578 



OBITUARIES, UNITED STATES. 



eon of the illustrious General Porter, who 

 served his country with credit in 1812, and 

 afterward as Secretary of War under the ad- 

 ministration of John Quincy Adams. 



June . SKINNER, JOHN B., a Demo- 

 cratic leader, and jurist, of New York ; died in 

 Buffalo, aged 72 years. He was the son of 

 Benjamin Skinner, one of the early settlers of 

 Williamstown, Mass., and was born there, July 

 23, 1799; graduated at Williams College in 

 the class of 1818, studied law, and in 1821 was 

 admitted to the Supreme Court of New York. 

 In 1826 he was nominated by Democratic con- 

 stituents for the Assembly, and was elected 

 by a large majority. In 1838 he was nomi- 

 nated by Governor Marcy, at the solicitation 

 of the bar, as Circuit Judge and Vice-Chancel- 

 lor of 'the Eighth District. His nomination 

 was confirmed by the Senate. In 1846 he 

 was appointed District Judge of the Court of 

 Common Pleas, which office he held until the 

 change of the constitution abolished the 

 office. In 1852 he was, with Horatio Sey- 

 mour, appointed State delegate to the Balti- 

 more Convention, which nominated Franklin 

 Pierce for President; and the next year one 

 of the presidential electors to cast for him the 

 vote of the State. In 1853 he was appointed 

 Attorney of the United States for the North- 

 ern District of New York, which he declined, 

 and in 1860 removed to Buffalo, where he re- 

 sided till his death. Judge Skinner held many 

 offices of trust, among which were : President 

 of the Board of Trustees of the New York 

 State Asylum for the Blind, an institution re- 

 cently established at Batavia ; President of 

 the State Normal School in Buffalo; Viee- 

 President of the Reformatory at Warsaw ; a 

 member of the Board of Trustees of the Buf- 

 falo Female Academy, and also a member of 

 the Board of Trustees of the Buffalo City 

 Savings- Bank. He was prominently identified 

 with the Erie County Bible Association ; and 

 in the positions of President of the Buffalo 

 General Hospital, and one of the Board of 

 Trustees of that institution, he exerted a great 

 influence. 



July 1. HOWARD, Rev. W. W., D. D., a 

 Presbyterian clergyman and an eminent edu- 

 cator ; died at Aurora, Cayuga County, N. Y., 

 aged 54 years. He was born in London, Sep- 

 tember 19, 1817, and after a thorough aca- 

 demic preparation entered Magdalen Hall, Ox- 

 ford. Upon the completion of his course there 

 he chose the office of a teacher, and was for a 

 time employed in London. In 1849 he came 

 to this country and entered upon his vocation 

 at the West, and, after passing some time in 

 Indiana, became a professor in the Military In- 

 stitute at Drennon Springs, Ky. On his return 

 to the East, he was for some years a professor 

 in the academy at Sing Sing, N. Y., in the 

 high-school at Jersey Shore, Pa., and then 

 became principal of Erasmus Hall at Flatbush, 

 on Long Island. Having been licensed to 

 preach the Gospel by the Second Presbytery 



of New York, he was called in 1863 to be 

 pastor in Aurora, and he continued in that 

 pastorate till his death. Dr. Howard took 

 a deep interest in the establishment of 

 Wells Female College, named after its found- 

 er, Henry Wells, Esq., of Aurora, and became 

 its first president. He was a man of large 

 culture, of fine scholarship, and distinguished 

 for his executive ability. 



July 2. CHESTER, Rev. ALFRED, a Presby- 

 terian clergyman and teacher; died in New 

 York City, aged 73 years. He was born in 

 Hartford, Conn., March 17, 1798, and educated 

 in Hartford schools till 1812, when he was 

 placed in the academy at Lenox, Mass., for two 

 years. In June, 1814, he joined the Centre 

 Church, in Hartford, Conn., then under the 

 pastoral charge of the Rev. Nathan Strong, 

 D. D. The same year he entered Yale College, 

 where he graduated in 1818. He studied the- 

 ology at Andover and Princeton, and in 1821 

 was licensed to preach the Gospel by the Pres- 

 bytery of New Brunswick. He then spent 

 three winters in South Carolina as a mission- 

 ary, officiating in the churches of Cambridge 

 and Hamburg, and in that of Stony Creek, at 

 Pocotaligo. He was ordained July 18, 1826, 

 by the Presbytery of Elizabethtown, and at 

 the same time installed pastor of the First 

 Presbyterian Church, Rahway, N. J. In 1829 

 he resigned his pastoral charge, and became 

 principal of the academy at Morristown ; 

 where, subsequently, he established a private 

 classical boarding-school for boys, over which 

 he presided with fidelity and success for more 

 than thirteen years. His health failing, he 

 spent a winter in Mississippi and the Western 

 States, and was compelled, ultimately, to re- 

 linquish his school altogether. In the early 

 establishment of the Presbyterian Board of 

 Publication, he acted as agent for the sale and 

 distribution of its books, continuing to reside 

 in Morristown until 1859, when the family 

 removed to their home in Elizabeth. Here, 

 for some years, he acted as chaplain for the 

 city prison. 



July 3. KNOWLTON, GEORGE II., United 

 States Assessor and editor of the Portland 

 (Me.) Press ; died in that city. 



July 3. MAYNADIER, Colonel and Brevet 

 Brigadier-General WILLIAM, U. S. A., died in 

 Washington, D. C., aged 65 years. He entered 

 the Military Academy from the District of 

 Columbia in 1823, and graduated third in a 

 class of thirty-eight. His first grade of second- 

 lieutenant in the First Artillery was awarded 

 July 1, 1827, and his first duty performed 

 at Fortress Monroe, where for some years he 

 was attached to the artillery school of prac- 

 tice. Acting as aid in the general staff in 

 Scott's Black Hawk expedition of 1832, and 

 subsequently with Major-General Macomb 

 during the early part of the Florida War, 

 he was in 1832 made first-lieutenant, and 

 four years after captain. His new grade at- 

 tached him to the ordnance, and his services 



