Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 01.djvu/288

 BELMONT.

BELMONl.

tical jiersons " to leave the province liefore Nov. 1, 17(X). and decreeing that any such i)erson found in the province after that date should be " liable to i)eri>etual imprisonment, and to death, if taken after liaving escaped from prison." During the rem:under of his rule he pLinned improvements for the city, negotiated treaties with the Indians, antl worked earnestly for the general welfare of the provinces under his control. See " Life of Bellomont."' by Frederic De Peyster (1879). He died in New York city, March 5, 1701.

BELMONT, August, banker, was born in Al/.ey, in the Palatinate, Rhenish Prussia, Dec. 6, IS 1(5. His father was a wealthy landed proprietor, and gave his son an excellent education. The boy, when he was fourteen years old, went into the servicjeof the Rothschilds at Frankfort-on-the- IMain. He began with- out a salary, and his first duties were to sweep the offices. Under the tutelage of the princely bankers h e developed a r e - markable aptitude for financial affairs. After three years he was, transferred to the ^ , . ., A« 3 branch house at

l-^jm Mf^' ^^I^^^^- There he •> *. fi^j.^y^ successfully carried

on important negotia- tions with the papal government. He stud- ied paintings in the galleries and palaces of Naples. He remained in Naples three years, and then went to Havana to look after the Rothschilds' interests in Cuba. From Havana he went on to New York city to assume charge of the interests of the Rothschilds in America and establish himself in business as a banker. In 1S37 he rented a small office in Wall street and laid the foundation of the banking house of August Belmont & Co. He was twenty- one years old, with six j-ears" business experience and a boundless ambition. He met with rivalry and opposition, but as his bills of exchange were on the Rothschilds he maintained his stand. He became a naturalized citizen of the United Stites, joined the Democratic party, and voted for Polk and Dallas in 1844. In the same year the Austrian government appointed him consul-general of that empire for the United States. He held this post until 1850, when he re- signed, owing to his disapproval of the manner in wliich Austria treated Kossuth and the Hungari- ans. He was sent to Holland in 1H.~)8 as charge d'affnirea. and the next year was ai)iM)inted resident mini.ster by President Pierce, and made

for himself a reputation as a diplomat by securing to the United States the privilege of sending con- suls to the colonies of tl\e Dutch East Indies. At the close of President Pierces administration Mr. BelmontreturnedtoNew York city. During the controversy that preceded the civil war he advocated peace and compromise. He was a delegate to the national Democratic con- vention at Charleston in 1860, and there supixirted Senator Douglas, and was elected cliairman of the national Democratic committee by the con- vention that met at Baltimore and nominated Douglas and Johnson. He declared that the election of Lincoln was no excuse for dissolv- ing the Union, and he used all his influence with the moderate statesmen of the southern states, begging them not to follow the example of South Carolina; he also proposed compromise meas- ures to the Republican leaders. When Fort Sumter was fired upon, Mr. Behnort became as strongly interested in prosecuting the war as he had previously been in preventing it. He helped raise the first German regiment in New York, and on May 15, 1861, presented it with a flag. In opening the Democratic national convention of 1864 he spoke strongly in favor of a change in the administration, but even more strongly in favor of prosecuting the war for the main- tenance of the Union. Mr. Behnont continued as chairman of the Democratic national com- mittee after the campaign of 1864, and opened the convention of 1868 which nominated Seymour and Blair. In 187'2, when Horace Greeley, the nominee of the Liberal Republicans, was accepted by the Democrats as their candidate, Mr. Bel- mont resigned and retired from active political life. Early in his residence in New York Mr. Bel- mont was the challenged party in a duel brought about by his championing a lady, an entire stranger, for whom he resented a real or fancied insult. Duelling was then in fashion, and Bel- mont accepted the challenge. He was wounded in the left leg below the knee, and his opi)onent was shot through the heart. The young banker, in 1849, was married to the innocent cause of the duel, Caroline Sliilell Perry, a daughter of Com- modore Matthew C. Perry, and niece of Commo- dore Oliver H. Perry, the hero of Liike Erie. They had four sons. Perry, August, Oliver Hazard Perry, and Raymond, and one daughter, who married S. S. Howland. In 1850 he expended two hundred thousand dollars for a collection of forty pictures of old Dutch and Spanish masters. He died in New York city, Nov. 24, 1890.

BELMONT, Perry, diplomatist, was born in New York city Dec. '28. 1851; son of August and Carolina Slidell (Perry) Belmont. He was edu- cated at the Rector}- school, Hamden, Conn., and at Harvard college, where he was gra<luated in