Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1900, volume 4).djvu/689

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PARKE
PARKER

cated at the College of Philadelphia. At the be- ginning of the Revolutionary war he entered the Continental army, and he served in the quarter- master's department, and was with Washington's army till the close of hostilities, attaining the rank of lieutenant-colonel. After the peace he lived for some time in Philadelphia, Pa., and afterward in Virginia. Col. Parke published " The Lyric Works of Horace, translated into English Verse, to which .are added a Number of Original Poems " (Philadel- phia, 1786). The volume was issued under the pen-name of "A Native of America." The work was dedicated to Gen. Washington, and the trans- lations, which are in rhymed verse, are paraphrased by the substitution of American public characters for the Roman worthies to whom Horace addressed his odes, and by the application of descriptive pas- sages and allusions to local and contemporary con- ditions. The ode that celebrates the return of Augustus from Spain is made to apply to Wash- ington's victorious return from Virginia. Besides Parke's own productions, the volume contains poems by some of his friends, and parodies by John Wilcocks, a young British officer, and preserves some elegant translations from Anacreon's odes and Ovid's elegies, made more than fifty years be- fore by the prothonotary of the New Castle court, David French (q. v.).


PARKE, John Grubb, soldier, b. in Chester county. Pa., 23 Sept., 1827. He was graduated at the U. S. military academy in 1849, and assigned to the topographical engineers. In 1849-'50 he was engaged in de- termining the start- ing - point of the boundary - line be- tween Iowa and Minnesota, and sub- sequently on the survey of the Little Colorado river, and in charge of surveys for a Pacific rail- road on the thirty- second parallel. He became 1st lieuten- ant of topographi- cal engineers on 1 July, 1856, and was chief astronomer and surveyor in the

delimitation of the

northwestern boundary between the United States and British America from 2 March, 1857, till the beginning of the civil war. He was promoted cap- tain of topographical engineers on 9 Sept., 1861, and appointed brigadier-general of volunteers on 23 Nov. In the beginning of 1862 he accom- panied Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside's expedition to North Carolina, receiving the brevet of lieuten- ant-colonel in the U. S. army for services in the capture of Fort Macon. He was promoted major- general of volunteers on 18 July. 1862, and served as chief of staff of the 9th corps during the Mary- land campaign, being engaged at South Mountain and Antietam. and in the pursuit of the enemy to Warrenton. When Gen. Burnside took command of the Army of the Potomac, Gen. Parke was re- tained as his chief of staff, and was present at the battle of Fredericksburg. He participated in the movement of the 9th corps into Kentucky, and commanded it on the march to Vicksburg. arriv- ing before the surrender. In the reoccupation of Jackson. Miss., he was in command of the left wing of Gen. Sherman's army, receiving the brevet of colonel for his part in the operations. In the East Tennessee campaign he was engaged at Blue Spring in the defence of Knoxville. for which he was subsequently brevetted brigadier-general, and in the following operations against Gen. James Longstreet, after Gen. Burnside resumed command of the corps, he led one of its divisions, and in the Richmond campaign of the Army of the Potomac he was engaged at the battle of the Wilderness and the combats around Spottsylvania, but was then disabled by illness imtil 13 Aug., 1864, when he re- sumed command of the 9th corps before Peters- burg. He was brevetted major-general in the U. S, army for repelling the enemy's assault on Fort Steadman. and took part in the pursuit of Lee's army until it surrendered. He had been commis- sioned as major in the corps of engineers on 17 June, 1864. After commanding the districts of Alexandria and southern New York, he resumed charge of the northwestern boundary survey on 28 Sept., 1866. He superintended the repair and con- struction of fortifications in Maryland in 1867-'8, and was on duty in the office of the chief of engi- neers at Washington, D. C, from 1 June, 1868. He was promoted lieutenant-colonel of engineers in 1879, and colonel in 1884, and in 1887 was ap- pointed superintendent of the U. S. military acad- emy, being retired in 1889. He is the author of reports in "Explorations and Surveys for a Railroad Route from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean" (Washington, 1854-'5); also of "Compilations of Laws of the United States relat- ing to Public Works for the Improvement of Rivers and Harbors" (1877; revised ed., 1887), and " Lavvs relating to the Construction of Bridges over Navigable Waters " (1882 ; revised ed., 1887).


PARKE, Joseph, clergyman. b. in Newton, Mass., 12 March, 1705; d." in Westerly, R. I., 1 March, 1777. He was graduated at Harvard in 1724, studied theology, and was ordained in 1732. From 1733 till 1740 he labored as a missionary among the Indians and English settlers of Rhode Island, residing at Westerly, where he organized a church, in connection with which he established a Sunday-school in 1752, nearly thirty years before the experiment was made in England. He was pastor at Southold. R. I., from 1752 till 1756, but afterward returned to Westerly.


PARKE, Thomas, physician, b. in Chester county. Pa., 6 Aug., 1749; d. in Philadelphia. 9 Jan., 1835. He became a pupil of Robert Proud, the historian, studied medicine under Dr. Cadwala- der Evans, and in 17 rO received from the College of Philadelphia the degree of bachelor of medicine. In 1771 he visited Europe, where he attended clini- cal practice at Guy's and St. Thomas's hospitals, London, and a course of lectures at Edinburgh, returning to Philadelphia in 1773, where he engaged in practice, attaining to eminence in his profession. In 1777 he became a physician at the Pennsylvania hospital, which post he "held for half a century. In 1787 he was one of the founders of the College of physicians of Philadelphia, and from 1818 until his death he was president of this body, and was the last survivor of its founders. He was a member of the American philosophical society as early as 1774, in 1795-6 held the office of curator, and was a director of the Philadelphia library from 1778 until his death.


PARKER, Amasa Junius, b. in Sharon, Conn., 2 June, 1807; d. in Albany, N.Y., 13 May, 1890. His father, Daniel, was for many years a Congregational clergyman, and a teacher in Greenville, N. Y., and elsewhere. The son went to Union in the summer of 1825, passed an examination on the whole course,