Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 08.djvu/430

 PRESCOTT

PRESCOTT

was admitted to the bar in 1859, and practised in Concord. 1859-61. He was associate editor of the Indt']>eitdciit Democrat at Concord, 1861-6ft, and special agent for New England, of the U.S. treasury department. 180.5-67 and 1869. He was married. June 10. 1809. to Mary Little, daughter of Jelferson and Nancy (Peart) Noyes of Concord. He was secretary of the state of New Hampshire, 1872-73 and 1875-76; secretary of the Republican state central committee, 1859-74; gov- ernor. 1877-79; secretary of the state college of electors, 1861, 1805, 1869, 1873, 1877 and 1881. and a delegate-at-large to the Republi- can national convention of 1880. He retired to his farm at Epping in 1880. He was president of the Bennington, Vt., Battle Monument associa- tion, and of the Provident Mutual Relief associa- tion; vice-president of the New Hampsiiire His- torical society; fellow of the Royal Historical society of Great Britain, and an honorary member of the Marshfieid club of Boston. He was also a trustee of the New Hampshire College of Agri- culture and the Mechanic Arts, 1874-95, and of Dartmouth college, 1878-95. He died in Epping, N.II.. Fel). '22. 1895.

PRESCOTT, George Bartlett, electrician, was born in Kingston. N.H.. Sept. 16, 1830; son of Mark HoUis and Priscilla (Bartlett) Prescott; grandson of Mark and Polly (Bean) Prescott, and of David Bartlett, and a descendant of James, the immigrant, and Mary (Boulter) Prescott. He received a private school education in Portland, Me., made a special study of electricity and tele- graphy, and was connected with several telegraph offices in Connecticut and Massachusetts, 1847-58. He was married, Dec. 9, 1857, to Eliza Curtis, daughter of Israel M. Parsons of Springfield, Mass. He was superintendent of the American telegraplj company, 1858-66; of the Western Union telegraph company, 1866-69, and electrician of the latter in 1869. He was as.sociated with Thomas A. Edison in the duplex and quadruplex telegraphic inventions; introduced them in 1870 and 1874; invented an improvement in telegraph insulators in 1872, and in the quadruplex tele- graph in 1876. He was electrician of the Inter- national Ocean telegraph company, 1873-83; and in 1883 was sent to Europe by the Western Union telegrajdi company to study foreign methods of telegrapliy. On his return he intro- duced many improvements, among them the pneumatic tube system, which was adopted in New York city in 1876. He was vice-i>resident, director and member of the executive and finance committees of the Gold and Stock telegraph com- pany, 1873-81; one of the incorporators and

directors of the Metropolitan telephone and tele- .graph company, 1879-82; president of the Man- hattan telegraph company and of the American Speaking telephone company, 1879-82, and a di- rector and member of the executive committee of the Bell telephone company of Philadelphia. He published an account of his discovery of the electri- cal origin of the Aurora Borealis, and his experi- ments thereon in the Boston Journal, February, 1852, and in the Atlantic Monthly, 1859, and is the author of: History, Tlieory and Practice of the Electric Telegraph (1860); The Proposed Union of the Telegraph and Postal Systems (1869); The Governntoit and the Telegraph (1872); Electricity and the Electric Telegraph (1877); The Speaking Telephone, Talking Phonograph and Other Novel- ties (1878); The Speaking Telephone, Electric Light, and other Recent Electrical Inventions (1879); Dynamo-Electricity; its Generation, Ap- plication, Transmission, Storage and Measure- 7nent (ISSi); Bell's Electric Speaking Telephone; its Invention, Construction, Application, Mod- ification and History (1884), and The Electric Telephone (1890). He died in Nevs^ York city, Jan. 18, 1894.

PRESCOTT, William, soldier, was born in Groton. Mass., Feb. 20, 1726; son of Judge Ben- jamin Prescott; and great-grandson of John and Mary (Platts) Prescott of Lincolnshire, England, who immigrated at an early date to Lancaster, Mass. William Prescott removed to an unsettled tract of country not far from his native town, and there established a settlement, which he sub- sequently caused to be made into a township, and wiiich he named in honor of Sir William Pepper- rell, continuing to hold his estate under the original Indian title. He served as a lieutenant in the colonial army, under Gen. John Winslow, in the expedition against Cape Breton, 1754, and against Acadia. 1755, and was promoted captain. In recognition of his gallantry he was offered a commission in the regular army, but declined, returned to Pepperrell, and was married to Abigail Hale. Their son, William Prescott (1762- 1844), Harvard, 1783, was a member of the governors' council for many years, judge of the court of common pleas, Suffolk county, 1818-20, a delegate to the state constitutional convention in 1820, a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the father of AVilliam Hickling Prescott, the historian. In August, 1774, Captain Prescott was active in stimulating the resistance of his townsmen to royal authority, and soon after was appointed colonel of a regiment of minute men, his commission being signed by Gen. Joseph Warren. He proceeded to Lexing- ton, Ajjril 19, 1775, but General Pitcairn having retreated before his arrival, he continued his march to Cambridge, where he joined the pro-