Page:Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography volume 4.djvu/561

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VIRGINIA BIOGRAPHY


421


November 18, 1794, in Nelson county, Vir- ginia, daughter of Robert and Margaret Jor- dan (Cabell) Rives, and granddaughter of William and Lucy (Shands) Rives, was a member of one of the oldest and most con- spicuous families of that state. They had three children : Robert Lawrence, Margaret, Elizabeth.

Robert Lawrence Brown, son of Alexan- der and Mary S. (Rives) Brown, was born March 9, 1820, in Nelson county, Virginia, and died at his home, "Sunny Side," in that county, June 8. 1880. He was a student of the University of Virginia from 1836 to 1839, and for some years engaged in busi- ness as a farmer, planter and merchant. Later he was for some years director of the Lynchburg Female Seminary, after which he returned to Nelson county and taught in the Norwood high school. He was a lieu- tenant of the Provost Guard at- Lynchburg during the war with the states. He mar- ried (first) at Glenmore, April 6, 1842, Sarah Cabell Callaway, daughter of George and Mary (Cabell) Callaway, born Novem- ber 23, 1820, died July 25, 1849. She was the mother of three children : Alexander, George Mayo and Alice Cabell. The first lived to maturity and w^as for many years an active and useful citizen. The others died in in- fancy. Mr. Brown married (second) Sep- tember 2,'j, 1853, Margaret Baldwin Cabell, born September 27, 1826, daughter of Mayo and Mary Cornelia Briscoe (Daniel) Cabell, died August 29, 1877. The Cabell family is noticed at considerable length elsewhere in this work. The founder of the family in this country was Dr. William Cabell, whose history is elsewhere given, and he was a son of Colonel William (2) Cabell, who married Mary Jordan and was the father of Mayo Cabell, born November 7, 1800, a merchant and very capable business man. He was sole executor of his father's large estate, and succeeded the latter as administrator of the estate of Dr. George Callaway, of Glenmore. At the age of thirty-five years he was also placed in charge of "Montezuma," the estate of his sister, Mrs. McClelland. He was a county magistrate, prominent in the Epis- copal church, and, while a Whig, was loyal to his state during the war between the states. His first wife, Mary Cornelia Bris- coe (Daniel) Cabell, was a daughter of Judge William and Margaret (Baldwin)


Daniel, and aunt of United States Senator John W. Daniel. She was born October 14, 1804, and died March 7, 1843, ^^ Union Hill, Virginia. Their daughter, Margaret Bald- win, became the wife of Robert Lawrence Brown, as above noted. Their children : Mayo Cabell, died at the age of four years ; Robert Lawrence (2), now in business in Kansas City, Missouri ; Mary Cornelia Bris- coe, married Dr. James Matthew Ranson, of Charlestown. West Virginia ; William Cabell, of further mention ; Lucy Rives ; Joseph Carrington. a banker at Osage City; Elizabeth Daniel, unmarried ; Mayo Cabell.

Rt. Rev. William Cabell Brown, fourth son of Robert Lawrence Brown, and third child of his second wife, Margaret Baldwin (Cabell) Brown, was born November 22, 1861, at Lynchburg, Virginia. He was edu- cated largely under his father's care at Nor- wood high school, and the schools of Nel- son county, Virginia. For seven years he was a teacher at the Episcopal High School, Alexandria, Virginia, after which he attend- ed the Theological Seminary of Virginia, from which he was graduated in 1891. He was ordained deacon, June 26, 1891, and ad- vanced to the priesthood, August 2, of the same year. Immediately thereafter he went to Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, where for twenty-three years he continued as mission- ary, and was recalled to Virginia in 1914 to be consecrated as bishop. He was elected bishop of Porto Rico in 1904, and in Octo- ber, 1914, was consecrated as bishop of Rich- mond. He is the only missionary of his church who has been recalled from the field to accept a bishopric. While in Brazil he translated the Bible into the Portuguese language to facilitate his work among the people of that empire, now republic. Bishop Brown comes to his labors in his native state ecjuipped by long experience and faithful study, and is deservedly popular with both clergy and laity.

He married, August 4. 1891, at Christ Church, Georgetown, Virginia, Ida Mason Dorsey, a granddaughter of Senator Mason, born in Baltimore, Maryland, daughter of John Thomas Beale and Katherine Chew (Mason) Dorsey, both of whom are now deceased. Of the five children of Bishop Brown, the oldest. William Cabell, died in Brazil at the age of three years ; the others are : John Dorsey, a teacher in the Epis-