Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 03.djvu/439

 ELIOT

ELKINS

congresses, 1859-69, declining nomination for the 41st congress. In 1854 he made the first effort for the repeal of the fugitive slave law, and in 1864, as chairman of the conamittee on emancipa- tion, he reported the biU establishing a bureau of Freedmen's affairs, which became a law. He died in New Bedford, Mass., June 12, 1870.

'ELIOT, Walter Graeme, sanitary engineer, was born in New York city, Nov. 16, 1857 ; son of Dr. Augustus Greele and Elizabeth Antoinette (Proctor) Eliot; grandson of Daniel Eliot (Dart- mouth, 1813) and of Col. Amos Proctor of Essex, N.H. ; great-grandson of David Eliot and of James Proctor, New England militia officers in the American Eevolution, and a direct descend- ant of Andrew and Grace (Woodier) Eliot, Beverly, Mass., 1665. He was graduated from the School of mines, Columbia college in 1878. He was a teacher of Latin and mathematics for two years and then practised sanitary engineer- ing. He was special agent of the tenth U.S. census to report as expert upon the water-works system of the principal cities, 1880-81, and assist- ant sanitary engineer on the New York board of health, 1881-87. He was connected with various business corporations until May, 1890, when he took charge of The University Magazine as its managing editor. He was prominently men- tioned for the presidency of Rutgers college as a successor to President Gates, was appointed a member of the advisory council of the world's fair auxiliary of the Columbian exposition in Chicago, December, 1892, and was chemist of the New York health department, 1895-97. Columbia college conferred on him the degrees of C.E. and Ph.B., 1879, and Ph.D., 1882. He received the degree of LL.D. from St. Francis Xavier college, 1892, the first Protestant so honored by that in- stitution. He was married Feb. 4, 1892, to Maud, youngest daughter of John A. Stoutenburgh of Hyde Park, N. Y. He is the author of A Sketch of the 'Eliot Family (1886) ; The Famous Physicians oj Neio Yoi% 1775-1900 (1899) and College Presi- dents of America (1899).

ELIOT, William Qreenleaf, educator, was born in New Bedford, Mass., Aug. 5, 1811; son of

William Greenleaf and Dawes Eliot, and

brother of Thomas Dawes Eliot. He was gradu- ated from Columbia college, D.C., in 1831, and from Harvard divinity school in 1834. He was instructor in Hebrew at Harvard, 1833-34, and in 1834 became pastor of the Unitarian Church of the Messiah, St. Louis, Mo., where he remained until 1872. He was president of the board of directors of Washington university, St. Louis, from its organization in 1854 imtil 1872, when he became chancellor of the institution, at the same time holding the chair of civil polity. He was a corresponding member of the Massachusetts his-

torical society. Harvard conferred upon him the degree of S.T.D. in 1854. He published: Manual of Prayer (1851) ; Discourses on the Doc- trines of Christianity {18o2; 22d ed., 1886); Lect- tires to Young Men (1853; 11th ed., 1882) ; Lectures to Yoiing Women (1853; 13th ed., 1880); The Unity of God (1854) ; Early BeUgious Education (1855) ; The Discipline of Sorrow (1855) ; The Story of Archer Alexander, from Slavery to Freedom (1885); and addresses and contributions to periodicals. He died at Pass Christian, Miss., Jan. 23, 1887.

ELKIN, William Lewis, astronomer, was born in New Orleans, La., April 29, 1855; son of Lewis and Jane Magoon (Fitch) Elkin. He attended the Royal polytechnic school at Stuttgart, Ger- many, and was gi-aduated from the University of Strasburg in 1880. From 1881 to 1883 he was associated with Dr. David Gill in investigating the parallaxes of southern stars, at the Cape of Good Hope observatory. In 1884 he attended Yale, continuing his observations at the Yale observatory. Among the results of his investiga- tions are : Triangulations of the Pleiades and polar stars with the heliometer; parallax determina- tions of bright and large proper motion stars with the same instrument ; measurement of the solar parallax in co-opei'ation with other heliometer observers, and meteor tracks secured by photog- raphy. He was elected a foreign associate of the Royal astronomical society of London in 1892, and a member of the National academy of sciences in 1895. Yale conferred upon him the honorary degree of M.A. in 1893.

ELKINS, Stephen Benton, senator, was born in Perry county, Ohio, Sept. 26, 1841 ; son of Col.

Philip Duncan and (Withers) Elkins. His

father was born in Virginia ; removed to Perry county, Ohio, in 1827 with his par- ents; served in the Florida war, 1836-37; removed to Westport, Jackson comity. Mo., in 1844, and in 1861 joined the Confeder- ate forces under Gen. Sterling Price, with his son John, a boy of sixteen, continuing in the service dm-ing the existence of the Confederacy. He died

in 1897. Stephen's grandfather Elkins was a sup- porter of President Jefferson's plan of emancipa- tion, and removed to Perr j- county, Ohio, where he purchased a large tract of land in the Hocking val- ley. Stephen was graduated at the University of Missouri in 1860, and at the outbreak of the civil