Page:One of a thousand.djvu/638

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624 WALKER. WALKER. was formed, George W. Walker & Co. and Miles Pratt & Co. uniting, from which, in 1877, came the Walker & Pratt Manufac- turing Co., a corporation with a capital of three hundred thousand dollars, organized under the laws of Massachusetts. Of this company Mr. Walker is president. The works of the company are at Watertown, and their ware-rooms are in the city of Boston. For the past twenty years Mr. Walker has been a resident of Maiden, taking an active interest in local affairs, and has been repeatedly called to public office. He was the chairman of the board of selectmen GEORGE W WALKER. during the last two years of Maiden's corporate existence as a town, and has been on the board of sinking fund com- missioners and trustees of the public library since they were established. He was one of the representatives from the 8th Middlesex district (Maiden and Everett) in the Legislature of 1885-86, and served on the committees on finance and expenditures. Mr. Walker's business career has been conspicuously successful, and in public office he has served with credit to himself and satisfaction to his constituents. He is a member of Con- verse Lodge F. & A. M., Royal Arch Chapter of the Tabernacle, Beauseant Commandery of Knights Templar, all of Maiden. His church relations are with the First Congregational church of that city. In Albany, N. Y., on September 2, 1857, he married Elizabeth Mary, daughter of John Wesley and Gertrude (Van Schaick) Kinnicutt. Mrs. Walker died June 3, 1879. Of this union were five children : George Kinnicutt, Arthur Willis, Gertrude Annie, Bessie Louise, and Mary Lena Walker. F"or his second wife he married in Port- land, Maine, on December 14, 1880, Mrs. Dorcas Elizabeth Hagar, daughter of Abiel and Elizabeth (Philbrick) Shaw. Mr. Walker is one of the six owners of Big Five Island, located in Sheepscot Bay, off the coast of Maine, where they usually reside with their families during the months of July and August. Mr. Walker is one of the two members of this com- munity who own steam yachts, which furnish additional recreation to their com- rades. WALKER, HENRY, son of Ezra and Maria A. Walker, was born in the city of Boston, his present residence. His early education he obtained at the public schools of Boston, receiving the Franklin medal and other prizes at the Boston Latin school, where he fitted for Harvard College. He was graduated from Harvard in 1855, in the class with Alex- ander Agassi/, Phillips Brooks, Theodore Lyman, F. II. Sanborn, and others, and commenced the study of law in the office of llutchins & Wheeler. Three days after the first gun was fired at Fort Sumter, as adjutant of the 4th regiment, Massachusetts volunteer militia, he patriotically answered the call of Presi- dent Lincoln for troops, being the first Harvard graduate to take up arms for his country. The 4th regiment was the first to leave Massachusetts, and the first to land at Fortress Monroe, ensuring the safety of that most important military posi- tion. After serving there, at Newport News and at Hampton, he returned home with the regiment, and actively engaged in the rallying of troops, and in other duties pertaining to the war. In the tall of 1861 he was commissioned lieutenant-colonel of the 4th regiment, and in the following year, as its colonel, was ordered with it to the department of the Gulf. There he took part in the campaign up the Teche and the siege of Port Hudson, holding several im- portant positions. Honorably discharged at the expiration of his term of service, he returned to Boston early in 1S65 and re- sumed the practice of law.