Page:History of Iowa From the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the Twentieth Century Volume 4.djvu/470

 banking and became president of a bank at Denison and also at Manilla. In the presidential campaign of 1896, Mr. Shaw for the first time took an active part in politics and in the discussion of the money issue he made able arguments for the gold standard which attracted attention and gave him a State-wide reputation as an effective public speaker. In 1897 he was nominated by the Republican State Convention for Governor and after a spirited canvass was elected by a majority of over 11,000. Two years later he was reëlected by a majority of more than 44,000. In 1898 he was president of the Sound Money Convention at Indianapolis, where his speech was considered an able defense of the gold standard. Upon the expiration of his second term in January, 1902, Governor Shaw was appointed by President Roosevelt Secretary of the Treasury.  WILLIAM T. SHAW was born in Steuben, Washington County, Maine, on the 22d of September, 1822. He was educated in the Maine Wesleyan Seminary and went to Kentucky where he taught school for some time. When the Mexican War began he at once enlisted and served through the war taking part in many of the principal battles. In 1849 and in 1852 he led parties across the great western plains which were then unsettled and infested with hostile Indians. In 1853 he came to Iowa, locating at Anamosa. Upon the organization of the Fourteenth Iowa Volunteer Infantry Mr. Shaw was appointed by Governor Kirkwood, colonel. He led the regiment in the thickest of the fight at the Battle of Fort Donelson and again at Shiloh where his regiment was assailed by overwhelming numbers and forced to surrender. At the disastrous Battle of Pleasant Hill, Colonel Shaw commanded a brigade and made a most gallant fight, aiding greatly in saving General Banks' army from disaster. In a letter written soon after the battle he exposed the incompetency and drunkenness of certain of his superior officers and they took their revenge by procuring his dismissal from the service. It was the general opinion of his associates in the Red River campaign that he richly deserved promotion to the rank of Brigadier-General. In 1875 he was elected on the Republican ticket a member of the House of the Sixteenth General Assembly. STEPHEN B. SHELLEDY was born in Kentucky in 1802. He came to Iowa in 1842 and took up his residence at “Tool's Point” (now Monroe), then in Mahaska County. He was elected by the Whigs to the First Constitutional Convention which assembled that year. In 1845 he was chosen to represent Mahaska, Washington and Keokuk counties in the House of the Territorial Legislature and was reëlected, serving until Iowa became a State. He was a member of the Second Constitutional Convention which framed the organic law under which the Territory became a State. In 1854 he was a member of the Whig State Committee which managed the campaign that resulted in the election of James W. Grimes,