Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1900, volume 4).djvu/546

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506
NEWSHAM
NEWTON

The bishop took charge of the boy, and on 15 May, 1820, he was admitted to the institution. His artis- tic taste was developed by its dii'ectors, who placed him with George Catlin,"the portrait-painter, and Hugh Bridport, the miniature-painter, for instruc- tion. When he was seventeen years old he was placed with Cephas G. Childs. the engraver and part- ner of Henry Inman in the lithographic business, where he remained for four years. Here he learned the art of drawing upon stone for lithography, in which he became justly celebrated as the most skil- ful and faithful lithographic portrait draughtsman this country has yet produced. One of his earliest attempts was a portrait of liis benefactor. Bishop White, for the institution that had fostered him. His most important works, for size, subject, and execution, are his portraits of Chief-Justice Mar- shall and William Rawle, the elder, both after paintings by Henry Inman.


NEWSHAM. Joseph Parkinson, lawyer, b. in Preston, Lancashire, England, 24 May, 1837. He came early to this country, and was educated in the public schools at St. Louis, Mo. Studying law, he was admitted to the bar in Hlinois and Missouri in 1860, and practised in St. Louis. En- tering the National army, he served on the staff of Gen. -John C. E'remont, and afterward on that of Gen. Andrew J. Smith during the entire campaign of the latter from Paducah to Shiloh. He was then adjutant of the 32d Missouri volunteers, and re- signed, 4 July, 1864. The same year he removed to Louisiana and took an active part in the work of reconstruction. He was admitted to the Louisiana bar in 1865, and was a member of the Reconstruc- tion convention of 1867-'8. He subsequently es- tablished and edited " The Feliciana Kepnblican," the first Republican newspaper in that part of the state from 1868 till 1872. He sat in the 40th con- gress, serving from 18 July, 1868, till 3 March, 1869, and was a candidate for re-election, but his opponent, Michael Ryan, Democrat, obtained the seat. On Mr. Newsham's asserting that fraud and intimidation had been used, the house, after in- vestigation, declared the latter legally elected, and he consequently served from 25 May, 1870, till 5 Dec. of the same year. Since then he has resided on his plantation at Bayou Sara, La., and served as parish judge and parish attornev.


NEWTON. Gilbert Stuart, artist, b. in Hali- fax. N. S.. 20 Sept., 1794; d. in Chelsea, Eng- land, 5 Aug., 1835. His father, Edward, was Brit- ish collector of customs at Halifax ; his mother was the daughter of a Scottish loyalist named Stuart, who fled from Rhode Island to Halifax, and thence to England, at the beginning of the Revolution. After the fathers death Mrs. New- ton removed with her family to the neighbor- hood of Boston, Mass., about 1803. Gilbert left Boston when yet a youth and went to Italy, where he studied a year. He had painted some pictures and portraits before leaving home which excited attention and were thought very promising, and while in Italy he produced a portrait of an official which was much admired, but he decided to go to England. In Paris, on his way, he met Washing- ton Allston, Sir David Wilkie, and Charles R. Leslie, and returned with Leslie to England. He was admitted as a student at the Royal academy, elected an associate in 1828, and an academician in 1832. His career in England was one of brill- iant success. Upon his first arrival in that country he and Washington Irving had lodgings together in Langham place. Irving writes in 1824 to Les- lie : " When you see Newton, remember me affec- tionately to him. I often look back with fondness and regret to the times we lived together in Lon- don in a delightful community of thought and feeling, struggling our way onward in the world, but cheering and encouraging each other. I find nothing to supply the place of that heartfelt fel- lowship." In 1831 Mr. Newton was ill, and, as his physician urged his taking a voyage, he sailed for the United States in October of that year. The following August he married in Boston, and he returned to England with his wife in October, 1832. Nearly three years later he died, leaving his widow and one daughter. He was buried in the cemetery of the village church at Wimbledon. A monument, executed by Sir Francis Chantry, was raised to him by a few of his fellow-academicians, bearing the inscription : " To Gilbert Stuart New- ton this monument is raised by a few friends who admired him as an artist and loved him as a man." What is to be said of Mr. Newton as a man may be read in the letters of Leslie and Washington Ir- ving that are quoted in the " History of the Arts of Design." in a notice of Mr. Newton by William Dunlap. Dunlap shows some irritation that New- ton should have considered himself an Englishman, but he was certainly such by birth and parentage, and his whole career was in England. He took to portraiture at first, mainly, it appears, because he disliked the labor of study required for effective genre painting, in which direction his greatest tal- ent lay. The remonstrances of his friends, how- ever, particularly Washington Irving, had their effect, and he soon afterward produced his first subject picture, " A Poet Reading his Verses to an Impatient Gallant." He had an extraordinary eye for color, and possessed considerable humor, excel- ling particularly in the illustration of scenes from Moliere, " Gil Bias," etc. Besides portraits, he painted about sixty pictures, including "Falstaff escaping in the Buck-Basket," " Girl at her Devo- tions," " The Adieu," " The Dull Lecture," " The Duenna," " The Late Player," in the New York historical society's rooms, and " The Trunk Scene in ' Cymbeline.' " Many of them have been en- graved. His portraits include likenesses of Sir Walter Scott at Abbotsford, Thomas Moore, Syd- ney Smith, Henry Hallam. and Washington Irving. While Mr. Newton was in this country in 1831-'2 he painted eight small portraits. His "DuU Lec- ture" is in the Lenox library. New York city. Washington Irving described this picture, at the request of the artist, in these lines :

"Frostie age, frostie age,
Vain all your learning !
Drowsie page, drowsie page,
Evermore turning !
Young head no lore will heed.
Young heart's a reckless rover ;
Young beautie, while you read,
Sleeping, dreams of absent lover."


NEWTON, Hubert Anson, mathematician, b. in Sherburne, N. Y., 19 March, 1830; d. in New Haven, 13 Aug., 1896. He was graduated at Yale, after which he studied higher mathematics. In 1852 he was appointed tutor, and entering on that office in January, 1853, he was given charge of tTie entire mathematical department at once, owing to the illness of Prof. Anthony D. Stanley. He was elected full professor in 1855, and, after spending a year abroad, began the active discharge of the duties of his chair, which he continued until his death. His scientific work in pure mathematics includes researches "On the Construction of Certain Curves by Points," " Certain Transcendental Curves," and similar papers, but his most valuable investiga- tions were in connection with meteors and like