Page:Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography volume 2.djvu/168

 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

125

fourth congresses (March 4, 1793-March 3, 1797) f at the beginning of the war of 1812 he enlisted, was appointed colonel of volun- teers, and marched with his regiment to Norfolk; subsequently he was appointed brigadier-general and major-general of militia; after his service in congress he located in Abingdon, Virginia, and prac- ticed law; married, in 1792, Sarah, daugh- ter of Col. William Campbell, who distin- guished himself in the battle of King's Mountain; their sons, William Campbell, John Smith, and Thomas Lewis, became prominent, the first as a legislator and edu- cator, the second as an orator, the third as a legislator and soldier; Gen. Preston died while on a visit to his son, William C. Pres- ton, Columbia, South Carolina, May 25, 1835.

Preston, William Ballard, born at "Smith- field/' Montgomery county, Virginia, No- vember 25, 1805, son of Governor James Patton Preston ( q. v.) ; was graduated from William and Mary College in 1823; was graduated from the law school of the Uni- versity of Virginia, admitted to the bar, and engaged in practice in 1826; was elected to the Virginia house of delegates and to the state senate, serving through a number of terms; elected as a Whig to the thirtieth congress (March 4, 1847-March 3, 1849) ♦ o^ March 8, 1849, assumed the portfolio of the navy department, having been appointed secretary by President Taylor, and he con- tinued in this position until the death of Gen. Taylor, when he went out of politics and public life; in 1858 a scheme was on foot in Virginia to open commercial inter- course with France, and a line of steamers was projected for that purpose; he was sent

tc» France to promote this scheme, but was obliged to return without achieving suc- cess, owing to the secession of the Southern states ; he was elected a member of the Vir- ginia secession convention in 1861, but he was himself a Union man and opposed the secession movement so long as there was any use in such opposition; he was elected to the Confederate senate in 1861, and was a member of that body at the time of his death, which occurred in Smithfield, Vir- ginia, November 14, 1862.

Fryer, Roger Atkinson, born in Dinwiddie county, Virginia, July 19, 1828 ; was gradu- ated from Hampden-Sidney College in 1845, and from the University of Virginia in 1848; studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1849, ^"d practiced a short time in Peters- burg, but abandoned the law on account of ill health; engaged on the editorial staff of the "Washington Union'' in 1852 and the '^Richmond Enquirer" in 1854; appointed special minister to Greece in 1854; returned home and established *The South" in 1857, and after it had failed was on the staff of the "Washington States;** elected as a Dem- ocrat to the thirty-sixth congress, to fill the vacancy caused by the death of William O. Goode, and served from December 7. 1859, to March 3, 1861 ; served in the Confederate army; member of the Virginia Confederate house of representatives; captured by the Union troops in November, 1864, and con- fined in Fort Lafayette, but soon afterwards released: moved to New York City and practiced law, 1866-1890; delegate in the Democratic national convention of 1876; judge of the court of common pleas of New York. 1890-1894; justice of the New York supreme court, 1894-1899: retired upon

Digitized by

Google