Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1900, volume 1).djvu/282

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254
BEVERIDGE
BICKER

lock. In 1752 he emigrated to New England, where he remained five years, and then accepted the professorship of languages in the college and academy of Philadelphia. According to his biographer, Alexander Graydon, he was mercilessly imposed upon by the pupils, he being small of stature and a poor disciplinarian. William Bradford published for him a volume of original Latin poems entitled "Epistolæ Familiares et Alia qujedam Miscellanea" (1765). To the Latin poems are appended translations for which the editor quaintly apologizes, since " they are done by students under age, and if the critic will only bear with them till their understandings are mature, I apprehend they are in a fair way of doing better."


BEVERIDGE, John Lourie, b. in Greenwich, N. Y.. 6 July, 1834. In 1842 he removed westward, first to Illinois, and then to Tennessee, where he became a lawyer. In 1855 he returned to Illinois, settling in Chicago, and he gained prominence in his profession. At the beginning of the civil war he volunteered in the service of the United States, and attained the rank of brigadier-general of volunteers. He was elected lieutenant-governor of Illinois in 1872, and in 1873 succeeded Gov. Oglesby as chief executive of the state.


BEVERLY, Robert, historian, b. in Virginia about 1675 ; d. in 1716. He became clerk of the council of Virginia about 1697, when Sir Edmund Andros was governor. This office his father, Maj. Robert Beverly had held before him. His "History of the Present State of Virginia" (London, 1705) included an account of the first settlement of Virginia, and the history of the government until that time. In 1707 a French translation, with fourteen wood-cats by Gribelius, was published in Amsterdam, and in 1722 a second English edition was brought out, with the French illustrations. A third edition, with an introduction by Charles (Campbell, appeared in Richmond (1855). Mr. Beverly was the first American citizen in whose behalf the habeas corpus act was brought into requisition,


BEWLEY, Anthony, clergyman, b. in Tennessee, 22 May, 1804 ; d. at Fort W6rth, Texas, 13 Sept., 1860. Mr. Bewley began preaching in the Tennessee conference of the Methodist Episcopal church in 1829, and was transferred to the Missouri conference in 1843. In the following year the denomination was divided by the slavery question; but Mr. Bewley refused to join his conference in secession, and preached independently, earning his living, meanwhile, by manual labor. Other Methodist preachers of a like mind joined him, and he became their presiding elder. In 1848 a reorganization of the church took place in Missouri, and he entered its service to find himself in a short time stigmatized as aJi abolitionist, and, like his brethren of the same way of thinking, in danger of violence. He continued to preach according to his convictions until 1858, when he was appointed to Texas, but was driven temporarily from his post by threats of violence. Returning in 1860, contrary to the advice of his friends, he remained for a few weeks ; but such was the excitement that he deemed it expedient again to flee for his life. After his departure a reward of $1,000 was offered for his apprehension, and in September, 1860, he was arrested in Missouri, carried back to Fort Worth, Texas, and hanged by the mob, solely because he had proclaimed the injustice of human slavery.


BIARD, Peter (be-are), missionary, b. in Grenoble, France, in 1565 ; d. in France in 1622. As a missionary priest of the Jesuits he came to America, visiting Port Royal, Nova Scotia, in 1611. In 1612 he ascended Kennebec river and established friendly relations with the natives. The following year he visited Penobscot river, about the same time establishing a colony on Mount Desert island, hoping to make it a permanent missionary settlement. The same year, however, the little hamlet was destroyed by the English under Samuel Argall, deputy-governor of Virginia. One of Biard's assistants was killed, and he himself made prisoner and carried away. This outrage caused the earliest actual hostilities between the French and English colonists. In 1616 was published in Lyons, from his pen, the first of the remarkable series of "Jesuit Relations " (40 vols., 1632-72), which have proved among the richest sources of information for historians of America. Biard's volume was entitled "Relation de la nouvelle France," etc.


BIBAUD, Michel (be-bo), Canadian author, b. near Montreal. 20 Jan., 1782; d. there, 3 Aug., 1857. He entered the Roman Catholic college of St. Raphael, and, being naturally inclined to literature, devoted himself to studies in that direction, giving his attention mainly to the defence of Canadian nationality and the preservation there of the French vernacular. He published the first French histoi-y of Canada since the conquest, produced much creditable poetry, wrote an essay on "Arithmetique elementaire." and contributed to the leading French publications of Canada. During the latter part of his life he was engaged in translating into French the report of the geological commission.—His son, Francois Marie Uncas Maximilien, author, b. in Montreal in November, 1824, is law professor at the Jesuit college in his native city. His literary work, which has been mainly in the line of history, includes "Discours historique sur les races sauvage de I'Amerique septentrionale" (1846); "Les sagamas illustre de I'Amerique septentrionale" (1848); "Dictionnaire historiques des hommes illustres du Canada et de I'Amerique" (1857); "Tableau historique des progres materiels et intellectuels du Canada " (1858); and "Pantheon Canadien " (1858).


BIBB, George Minos, b. in Virginia, 30 Oct., 1770; d. in Georgetown, D. C, 14 April, 1859. He was graduated at Princeton in 1792, studied law, and settled in Kentucky, where he was presently elected to the legislature, three times chosen chief justice of the state, and for two years in its senate. In 1811-’4 and 1829-'35 he was a member of the U. S. senate. President Tyler appointed him secretary of the treasury in 1844. after which he practised law in Washington, and was an assistant in the attorney-general's office. He is the author of "Reports of Cases at Common Law and in Chancery in the Kentucky Court of Appeals" (1808-11).


BIBB, William Wyatt, governor of Alabama, b. in Virginia, 1 Oct., 1780; d. near Fort Jackson, Ala., 9 July, 1820. He was the son of Capt. William Bibb, was graduated at William and Mary college, and studied medicine at the university of Pennsylvania, receiving the degree of M. D. in 1801. Removing to Georgia, he was a member successively of the two branches of the legislature. He was a member of congress from 1807 till 1813, when he was chosen to the U. S. senate, and retained his seat there until 1816. He removed to Alabama, then a territory, and was governor in 1817-'9, when it was admitted as a state, and he was elected as its first executive. He died while in office, and his son, Thomas Bibb, succeeded him as governor, 1820-'1.


BICKER, Walter, soldier, b. in New York city, 29 Feb., 1790; d. at Far Rockaway, L. I., 3 June, 1880. He served in the war of 1812, and at the