Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 04.djvu/283

 GEORGE

GEORGE

Selections from WordswoHli and Prefaces and Essays on Poetry (1889); Coleridge's Principles of Criti- cism (18U0); The Ancient Mariner (1893); Select Poems of Burns (1895); Select Speeches of Daniel \[''ebster (189-1); The Bunker Hill Oration (1894); Burke's American Orations (1895), and Oration on Conciliation with America (1895); Tennyson's Prin- cess (1897); 'ITie Shorter Poems of John Milton, iuoludiag the two Latin elegies and an Italian sonnet to Diodati, and the Epitaphium-Damonis (1898); From Chaucer to Arnold {\%m): and By- ron's Childe Harold (1899). Many of these became popular as school text-books.

GEORGE, Enoch, M.E. Inshop, was born in Lancaster count}', Va., in 1767. He was brought up in the faith of the Chui'ch of England, but in 1790 he joined the Virginia conference cf the M.E. church and till 1792 was a .junior preacher in the Caswell circuit. He tlieu removed to South Carolina, where in 1796-97 he was presid- ing elder of the Charleston district. He retired on account of ill health, 1796-1803; was a member of the Baltimore, MJ., conference, 1803-16, and held the office of bishop, 1816-28. He died in Stauutcm, Va., in August, 1828.

GEORGE, Henry, political economist, was born in Philadelphia, Pa., Sept. 2, 1839; the eldest son of Richard Samuel Henry and Catha- rine Pratt (Vallance) George; and grandson of Capt. Ricliard George, who had been brought from England when a child and was a sea captain _ from Philadeljihia

and suffered impris- onment by the British in the war of 1813. His father was a book publisher, and Henry attended the Protes- tant Episcopal acad- emy and also the Philadelphia high school which he left in 1853 to go to work. In 1855 he shipped as forema.st boy on the ship Hindoo to Mel- bourne and Calcutta and back to New York, consuming fourteen months in the voyage. He then learned the printer's trade and in 1858 he worked his way around Cape Horn to California as ship's steward on the U.S. lighthouse tender .Slinhrick, and there joined a party for the Frazier river, British Colum - bia, to dig gold. The excitement subsided soon after he reached Victoria and he did not attempt to go up the river to the mines, but returned to San Francisco in the steerage. He worked as a printer, and in a rice mill, and soon after joined the typographical union. He nest started the

Evening Journal in partnership witt five other printers, but was forced out by adversity, the war opening and the paper having no telegrapliio sarvios. In 1861 he was married to Ari.iie C. Fox, a native of Australia, who had come with Iier parents to California. Slie was a Roman Citliolio, but as the season was Advent and it was a runaway match, they were married by a MathoJist preaclier. The marriage was, how- ever, sanctioned at Sacramento soon after by the Rev. Father Nathaniel Gallagher. Mr. George was at that time compositor on the Sacramento Union. Henry, the elilest son, was born in Sac- ramento, Nov. 3, 1862, and Richard, the second son. who became a sculptor, was born in San Francisco on Jan. 27, 1865. In that year Henry George, while still setting type, and at times suffering extreme ])overty, began to write for the publis pre.ss, at first under a pen name. When Presilent Lincoln was assassinated Mr. George wrote an anonymous letter to the editor of the AUa-Californian, on which he was setting type, and was surprised to find it in the editorial col- umns next day. Soon after that he was engaged as special reporter on a new paper, the Times, and within a few montlis was cliief of staff. He then began to study the tariff question and was converted to the theory of absolute free trade. He went to New York by the overland route in 1868 to establish a press service for the San Fran- cisco Herald, but failed through the excessive charges of the Western Union telegraph com- pany. He drew up and gave to the press a vig- orous protest against the telegraph monopoly. In 1869 he wrote an article on the anti-Chinese question in California, for the New York TriJi- nne, at the instance of John Russell Young, its managing editor. This was probably the first article upon that subject printed on the Atlantic coast. John Stuart Mill wrote him a congratula- tory letter, and the article otherwise attracted wide attention, especially on the Pacific slope, where his advocacy of Chinese exclusion pointed out a way to escape the threatened competition. He returned to California in 1869 with a commis- sion to act as correspondent of the Tribune, which commission Mr. Young's successor promptly repealed. He then took cliarge of the Sacramento Reporter, and on its formation into a stock company, Mr. George was given, besides a salary, one-quarter of the shares. When the Central Pacific railroad purchased the paper Mr. George retired from its editorship, as he would not edit a paper for a monopoly. But though deprived of his paper he was not to be silenced, and he issued a pamphlet supporting the candi" dature of Governor Haight for re-election, and opposing the Central Pacific's effort to get another subsidy; and though Haight was defeated