536 



OBITUARIES, AMERICAN. (BRADLEY BRISBIN.) 



Bay of Fundy," " ShipwrecK on JNantucKey ".Ligm 

 house in St. John Harbor," " The Coast of Labrador," 



" Crushed by Icebergs," " Arctic Wreckers," a group 

 of polar bears, " The Land of the Midnight Sun," 

 " Sunset in the North," " Arctic Scene," exhibited at 

 the National Academy in New York, 1866, "Three 

 Sealers crushed by Icebergs," and, his last, a sum- 

 mer sketch of the coast of Greenland. Nearly one 

 hundred of his paintings were exhibited in New York 

 in November, 1892. 



Bradley, Joseph ,, jurist, born in Berne, Albany 

 County, N. Y., March 14, 1813 ; died in Washington, 

 D. C., Jan. 22, 1892. With very limited advantages, 

 his education was sufficient to enable him to support 

 himself by teaching when he was sixteen years old, 

 and to provide the means for going to college. He 

 was graduated with high honors, especially in mathe- 

 matics, at Rutgers College in 1836, and began prepar- 

 ing for the ministry, but while principal of the 

 Millstone Academy, New Jersey, ne changed his 

 plans, studied law in Newark, and was admitted to 

 the bar in 1839. During the ensuing thirty years he 

 followed his profession closely, was engaged in many 

 of the important causes tried in the New Jersey courts 

 and the United States courts of that district, and 

 achieved large success. For a long time he was a 

 director in and counsel to the Camden and Amboy 

 Railroad Company, and was also counsel to the Dela- 

 ware and Rantan Canal Company. His standing as a 

 lawyer was further attested by his employment in 

 causes that attracted more than usual attention, among 

 them the Passaic Bridge case, which he argued before 

 the United States Supreme Court in 1860 ; the Meeker 

 will case, which occupied the State courts from 1852 

 till 1860 ; the Belvidere land controversy ; and the 

 trials for murder of Harden, the Methodist Episcopal 

 minister who was hanged for poisoning his wife, and 

 of Donelly, who assassinated his bosom friend at Long 

 Branch. ' Besides attending to his law practice, he was 

 mathematician of the Mutual Benefit Life Insurance 

 Company in 1851-'63, and President of the New Jer- 

 sey Mutftal Life Insurance Company in 1865-'69. He 

 delivered the first of several addresses before the 

 literary societies of Rutgers College in 1849, the 

 annual address before the New Jersey Historical So- 

 ciety in 1851, many patriotic ones during the civil 

 war, and the oration at the centennial of Rutgers 

 College in 1870. He married a daughter of Chief- 

 Justice Hornblower, of New Jersey, m 1844. Polit- 

 ically, he was a Whig in the days of that party, and 

 afterward was an ardent Republican. In 1868 he 

 headed the Republican electoral ticket in his State. 

 In 1870 President Grant nominated him and William 

 Strong to fill two vacancies in the United States Su- 

 preme Court, and he was assigned to the 5th circuit, 

 and subsequently transferred to the 3d. Some of 

 his decisions attracted much attention, notably those 

 in the Texas slaughter-house cases, and that in the 

 Grant Parish trials in Louisiana. These trials were 

 based upon indictments charging certain persons with 

 murder and a conspiracy to take away the rights of 

 American citizens of African descent, under the 13th 

 amendment to the Federal Constitution, and after a 

 thorough analysis of the evidence, Judge Bradley de- 

 clared the indictments invalid. For none of his de- 

 cisions, which fill more than 40 volumes of the United 

 States Supreme Court " Reports," did he receive ad- 

 verse criticism excepting from persons whose interests 

 or political prejudices they antagonized. In 1877, by 

 the choice of four of his associates on the Supreme 

 Court bench, he became the fifth member of the elec- 

 toral commission created by Congress. His appoint- 

 ment gave the Republican partj' a majority on the com- 

 mission. He concurred in the judgment of the Repub- 

 lican members of the commission, and, as if aware 

 that he was the object of grave suspicion to hosts of 

 excited politicians, he supplemented his votes by argu- 

 ments remarkable for their clearness, independence, 

 and force. Judge Bradley continued to be an inde- 



fatigable student to the close of his life. He was fond 

 of working out intricate mathematical problems, de- 

 vised a perpetual calendar, and when at his home in 

 Newark spent his leisure in historical and genealog- 

 ical research. 



Brannan, John Milton, military officer, born in Wash- 

 ington, D. C., in 1819; died in New York city, Dec. 

 17j 1892. He was graduated at the United States 

 Military Academy, and appointed brevet 2d lieu- 

 tenant 1st United States Artillery, July 1, 1841 ; was 

 promoted 2d lieutenant, May 16, 1842; 1st lieutenant, 

 March 3, 1847; captain, March 4,1854; major, Aug. 

 1, 1863; lieutenant-colonel 22d Infantry (which he 

 declined), July 28, 1866 ; lieutenant-colonel 4th Ar- 

 tillery, July 18, 1877; colonel 4th Artillery, March 

 15, 1881 ; and was retired April 19, 1882. In the vol- 

 unteer service he was commissioned brigadier-general, 

 Sept. 28, 1861 ; brevetted major-general, Jan. 23, 1865 ; 

 and was mustered out of service, May 31, 1866. Dur- 

 ing his military career he was brevetted captain, Aug. 

 20, 1847; lieutenant-colonel, Sept. 25, 1862, for gal- 

 lantry at Contreras and Churubusco; colonel, Sept. 

 20, 1863, for Jacksonville, Fla. ; brigadier-general, 

 March 13, 1865, for Chickarnauga, and major-general 

 the same day for the campaign against Atlanta ; and 

 major-general of volunteers, Jan. 23, 1865, for meri- 

 torious services in the field during the civil war. In 

 1870 he was in command of the United States troops 

 at Ogdensburg at the time of the threatened Feniun 

 raids' into Canada, and in 1877 he commanded the 

 Federal force that was sent to Philadelphia during 

 the railroad riots. 



Brewer, Francis Bi. manufacturer, born in Keene, 

 N. II., Oct. 8, 1820 ; died in Westfield, N. Y., July bO, 

 1892. In 1851 he removed to Titusville, Pa., and he 

 was engaged there ten vears in extensive lumber 

 dealings. During this period he gave much study to 

 the old Indian traditions that the land in that neigh- 

 borhood contained veins of oil, which he believed to 

 be petroleum. The firm of which he was a member 

 took out the first lease on record in the oil fields, 

 July 4, 1853, and Mr. Brewer was an incorporator and 

 director in the first petroleum-oil company ever 

 formed. After spending several years in the oil fields, 

 he removed to Westfield, N. Y., was elected to the 

 Assembly in 1873-'74, was a Government director of 

 the Union Pacific Railroad in 1874-'78, manager 

 of the State Insane Asylum at Buffalo in 1881-'82, 

 and was elected to Congress from the 32d New York 

 District as a Republican in 1882. While in Congress 

 he served as a member of the select committees on 

 the Payment of Pensions, Bounty, and Back Pay, 

 and on ventilation and Acoustics. 



Brioe, Benjamin W. ( military officer, born in Virginia 

 in 1809; died in Washington, D. C.,Dec. 4,1892. He 

 was graduated at the United States Military Academy, 

 and appointed a brevet 2d lieutenant in the 3d United 

 States Infantry in 1829, served in the expedition against 

 the Sac Indians in 1831, and resigned from the army 

 in 1832. Establishing himself in Ohio, he studied 

 law, and was admitted to the bar; was brigade major 

 in the State militia in 1835-'39 ; became associate judge 

 of the Court of Common Pleas of Licking County in 

 1845 ; and was appointed adjutant-general of the State 

 in 1846. He re-entered the army as major and pay- 

 master, March 3, 1847, and, after serving through the 

 Mexican War, was discharged March 4, 1849. On Feb. 

 9, 1852, he was reappointed major and paymaster ; Nov. 

 29, 1864, was promoted colonel and paymaster-general ; 

 July 28, 1866, brigadier-general and paymaster-gen- 

 eral ; and Jan. 1, 1872, was retired. He was brevetted 

 lieutenant-colonel, colonel, and brigadier-general, Dec. 

 2, 1864, and major-general, March 13, 1865, for faith- 

 ful and distinguished services in the pay department 

 during the war. 



Brisbin, James 8., military officer, born in Boalsburg, 

 Center County, Pa., May 23, 1837 ; died in Philadel- 

 phia, Pa., Jan, 14, 1892. Prior to the civil war he 

 taught school, edited the " Center Democrat," and be- 

 came widely known as an antislavery speaker. He 

 enlisted as a private in a Pennsylvania regiment in 



