Page:History of Iowa From the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the Twentieth Century Volume 4.djvu/272

 taught school. He graduated at the Alfred, New York, University and studied law, coming to Iowa in April, 1854, locating at Marion in Linn County where he began the practice of his profession. In February, 1856, he was a delegate to the State Convention which met at Iowa City and organized the Republican party of Iowa. In August, 1862, he raised a military company for the Twentieth Iowa Volunteer Infantry, of which he was chosen captain, serving under General Francis J. Herron. In March, 1863, he was promoted to judge advocate on the staff of General Herron and served in the army until April, 1865, when he was brevetted major. In November, 1865, he was appointed district judge but resigned the following year to accept the position of attorney for the Northwestern Railway Company. For many years he was the Iowa attorney for that company and long ranked among the ablest lawyers in the State. He was for more than a quarter of a century one of the most influential leaders of the Republican party in Iowa. He died at his home in Cedar Rapids, June 12, 1902. SILAS A. HUDSON was born in Mason County, Kentucky, December 13, 1815, and came to Iowa in 1839, locating at Burlington. He was a clerk in one of the early Territorial Legislatures and was chief clerk of the House of the First General Assembly of the State in 1846. He drafted the charter of the city of Burlington and the ordinances under which it was governed for twenty years. Mr. Hudson was an intimate friend of George D. Prentice, Horace Greeley, Abraham Lincoln and General U. S. Grant and was instrumental in making the arrangements under which Lincoln went to New York and made his great Cooper Institute speech which led to his nomination for President. He was a cousin of General Grant, whom he knew from boyhood. After General Grant became President, he appointed Mr. Hudson Minister to the Central American States, a position he held until 1872. He died at Burlington on the 19th of December, 1896. JOSEPH C. HUGHES was born in Washington County, Pennsylvania, April 1, 1821. He completed his collegiate course at Jefferson College, Cannonsburg, and was a graduate in medicine of the University of Maryland. In 1845 he located at Mount Vernon, Ohio, and five years later became demonstrator in anatomy in the College of Physicians and Surgeons at Keokuk, Iowa, then the Medical Department of the State University. In 1851 he was elected to fill the chair of anatomy and the following year became dean of the faculty. In 1853 he was elected to the chair of surgery which he held for many years. For three sessions he performed double duty, lecturing often three times a day and to him is largely due the upbuilding of the institution in early days. Dr. Hughes also founded a medical and surgical infirmary and an eye and ear institute in connection