Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 06.djvu/399

 LEE

LEE

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Lee fatnih- of Virginia. Arthur Lee was edu- cated at Eton and the University of Edinburgli, where he received a prize, a diploma, and the degree of M.D. After making a journey through Holland and Germany he returned to

Virginia and prac- tised medicine in Williamsburg, The effort to enforce the stamp act which call- ed forth the West- moreland declaration determined him to study law in order more effectively to assist the colonies in obtaining redress from the heavy tax- ation laid upon them. He studied law in the Temple, London, 1766-70, and practised in London, 1770-76, meantime studying the Colonial questions and discussing the Towns- hend acts and other aggressive measures pro- posed b\- Parliament. At this time he won considerable fame as a writer, signing himself "Monitor" and *' Junius Americanus." He was also the author of " An Appeal to the English Nation." He was a leading member of the '• Supporters of the Bill of Rights," organized for the discussion of the measures of the British ministry and the restoration to the American colonies of the right to regulate taxes through their own representatives. In supiwrting the resolutions adopted by the society, of which Lee was the author, he sustained an able discussion with the unknown author of the " Letters of Junius." He gained the friendship of Burke, Priestly, Dunning. Baire and Sir William Jones, and was admitted to a fellowsliip in the Roj-al society. He was appointed by the general court of Massachusetts in 1770 as representative for that colony in London as associate with Benjamin Franklin, and in 1775, when Ricliard Penn reached London with the last petition from the Continental congress and the appeal to the English people, of which his brother, Richai-d Henry Lee, was the author, lie undertook to have the petition reach the king, but in vain. He was appointed by congress, «ith Franklin, Jay and Dickinson, to open correspondence with friends of America in Europe and was made the secret agent of the committee in London, and he opened negotiations with the French govern- ment which led to his residence in Paris during the spring and summer of 1776. In 1776 congress appointed him a joint commissioner with Benja- min Franklin and Silas Deane to secure a treaty of

alliance with France, and in 1777 he was intrusted with special missions to the governments of Spain and Prussia, and in October, 1778, was continued as sole commissioner to Spain, also acting in the same capacity to the court of Prussia but residing in Paris. His frequent quarrels with Franklin and Deane led to his re- call in the autumn of 1779. He was a represen- tative in the general assembly of Virginia, 1781; a delegate to the Continental congress, 1781-84; Indian commissioner in western Nev.* York and Pennsylvania, 1784, and a member of the board of treasury, 1784-89. He was opposed to the adoption of the Federal constitution, and his op- position appears to have been due to excessive distrust in the motives that actuated his fellow patriots and his concern for the riglits of the colonists. He retired to his estate at Urbana, Middlesex county, Va., in 1789, where he de- voted himself to his books and correspondence. He was a member of the American Philo.sophical society; fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and I'eceived the honorary de- gree of LL.D. from Harvard college in 1781. See " Life of Arthur Lee. with his Political and Literary Correspondence " by R. H. Lee (2 vols., 1829); Sparks's " Diplomatic Correspondence "; and many political and diplomatic papers pre- served in the library of Harvard college. He died unmarried in Urbana, Va., Dec. 12, 1792.

LEE, Benjamin, physician, was born in Nor- wich, Conn., Sept. 26, 1833; son of the Rt. Rev. Alfred and Julia (White) Lee. He was grad- uated from the University of Pennsylvania, A.B., 1852, A.M., 1859; and from the New York Medical college, M.D. in 1856; continued his medical studies in Europe and then practised in New York cit}'. He edited the A7nerican Med- ical Monthly in 1862 and was surgeon to the 22d regiment, N.G.S.N.Y., 1862 and 1863. He re- moved to Philadelphia, Pa., in 1865, where he made a specialty of orthopedic surgerj^ and the treatment of nervous- diseases, and invented the method of self-suspension for the treatment of spinal diseases. He was elected a member or officer of the more important state and national medical societies, and an honorary member of the societies of hygiene of Brussels and Paris. He was health officer of the city and port of Phil- adelphia, 1898-99. He received the degree of Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1872. He is the author of: The Correct Principles of Treatment of Angular Curvature of the Spine (1S67); Tracts on Massage (1885); Annual Reports of the State Board of Health of Pennsylvania (1885-99).

LEE, Benjamin Franklin, A.M.E. bishop, was born in Bridgeton, N.J., Sept. 18, 1841; son of Abel and Sarah (Gould) Lee; and of African de-