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William Proctor Mellen

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William Proctor Mellen

Birth
USA
Death
17 Nov 1873 (aged 59)
Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio, USA
Burial
Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio, USA GPS-Latitude: 39.1700821, Longitude: -84.5241928
Plot
Sec 45 - Lot 9 - Space 13
Memorial ID
View Source
Married # 3 ELLEN SEYMOUR CLARK(E). (born 11 Jul 1833 in Green Bay, Wisconsin; married William Proctor Mellen in 1856. Ellen Mellen was the sister of Isabel, his second wife. Ellen wrote a will in 1881, so the assumption could be made that she was still living.

~

The Rocky Mountain News
Denver, Colorado, Friday, June 23, 1871

No person has as yet been selected for president of the colony, although several prominent gentlemen of the United States have been mentioned. General R. A. Cameron of Greeley, formerly vice president and superintendent and general manager of this colony. W. E. Pabor is secretary, and Mr. E. S. Nettleton is chief engineer, both of these gentlemen having formerly held similar positions in Union colony and Mr. William P. Mellen, late of New York, and now of the Denver and Rio Grande railway, is treasurer.
http://freepages.hobbies.rootsweb.com/~jcrislip/Lafont.htm

From David Mellen's 1853 tree:

studied law and had been admitted to practice at the Bar when the death of his first wife (Ruth) took place. He then removed to Cincinnati where he commenced business and where it is said his income was not less than $4,000 a year. Yet, desirous and having a prospect of increasing his income, he rented coal beds, first in Prestonburg and then in Peach Orchard, KY.

Transcription of: Genealogy of the children of WP Mellen by Chase Mellen 1907

William Proctor-Mellen was a lawyer. He was educated at the old Fredonia Academy in Fredonia, New York. After practising law there, in Peru, Illinois, and in Detroit, Michi he settled in Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1844, and for a short time was a partner of Salmon F. Chase, subsequently Gover of Ohio, Senator, Secretary of the Treasury, and Chief Justice of the United States. In 1845, Mr. Mellen formed a law partnership with Edward Pugh of Cincinnati, and the firm became a leading one of the time in that city. In 1849, he became interested in the development of coalmines in Kentucky, and moved his family to Peach Orchard, in that state, shortly thereafter. The business at first prospered. But in 1860 it ended disastrously, owing largely to the panic of 1857 and the threatening conditions preceding the out of the Civil War, which prevented the raising of needed capital.

Mr. Mellen disposed of his interests in the mines and returned with his family to Cincinnati, where, in February 1861, he resumed the practice of the law. Shortly after the commencement of the Civil War, however, Mr. Chase, then Secretary of the Treasury, appointed him Supervising Spe Agent of the Treasury Department. A year or two later he was appointed General Agent. In the summer of 1865 he bought a place at Flushing, Long Island, New York, whither he moved his family. In 1868 or 1869 he resigned his official position and began the general practice of the law at 115 Broadway, New York City, as a partner in the firm of Jordan, Hinsdale & Mellen. In 1870, after the marriage of his eldest daughter, Queen, to General Palmer, he joined the latter and became connected, as counsel, with the Denver & Rio Grande Railway Company and allied enter in the development of Colorado. In August 1871, he took part in the staking out of Colorado Springs. In December 1871, he moved his family to Colorado.

For a few months the two families lived in a temporary log cabin at Manitou. Early in the winter of 1871-1872 General Palmer's house at Glen Eyrie, about five miles northwest of Colorado Springs, was finished, and both families lived there until after Mr. Mellen's death, which occurred in Cincinnati, while on a trip east, November 17 1873. He is buried in the lot owned by him in Spring Grove Cemetery, Cincinnati.

After Mr. Mellen's death, his son-in-law, General Palmer, assumed the burden of caring for his family and educating his children. This record would be incomplete if acknowl were omitted of the loyal and devoted way in which this self-assumed trust was executed. Mr. Mellen's widow and family lived for a few years in what was known as the Hunt house on Nevada Avenue, Colorado Springs; then at Manitou, and subsequently on Cascade Avenue, Col Springs, until August, 1881, when they went to Eng For a few months they lived at Roydon Hall, near Tunbridge, Kent. Thereafter they lived first at Pembroke Lodge and finally in Cedar Villa, Kensington, London. Nathan studied architecture and Chase and Clark went to Oxford (Brasenose College), where Chase obtained the decree of B.A. in 1887. The family returned to Glen Eyrie in May, 1887, and lived there until May, 1889, when Mrs. Mellen came to New York, and the family lived at 8 Wash Square North for five years. After the marriage of her sons and daughters she lived part of the time in New York and part of the time in England, until 1897 when she went to Cape Town, South Africa, on a visit to her daugh Mrs. Sclater.

The lineal ancestor of William Proctor Mellen, who first landed in America, was Thomas McMuLLEN, who was born in the Province of Ulster, County of Antrim, Ireland, in 1694 or 1697. His ancestors are believed to have emigrated from Scotland to the north of Ireland in the time of Henry VIII and Oliver Cromwell, and there to have engaged in the cultivation of flax and the manufacture of linen. In the records of the Town of Pelham, Massachusetts, where the family eventually settled, the name is spelled indifferently McMillen, McMullen, McMillan, Mellin, Millen and, finally, Mellen.

Thomas McMuLLEN emigrated from Ireland with his two sons, James and Patrick, the latter having been born in Ireland in 1724. They arrived in Boston in 1728. His wife sailed with them, but died on the voyage. Her maiden name is unknown. He married for the second time a Miss Hunter, near Boston, who lived for a short time only. After her death he married Elizabeth Wilson, a widow. The elder son, James, was killed by the fall of a tree while living with his father at Holden, Massachusetts, near Worcester. Patrick married Mary Colister of Holden, April 1749. Her parents had also emigrated from Ireland. Thomas sold his farm in Holden about 1750, and, with his third wife, his son Patrick, and the latter's wife, moved to Pelham, Hampshire County, Massachusetts. There the father and son purchased two adjoining farms. No other children were born to Thomas, who died June 4, 1771. His gravestone bears -his name spelled McMillan. But records of the town of Pelham spell it McMullen.

Patrick and Mary had nine sons and three daughters. He was a constable, surveyor and selectman of the Town and a Deacon of the Presbyterian Church. He died, aged 75, May 18 1797. His wife died August 25, 1811, aged 74. The name is spelled Mellen on her gravestone and thenceforth, in the line we are following, is spelled, with an occasional exception, the same way. He, his wife and his father, are buried in the southeast corner of the old burying-ground at Pelham. Patrick's eldest sons, James Caldwell and Thomas, moved to MarcelIus and Madison, New York, respectively. Thomas seems to have spelled the name "Millen" and it is thus spelled by his descendants who live in Madison. Patrick served in a company under Cap't. Robert Letherbridge in a regi commanded by Colonel Billings, which marched by order of the Captain General to the relief of Fort William Henry in 1757, during the French and Indian war.

Patrick's fourth son WILLIAM, born March 29 1756 remained in Prescott and married there Hannah Smith, daughter of Andrew and Jane Smith, May 15 1782. He had six children, the eldest David, the author of the manuscript referred to in the preface. Hannah Mellen died in 1790. Her husband married for a second time Jane Lindsay, by whom he had two children. She died shortly thereafter, and on December 31 1814, he married for a third time Hannah Thompson, a widow. He died August 1 1835, at Prescott, Massachusetts.

William's second son, WILLIAM, born December 3 1784, married, October 9 1809, the daughter of Reuben and Mercy Snow, of Greenwich, Massachusetts. They had but two children, william proctor, born September 9 1814, and Mercy Charlotte, born October 23 1816. In 1823 William Mellen moved to Pomfret, New York, and in 1825 his family followed him. They then settled in Fredonia, New York, near Dunkirk. William and Sarah Mellen died at Peach Orchard, at the home of their son, William Proctor, on May 7 1852, and August 10 1850, respectively, and are buried in Spring Grove Cemetery, Cincinnati.

William Proctor Mellen was married three times. His first wife was Ruth Sprague of Fredonia, New York, the daughter of Captain Jonathan S. Sprague. She died of consumption September 3 1843. They had one son, Wil Sprague, born at Fredonia April 18 1842. After her death, William Proctor Mellen moved to Cincinnati and practised law. There he met and married, in August or September of 1846, Isabel Clark, the daughter of Major Nathan and Charlotte Seymour Clark. They had three chil Malcolm, born July 12 1847; Mary Lincoln (Queen), born at Cincinnati, March 26, 1850, and Isabel. Malcolm and Isabel died in or prior to 1865. Isabel Clark Mellen died in 1854.

On May 23 1856, William Proctor Mellen married his third wife, Ellen Seymour Clark, a younger sister of the second wife. They were married at Peach Orchard, Ken and lived there until shortly before the outbreak of the Civil War, when they moved to Cincinnati. Their chil are: Helen Seymour, born March 23, 1857, at Cincin Charlotte Seymour, born December 13, 1858, at Peach Orchard; Nathan Clark, born at Peach Orchard, October 4, 1860; Chase, born at Cincinnati, September 21, 1863; Clark, born at Cincinnati; June 4, 1865; Margaret Seymour, born at Flushing, Long Island, New York, February 14, 1870: and Maud Seymour, born at Glen Eyrie, near Colorado Springs, Colorado, October 13, 1872.

William Sprague Mellen married Ellen Manly in July 1874, at Cincinnati, Ohio. He had a short period of service in the Union forces during the Civil War. He was a mem of the firm of Mellen, Brown & Company, cotton factors and commission merchants. He had no children and died at Cincinnati on February 5 1898.

Mary Lincoln (Queen) Mellen, married November 281870 at Flushing. Long Island, General William Jackson Palmer of Delaware and Pennsylvania. Their children are Elsie Mellen, born in New York, October 30, 1872; Dorothy, born at Geln Eyrie, October 29, 1880, and Marjorie, born in England November 12, 1881. Queen died at Frant, Eng December 29, 1894. Her children are unmarried.
General Palmer came of Quaker stock and was born at Kinsale Farm, near Leipsic, Delaware, September 9, 1836. His father was John Palmer, his mother's maiden name Matilda Jackson. He entered the service of the Pennsylvania Railroad under John Edgar Thomson, president. When the Civil War broke out, he raised the Anderson troop of cavalry in Philadelphia, being chosen captain thereof. Subsequently this troop became enlarged to a regiment as the Fifteenth Pennsylvania Cavalry, of which he became colonel. He served through the war with distinction. At one time he was captured and was confined for four months in Castle Thunder. A narrative of this experience will be found in Harperr's Magazine for June, 1867 ("The General's Story"), Vol. XXXV, p.60. His command was engaged in the pursuit of Jefferson Davis and came within an ace of cap hi. Before the close of the war, he was brevetted a brigadier general by President Lincoln for distinguished service. Thereafter he became engaged in making surveys west of the Mississippi for transcontinental lines of railroad and became the surveyor in charge of the construction of the Kansas Pacific Railroad, the first railroad to reach Denver, Colorado, from the east. While engaged in this latter-work, he perceived the great natural resources of Colorado, and organized a company for building, as a narrow gauge, the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad, running south from Denver along the base of the Pike's Peak Range. .The organization of numerous land development companies, of what is now the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company, the extension of the Denver & Rio Grande. the consequent growth and develop of Colorado, the building of the Rio Grande Western Railway from the Colorado terminus of the Denver & Rio Grande to Salt Lake City, Utah, and the opening of valuable and extensive coal mines at Pleasant Valley, Utah, were primarily due to his genius and inspiration. He was one of the founders of Colorado Springs and numerous other towns in Colorado.

He has given largely to Colorado College and has also laid out and given parks to Colorado Springs, in addition to many other benefactions.

Early in the seventies, he conceived the plan of building a railroad from the United States border to the city of Mexico, and, in association with James Sullivan, obtained from the Mexican Government valuable concessions for the construction and operation of a large railway system in the Republic of Mexico. These concessions resulted finally in the building of the Mexican National Railway from Laredo, Texas, to the City of Mexico, connecting at Laredo with the Texas-Mexican Railway. In addition to this line the Mexican National Construction Company built short lines near Zacatecas, and Colima, Mexico.
Married # 3 ELLEN SEYMOUR CLARK(E). (born 11 Jul 1833 in Green Bay, Wisconsin; married William Proctor Mellen in 1856. Ellen Mellen was the sister of Isabel, his second wife. Ellen wrote a will in 1881, so the assumption could be made that she was still living.

~

The Rocky Mountain News
Denver, Colorado, Friday, June 23, 1871

No person has as yet been selected for president of the colony, although several prominent gentlemen of the United States have been mentioned. General R. A. Cameron of Greeley, formerly vice president and superintendent and general manager of this colony. W. E. Pabor is secretary, and Mr. E. S. Nettleton is chief engineer, both of these gentlemen having formerly held similar positions in Union colony and Mr. William P. Mellen, late of New York, and now of the Denver and Rio Grande railway, is treasurer.
http://freepages.hobbies.rootsweb.com/~jcrislip/Lafont.htm

From David Mellen's 1853 tree:

studied law and had been admitted to practice at the Bar when the death of his first wife (Ruth) took place. He then removed to Cincinnati where he commenced business and where it is said his income was not less than $4,000 a year. Yet, desirous and having a prospect of increasing his income, he rented coal beds, first in Prestonburg and then in Peach Orchard, KY.

Transcription of: Genealogy of the children of WP Mellen by Chase Mellen 1907

William Proctor-Mellen was a lawyer. He was educated at the old Fredonia Academy in Fredonia, New York. After practising law there, in Peru, Illinois, and in Detroit, Michi he settled in Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1844, and for a short time was a partner of Salmon F. Chase, subsequently Gover of Ohio, Senator, Secretary of the Treasury, and Chief Justice of the United States. In 1845, Mr. Mellen formed a law partnership with Edward Pugh of Cincinnati, and the firm became a leading one of the time in that city. In 1849, he became interested in the development of coalmines in Kentucky, and moved his family to Peach Orchard, in that state, shortly thereafter. The business at first prospered. But in 1860 it ended disastrously, owing largely to the panic of 1857 and the threatening conditions preceding the out of the Civil War, which prevented the raising of needed capital.

Mr. Mellen disposed of his interests in the mines and returned with his family to Cincinnati, where, in February 1861, he resumed the practice of the law. Shortly after the commencement of the Civil War, however, Mr. Chase, then Secretary of the Treasury, appointed him Supervising Spe Agent of the Treasury Department. A year or two later he was appointed General Agent. In the summer of 1865 he bought a place at Flushing, Long Island, New York, whither he moved his family. In 1868 or 1869 he resigned his official position and began the general practice of the law at 115 Broadway, New York City, as a partner in the firm of Jordan, Hinsdale & Mellen. In 1870, after the marriage of his eldest daughter, Queen, to General Palmer, he joined the latter and became connected, as counsel, with the Denver & Rio Grande Railway Company and allied enter in the development of Colorado. In August 1871, he took part in the staking out of Colorado Springs. In December 1871, he moved his family to Colorado.

For a few months the two families lived in a temporary log cabin at Manitou. Early in the winter of 1871-1872 General Palmer's house at Glen Eyrie, about five miles northwest of Colorado Springs, was finished, and both families lived there until after Mr. Mellen's death, which occurred in Cincinnati, while on a trip east, November 17 1873. He is buried in the lot owned by him in Spring Grove Cemetery, Cincinnati.

After Mr. Mellen's death, his son-in-law, General Palmer, assumed the burden of caring for his family and educating his children. This record would be incomplete if acknowl were omitted of the loyal and devoted way in which this self-assumed trust was executed. Mr. Mellen's widow and family lived for a few years in what was known as the Hunt house on Nevada Avenue, Colorado Springs; then at Manitou, and subsequently on Cascade Avenue, Col Springs, until August, 1881, when they went to Eng For a few months they lived at Roydon Hall, near Tunbridge, Kent. Thereafter they lived first at Pembroke Lodge and finally in Cedar Villa, Kensington, London. Nathan studied architecture and Chase and Clark went to Oxford (Brasenose College), where Chase obtained the decree of B.A. in 1887. The family returned to Glen Eyrie in May, 1887, and lived there until May, 1889, when Mrs. Mellen came to New York, and the family lived at 8 Wash Square North for five years. After the marriage of her sons and daughters she lived part of the time in New York and part of the time in England, until 1897 when she went to Cape Town, South Africa, on a visit to her daugh Mrs. Sclater.

The lineal ancestor of William Proctor Mellen, who first landed in America, was Thomas McMuLLEN, who was born in the Province of Ulster, County of Antrim, Ireland, in 1694 or 1697. His ancestors are believed to have emigrated from Scotland to the north of Ireland in the time of Henry VIII and Oliver Cromwell, and there to have engaged in the cultivation of flax and the manufacture of linen. In the records of the Town of Pelham, Massachusetts, where the family eventually settled, the name is spelled indifferently McMillen, McMullen, McMillan, Mellin, Millen and, finally, Mellen.

Thomas McMuLLEN emigrated from Ireland with his two sons, James and Patrick, the latter having been born in Ireland in 1724. They arrived in Boston in 1728. His wife sailed with them, but died on the voyage. Her maiden name is unknown. He married for the second time a Miss Hunter, near Boston, who lived for a short time only. After her death he married Elizabeth Wilson, a widow. The elder son, James, was killed by the fall of a tree while living with his father at Holden, Massachusetts, near Worcester. Patrick married Mary Colister of Holden, April 1749. Her parents had also emigrated from Ireland. Thomas sold his farm in Holden about 1750, and, with his third wife, his son Patrick, and the latter's wife, moved to Pelham, Hampshire County, Massachusetts. There the father and son purchased two adjoining farms. No other children were born to Thomas, who died June 4, 1771. His gravestone bears -his name spelled McMillan. But records of the town of Pelham spell it McMullen.

Patrick and Mary had nine sons and three daughters. He was a constable, surveyor and selectman of the Town and a Deacon of the Presbyterian Church. He died, aged 75, May 18 1797. His wife died August 25, 1811, aged 74. The name is spelled Mellen on her gravestone and thenceforth, in the line we are following, is spelled, with an occasional exception, the same way. He, his wife and his father, are buried in the southeast corner of the old burying-ground at Pelham. Patrick's eldest sons, James Caldwell and Thomas, moved to MarcelIus and Madison, New York, respectively. Thomas seems to have spelled the name "Millen" and it is thus spelled by his descendants who live in Madison. Patrick served in a company under Cap't. Robert Letherbridge in a regi commanded by Colonel Billings, which marched by order of the Captain General to the relief of Fort William Henry in 1757, during the French and Indian war.

Patrick's fourth son WILLIAM, born March 29 1756 remained in Prescott and married there Hannah Smith, daughter of Andrew and Jane Smith, May 15 1782. He had six children, the eldest David, the author of the manuscript referred to in the preface. Hannah Mellen died in 1790. Her husband married for a second time Jane Lindsay, by whom he had two children. She died shortly thereafter, and on December 31 1814, he married for a third time Hannah Thompson, a widow. He died August 1 1835, at Prescott, Massachusetts.

William's second son, WILLIAM, born December 3 1784, married, October 9 1809, the daughter of Reuben and Mercy Snow, of Greenwich, Massachusetts. They had but two children, william proctor, born September 9 1814, and Mercy Charlotte, born October 23 1816. In 1823 William Mellen moved to Pomfret, New York, and in 1825 his family followed him. They then settled in Fredonia, New York, near Dunkirk. William and Sarah Mellen died at Peach Orchard, at the home of their son, William Proctor, on May 7 1852, and August 10 1850, respectively, and are buried in Spring Grove Cemetery, Cincinnati.

William Proctor Mellen was married three times. His first wife was Ruth Sprague of Fredonia, New York, the daughter of Captain Jonathan S. Sprague. She died of consumption September 3 1843. They had one son, Wil Sprague, born at Fredonia April 18 1842. After her death, William Proctor Mellen moved to Cincinnati and practised law. There he met and married, in August or September of 1846, Isabel Clark, the daughter of Major Nathan and Charlotte Seymour Clark. They had three chil Malcolm, born July 12 1847; Mary Lincoln (Queen), born at Cincinnati, March 26, 1850, and Isabel. Malcolm and Isabel died in or prior to 1865. Isabel Clark Mellen died in 1854.

On May 23 1856, William Proctor Mellen married his third wife, Ellen Seymour Clark, a younger sister of the second wife. They were married at Peach Orchard, Ken and lived there until shortly before the outbreak of the Civil War, when they moved to Cincinnati. Their chil are: Helen Seymour, born March 23, 1857, at Cincin Charlotte Seymour, born December 13, 1858, at Peach Orchard; Nathan Clark, born at Peach Orchard, October 4, 1860; Chase, born at Cincinnati, September 21, 1863; Clark, born at Cincinnati; June 4, 1865; Margaret Seymour, born at Flushing, Long Island, New York, February 14, 1870: and Maud Seymour, born at Glen Eyrie, near Colorado Springs, Colorado, October 13, 1872.

William Sprague Mellen married Ellen Manly in July 1874, at Cincinnati, Ohio. He had a short period of service in the Union forces during the Civil War. He was a mem of the firm of Mellen, Brown & Company, cotton factors and commission merchants. He had no children and died at Cincinnati on February 5 1898.

Mary Lincoln (Queen) Mellen, married November 281870 at Flushing. Long Island, General William Jackson Palmer of Delaware and Pennsylvania. Their children are Elsie Mellen, born in New York, October 30, 1872; Dorothy, born at Geln Eyrie, October 29, 1880, and Marjorie, born in England November 12, 1881. Queen died at Frant, Eng December 29, 1894. Her children are unmarried.
General Palmer came of Quaker stock and was born at Kinsale Farm, near Leipsic, Delaware, September 9, 1836. His father was John Palmer, his mother's maiden name Matilda Jackson. He entered the service of the Pennsylvania Railroad under John Edgar Thomson, president. When the Civil War broke out, he raised the Anderson troop of cavalry in Philadelphia, being chosen captain thereof. Subsequently this troop became enlarged to a regiment as the Fifteenth Pennsylvania Cavalry, of which he became colonel. He served through the war with distinction. At one time he was captured and was confined for four months in Castle Thunder. A narrative of this experience will be found in Harperr's Magazine for June, 1867 ("The General's Story"), Vol. XXXV, p.60. His command was engaged in the pursuit of Jefferson Davis and came within an ace of cap hi. Before the close of the war, he was brevetted a brigadier general by President Lincoln for distinguished service. Thereafter he became engaged in making surveys west of the Mississippi for transcontinental lines of railroad and became the surveyor in charge of the construction of the Kansas Pacific Railroad, the first railroad to reach Denver, Colorado, from the east. While engaged in this latter-work, he perceived the great natural resources of Colorado, and organized a company for building, as a narrow gauge, the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad, running south from Denver along the base of the Pike's Peak Range. .The organization of numerous land development companies, of what is now the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company, the extension of the Denver & Rio Grande. the consequent growth and develop of Colorado, the building of the Rio Grande Western Railway from the Colorado terminus of the Denver & Rio Grande to Salt Lake City, Utah, and the opening of valuable and extensive coal mines at Pleasant Valley, Utah, were primarily due to his genius and inspiration. He was one of the founders of Colorado Springs and numerous other towns in Colorado.

He has given largely to Colorado College and has also laid out and given parks to Colorado Springs, in addition to many other benefactions.

Early in the seventies, he conceived the plan of building a railroad from the United States border to the city of Mexico, and, in association with James Sullivan, obtained from the Mexican Government valuable concessions for the construction and operation of a large railway system in the Republic of Mexico. These concessions resulted finally in the building of the Mexican National Railway from Laredo, Texas, to the City of Mexico, connecting at Laredo with the Texas-Mexican Railway. In addition to this line the Mexican National Construction Company built short lines near Zacatecas, and Colima, Mexico.


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