KNOWLES. 565 KNOX. iiianufaclure of cotton warps, but from 1859 was conccrnctl priucipally with liis inveiilioiis. He const lucted a steam pump, tlic manufacture of which was so successful that the Knowles pump- works, later acquired by the Blake Company of Boston, became the largest of the sort in the L'nited States. A tape-binding loom was also manufactured by liim under various patents. He was elected to the ilassachusetts Legislature, as a member of the Assembly in 1802 and 1865, and of the Senate in 1809. KNOWL'TON, Frank Hall (I860-). An AnH-rican botanist and paleontologist, born in Brandon, 't. He took a science course in Mid- (llel)ury College, and in 1890 took the degree of Pli.D. at Columbian University, Wasliington, where he had been professor of botany for the nine preceding years. From 1884 lie was em- ployed in the United States National Museum as botanist, then as paleontologist ; he became head of the latter department in the United States Geological Survey in 1900. He edited The I'Ifiiit World, and wrote botanical definitions for the fitan(l<irj. Century, and Y€hs1cr's diction- aries, special articles for the Jeirixh Encyclo- pedia, and Fossil Wood and lAgnitc of the Po- tomac Formation (1889) ; Fossil Flora of Alaska (1894); and Catalogue of the Cretaceous and Tertiary Plants of Sorth America (1898). KNOWLTON, Thomas (1740-70). An Ameri- can soldier, born at Asliford. Conn. He served during the French and Indian War in Putnam's Rangers, rising to the rank of lieutenant, and in 1862 joined the e.xpedition which captured the city of Havana. Two years afterwards he took part in an Indian campaign under General Brad- street, and then retired to his farm at Ashford, where he remained until the outbreak of the Revolution, when he led a company of Connecti- cut militia to Boston, the first troops from an- other colony to come to the aid of Slassachusetts. He l>ore a conspicuous part in the battle of Bunker Hill, where his men formed the left wing of the American forces, and for his services on this occasion was promoted to the rank of major. Tn 1770 he was given the command of a regiment of rangers with the rank of lieuten- ant-mlonel. and was instrumental in .selecting Xalhan Halo for the mission which terminated fatally for the spy. On Septemljer 10. 1770, anx- ious to retrieve ine reputation of the Connecticut tioops which bad sufTered considerably at Kip's Bay. he led a desperate charge at Harlem Heights and fell mortally wounded. His death aroused the patriots to renewed efTorts. and they finally drove the Britisli from the field. Washington mentioned liiiii the ne.xt day in general orders as a soldier of whom "any country in the world might well be proud." KNOW-NOTHINGS. In American history, a secret political (larty or society, which after 18.^2 suddenly gained the ascendency in several States, and then as rapidly declined. Its work was closely allied with the movement of the 'American' and 'Xativist' parties, and it aimed, through very stringent naturalization laws, to make politically powerless the large number of immigrants then settling in the United States, and through other means (o check the growth of foreign inilucmes and ideas. A decade earlier the American Party had shown strength in New York City, and after the Democratic victorj- of 1843, which resulted in many local offices being given to the foreign-born, the native Americans carried the city election of April, 1844. In the tall of the .same year both New York and Phila- delphia gave Nativist majorities, but three years later the party had disappeared in the former city. The Twenty-ninth Congress had si. Nativist members, while the Thirtieth had only one. The Irish famine and the revolutionaiy movements in Kurope during 1848 and 1849, "with the re- action thereafter, occasioned a greatly increased immigration, and caused a reappearance of the Nativist movement in the form of a secret so- ciety variously known as 'The Sons of '70." or "The Supreme Order of the Star Spangled Ban- ner,' which was primarily opposed to immigration and the spread of Catholicism in America, and the members of which, upon being questioned about their order, uniformly replied "I don't know.' The party which came to be organized, and which from the above circumstance was popularly called the 'Know-Nothing Party,' con- ducted its work in profound secrecy, holding secret conventions, and often so casting its vote as to make it an indeterminate quantity in many elections. In the State elections of 1854, the party carried Massachusetts and Delaware. In New York it jiolled more than 120,000 votes, and it also showed strength in the Middle States. In 1855 it was successful in four New England States, and in New Y'ork. Kentucky, and Califor- nia. Its strength was due in no small measure to the dissolution of the Whig Party. EfTorts were made, by means of the questions raised by this movement, to supersede the anti-slavery agitation, which was then rapidly increasing, but in 1850 the latter obscured the former, and many Know-Nothings joined with the Republicans in supporting Frfimont for the Presidency. The party, however, held a 'secret grand council' on February 19, 1850, at which a platform was adopted including a proposition for a twenty-one years' residence qualification for naturalization. On February 22d an ojien convention was held. which some 227 delegates attended, and by this convention Millard Fillmore was nominated for the Presidency, and A. J. Donelson of Tennessee for the Vice-Presidency, these nominations being later adopted by the remnant of the Whigs. The delegates from the States of the North refused to be bound by the vote of this convention, and Fremont became the candidate for the Presidency of the so-called North Americans, as well as of the Republicans, tn the early State elections, in the fall of 1850. the party sueceeded in electing Governors of Rhode Island and New Hampshire, but in the Presidential election there was a very great decrease in the party's vote, many of its members apparently voting the Republican ticket. The party secured only eight electoral votes, those of JIaryland. In 18.57 it carried Rhode Island and Maryland, but by 1800 had entirely disap- peared. KNOX, Hknry (1750-1806). An American soldier, prominent in the Revolutionary War. He was born in Boston, where he was engaged in business as a bookseller from 1770 to 1775. He entered the Continental .Army immediately after the Battle of Lexington, served as aide to (ieneral Ward at the battle of Bunker Hill and during the siege of Boston, and distinguished himself by procuring from Lake George and the Canadian frontier a large number of cannon.
