Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1900, volume 2).djvu/328

306 EDWARDS, Cyrus, lawyer, b. in Montgomery county, Md., 17 Jan, 1793: d. in Upper Alton. 111., in September, 1877. In the early history of Illinois he was one of its most prominent and useful citi- zens. He was fi*equently elected to the legislature, and was especially conspicuous as a friend of educa- tion. He was active in originating the State nor- mal school at Bloomington, and was for thirty-five years president of the board of trustees of Shurt- iefl: college, to which institution he gave real estate valued at $10,000, besides other genei'ous donations. He received the degree of LL. D.

EDWARDS, Jesse, clergyman, b. in Elmira, K Y., 21 Feb., 1819 ; d. in Plover, Wis., 6 Feb., 1866. He was graduated at Princeton theological seminary in 1842, and licensed to preach the same year. Removing to Indiana, he was ordained in 1845, and labored at Delphi, Rock Creek, and Monticello until 1847, when he returned to New York and preached both at Sparta and Portage- ville. In 1850 he went to Wisconsin as a mission- ary, and engaged in that work at Plover, Portage county, Stevens Point, and Gi'and Rapids. While thus employed he was (1859) elected professor of Latin and Greek at Carroll college, Waukesha, Wis. When that institution was closed in 1861 he returned to Plover. Mr. Edwards was distin- guished for his biblical scholarship.

EDWARDS, John, senator, b. in Virginia in 1755 ; d. in Bourbon county, Ky., in 1837. In 1780 he removed to that portion of Virginia now com- prised in the state of Kentucky, and entered 23,000 acres. He was a member of the state legislature from 1781 till 1785, again in 1795, and from 1796 till 1800. He was a delegate in the conventions of 1785-7 and '8, called to set off the state of Ken- tucky, and was also elected to the convention that ratified the Federal constitution, and to that held in 1792, which framed the constitution of the state. He was a United States senator from Kentucky from 24 Oct., 1791, till 3 March, 1795. About 1800 he retired from public life.

EDWARDS, John, author, b. in Llanuwch-y- lynn, Wales, 15 April, 1806 ; d. near Rome, N. Y., 20 Jan., 1887. He was educated in his native place, where he resided until the age of twenty-two, when he settled in Utica, N. Y., near which town he purchased a farm in 1828. In 1834 he removed to the city of New York, where he remained six years, and then returned to his farm in Oneida county. In 1866 he purchased a small farm in the suburbs of Rome, N. Y., where he resided until his death. In his native land, and among the Welsh inhabi- tants of America, Mr. Edwards was known as Eos Glan Twrch (" the nightingale of the Twrch "), his birthplace being on the banks of the river Twrch. He began to write at an early age, and soon be- came a successful competitor for the prizes award- ed at the " Eisteddfodau " — the annual gatherings of the Welsh people — for the best songs and prose essays. His name was among the foremost in con- nection with these yearly festivals, and he was an adjudicator in many of them. To his influence and labors some of the earliest Welsh periodicals in America are indebted for their successful estab- lishment. To many of them he was a constant contributor, and of one, "Amserai," published in Utica, N. Y., he was editor. His published poems include " The Crucifixion " (1853) and " The Omni- presence of God " (1859).

EDWARDS, John, lawyer, b. in Jefferson coun- ty, Ky., 24 Oct., 1815. He received a common- school education, studied law, and entered upon the practice of his profession. He was a member of the legislature of Indiana from 1845 till 1849, when he emigrated to California, and was at once made alcalde. He returned to Indiana in 1852, and was in the same year elected to the state sen- ate. He removed subsequently to Iowa, was chosen a member of the State constitutional convention in 1855, and was in the legislature from 1856 till 1860, serving the last two years as speaker of the house. On 21 May, 1861, he was appointed lieu- tenant-colonel and aide-de-camp on the governor's staff. He organized and commanded state troops until May, 1802, when he became colonel of the 18th Iowa infantry. On 26 Sept., 1804, he was promoted to be brigadier-general of volunteers, and was mustered out of the service, 15 Jan., 1866. After the close of the war he settled at Fort Smith, Ark., and was appointed U. S. assessor, 6 Aug., 1806. He was also elected a mem'ber of the 42d congress as a liberal Republican, but his election was successfully contested by Thomas Boles, who took his seat, 9 Feb., 1872.

EDWARDS, John Ellis, clergyman, b. in Guilford county, N. C, 1 Aug., 1814, d. in Lynchburg, Va., in 1891. He was graduated at Randolph-Macon college. Va., which gave him the degree of D. D. Dr. Edwards entered the Methodist ministry in 1834. and was continuously engaged in pastoral work after that time, with the exception of the period occupied by a European tour in 1856. He was stationed for twenty-one years at Richmond, Va., and has represented tlie Virginia conference in the quadrennial sessions of the General conference of the Methodist Episcopal church south for thirty years. He also was present as a representative of the same body in the Centennial conference held in Baltimore in December, 1884. Dr. Edwards is the author of " Travels in Europe "' (New York, 1857) ; " Life of Rev. John Wesley Childs " (Philadelphia, 1851) ; " The Confederate Soldier " (1868) and "Log Meeting-House," etc. (Nashville, 1884), and of addresses, tracts, etc. — His son, Landon Branie, physician, b. in Prince Edward county, Va., 20 Sept., 1845, was educated at Randolph-Macon college. In 1863 he enlisted in the artillery corps of the Confederate army, in which he served until the end of the war. He was graduated at the medical department of the University of the city of New York in March, 1867, and until October of that year served as house physician in the Charity hospital, Blackwell's Island, and then as assistant physician to the hospital for nervous diseases at Lake Mahopac, N. Y. In 1868 he began to practise at Lynchburg, Va., and was largely instrumental in founding the Medical society of Virginia in 1870, of which he is recording secretary. In 1872 he was made a member of the State board of health, and the same year removed to Richmond. In April, 1874, he established the " Virginia Medical Montlily," and about the same time he was appointed lecturer on anatomy in the Virginia medical college, in 1875 lecturer in the same college on materia medica and therapeutics, and in 1880 on medico-legal jurisprudence. Dr. Edwards is a member of many professional societies, and has contributed frequently to other medical journals besides his own. Among the subjects he has discussed are " Chloral Hydrate in Chronic Gastric Ulcer" and "Strychnia in Tremulous Effects of Tobacco-Smoking." — Another son, William Emory, clergyman, b. in Prince Edward county, Va., 10 June, 1842, was graduated at Randolph-Macon college in 1862, and has since been a clergyman of the Methodist Episcopal church south, in the territory of the Virginia conference, and has received the degree of D. D. He is the author of "John Newsom ; a Tale of College Life " (Nashville, 1883).