Page:The part taken by women in American history.djvu/706

Rh erine and Junewell Simonds Hodgkins. Her father was a cousin of Justice Salmon P. Chase. She was educated in the public schools of Washington, graduating in 1892. She is possessed of a deeply sympathetic nature and a philanthropic spirit.

Connecting herself in early life with the Metropolitan Memorial Methodist Episcopal Church, she became engaged in Sunday school, Epworth League and other church activities. For years she has been the efficient president of one of its missionary societies, "The World Wide Circle," and has been highly successful in raising funds for the support of orphans, Bible women, etc., in foreign lands. She has been acting treasurer of the Washington District Woman's Foreign Missionary Society for some years, and is the statistical secretary for the Baltimore branch of that association.

She was married to William Sherman Dewhirst, of Illinois, in 1897, he having connected himself with government service in Washington, D. C. He is a steward of the Metropolitan Church. They have one son, twelve years of age.

Mrs. Dewhirst is a daughter of the American Revolution and recording secretary of "Our Flag" Chapter. She has fine financial ability and is a welcome ally in every good work.

Mrs. Theresa A. Williams, temperance worker and philanthropist, was born September 22, 1853, in Detroit, Michigan, and is the daughter of J. A. and Martha Hepburn Riopelle. She is descended on her mother's side from the Clements of New England, through whom she has common ancestry with Frances E. Willard, and on her father's side with the well-known French family of Riopelles, of Detroit.

She was blest with a liberal education and a broad and generous public spirit. She was married to Henry E. Williams on November 15, 1876, residing for many years in Washington, D. C. Mr. Williams is assistant chief of the United States weather bureau and has always been in the fullest accord with her temperance and philanthropic work. Mrs. Williams is prominently connected with the Woman's Christian Temperance Union of the District of Columbia, which she joined in 1882, and is official parliamentarian for that body. She is president of Chapin Union, its pioneer auxiliary, and was for many years district treasurer. She was so efficient that an article printed in the daily papers giving a sketch of the officers who planned the great national convention of 1900 called her the "Sherman Financier." She served for ten years as treasurer of the National Missionary Association of the Universalist Church of which society she is now the president.

Mrs. Emma Sanford Shelton, president of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, of the District of Columbia, was born in Westmoreland County, Va., in 1849. She was the daughter of Julia Ellis Bibb and Charles Henry Sanford, a lawyer residing at Montrose, the county seat.