mand of the trans-Mississippi department, with headquarters at Little Rock, Ark. He was tend- ered a commission as lieutenant-general while there, and at first declined, but accepted when Jef- ferson Davis pressed it upon him a second time. In March, 1863, he was at his own request relieved in the command of the department by Gen. E. Kirby Smith. He attacked Helena, Ark., on 3 July, 1863. and was driven back with heavy losses.
HOLMES, George Frederick, educator, b'. in
Demerara, British Guiana, in 1820. He was edu-
cated in Durham university, England, came to the
United States at the age of eighteen, and was a
teacher in Virginia, Georgia, and South Carolina.
In 1842 he was admitted to the bar of South Caro-
lina by a special act of the legislature before he
had been naturalized. He was assistant editor of
the "' Southern Review " for some time. He be-
came a professor in Richmond college, Va., in
1845, in 1846 president of the University of Missis-
sippi, and in 1847 professor of history, political
economy, and international law in William and
Mary college. In 1857 he was chosen professor of
history and literature in the University of Vir-
ginia. He is the author of a series of text-books
that were used in southern schools, for which they
were especially designed.
HOLMES, Isaac Edward, statesman, b. in
Charleston, S. C, 6 April, 1796; d. there, 24 Feb.,
1867. He was prepared for college by his cousin,
Christopher E. Gadsden, and graduated at Yale in
1815, was admitted to the bar in Charleston in
1818, and became a successful lawyer. He entered
the legislature in 1826, and during the nullification
crisis of 1832-'3 was a leader of the extreme state-
rights party, and one of the founders of the South
Carolina association. The proposition that the
state should nullify the tariff first emanated from
him. He engaged in planting for a time. In 1838
he was sent to congress, and was an active member
of the house till 1850, serving as chairman of the
committee on commerce, and afterward of that on
naval affairs. He then removed to California, and
practised law from 1851 till January, 1861, when,
on learning of the passage of the ordinance of se-
cession, he returned to South Carolina. He passed
through Washington, and, in several interviews
with William H. Seward and Gen. Winfield Scott,
endeavored to avert the civil war. After the close
of hostilities he was appointed a commissioner of
the state to confer with the Federal government.
He was the author of the " Recreations of George
Taletell," consisting of stories, essays, and descrip-
tive sketches (Charleston, 1822), and, in conjunc-
tion with Robert J. Turnbull, published a volume
of political essays in favor of state rights, under
the signature of " Caroliniensis " (1826).
HOLMES, John, Canadian senator, b. in Ross-
shire, Scotland, in March, 1789 ; d. in 1870. He
emigrated to Nova Scotia in 1803, and sat in the
assembly of that province from 1836 till 1847, and
from 1851 till 1858. From the latter date he was
a legislative councillor until 1867, when he became
a senator of the Dominion. — His son, Simon H.,
journalist, b. at East River, Pictou, N. S., in 1843,
was educated at the grammar-school. New Glas-
gow, and at Pictou academy, and was admitted to
the bar of Nova Scotia in 1865. He was elected to
the provincial parliament for Pictou, N. S., and
represented it from 1871 till 1882. He has been
editor and proprietor of the Pictou " Colonial
Standard " for many years.
HOLMES, John, senator, b. in Kingston, Mass.,
in March, 1773 ; d. in Portland. Me., 7 July, 1843.
He was graduated at Brown in 1796, studied law,
was admitted to the bar in 1799, and settled in Al-
fred, Me. He practised with success, was a mem-
ber of the Massachusetts house of representatives
in 1802-'3, and took an active part in the debates.
He was a member of the state senate from 1813
till 1817, when he was chosen to congress as a
Democrat from Massachusetts, and served until
the admission of Maine as a state. He was a
member of the convention to form a state consti-
tution, and chairman of the committee that drafted
it, and was elected a senator in congress from
Maine in 1820, and re-elected for a full term the
following year. He was appointed by the legisla-
ture a commissioner to devise and report a system
of government for the state prison and to revise
the criminal code of the state.' On the resignation
of Albion K. Parris in 1827, he was again elected
to the U. S. senate, serving till 1833. In 1835-'8
he was a member of the state house of representa-
tives. In 1841 he was appointed United States
attorney for the district of Maine. He published
" The Statesman, or Principles of Legislation and
Law " (Augusta. 1840).
HOLMES, John, Canadian educator, b. in
Windsor, Vt., in 1799; d. in Lorette, near Quebec,
Canada, in 1852. He was preparing to enter the
ministry of the Wesleyan church, when he became
a convert to Roman Catholicism. He subsequent-
ly studied philosophy and theology in the seminary
of Montreal, and was a professor for some time in
Nicolet college. While there he was ordained
priest, and appointed assistant to the cure of Ber-
thier, after leaving which parish he was a mis-
sionary to the eastern townships. In 1828 he en-
tered the seminary of Quebec as professor, was
elected a director, and soon became principal. He
was the first to introduce the study of Greek into
the seminary, and created a sensation by the intro-
duction of dramatic performances, music, and dia-
logues in public examinations. He was commis-
sioned in 1836, by the provincial government, to
inquire into the system of normal schools in Eu-
rope and the United States, and to procure teach-
ers and apparatus for the new normal school at
Montreal, which was opened upon his return to
Canada in 1837. The insurrection and the suspen-
sion of the constitution, however, soon forced its
projectors to close the institution, and it was not
reopened until twenty years afterward. In 1838
a domestic affliction led him to live thenceforth in
seclusion, and he appeared only to deliver a course
of Lenten lectures, which was published as " Con-
ferences de Notre Dame de Quebec" (1850). He
published also a "Manuel abrege de geographic
moderne " (revised ed., Quebec, 1870).
HOLMES, John McClellan, clergyman, b. in
Livingston, N. Y., 22 Jan., 1834. He was the son
of an eminent minister of the Reformed church,
and was graduated at Williams in 1853, and at the
New Brunswick theological seminary in 1857. He
became pastor of a church in Brooklyn, N. Y., in
1859, of the Reformed church in Hudson, N. Y., in
1865, and in 1877 of the State street Presbyterian
church in Albany, N. Y. He was for several years
a member of the educational and missionary boards
of the Reformed church, president of the general
synod in 1876. a delegate to the Pan-Presbyterian
council at Edinburgh in 1877, and moderator of
the Presbyterian synod of New York in 1884. He
was also for some time an associate editor of the
"Christian Intelligencer," and has contributed
largely to the religious press. Many of his ser-
mons have been published.
HOLMES, Mary Jane, author, b. in Brookfield, Mass. Her father was a brother of the
