Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 07.djvu/380

 MERRIMON

MERRITT

Manchester, \'t., and was graduated from Wil- liams college, A.B., 1850, A.M., Ib53, and from Union Theological seminary in 1854. He was pastor of Congregational churches at Batavia, 111., 1857-60, and Green Bay, Wis., 1860-63: president of Ripon college. Wis., 1863-76, and pastor in Somerville, Mass., 1882-87. He was married, July 7, 1857, to Anna R., daughter of the Hon. Samuel D. and Mary V. S. (Nash) Lock- wood. He was a corporate member of the A.B. C.F.M. In 1887 he removed to Boston, Mass., where he was without charge up to the time of deatli. Aug. 1, 1892.

MERRIMON, Augustus Summerfield, sena- tor, was born in Buncombe county, N.C., Sept. 15. 1830; son of the Rev. Branch H. and Mary (Paxton) Merrimon ; grandson of William and Sarah Grace (McDowell) Paxton, and great- grandson of Col. Charles McDowell, a hero of King's Mountain. His father was a Methodist preacher in Tennessee and North Carolina for sixty years. He was reared on a farm, pursued his studies under the direction of his father and attended a school in Asheville, kept by James Norwood. 1850-51, where he served as an in- (Btructor in English. In 1851 he was licensed to practice law. He was county attorney for Bun- combe and other western counties ; represented Buncombe county in the state legislature as a Whig in 1860, where lie opposed secession, but when the hct was passed he enlisted in the Rough and Ready Guard, a mountain regiment, was com- missioned 'captain on Col. William Johnston's staff and assigned to the commissary department. He served at Fort Macon, Ocracoke, and else- where, and in the latter part of 1861 resigned his commission, having been appointed solicitor for the 8th judicial district of North Carolina, and held the office till the close of the war. He was elected judge of the 8th judicial district by the state legislature in 1866, and served until the court was closed by Federal military orders. He settled in Raleigh in the practice of law in 1867. He declined the nomination of the Democratic party for governor of North Carolina in 1868, and was defeated for associate justice of the supreme court the same year. He was defeated for gov- ernor of the state in 1872 by Tod R. Caldwell, and was elected to the U.S. senate over Z. B. Vance, also a Democrat, and served 1873-79. He was associate justice of the supreme court of North Carolina as successor to Thomas Ruffin. resigned, 1883-89, and chief-justice as successor to W. N. H. Smith, deceased, 1890-92. He was chairman of the Democratic state executive committee. He was married, in 1852, to Margaret J., daughter of Israel Baird of Buncombe county. N.C., and four sons and three daughters survived him. He died in Raleigh, N.C., Nov. 14, 1892.

MERRITT, Anna Massey Lea, artist, was born in Philadelphia, Pa., Sept. 13, 1844 ; daugh- ter of Joseph and Susanna (Massey) Lea ; grand- daughter of Joseph and Anna (Robeson) Lea and of Robert Valentine and Anna (Kimber) Massey, and a descendant of Quaker ancestors in the Kimber and Jackson families, and of Andrew Robeson, first chief-justice of Pennsylvania. She was privately educated with unusual care for that period. When seven years of age she studied art for a few months under William H. Furness. About 1865 she studied under Prof. Heinrich Hoffman in Dresden. In 1871 she went to London, England, and there studied under Henry Mer- ritt, the artist and author, to whom she was mar- ried April 19, 1877. She is the author of a me- morial entitled " Henry Merritt Art Criticism and Romance," illustrated by twenty-three etch- ings (1879). She received a diploma and medal at the Centennial exposition, Philadelphia, 1876, and was until 1890 a constant exhibitor at the Royal Academy ; was elected a member of the Royal Society of Painter-Etchers, Lon- don, and received an award and medal in the British section of the World's Co- lumbian exposition. Chicago, 1893, for , large decoration in the vestibule of the Women's building. After 1890 she made her home chiefly in a retired village in Hampshire, England, giving much time to subjects suggested by country scenes. The summers of 1893 and 18- 94 were devoted to mural paintings for St. Martin's church, near Wanersh, Surrey. England. She etched two portraits of Mary Wollstonecraft (1879) ; portrait of Sir Gilbert Scott (after George Richmond) (1883) ; portrait of Ellen Terry as Ophelia ; and portrait of James Russell Lowell, She painted, among other pictures : Portrait of a Young Lady, exhibited at the Royal Academy (1871) ; The Pied Piper of Hamelin (1872) ; St. Cecilia (1875); War (1882); Eve Overcome by lie- morse (1885), which obtained a medal and award from the British section at the Chicago World's Fair, 1893 ; Camilla (1883), honorable mention Paris exposition. 1889 ; Love Locked Out (1890), purchased by the Chantrey fund and ultimately placed in the National Gallery of British Art ; \Mien the World Was Young (1891); A Piping Shepherd (1895). purchased by the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts ; The Narrow Way,

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