1863.] 247 [Coppeo. 



the Academy of Natural Sciences at Philadelphia, Messrs. 

 Blanch ard & Lea, Dr. I. I. Hayes, and Sidney George Fisher, 

 of Philadelphia, Dr. Lewis H. Steiner, of Baltimore, Mr. 

 Gowan, bookseller, of lN"ew York, Bishop Duggan, of Chicago, 

 and the Librarian of the University of Michigan. 



A copy of the Transactions, Vol. XII, Part iii, was laid on 

 the table. 



Prof. Coppee read the following obituary notice of General 

 0. McK. Mitchel. 



BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICE. 



The subject of this sketch had achieved such brilliant success in 

 science and in arms, that the detailed story of his life would be read 

 with eager interest by his admiring countrymen. It is to be hoped 

 that such a biography will not be withheld j not alone in eulogy of 

 his virtues and his achievements, but as a bright example to our- 

 selves and to our children. It is not, however, the purpose of the 

 writer, here and now, to present these details. It is only intended 

 to glance at the principal objective points in his eager, ardent, devout, 

 and energetic life. 



Ormsby McKnight Mitchel was born in Union County, Kentucky, 

 on the 28th of August, 1810. He had the misfortune to lose his 

 father when he was three years old, and thus, from his early infancy, 

 he was left to battle with the world, and win such a place in its 

 esteem, as the God-given genius and indomitable energy he possessed 

 might secure for him. Immediately after his father's death, his 

 family removed to Ohio ; and at twelve years of age, he became a 

 clerk in a store in the town of Miami, whence, however, not long 

 after, he moved with his family to Lebanon. A bright and in- 

 quiring boy, he soon found the plodding and menial duties of a 

 country store tame, painful, and unsatisfactory. 



Always eager in the pursuit of learning, and especially of that 

 practical knowledge which could clear the wilderness, and build towns 

 like magic in our then wild as well as far West, he bent his energies 

 towards procuring an appointment to the Military Academy at West 

 Point, where, he had been told, such instruction was given at the 

 expense of the Government, and an assured future lay beyond to the 

 honorable graduate. He was successful ; he entered the Military 

 Academy on the 23d of June, 1825, when not yet fifteen years old, — 



