Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography/Manigault, Gabriel

MANIGAULT, Gabriel (man-e-go), patriot, b. in Charleston, S. C., 21 April, 1704; d. there, 5 June, 1781. He engaged successfully in commercial pursuits in Charleston, accumulating a fortune of about $800,000. Refusing tempting inducements to enter into the slave-trade, which was very lucrative, he invested his profits in rice-plantations and slaves, exercising such care and humanity in their treatment that their natural increase in thirty-eight years from 86 to 270 was instanced before a committee of the British house of commons in 1790 in justification of the slave system. He was treasurer of the province of South Carolina in 1738, when the accounts of the St. Augustine expedition were examined, and for several years represented Charleston in the provincial house of commons. Shortly after the Declaration of Independence he advanced $220,000 from his private fortune to the state of South Carolina for purposes of defence. When Gen. Augustine Prevost appeared before Charleston in May, 1779, he armed and equipped himself and his grandson, Joseph, a boy of fifteen, and both took their places in the lines for the defence of the city. At his death he left £5,000 sterling to the South Carolina society, of Charleston.—Gabriel's great-grandson, Gabriel Henry, soldier, b. in Charleston, S. C., 28 Dec, 1788; d. on his plantation, 7 Jan., 1834. He moved with his parents to New York in 1805, and the same year, after a short stay at Princeton, was sent to Paris for a military education, and entered the Lycée impérial. On leaving, in 1808, he declined a commission in the French array, and returned with the desire of obtaining a commission in the U. S. army. In 1813 he served as aide-de-camp with the rank of captain on the staff of Gen. Izard, who commanded a brigade under Hampton on the Canada frontier. He was brevetted major at the close of 1813, and until the end of the war was an assistant inspector-general. He was offered a captaincy in one of the artillery regiments when the army was reduced, but, returning to South Carolina, where he inherited property, he devoted the remainder of his life to agriculture.—Gabriel Henry's brother, Charles, merchant, b. in Charleston, S. C., 7 April, 1795; d. 30 April, 1874, removed to New York with his parents in 1805, and two years afterward to Philadelphia, where he grew to manhood. He was at the University of Pennsylvania in 1814 when the British burned Washington, and served in the militia that was ordered out for the defence of Philadelphia. He then entered mercantile life, and after 1817 travelled extensively in Asia, Australia, and South America. He returned to South Carolina in 1823, where he married, and became a rice-planter.—Charles's son, Gabriel Edward, physician, b. in Charleston, S. C., 7 Jan., 1833, was taken as an infant to Paris, and again at thirteen years of age, and entered the Collége Bourbon, where he completed two classes. He was graduated at the College of Charleston, 1852, and at the medical college of South Carolina in 1854, and returned to Paris to continue his medical studies, at the same time studying zoölogy at the Jardin des Plantes. He served in the civil war as private, and then as adjutant of the 4th South Carolina cavalry. He continued his zoölogical studies and was elected in 1873 curator of the museum of natural history in the College of Charleston, which post he still holds. He delivers public lectures at the college on his branch, and is a contributor on zoölogical and other subjects to the proceedings of the Elliott society of science and art. He is president of the Carolina art association.—Gabriel's great-grandson, Arthur Middleton, soldier, b. in Charleston, S. C, in 1824; d. 16 Aug., 1886, was prepared for college, but entered business in Charleston. In 1846 he was elected 1st lieutenant of the Charleston company in the Palmetto regiment. He served through the Mexican war under Gen. Scott, and was present in all the battles in which his regiment participated. Returning, he resumed his occupation, which he continued until he inherited a rice-plantation on Santee river, S. C. At the beginning of the civil war he served as inspector-general on Beauregard's staff, and, having been elected colonel of the 10th regiment of South Carolina infantry, he commanded the 1st military district. Early in 1862 he was ordered to Mississippi, and served continuously in the western army under Bragg, Johnson, and Hood, and was made brigadier-general in 1863. His brigade was frequently engaged, and did severe fighting in the retreat before Sherman. He was wounded twice, the second time severely in the head, at the battle of Franklin, Tenn. At the close of the war he attempted rice-planting again, but without success, and in 1880 he was elected adjutant-general of the state, serving in that post six years, and being the candidate of the Democratic party for re-election at the time of his death, which was hastened by the consequences of the wound that he received at Franklin.