BROWN, WILLIAM. 



BULLIONS, PETER. 



171 



of 10,472. In this way the waste over the 

 country must be very great. In the great 

 American curing establishments the brine 

 wasted must be something enormous, as he 

 found that in eight of the Federal States 

 four million pigs were slaughtered and cured 

 during the season of 1863. 



BROWN, Sir WILLIAM, a British merchant, 

 born at Ballymena, County Antrim, Ireland, 

 March 5, 1784, died at Richmond Hill, near 

 Liverpool, March 3, 1864. Early in the present 

 century he migrated with his father, Alexander 

 Brown, to Baltimore, and received his com- 

 mercial education in the counting-house of 

 what eventually became the firm of Alexander 

 Brown and Sons, linen importers of that city. 

 In 1809 William returned to England and es- 

 tablished a branch of the firm in Liverpool. 

 Within a few years additional branches were 

 established in New York and Philadelphia, and 

 the business, assuming by degrees a more gene- 

 ral character, was finally confined principally 

 to banking transactions. The reputation of the 

 house for sagacity and probity and its known 

 connections with both sides of the Atlantic, 

 made it a most important medium for business 

 communications between the United States 

 and Great Britain. During the commercial 

 crisis of 1837 the firm held American bills for 

 ?. very large amount, including nearly 800,000 

 of protested paper, and had at the same time 

 to meet engagements in England amounting to 

 1,950,000. Their own resources were, to a 

 considerable extent, locked up in American se- 

 curities, not immediately available, and during 

 the panic prevailing on both sides of the At- 

 lantic it was impossible to draw bills or to 

 remit specie to England. But as the suspen- 

 sion of the firm, even for a limited time, would 

 have greatly aggravated the commercial em- 

 barrassments of the period, the English branch 

 succeeded in effecting a loan from the Bank of 

 England for the whole amount of its engage- 

 ments in that country, depositing securities for 

 the advance to the amount of 5,000,000. 

 The whole sum borrowed from the Bank was 

 repaid in six months, and thenceforth the 

 house enjoyed an unsurpassed reputation for 

 business integrity both in Europe and America. 

 In 1844 Mr Brown unsuccessfully contested 

 the representation of South Lancashire in 

 Parliament, but in 1846, and again in the gene- 

 ral election of 1847, he was returned without 

 opposition, and continued to hold his seat until 

 1859. He was a constant attendant on the 

 business of the House of Commons, and though 

 not a frequent speaker, was considered a lead- 

 ing authority on questions of finance and com- 

 merce. In 1850 he carried on through the 

 columns of the " Pennsylvanian " newspaper a 

 correspondence witl. Mr. Meredith, United 

 States Secretary of the Treasury, and Abbott 

 Lawrence, in defence of Free Trade. During 

 the latter part of his life he was much inter- 

 ested in the establishment of the Museum and 

 Free Library of Liverpool, a large portion of 



the expense of which was defrayed by him. 

 He was also a handsome contributor to the 

 hospitals and other public charities of the city, 

 and in the famine in Ireland, in 1847, and on 

 other occasions, showed much philanthropic 

 zeal. In 1852 he was appointed Deputy-Lieu- 

 tenant of Lancashire, and during 1863 he 

 served as high sheriff. About a year before 

 his death he was created a baronet. Though 

 so many years had elapsed since his departure 

 from the United States, he never ceased to feel 

 a warm interest in that country, with which 

 his business relations always remained close, 

 and was often its defender against unjust as- 

 persions. The progress of the existing civil 

 war seemed to make no change in his friendly 

 feelings to the American people, and he is 

 known to have liberally aided the efforts in- 

 augurated by the latter in 1862 to send food to 

 the suffering Lancashire operatives. 



BULLIONS, Rev. PETEB, D. D., an Ameri- 

 can clergyman, teacher, and author, born at 

 Moss Side, about five miles west of Perth, Scot- 

 land, in December, 1791, died at Troy, New 

 York, Feb. 13, 1864. His father, though in but 

 moderate circumstances, kept him constantly at 

 school till he was sixteen years of age, though 

 most of the time he worked upon his father's 

 little farm morning and evening. The next 

 two and a half years were devoted entirely to 

 agricultural labors, and his father was desirous 

 that he should be apprenticed to a mechani- 

 cal business. He himself, however, was very 

 anxious to obtain a liberal education, and com- 

 menced preparing for college at a school near 

 his father's. In the autumn of 1810 he entered 

 the University of Edinburgh, and took a three 

 years' course, supporting himself partly by his . 

 previous earnings and partly by teaching. In 

 September, 1813, immediately after leaving 

 college, he commenced the study of theology 

 under Professor Paxton of the Associate Church, 

 and continued under his instruction for four 

 years, sustaining himself by teaching during his 

 vacations. The death of his father in 1813 

 threw upon him the whole charge of the family, 

 and the four years of his theological course were 

 consequently years of intense labor and anxiety. 

 In June, 1817, he was licensed to preach by the 

 Presbytery of Edinburgh, and three weeks later 

 married and embarked for New York. After 

 spending a few months as a temporary supply to 

 churches in Washington County, N. Y., and its 

 vicinity, Mr. Bullions was ordained and settled 

 in March, 1818, as pastor of the Presbyterian 

 Church at Argyle, in that county. After a 

 remarkably successful pastorate of six years, his 

 health, impaired by the excessive physical ex- 

 ertion of attending to his duties in a congrega- 

 tion so widely scattered, declined so much that 

 he was compelled to resign. In November, 

 1824, he accepted the professorship of languages 

 in the Albany Academy, one of the best and 

 most liberally endowed institutions of its class 

 in the country. He held this professorship for 

 twenty-four years, resigning in 1848. In 1831i 



