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ordinary political school, but he was the Judge embodying in his life the highest character and attributes of the office which he laid down only with his life.

Another who knew him well, the first Rector of St. John's Episcopal Church, with which he communed, in which he was a bright and shining light and for which he labored in the promotion of its welfare and the service of his divine Master, -thus speaks of him: "honest, generous, kind-hearted and as true a man as the sun ever shone upon, always the christian gentleman who carried his religion with him in all the walks of life and never ashamed to acknowledge himself a disciple of the Man of Galilee."" Other testimonials and from various classes were given of his worth, but we have said enough to establish the fact that he had ever found a place in the hearts of those who knew him and among whom he lived and with whom he labored in the making of the State and in crowning it with the glory of later years.

John James Dyer was the son of Zebulon and Rebekah Dyer, and was born in Franklin, Pendleton County, Virginia (now West Virginia), July, 26th, 1809. His ancestors were of English nationality; we are not advised of his maternal ancestry. His mother, Rebekah, was the daughter of Major Wagner of Revolutionary fame. Judge Pennypacker, of the Virginia Court and later U. S. Senator, was a brother-in-law of Judge Dyer and a relative also of the lady whom he later married; it was through his influence, in part at least, that Mr. Dyer secured his appointment as Judge. His higher

education was commenced in the "Henderson select classical school" conducted by the Rev. John Henderson who was a prominent Presbyterian minister and resided in Augusta County near Richmond, Va., and completed in the University of Virginia from which he was graduated. He then entered the law school of Judge Brisco G. Baldwin, a member of the Court of Appeals, at Staunton, Va., and after completing the course was admitted to the bar and practiced in Pendleton and adjoining counties. His preparatory education was no doubt

thorough as the school had the reputation of sending out into the world many bright boys, who, after graduating, became celebrated in the State as business and professional men.

In the fall of 1835 he married Miss Mary C., daughter of Hon. Joseph H. Samuels, of the Valley of Virginia. In 1842 this estimable lady died leaving three children, Miss Lucy (who later married Mr. Geo. Crane, of Dubuque, a prominent attorney and postmaster under Gen. Harrison), Chapman and Mary, also later married. In the spring of 1845 Judge Dyer married Miss Lucy W. Samuels, sister of his former wife. These ladies were sisters of the Hon. Benjamin M. Samuels, so well known to the people of Iowa in earlier years as one of the most talented and eloquent members of the State bar and whose genial qualities endeared him to the public; he was a candidate for Governor at a later period but being a staunch Democrat in Republican days he shared the fate of his party and was defeated.

Soon after his marriage and while Iowa was yet a Territory he came west and located, first in Jackson County, in the new Territory, and thus became a member of the Old Settlers' Society. Most of the Southern people from Virginia, Kentucky and Tennessee had chosen southern Iowa as their new home, while Mr. Dyer selected the northern part of the Territory in which to cast his lot. He first came west to look after some lands he had entered and was so delighted with the prospect before him, the beauty of the land, the enterprise of the citizens, that he decided at once to locate with and among them and so brought his family after his return home for the purpose. Later he selected Dubuque as his future home, where he lived an honored, respected and useful life until in the summer of 1855 he went back to his old home in Virginia and was taken sick and died on the 14th of September, 1855, breathing his life away gently; he was buried at Woodstock, Virginia, in the beautiful historical Shenandoah Valley, beside his first wife, leaving his second wife, her sister, with three children, Charles L., residing in Seattle, Washington; Frank

W. in Minneapolis with whom the mother is living; and the youngest and last child, Will Pendleton, also residing in Minneapolis-these sons of our old friend are doing well in business and are worthy sons of the father.

Judge Dyer will ever be remembered and held in high esteem by those who knew him for his manly virtues, his retiring and unostentatious manner, the freedom of his intercourse with his fellow citizens and for his sound judgment and wise counsel and his truly christian character rather than for any innate greatness. He was a safe and a conservative man in the administration of the affairs of his Court; he was a student as well an administrator of the law; he had a high appreciation of the dignity of his Court and so presided that all having business therein were led to observe the decorum of the place and appreciate the judicial bearing of its incumbent. It being the highest Court within the State and the representative of the Nation in its administration of justice he had no easy task to mark the pathway that others at a later period might follow. He was ever ready to lend a helping hand to his fellow citizens in the furtherance of the development of the city he had chosen as his residence and to promote the general welfare of the people of the State in whose behalf he had so effectually labored in territorial days. He ever lent his aid in behalf of all enterprises having for their object the promotion of the best interest of the people in their developing progress as citizens of the municipality or of the State. He was outspoken in his praise of men deserving well as he was in the condemnation of wrong. Not only the members of his church, for he was a strict churchman, but of all denominations in the city revered his christian character and joined in praise and commendation of his services in behalf of religion, morality and education the foundation of all good government and the happiness of mankind.

In the home circle, by the fire-side, he was the model husband and father and a good entertainer; he delighted in the company of the worthy and meritorious and with them

spent many happy passing hours, talking over the past to which he looked with pride and of the future for which he had great hope in that the State, with whose people he had cast his lot would yet rise higher and higher in the scale of its grandeur and magnitude as the home of a people whose virtues and whose enterprise should fittingly correspond with the beauty and fertility of the land they had made their own. Surely such a life was not spent in vain, nor was his strength wasted in frivolous pursuits after personal gain either of wealth or honor, both came to him honestly as he deserved them. Dying as he had lived he has left behind a name, one of the proudest names inscribed upon the escutcheon of Iowa's heraldry.

"O Christian, let thy faith arise

In every time, in every place;
The Maker of the earth and skies

Is strengthening thee to run the race-
Bid tears depart, subdue thy grief,

Hushed be the sighs and wiped the tears;

Thy God is nigh to give relief

And speaks in mercy I am here'."

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CHARLES SHEPHERD.

A REVOLUTIONARY SOLDier,

BY HIRAM HEATON.

HERE are old men now living who, when boys in eastern States, remember that on the Fourth of July celebrations of those days, an old man would occupy the place of honor, and the orator of the occasion would turn to him, when speaking of the debt of gratitude owed to the patriot soldiers of the War of Independence, and invoke blessings on him as one of the heroes of that struggle. Strong hands would raise the old man aloft that all might see him and the old man's presence would kindle a more intense flame of

patriotic fire in the hearts of the multitude than could be kindled by the most impassioned oratory.

One of these old men came to Iowa in early days, lived a few years and died and was buried within our borders, but the old man's memory has almost faded away and no monument has been reared over his dust to mark a spot that should be one of the most honored in the State.

In 1837 Charles Shepherd came to the Territory of Iowa, from Brooklyn, New York, with his wife, three sons and one daughter-two of the sons were married and had families. Shepherd had served in the War of Independence as a private in the Pennsylvania troops under Captain Patrick Duffee and Colonel Thomas Proctor. For the three years of his actual service he received in 1818 a pension of eight dollars a month. At the time of his application for pension he was fiftyeight years of age; he was living at that time at Duanesburg, New York, but he afterwards moved to Brooklyn where his son, Henry, kept a bowling-alley. Shepherd lived a number of years, after he came to Iowa, in a little cabin beside the Old Territorial road, two miles west of Rome, Henry County. The cabin stood a few rods east of where the road to Millspaugh's mill, at the pres ent time, diverges from the main road. Mr. Shepherd is remembered as being a very small man, whom time had bowed until he almost went double.

It cannot be denied that the Shepherd family was not held in high esteem by the neighboring settlers, but this was because of the worthless character of the sons; one of whom lived with his parents, and all of them depending upon his pension, to a great extent, for a living. However, emigrants and travelers, in passing by the humble cabin, when they learned of the history of its occupants would stop to see the old soldier, that they might be able to tell, they had seen one who had served in the Revolution. They would make him small presents of tobacco and whiskey, for he was not an exception to the rule that "drinking is the soldier's pleasure."

To those who, mindful of the honorable part he had borne

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