Rutland County Biographies

History of Rutland County Vermont
Written by H. P. Smith and W. S. Rann
Published by D. Mason & Co. in 1886

SHELDON, CHARLES, son of Medad Sheldon, was born in Rutland July 24, 1813. His father was born on the l6th of December, 1776, at Bernardston, Mass., and was the father of eleven children. He was a blacksmith and farmer, and resided in Rutland from 1808 to 1825, where he was a respected citizen. In 1825 he removed to St. Lawrence county, N. Y., and engaged in farming and manufacturing business, which he continued until his removal to Troy, N. Y. His death occurred on the 27th of July, 1846, at the home of his son-in-law, George Reddington. of Waddington, N. Y., at which place he was buried.

The grandfather of Charles Sheldon was Amasa, the son of Captain Amasa, of the Revolutionary army, and Sarah (Bardwell) Sheldon, and married Sybil, daughter of John Holton, of Northfield, Mass., on the 25th of July, 1771 ; he died at Rockingham, Vt., in 1780. John Holton was a descendant in the third generation from Deacon William Holton, the English immigrant, who settled in Massachusetts in 1634, and who was afterward one of the first settlers in Hartford, Conn.

Charles Sheldon's educational advantages were confined to study in the district school and only until he was twelve years of age. The succeeding two years he spent on his father's farm in Waddington, N. Y., after which he began work at the cabinet-making trade ; but this he found uncongenial to his tastes and he gave it up and began a period of service in a country store. At the age of sixteen he removed to Montreal and engaged in the steamboat business. In two years he was master of a boat on the St. Lawrence and Ottawa Rivers, a position which he held for six years, when he resigned at the age of twenty-four years. In March, 1835, Mr. Sheldon went to Troy, N. Y., and there embarked in the lumber trade. In 1841 he removed to New York city and followed the same business with a fair degree of success until April, 1850. In that year he transferred his activities to another field. Settling in Rutland, his birthplace, he engaged in the marble business of D. Morgan, jr., & Co., and was admitted to a partnership in the firm, whose title was accordingly changed to Sheldon, Morgan & Co. From the time of his advent to this business extensive improvements and additions were rapidly made, among which was the erection of a mill of eight gangs of saws. The firm at that time employed only twenty-five men. The business was temporarily suspended in 1851 and again in 1866 by the burning of the works ; but in each instance the mills were promptly rebuilt and in greatly extended form. On the occasion of the last fire a mill of twenty-four gangs was erected and in operation within eight weeks after the conflagration. In 1874 another twenty-four gang mill was erected. Since that time new mills and shops have been repeatedly added, comprising all of the departments of marble sawing and finishing, until there are now six different buildings in use, all constructed of marble, and covering an area of more than 84,000 square feet. The site of these works was a tamarack and cedar swamp when Mr. Sheldon entered the business ; it is now a busy hive of industry. One hundred and forty tenements have been erected for homes for the employees. Three large quarries, all located at West Rutland, are owned by the firm, and the mills are operated by a double engine of 300 horse power, and one single of 125 horse power. The quarrying machinery is mostly operated by a Rand air compressor. The magnitude of this business has been yearly increased.

In the year 1857 Charles Sheldon purchased the interest of Mr. Morgan in the business and the firm was reorganized under the name of Sheldon & Slason. In 1865 was purchased the share of Dr. Lorenzo Sheldon and then he associated his own sons, .John A. and Charles H., with himself in partnership. In 1881 Mr. Slason's interest was purchased and William K. Sheldon, another son of Charles, entered the firm and the title was changed to Sheldon & Sons, which it still bears.

In political affairs Mr. Sheldon was formerly an active participant. While residing in Troy and New York he was an ardent and active Whig. After coming to Rutland he declined further political participation and has persistently declined official political station of any kind. His attention has been devoted to his large and growing business and for a long series of years he was seldom absent from his office.

Charles Sheldon was married on the 30th of June, 1838, to Janet, daughter of John and Janet (Somerville) Reid. Mrs. Sheldon's mother was born in Scotland ; her patronymic is of high social and scientific distinction. They have had seven children, six sons and one daughter. All of the sons are living, four of them in business with their father, and two in business in New York city. Mrs. Sheldon died in February, 1859. Mr. Sheldon subsequently married Harriette, daughter of George Reddington, of St. Lawrence county, N. Y.

 SHELDON, JOHN ALEXANDER, eldest son of Charles and Janet (Reid) Sheldon, was born in Troy, N. Y., August 14, 1839. His education was received principally at the Sand Lake Academy, Sand Lake, N. Y., and at Williamstown, Mass. Just before he reached fifteen years of age he left school and entered the store of Sheldons, Morgan & Slason. He filled a minor station here for several years, and then accepted the position of book-keeper for the same firm. He remained in this office until the breaking out of the War of the Rebellion. The call of the government for volunteers, which drew from their homes so many of the sons of Vermont, stirred his sense of patriotism and he joined the First Regiment of Vermont Volunteers (three months men) as sergeant. Returning home at the expiration of this term, he remained until the organization of the Tenth Regiment, in which he again went to the front as captain of Company C. The record of this gallant regiment has been preserved in a historical volume and will be found in brief in this work. Mr. Sheldon remained in the field through the remainder of the war, and on his return purchased an interest in the great marble business of his father, as described above. As a member of this firm his excellent business qualifications, his untiring industry and his general popularity have enabled him to exert an influence for its prosperity second only to that of his father. These qualifications have not gone unrecognized by his townsmen ; he has filled the office of selectman three years; was trustee of Rutland village and one year president of the board. In 1876 he was elected to represent the town in the Legislature of the State ; in this year he also acted as senior aid-de-camp on Governor Fairbank's staff. He was for several years a trustee of the old Rutland Savings Bank and is now vice-president of the Merchants' National Bank of Rutland. Immediately succeeding the war he took up his residence in Rutland village, where he purchased his beautiful home in the spring of 1870.

Mr. Sheldon was married on the 20th of December, 1866, to Caroline A., daughter of Augustus M. Eastman, of Brooklyn, N. Y. They have seven children, four sons and three daughters, as follows: Charles Alexander, born October 17, 1867 ; Augustus Eastman, born June 20, 1869; Mai-y Hatfield, born March 3, 1871 ; Francis Marion, born February 1, 1873; John Somerville. born February 4, 1875 ; Carolyn Pearl, born November 9, 1876; Archie McDaniels, born April 23, 1885.

SLASON, CHARLES HARMON, was born in West Rutland, Vt., on the 28th of October, 1827. He came of a family which was very prominent in the history of Rutland county. His father was Francis Slason, who was born at Stamford, Conn., March 23, 1790. He came to West Rutland in 1810, and was married to Mary Gordon on the 1st of July, 1814; they had three children - James L., Anna Maria and William Wallace; the latter was killed by the cars at Middlebury, in March, 1875. Francis Slason was a leading merchant of West Rutland for more than fifty years; was a director of the Rutland National Bank from 1824 until his death, and was in many other ways made to feel that he had gained the esteem and confidence of the community. His wife died May 2, 1821. He afterwards married Celia Harmon, on the 26th of August, 1822 ; married at Hardwick, Mass., by Rev. B. Wesson ; they had two children - Francis Henry and Charles Harmon, the subject of this sketch. The former was born October 16, 1835, and died January 8, 1836; Francis Slason died January 14, 1882, at his home in West Rutland, and is buried in the family lot at Evergreen Cemetery at Centre Rutland. Of the other children, James L. was born at West Rutland October 1, 1814; Anna Maria at the same place April 20, 1816; and William Wallace June 2, 1818, also at West Rutland.

Upon the occasion of the death of Francis Slason, the following proceedings were had by the officers of the bank of which he had so long been a trusted director:

Whereas, It has pleased Almighty God to take from among us our deeply venerated former vice-president, Francis Slason, in the fullness of his days, and who has been a director of this bank since its first organization in 1824, and a most punctual attendant on the meetings of the board, and that while we regret that we cannot longer have his company, the recollection of his foresight, independent thought and the interest that he took in all that pertained to the welfare of the bank, will be a bright spot in our memory. Be it, therefore

Resolved, That we tender to the widow of our late friend and associate our sincerest sympathy with her in her loss of a beloved companion for so great a number of years ; also to the other members of the family, in the rupture of the dearest ties of relationship.

Resolved, That the foregoing be spread upon the records of the bank and that a copy be sent to the family of the deceased.

Charles H. Slason received his education at Castleton, Vt., and later attended Burr Seminary, and Burton's Seminary at Manchester, Vt. At the age of sixteen he began work in his father's store at West Rutland, and early developed rare capacity for business. In 1844 he struck the first blow that led to opening the first marble quarry in West Rutland (now owned by Sheldon &: Son), in company with Dr. Lorenzo Sheldon, David Morgan, William Barnes and his father, Francis Slason. This firm became in 1850 Sheldon & Slason, remaining such until the fall of 1881, when he sold his interest to the present firm of Sheldon & Sons.

In 1856 Mr. Slason married, at Nashua, N. H., Harriet L. Tilden, of Royalton, Vt., by whom he had three children as follows: Francis Charles, born December 9, 1867, at Jalapa, Mexico (where the family resided one year, he having in his possession a ranch nine miles square). William Tilden, born April 18, 1869, at Brooklyn, N. Y. Harriet E.. born April 1, 1872, at Nashua, N. H. Five days after the birth of Harriet E., Mrs. Slason died at Nashua and is buried in Evergreen Cemetery at Centre Rutland.

On the 27th of July, 1880, Mr. Slason was married to Mrs. Sarah F. McKelsey, at Saratoga, N. Y.. the ceremony being performed by Rev. James L. Slason, of Tinmouth, Vt. They had one child, Maria Henrietta, born December 22, 1881.

Mr. Slason died after a short and severe illness on the l0th of April, 1882, and was buried in the family lot in Evergreen Cemetery, Centre Rutland.

Mr. Slason was for many years a conspicuous figure in this community; was a prominent member of the Masonic fraternity in Rutland, being initiated in Center Lodge, No. 34, on the 6th of July, 1854, and remaining an honored member thereof until 1878: then he took his demit for the purpose of forming a new lodge at West Rutland. He was one of the charter members of Hiram Lodge No. 101, and continued a worthy brother until his death.

SMITH, WARREN H. The subject of this sketch was born in Brookfield, Vt., March 25, 1818. Here his grandparents and parents had settled as farmers. The grandfather, Timothy Smith, died in 1824 at the advanced age of ninety years, his widow surviving him, and died at the extraordinary age of ninety-four years. Norman Smith, the father of Warren, was born in Hanover, N, H., July 18, 1776. Susannah Worden, his mother, belonged to a leading and influential family of Scotch descent, in Halifax, Vt., where she was born October 15, 1780. His parents were married January 29, 1803, and raised a family of seven children, of whom three survive, Warren being the youngest.

Norman Smith died October 27, 1823. His widow remarried and died July 11, 1850, Thus at the early age of six years Warren was left to care for himself He was put out to service to make his way in life as best he could, enduring the trials, afflictions and inflictions of a poor boy among strangers during the earlier years of his boyhood, which he has never forgotten, and which begat in him a tender feeling and sympathy for poor children ever since. Warren remained in Brookfield till he was about fourteen years of age, working at farming summers and attending school winters, and then removed to Randolph, Vt., and there attended the academy and completed his education ; in the mean time working on farms in the summer and teaching school every winter for seven years, beginning when fourteen years of age.

He began the study of the law with the Hon. Wm. Nutting, at Randolph, at the age of twenty-one, and was admitted to practice at the Orange County Court, June term 1843. He had quite a practice and several cases in the County Court before he was admitted to the bar. His necessities for means to meet his expenses required him to do what work and business he could while getting his education and studying his profession.

In August, 1843, he came to Rutland county and engaged in active practice in his profession, devoting the energies of a healthy body and mind in the faithful service of his clients, and his practice became quite extensive and fairly remunerative ; in Which practice he has continued to the present, though of late years he has measurably retired from active practice and allowed himself the luxury of travel with his family in his own country and abroad. He never sought for political distinction or office, although a Whig and Republican and interested generally in politics and the success of the measures and principles of his political party. Of late years he has given his attention more to financial affairs and has become connected as director in two of the national banks in Rutland.

Mr. Smith was united in marriage, on the 8th of December, 1857, with Miss Helen B. Weymouth, of Walpole, N. H., where she was born on the 28th of February, 1837. They had born to them two sons and two daughters, and felt themselves especially favored and blessed with their four promising and healthy children, all of whom with their parents became members of the Congregational Church at Rutland, and the cup of human happiness for parents and children seemed full. But in the year 1883 affliction and extreme grief came in the death of their two older children, a son twenty-three and a daughter twenty-one years old.

Norman Weymouth, their eldest son, was born May 21, 1859, and died January 7, 1883. Theo Linsley, the eldest daughter, was born April 14, 1862, and died October 24, 1883. Guy Leslie was born April 21, 1866, graduated at Rutland High School, and is now a clerk in a bank in Rutland. Helen B., their youngest child, was born August 3, 1869, and is now in Rutland High School.

The death in one year of the son and daughter, under the circumstances, was painfully afflictive to parents and friends as well as to their acquaintances. Norman had from his early boyhood manifested a disposition for earnest and profitable study, was a very bright boy and intelligent young man, specially calculated to attach himself to friends and acquaintances. He had received his classical education at Middlebury and Williams Colleges, and pursued his medical studies at Vermont University and Atlanta (Ga.) Medical College, and had fully and ably prepared himself for the practice of medicine at Atlanta, where he had formed a partnership for practice. Being severely afflicted with rheumatism, he went to Atlanta in the hope that the milder climate of the South would benefit him ; but the dread enemy of the living had placed his seal upon his brow. " God's finger touched him and he slept."  Theo died at her home in Rutland of typhoid fever.

STRONG, GEORGE W. The subject of this sketch was a descendant of one of the most notable families of Rutland ; a family possessed of peculiar characteristics that were manifested in a spirit of enterprise to which Rutland is greatly indebted for its present position. Hon. Moses Strong, the father, was a man of ability and courage and in the period of his active life was the most progressive man in the community, and whose influence extended beyond State limits; for he was largely identified in the building of the Champlain Canal from Whitehall to Troy, N. Y., and projected a plan for its continuance to Rutland, and until his death advocated the feasibility of the project. He was born in Salisbury, Conn., in 1772. He was educated in his profession in the Litchfield, Conn., Law School, established by Tapping Reeves, LL.D., who was among the first of American lawyers. Mr. Strong was among the early graduates of this celebrated institution in 1796. In 1798 he removed to Addison county and was admitted to the bar of that county; but in 1800 removed to Rutland, began the active practice of his profession and became prominent in the business and social affairs of the community. In 1818 he was a representative in the Legislature ; in 1825 and 1826, chief judge of the Rutland County Court, and was one of the founders of the old Bank of Rutland, remaining a director until his death. He obtained the first charter for a railroad in Vermont. In 1835 he retired from practice to give attention to his private affairs, being at that time the largest land owner in Rutland county, and one-third of the present prosperous village of Rutland stands upon lands once owned by him. He died in 1842 at the age of seventy years.

The eldest son, Moses M. Strong, possessed the strong and progressive characteristics of his father. He was born in 1810; educated in the schools of Rutland and graduated from Dartmouth College in 1829; attended the Litchfield Law School, and was admitted to the Bennington county bar in 1831. After a few years practice in Bennington and Rutland he removed to Wisconsin in 1837. A half century ago he staked out a town twelve days west of Lake Michigan which is now the capital of Wisconsin. This is the simple history of one of the foremost and leading families of Rutland, as preliminary to the biography of a member of the family whose life was identified with the industry and promotion of his native town.

George W. Strong, son of Hon. Moses and Lucy Maria (Smith) Strong, was born in Rutland February 14, 1818. His mother died when he was of tender age and Judge Strong married Mrs. Harriet Woodbridge Hopkins, of Vergennes, when the little son was four years old ; to her care and training he was committed. He was graduated from Middlebury College in 1837 in the class with the distinguished poet, John G. Saxe and the eminent divine. Rev. Byron Sunderland, D.D. Soon afterward he entered the office of Phineas Smith and Edgar L. Ormsbee in the study of law and was admitted to the Rutland county bar in April. 1845. He opened an office but did not enter into active practice of his profession, as he had inherited in great degree the energy, public spirit and sterling business qualities of his father; his tastes, therefore, led him into business life, which was, in a measure, forced upon him by his having charge of much of the large landed estate of his father. He early identified himself in pushing forward the project of building the Rutland and Burlington railroad and devoted much of his time to procuring subscriptions and awakening public thought and interest in the road ; he engaged in its construction until it was opened in 1849. and was for some time a director of the corporation. He next turned his attention to the feasibility of the construction of the Rutland and Washington railroad, a line connecting Rutland with Troy. He engaged in its construction and after its opening became a director and for two years president of the corporation. After the opening of the home railways in which he was interested he gave his attention mainly to railroad building in the west. He took an active part in building the Cleveland and Pittsburgh railroad, of which he was afterward president for a time. In 1850 he contracted for the relaying of a road from Corning, N. Y., through Tioga county and for building the Chester Valley railroad in Pennsylvania. Among his latest enterprises and contracts was the building of a bridge across the Wisconsin River at Kilborn City. These great enterprises show the public spirit, sagacity and energy of the man who spent his life and wore himself out in the public service and became the benefactor of the generations that are to follow ; he left enduring monuments of himself in the railway enterprises which he projected and carried forward to completion.

In the mean time he was not unmindful of promoting the prosperity and up building of the town of his residence, and to him is Rutland indebted largely for its growth. None labored more earnestly to make it the chief town of the State, and his prophecy made in 1855, that Rutland would one day be a city of twenty-five thousand inhabitants, seems probable to be fulfilled. As an example of his faith in the growth of the town it may be stated that he laid out Washington street and erected the residence now occupied by E. Foster Cook. He laid out and gave the names to Madison avenue. Pleasant, Prospect and Hopkins streets and Strong's avenue - gave the lands for those streets to the town - all of them being a part of the old homestead and running through lands owned by him. There are several other streets which are the result of his enterprise and to which he gave names.

In politics he was an uncompromising Whig, and was presidential elector in 1856, with William C. Bradley, Lawrence Brainard, John Porter and Porteus Baxter ; they cast the vote of the State for John C. Fremont for president. Mr. Strong never sought or held public office, because of his time being absorbed in business, although he would many times have been honored with leading positions, had he signified his willingness to accept them. He was always an attendant of the Protestant Episcopal Church, and at his death, October 28, 1858, was a communicant of Trinity Church.

He married. May 14, 1845, Ellen Sophia Ellsworth, of Windsor, Conn., a daughter of Hon. Henry L. Ellsworth, and granddaughter of the distinguished chief justice, Oliver Ellsworth, of that State. One child, Catherine Ellsworth Strong, is living and resides in Rutland. Mrs. Strong a few years since married the Hon. John Prout, a leading lawyer of Rutland. Of Mr. Strong's father's family of eleven children, only two are living, Hon. Moses M. Strong, of Mineral Point, Wis., and John Strong, Washington, D. C.

This is but a brief sketch of a useful life -of a public spirited citizen who sacrificed life and fortune in promoting the interests of the generation in which he lived and labored, and the fruits of his service are being garnered by the generations that follow them.

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