Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 08.djvu/331

 PIATT

PICARD

Milroy to evacuate the place and fall back on Harper's Ferrj'. This order was countermanded by General Halleck, and resulted in Milroy's escape three days after, with a loss of 3,300 men. He was a representative in the Ohio legislature, 1865-66; Washington correspondent of the Cin- cinnati Commercial, 1868-71; established and edited, with George Alfred Townsend, the Capital at Washington, D.C., 1871-72, and was its editor-in-chief, 1873-80. He was arrested in 1876, by order of President Grant, on the charge of inciting the people through his paper to rebel- lion, insurrection and riot. He retired to his estate Mac-a-cheek, Ohio, in 1880, and devoted himself to literary work. He edited BelforcVs Magazine, New York, 1888-89. The University of Notre Dame, Indiana, conferred upon him the degree LL.D. in 1882. He is the author of several plays, including Lost and Won; A Hunt for an Heiress; Jane Shore, a King's Love; Emotional hisanity, and of Keno, a comic opera; Memoirs of the Men who Saved the Union (1887), and The Rev. Melancthon Poundex, a novel (1889). He was engaged with General Henry M. Cist (q.v.) in preparing a life of General George H. Thomas, at the time of his death. See " Work and Ways of Donn Piatt," by Charles Grant Miller (1893). He died at his home Mac-a-cheek, in central Ohio, Nov. 13, 1891.

PIATT, John James, poet, was born at James's Mills, now Milton, Ind., March 1, 1835; son of John Bear and Emily (Scott) Piatt; grandson of James and Rachel (Bear) Piatt, and of John and Catharine (Gray) Scott; great-grandson of Capt. AVilliam Piatt, of the Revolutionary army, and greats-grandson of John and Frances (Van Vleet) AVycoff Piatt of Six Mile Run, N.J. He learned the printer's trade in the office of the Ohio State Journal, published by his uncle, Charles Scott, and subsequently attended the high school. Capi- tal university at Columbus, and Kenyon college. He removed to Illinois with his parents in 1856, lived for some time on a farm, and wrote verses which were published in the Louisville Journal. In 1859 he became confidential secretary to George D. Prentice, editor of the Journal, and a member of its editorial staff. He was a clerk in the U.S. treasury department at Wash- ington, D.C., 1861-67; served on the staff of the Cincinnati, Ohio, Chronicle, 1868-69, and as literary editor and correspondent of the Cin- cinnati Commercial, 1869-78. He was assistant clerk of the U.S. house of representatives in 1870, and its librarian, 1871-75; U.S. consul at Cork, 1882-93, and at Dublin, April to September, 1893, when he returned to the United States, owing to a change in the administration, and devoted himself to literary work. He was married, June 18, 1861, to Sarah Morgan Bryan of

Kentucky. He contributed to the Atlantic Monthly and other magazines, and is the author of: Poems of Tico Friends (with William Dean Howells, 1800); The Nests at Washington and Other Poem,s (with Mrs. Piatt, 1864); Poems in Sunshine and Firelight (1866); Western Windov-s and Other Poems (1869); Landmarks and Other Poems (1871); Poems of House and Home (1878); Pencilled Fly Leaves: A Book of Essays in Town and Country (1880); The Union of American Poetry and Art (1880-81); Idylls and Lyrics of the Ohio Valley (1881); The Children of Out-of -Doors: A Book of Verses by Two in One House (with Mrs. Piatt, 1884); At the Holy Well: a Handful of Neiv Verses (1887);^ Return to Paradise (rev. ed. of Pencilled Fly Leaves, London, 1890); Little New World Idylls and Other Poems (1893); The Ghost's Entry and Other Poems (1895); Odes in Ohio and Other Poems (1897). He also edited and published The Hesperian Tree, an Annual of the Ohio Valley (1900 and 1903).

PIATT, 5arah Morgan (Bryan), poet, was born near Lexington, Ky., Aug. 11, 1836; daughter of Talbot Nelson and Mary Anne (Spiers) Bryan; grand-daughter of Morgan and Mildred (Simpson) Bryan, and of William and Mary (Simpson) Spiers. Morgan Bryan emigrated from North Carolina to Kentucky with Daniel Boone, whose wife was Rebecca Bi-yan, and set- tled at Bryan's Station, near Lexington. Sarah was graduated at Henry Female college, New- castle, Ky., in 1854, and began to write verses during her school days. She received encourage- ment from George D. Prentice (q.v.), who pub- lished her poems in the Louisville Journal, and they were extensively copied. Subsequently her contributions appeared in the New York Ledger, the Atlantic, Harx)er's and other periodicals in America and England. In addition to the works mentioned in connection with her husband, John James Piatt (q.v.), she is the author of: A Woman's Poems (1871); A Voyage to the Fortu- nate Isles and Other Poems (1874); That New World and Other Poems (1786); Poems in Com- pany u'ith Children (1877); Dramatic Persons and Moods (1880); An Irish Garland (1884); Selected Poems (1885); In Primrose Time (1886): Childs'- World Ballads (1887; new ser., 1895); The Witch in the Glass (1888); An Irish Wild- Floiver (1891); An Enchanted Castle (1893), and Complete Poems (3 vols., 1894).

PICARD, George Henry, author, was born in Berea, Ohio, Aug. 3, 1850; son of Jonathan Newman and Mary (Fairchild) Picard; grandson of Peter and Marie (Spaulsbury) Picard, and of Daniel and Elizabeth (Cooke) Fairchild, and a descendant of French Anabaptist emigres and Scotcli and English Puritans. He was graduated from Baldwin university, Berea, Ohio, in 1869,