Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1900, volume 2).djvu/158

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138
DEMAREST
DEMING

DEMAREST, David D., clergyman, b. in Har- rington, Bergen eo., N". J., ;:30 July, 1819. He was graduated at Rutgers in 1837, and at the New Brunswick theological seminary in 1840, and en- tered the ministry of the Reformed Dutch church. After holding pastorates in Catskill, Flatbush (Ulster CO.), New Brunswick, and Hudson, he be- came, in 1865, professor of pastoral theology and sacred rhetoric in New Brunswick seminary. He received the degree of D. I), from Princeton in 1857. Dr. Demarest has published sermons and addresses, and " History and Characteristics of the Reformed Protestant Dutch Church " (New York, 185G); "Practical Catechetics" (1882); and "The Huguenots on the Hackensaek," a paper read be- fore the Huguenot society of America, 13 April, 1885 (New Brunswick, 1886). He was also one of the editing committee of the " Centennial of the Theological Seminary of the Reformed Church in America " (New York, 1885), and has contributed largely to the " Christian Intelligencer," and to other magazines and reviews.


DEMAREST, John, clergyman, b. in New Bridge, N. J., in 1763 ; d. in 1837. When a boy. he was taken prisoner by a drunken Hessian trooper, whom he pushed off his "horse while fording a stream, and thus escaped. He studied under Di-. Solomon Froeligh, and was licensed as a minister in the Re- formed Dutch church in 1789. He owned the farm at Tappan where Maj. John Andre was buried. In August, 1821, the British government, at the request of Andre's sisters, sent a man-of-war to transfer the remains to England. The Duke of York, uncle of Queen Victoria, was on board, and was entertained by Mr. Demarest, who afterward received from the duke a gold-lined snuff-box, made from the cedar-tree whose roots had been found entwined about the skeleton. Andre's sisters sent him a silver communion service, designed for the use of a Roman Catholic priest, under a mistaken idea that such was his character. Mr. Demarest returned the service, with explanations, and it was replaced by a large silver cup, appropriately in- scribed. Mr. Demarest seceded from the Reformed church, with Dr. Solomon Froeligh, in 1822, and was suspended in 1824. — His grandson, James, b. in Williamsburg, L. I., 28 June, 1832. was graduated at Union in 1852, and at New Brunswick seminary in 1856. He has held pastorates in Hackensaek and Newark, N. J., Chicago, 111., and Kingston and Fort Plain, N. Y., and has published numerous sermons, including " Duty of the Reformed Church in the Future as foreshown by its Course in the Past " (in " Centennial Discourses," 1876). Union college gave him the degree of D. D. in 1877.


DEMERS, Jerome (de-mers'), Canadian educator, b. in St. Nicholas, near Quebec, Canada, 1 Aug., 1774; d. in Quebec, 17 May, 1853. He was educated at the Seminary of Quebec, where he finished his classical course in 1795, and his theological course in 1798. On 24 Aug. of the latter year he was ordained a priest of the Roman Catholic church. He became director of the Seminary of Quebec on 10 Aug., 1800, and was its superior in 1815-'21, 1824-'30, and 1836-42, following the rule of the seminary, which permits the same person to hold the office only six years in succession. Father Demers became vicar-general in 1825. During his connection with the seminary, a period of over fifty years, he taught, successively or at the same time, physics, chemistry, astronomy, architecture, philosophy, and theology. He was distinguished as an orator, and had considerable influence, doing much to promote a taste for natural philosophy and the fine arts. He published " Institutiones Philosophie^e " (Quebec, 1835), and left manuscript treatises on physics, astronomy, and architecture.


DEMERS, M., R. C. bishop, b. in Canada ; d. in Vancouver's island in 1871. He went to the North- west territory in 1838, and was engaged in mission- ary duty among the Indians till 1847, when he was consecrated bishop of Vancouver's island.


DEMEUNIER, or DESMEUNIER, Jean Nicolas (day-men-yay), French statesman, b. in Nozeroy, Franche-Comte,^ 15 March, 1751 ; d. in Parrs, 7 Feb., 1814. He was deputy to the states-general in 1789. He took also a part in the deliberations of the constituent assembly, which elected I him to serve on the legislative cdtamittee. When the assembly dissolved, Demeunier, foreseeing the reign of terror, left France in 1791. He came to New York, where he remained five yeai's, and on his return was made a senator by Consul Bonaparte in 1802. Demeunier is the author of " Voyages de Vancouver " ; " Esprit des usages et des coutumes des differents peuples"(3 vols., 1776-'80); '■ Essai sur les Etats-Unis " (1786) ; and " L'Amerique in- dependante" (4 vols., Ghent, 1790).


DE MILLE, James, Canadian author, b. in St.. John, N. B., in August, 1837 ; d. in Halifax, N. S., 28 Jan., 1880. He was graduated at Brown in 1854, and while in college wrote several songs that are still sung by students. He also contributed to newspapers in St. John while he was very young. He held the chair of classics in Acadia college in 1860-'5, and that of history and rhetoric in Dal- housie college, Halifax, from 1865 till his death. He published " Helena's Household " (New York, 1858); "The Martyr of the Catacombs" (1858); "Andy O'Hara" (1800); "John Wheeler's Two Uncles " (1860) ; " The Soldier and the Spy " (1865) ;. " The Arkansas Ranger " (1865) ; " The Dodge- Club " (1866) ; " Cord and Creese " (1867) ; " The American Baron " (1870) ; " The Lady of the Ice " (1870); "The Cryptogram" (1871); "A Comedy of Terrors " (1871) ; "An Open Question " (1872)'; and " The Living Link " (1874). He was also the author of books for boys, including " B. 0. W. C," " Fire in the Woods," " Boys of Grand Pre School." " Lost in the Fog," " Among the Brigands," " The Seven Hills," " The Winged Lion," " The Young: Dodge Club," " Picked up Adrift," and " Treasures of the Sea." In 1878 he finished a treatise on rhetoric, which was published in New York.


DEMING, Henry Champion, lawyer, b. in Middle Haddam, Coini., in 1815: d. in Plartford. 9 Oct., 1872. He was graduated at Yale in 1836, and at Harvard law-school in 1839. He then opened a law office in New York city, but devoted himself chiefly to literature, being engaged with Park Benjamin in editing the " New World," a literary monthly. He removed to Hartford in 1847, served in the lower house of the legislature in 1849-'50 and 1859-61, and in 1851 M'as a member of the state senate. He was mayor of Hartford in 1854-8 and in 1860-2, having been elected as a democrat. Early in the war he opposed coercion, even after the fall of Sumter, and when asked to preside at a war-meeting on 19 April, 1861, declined in a letter in which he said that he would support the Federal government, but would not "sustain it in a war of aggression or invasion of the seceded states." When Washington was threatened, however, he favored the prosecution of the war, and on 9 Oct., 1861, was elected by acclamation speaker pro tempore of the state house of representatives, the republican majority thus testifying their approval of his course. In September, 1861, he accepted a commission as colonel of the "charter oak" regiment (the 12th Connecticut), re-