revolution. He united with the Methodist church in Virginia in 1774, and in 1776 preached there as an evangelist, was admitted into the itiner- ant ministry in 1777, and labored in North Carolina. In 1780 he suggested to his intimate friend. Bishop Asbury, the plan of Cokesbury college. New Abingdon, Md., the first Methodist academic in- stitution in this country. He was in New York city in 1783-"5 and 1786-'9, and in 1789 removed to Philadelphia, where he published a Methodist hymn-book, printing a large part of it with his own hands. Shortly afterward the conference as- sumed tiie publication, and appointed him book- steward, and in this office he founded the Metho- dist book concern. He issued the "Arminian Magazine " in Philadelphia in 1789-'90, and the "Methodist Magazine " from 1797 till his death. Mr. Dickins was the first American preacher to re- ceive Thomas Coke and approve his scheme for organizing the Methodist denomination. Pie was a member of the " Christmas conference " of 1784, and suggested the name " Methodist Episcopal Church," which it adopted. During the yellow- fever epidemics of 1793, 1797, and 1798, he re- mained at his post in Philadelphia, and in the last year fell a victim to the disease. Mr. Dickins was a powerful preacher and one of the best scholars of his church at the time of his ministry. A sermon in his memory was delivered by the Rev. Ezekiel Cooper and afterward published (Philadelphia, 1799). See also John Atkinson's " Centennial His- tory of American Methodism " (New York, 1884). — His son, Asbury, secretary of the U S. senate, b. in North Carolina, 29 July, 1780 ; d. in Washington, 23 Oct., 1861, passed his early life in Philadelphia, and afterward spent several years in Europe. In 1801 he was associated with Joseph Dennie in founding the "Port Folio" at Philadelphia. He was a clerk in the treasury department under Secretary Crawford from 1816 till 1833, and while there composed and read Secretary Crawford's suc- cessful vindication of himself against the charges preferred by Ninian Edwards, then minister to Mexico. He was chief clerk of the state depart- ment in 1833-'6, and became secretary of the United States senate in 1886, an office that he re- tained until 1861. He published an oration on Washington (Pliiladelphia, 1800; New York. 1825).

DICKINSON, Alfred Elijah, clergyman, b. in Orange county, Va., 3 Dec, 1830. He was edu- cated at Richmond college and the University of Virginia, and became pastor of the Baptist church in Charlottesville. He subsequently spent several years in promoting Sunday-school and colportage work, and then became pastor of the Leigh street Baptist church, Richmond, Va. Still later he as- sociated himself with the Rev. Dr. Jeter as joint owner and editor of the " Religious Herald," and since the death of Dr. Jeter has been editor-in- chief of that journal, whose circulation and influ- ence he has greatly extended. He has received the degree of D. D. from Furman imiversity.

DICKINSON, Anna Elizabeth, orator, b. in Philadelphia, Pa., 28 Oct., 1842. Her father died when she was two years old, leaving her in poverty, and she was educated in the free schools of the so- ciety of Friends, of which her parents were mem- bers. Her early days were a continuous struggle against adverse circumstances, but she read eagerly, devoting all her earnings to the purchase of books. She wrote an article on slavery for the " Liberator " when only fourteen years old, and made her first appearance as a public speaker in 1857, at meetings for discussion held by a body calling themselves " Progressive Friends," chiefly interested in the anti-slavery movement. A sneering and insolent tirade against women, by a person prominent at these meetings, called from the spirited girl a with- ering reply, her maiden speech. From this time she spoke frequently, chiefly on temperance and slavery. She taught school in Berks county. Pa., in 1859-'0O, and was emploj^ed in the U. S. mint in Philadelphia from April to December, 1861, but was dismissed for saying, in a speech in West Chester, that the battle of Ball's Bluff " was lost, not through ignorance and incompetence, but through