Page:Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography volume 3.djvu/45

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UNDER THE CONFEDERACY


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Mary College, \\'illiamsburg, Virginia, in 1842, and practiced his profession in Wash- ington City until 1861. During the years preceding the war, he served on the com- mission, appointed by President Pierce, for the codilication of the district laws. He was also district attorney, and as such con- ducted the prosecution of Daniel E. Sickles for the killing of Philip Barton Key. He retained the office until after the inaugura- tion of Mr. Lincoln, when he went to Vir- ginia with his family. In 1861 he was ap- pointed assistant secretary of war for the Confederate States, and held the position during Secretary of War Benjamin's term of service. Under the cartel of exchange of prisoners of war, as arranged by Generals Dix and Hill, in July, 1862, Mr. Ould was appointed agent of exchange on behalf of the Confederacy, and in this position, which he held until the close of hostilities, he earned the respect of all parties by his humane efforts to effect the exchange of prisoners, and his careful attention to all the details of his office. At Appomattox he tendered his parole to Gen. Grant, who declined to treat him as a prisoner, and sent him under safeguard to Richmond. He was subsequently imprisoned by order of Secretary of War Stanton, was indicted for treason, and tried by a military commission, which promptly acquitted him. He then resumed the practice of law in Richmond.

Tyler, Robert, register of the treasury, born at "Cedar Grove," in New Kent county, ^'irginia, September 9, 1818, eldest son of President John Tyler and Letitia Christian. his first wife. In October, 1833, he entered \Villiam and Mary College, Williamsburg, and graduated from the academic depart-

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ment B. A., 1835 (the sole graduate in that year), and from the law department in 1837. As a young man he displayed fine literary powers and was the author of various poems, among them "Ahasuerus," and "Death, or Medora's Dream." He removed to Philadelphia, and entered on the practice of law, and met with success at the bar. He also engaged actively in political affairs. -At the age of twenty-eight, was elected president of the Irish Repeal Association. During his father's administration, he acted as signer of patents, and for a time as the president's private secretary. In 1847 h^ was appointed solicitor of the sheriff of Philadelphia, holding the office three years, and was afterwards appointed to the office of prothonotary of the supreme court of Pennsylvania, and in which he served until his removal to Richmond, in 1861. In 1854 he introduced and passed in the Democratic State Convention of Pennsylvania, the first resolution passed in any state in favor of a Pacific railroad, and wrote a largely cir- culated pamphlet in its favor. In 1858 he was chairman of the Democratic executive committee of Pennsylvania. He was active in promoting the nomination of Mr. Pierce tor the presidency in 1852, and the nomina- tion of Mr. Buchanan in 1856. Both these presidents held him in the highest esteem, and both offered him missions and offices of importance, all of which he declined. At the time of the Mexican war he recruited and tendered to the government a regiment in Philadelphia, but which was declined, on account of the quota of the state being al- ready filed. He was yet at his post as prothonotary in 1861, when Virginia, his native state, seceded. His southern senti- ments were well known throughout Phila-