COL. TOBIAS LEAR.
��Lear, was born March n, 1792, and died after a short illness, of cholera, Oct. 1, 1 S3 2.* He was a lawyer by profession, a prominent member of the Washington bar, where his talents and sterling worth had endeared him to his professional associates and secured to him honor and success. He was a most estimable man, talented, and well educated, and is remembered with great interest and affection by those of his old friends still living in this city with whom I have conversed. In noticing his decease the National In- telligencer, of Oct. 2, 1832, says, —
"His amiable manner, his high-toned tionor and benevolence, formed a char- acter seldom surpassed, and that placed him high in the confidence of his fellow- citizens.*'
The Washington bar held a meet- ' ing and designated six of its leading members to act as pall bearers, and voted to wear crape badges to the end of the ensuing term of court, in memory of one whose talents and vir- tues gave luster to an honorable pro- fession, and in whom was developed the excellencies of an irreproachable life, and an exalted character. He was the attorney of the Bank of the United States, the branch which was located in Washington. His residence, with office adjoining the house, on the south side of Pennsylvania Avenue, between 21st and 22c! streets, N. W., was purchased after Col. Lear's death, and was occupied by his son and fam- ily and the widow Lear, until her death, Dec. 2, 1856.
Benjamin Lincoln Lear married, first, Miss Maria Morris, to whose memory one of the described monu- ments was erected. She was a sister of Commodore Charles Morris, of dis- tinguished fame as an officer of the U. S. Navy, who died Jan. 27, 1856.
- " Brewster's Rambles about Portsmouth," usu-
ally correct and very reliable, in vol. 1, page 272, records Benjamin Lincoln Lear's death as occur- ring in 1831, and Col. Tobias Lear, Oct. 10, 1816, aged 50. Lincoln Lear died in 1832, and his father, Oct. 11, 1810, aged 54.
Appleton's American Encyclopaedia of 1872, gives Col. Lear's death Oct. 11, 18J0. corrected in subsequent editions.
��Benjamin Lincoln Lear's second wife was Miss Louisa Bumford, a daughter of Col. George Bumford, Chief of Ordnance, War Department, who was breveted for distinguished services during the war of 1812, and died March 25, 184S. He resided at and owned the beautiful estate in Washington called Kalorama. The only descendant of the family was a daughter of Benjamin Lincoln Lear and Louisa Bumford Lear, born after her father's death. With her husband, Wilson Eyre, of Philadelphia, she now resides at Newport, R. I.
In a law-suit for the papers belong- ing to Col. Lear, this grand-daughter established her claim, the contestants being the children of Commodore Henley, a brother of Mrs. Tobias Lear.
The widow of Benjamin Lincoln Lear married Richard C. Derby, of Boston, and both are now dead.*
Col. Tobias Lear was born in the Lear Mansion, on Hunking street, in Portsmouth, N. H., Sept. 19, 1762. His father, Captain Tobias Lear, was originally a ship-master, but retiring from the sea, "owned and cultivated one of the largest and most valuable farms " in the section of the State where he resided. The farm was sit- uated on Sagamore Creek, near where the first settlement in New Hampshire was made, and has since been known as the " Jacob Sheafe Farm," bordering on the creek, just opposite to the bridge, connecting Portsmouth with Newcastle, near the now well-known
- Before sending this sketch for publication, I
consulted that truly excellent lady, ilie widow of Commodore Beverly Kennon, who was killed by the bursting of a cannon on board of the U. H. Steamer ' Princeton,' Feb. 28, 1844. She is the great grand-daughter of Martha Washington, and occupies a palatial home in Georgetown, known a- 'The Tudor Place,' surrounded by many pre- cious and rare relics belonging to Washington and other distinguished families of his times. 1 consult- ed also the wife ot Hon. J. Bayard H. Smith, of Baltimore, a daughter of Commodore Henley, both estimable ladies whose whitened locks are to each a crown of beauty. Graceful in form, sym- metrical in character, cultured in mind, they becom- ingly adorn the high social positions they deserv- edly occupy. They both bear kinship to Mrs. Lear and Lady Washington, and with recollections undimmed, are reliable authorities. I therefore believe this sketch to be substan- tiallv correct.
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