ELLIS HENRY ROBERTS
ROBERTS, ELLIS HENRY, treasurer of the United States from July 1, 1897 to July 1, 1905, was born in Utica, New York, September 30, 1827. He was the son of Watkin and Gwen (Williams) Roberts. His parents were both natives of Merionethshire, North Wales; the father emigrated to the United States in 1817, and located in Utica, New York, where Watkin Roberts, a thrifty and industrious stonemason, continued to work at his trade. When Ellis Henry Roberts was nine years old he found employment in a printing office in Utica where he worked hard and passed through the various grades assigned to the printer's boy, and when twelve years old took his place at the case as a compositor. He determined to gain a college education and saved his earnings for that purpose. He attended Whitestown seminary three terms and was admitted to the sophomore class of Yale college in 1847. He worked at his trade during his vacations and thus paid his expenses at Yale. He took prizes including the Townsend prize in English composition in his senior year; he was chosen by his classmates in his junior year first editor of the "Yale Literary Magazine"; and he was graduated A.B., 1850, and received his A.M. degree in course. He was second honor man of his class and divided the Bristed scholarship with a classmate. He was elected principal of the Utica academy on his return home, and resigned the position in 1851 to accept that of working editor of the Utica "Morning Herald," a leading Whig journal of central New York. He soon became part owner, and in 1854 he purchased the property which was in 1870 organized as a stock company, and he continued as chief owner and editor-in-chief, 1854-89. His position as editor of so important a Whig and Republican newspaper brought him into active participation in politics, and he was elected as a Republican member of the state assembly in 1866, and was chosen to the United States congress as the representative from his district to the forty-second and forty-third Congresses, serving 1871-75. James G. Blaine, in "Twenty Years of Congress," says, "Mr. Roberts entered congress with great advantages and resources.
