Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography/Hague, William

HAGUE, William, clergyman, b. in Pelham, N. Y., 4 Jan., 1808; d. in Boston, Mass., 1 Aug., 1887. He was graduated at Hamilton in 1826, and at the Newton theological institution in 1829. On 20 Oct. of the latter year he became pastor of the 2d Baptist church at Utica, N. Y., where he remained until 1831. He held pastorates in Boston, Providence, and New York city. He was elected professor of homiletics in the Baptist theological seminary at Chicago in 1869, and later accepted a pastoral charge at Orange, N. J. Dr. Hague received the degree of D. D. from Brown in 1849, and from Harvard in 1863. He was also chosen a trustee of the former university in 1837 and of Vassar college in 1861. He was the author of numerous occasional addresses and orations, including discourses on the life and character of John Quincy Adams and Adoniram Judson. He also published “The Baptist Church Transplanted from the Old World to the New” (New York, 1846); “Guide to Conversation on the Gospel of John” (Boston); “Review of Drs. Fuller and Wayland on Slavery” (Boston); “Christianity and Statesmanship” (New York, 1855; enlarged ed., Boston, 1865); “Home Life” (New York, 1855); “The Authority and Perpetuity of the Christian Sabbath” (1863); “The Self-witnessing Character of the New Testament Christianity” (Philadelphia, 1871); “Christian Greatness in the Minister” (Boston, 1880); and “Life Notes,” an autobiography (1887). — His son, James Duncan, mining engineer, b. in Boston, Mass., 24 Feb., 1836, was educated at Harvard, at the Freiberg mining-school, and at the University of Göttingen. On his return to the United States he followed for a time the profession of mining engineer, and in 1867 became first assistant geologist on the U. S. geological survey of the 40th parallel, under Clarence King, holding that place for three years. In this connection he prepared the volume on “Mining Industries” (Washington, 1870) for the reports of the survey. He then returned to his profession. Mr. Hague was sent as U. S. commissioner to the World's fair in Paris in 1878, and with the assistance of George F. Becker wrote the report on “Mining Industries at the Paris Exposition of 1878” (Washington, 1880). —

Another son, Arnold, geologist, b. in Boston, Mass., 3 Dec., 1840. He was graduated at the Sheffield scientific school of Yale in 1863, after which he spent three years in Germany, studying at the universities of Göttingen and Heidelberg, and at the Freiberg mining-school. In 1867 he returned to the United States, and was appointed assistant geologist on the U. S. geological exploration of the 40th parallel under Clarence King. He then went to California, and spent the winter of 1867-'8 in Virginia City, Nev., studying the surface geology of the Comstock lode and the chemistry of the amalgamation process as practised there, and known as the “Washoe process.” The results of this study were published in volume iii. of the report of the exploration, under the title of “Chemistry of the Washoe Process.” He also contributed to the same volume a chapter on the geology of the White Pine mining district, in which there was first brought to notice the great development of Devonian rocks in the Great Basin of Utah and Nevada. In volume ii. — “Descriptive Geology” — of the report of the exploration, which is the joint work of Mr. Hague and Samuel F. Emmons, there is given the results of a detailed geological survey across the Cordilleras of North America, from the Great Plains to the Sierra Nevada range in California. This work included a geological atlas of maps and sections, which was completed after a great deal of hardship, the map of the Great Basin being accomplished before the completion of either the Union or Central Pacific railway. On the termination of this work in 1877 he received the appointment of government geologist of Guatemala, and travelled extensively over the republic, visiting the principal mining regions and the centres of volcanic activity. In 1878 he was engaged by the Chinese government to examine gold, silver, and lead mines in northern China. On the organization of the U. S. geological survey in 1879 he returned to the United States, and became one of its geologists. He was sent to Nevada, and made a report on the “Geology of the Eureka District.” In 1883 he was made geologist of the Yellowstone park division, and assigned to the study of the geysers of that district in connection with the extinct volcanic regions of the Rocky mountains. He is a member of scientific societies both in the United States and Europe, and in 1885 was elected to the National academy of sciences. He has made numerous contributions to scientific journals, on lithology and geology, and is the principal author of the following memoirs: “The Volcanoes of California, Oregon, and Washington Territory” (1883); “The Volcanic Rocks of the Great Basin” (1884); “On the Development of Crystallization in the Igneous Rocks of Washoe” (1885); “Nevada, with Notes on the Geology of the District” (1885); and “The Volcanic Rocks of Salvador” (1886).