· Early
Settlers of Maryland
· John
Wright Stanley
· Alfred
Stanley
· David
Sloan Stanley
· Henry
Morton Stanley
· Francis
Edgar Stanley
· Governors
of Kansas, Kentucky and Virginia
There are records available which outline the arrival of
Stanleys into the American colonies as early as 1635, into Massachusetts and
Connecticut. Later, in about 1680, two brothers descended from Sir John Stanley
Lord Deputy of Ireland landed at New Kent County, Virginia. The foregoing
chapter outlines another descendant of Sir John who arrived in Virginia about
1702. There is little doubt, though all pedigrees are not here listed, that the
earliest cases of the name of Stanley in the American colonies are descended
from the same line of English STANLEYs. The Genealogical Register provided the
following:
During the year 1634, a man named Thomas Stanley arrived in the
colonies as a free man and settled at Lynn, Massachusetts. Records for this man
exist in 1635 and 1640, when he was a representative and member of the ar. co.
The second of the name Stanley to immigrate to the American
colonies was Timothy Stanley in the year 1635. He enter the colonies a free man
and settled in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Third, to enter the colonies was Christopher Stanley. He entered
as a free man and settled in Boston, Massachusetts in 1641. By occupation, he
was a tailor.
By all accounts, the above listed men were the first of the name
to arrive in the colonies. The following list was found in Early Virginia
Immigrants:
"Not
since the publication of Hotten's Immigrants has a successful effort
been made to gather together, in one volume, a list of the thousands of persons
who came to Virginia during the early period of her life.
The
records of the Land Office in Richmond remain the only source from which these names
can now be obtained. As the records
stand, it is simply impossible, without
the
most
extensive and expensive research, to obtain names of persons who came to Virginia,
unless they themselves were patentees of land, and the great majority of immigrants
do not appear as patentees.
Nearly
twenty‑five thousand names have been collected from the original records
and placed in alphabetical order. The search has been systematic and thorough,
and every name from 1623 (when the
records began) down to 1666 has been noted,
with the date of appearance."
Those
persons named Stanley are here enumerated:
Alice Stanley 1652
Christopher Stanley 1652, Northampton County
George Stanley 1656
John Stanley 1639,
Accomack County
William Stanley 1648,
Northampton County
William Stanley 1649,
Northampton County
Adam Stanly 1653
Hugh Stanly 1649,
Northampton County
Judith Stanly 1655,
New Kent County
William Stanly 1654,
Lower Norfolk County
The following list was found in The Early Settlers of Maryland.
The list was compiled from records of land patents from 1633 to 1680, as
found at the Hall of Records, Annapolis, Maryland, 1968
... this is a selective index. It includes the names of
persons who came to Maryland with the intent of staying here, whether they
provided their own transportation, or someone else provided it.
Certain words that appear frequently in the remarks
column have special meaning as used in this index. 'Immigrated' (I) means the
individual furnished his own transportation to Maryland, while Transported (T)
means that some other indexed person paid for his passage. Often a person
listed as Transported is also described as a Servant (S), which means that he
had contracted to repay the cost of passage by acting as a servant for a number
of years. Under certain of the Conditions of Plantation, a servant was entitled
to claim fifty acres of land upon completing his period of servitude."
Peter
Standley Trans 1660
Robert
Standley Imm from Virginia, with
wife, 1661
Robert
Standley Trans from Virginia 1672
Adam
Stanley Imm 1658
George
Stanley Imm. 1667
Hugh
Stanley Married
Dorothy, widow of Giles
Sadler, prior to 1663
James
Stanley Of Cecil County, Imm 1679
John
Stanley Service 1666, of St.
Clements Bay
John
Stanley Trans 1667, son of
William
John
Stanley Service 1676, of St.
Mary's County
John
Stanley Trans 1679, son of James
John
Stanley Commissioned Deputy
Surveyor,
Talbot County, 1676
Mary
Stanley Trans 1667, wife of
William
Thomas
Stanley Trans 1656
Thomas
Stanley Trans 1664
Thomas
Stanley Trans 1667, son of
William
Thomas
Stanley Trans 1672
William
Stanley Trans 1661
William
Stanley Imm from Virginia 1667, to Swan Island
Talbot County, Maryland
William
Stanley Imm 1667, of Calvert County
George
Stanly Trans 1668
1742‑1781
The following was taken from A Rough Road in a Good Land,
Dictionary of American Biography and information obtained from the North
Carolina State Library, Genealogy Division.
John Wright Stanly was born 1742 in Charles City County,
Virginia, the son of Dancy and Elizabeth Wright Stanly. Other children of Dancy
and Elizabeth Stanly were Dancy, Jr., Richard Dancy, Susannah, and Wright who
was born in 1751.
By tradition, Dancy Stanly was the son of Major John Stanly of
Talbot County, Maryland. Major John Stanly is said to be the son of William
Stanly, also of Talbot County, who was a direct descendant of the Earl of
Derby.
John is established as having fourteen children, nine of which
can be accounted for by the North Carolina State Library: John, born 1774; Ann,
1775; Lydia, 1777; Richard, 1778; Wright, 1779; Alexander Hamilton; Fabius;
Frank, who lived at Danville, Virginia; and Major Alfred, of Alabama who was
touted as being a Confederate Guerrilla. Of the other five children, one is
mentioned below, Thomas.
John Wright Stanly settled in New Bern, North Carolina in 1773
after failing in a business venture in Honduras. (He had been put in jail in
Philadelphia in 1772 for bad debts) He prospered after settling in Craven
County, and built a house in New Bern that cost $20,000. This house still
stands as a public library and showplace. He owned thirteen privateers; one of
them named the General Nash was famous on the high seas during the War of 1812.
He lost most of his ships to the British Navy during the war. He acquired a
large wharf and distillery, and owned sixty‑nine slaves, which made him
one of the largest slaveholders in North America. Stanly County, North Carolina
was named for him. He had wealth, position and influence in North Carolina. He
died at the age of forty‑seven.
In 1802 his son John Wright Stanly, who at age
twenty‑three
had already held office in his
county killed in a duel ex‑Governor Richard Dobbs Spaugh, age fifty‑five,
over political views. The duel was fought behind the present Masonic Lodge Hall
in New Bern. Each man used a one‑shot flintlock pistol. Each man reloaded
and fired four times. Stanly had a bullet in his coat collar. On the fourth
shot, the ex‑Governor was killed. The duel
destroyed the good name of
Stanly in North Carolina since Spaugh was a very popular man.
Another son, Thomas Stanly, sitting at a banquet table in New
Bern, was insulted when a piece of bread thrown across the table fell in his
cup of tea and splashed tea on his vest. He challenged the bread thrower, Louis
D. Henry, and was killed in the duel that followed.
Edward Stanly, son of John Wright Stanley II, took the side of
the Union in the Civil War in 1860. There was some confusion about the State of
North Carolina remaining in the Union, and President Lincoln appointed him
acting Governor. The state had a strong elected governor in the personality of
Zeb Vance, and no one paid any attention to Stanly's appointment. Edward
Stanly, in disgust, left the state and moved to California. He was elected to
Congress from a western state. While serving in the Congress, he fought one of
the last duels ever fought by an office holder in the United States.
This son of John Wright Stanley II deserves particular attention
in addition to the foregoing statement.
He gained from his father very strong nationalistic opinions and
an intense hatred for the Democratic Party, which shaped his public life. His
mother was the daughter of Martin Frank of Jones County. His education in the
American Literary, Scientific and Military Academy at Middleton, Connecticut,
where he was a student from 1827 until 1829, tended to strengthen his
Federalism. Having taken up the study of law, he was admitted to the bar in
1832 and began his practice in Beaufort County, North Carolina. Soon thereafter,
he married the daughter of Hugh Jones of Hyde County. She died about 1850, and
some ten years later, he married Cornelia, a sister of Joseph C. Baldwin, then
an associate of the Supreme Court of California.
He was a successful lawyer, but his ambitions were almost wholly
political. In 1837, he was elected to Congress as a Whig. He served three
terms, distinguishing himself by his eloquence, his readiness to debate, and
his numerous quarrels. He became, as John Quincy Adams expressed it, "the
terror of the Lucifer Party" in his Memoirs, Volume Eleven,
1876,
page 19. Several times, he engaged in personal encounters on the floor of the
House, and he fought a duel with S. W. Inge of Alabama. By virtue of his
ability, however, he became leader of his party in the House. Defeated for re‑election
in 1843, he was a delegate to the Whig Convention in Baltimore in 1844, and was
elected to the House of Commons, being re‑elected in 1846. In 1847, he
became Attorney General for the State, but resigned the next year to return to
the legislature. Again elected to Congress in 1848, he supported the compromise
measures of 1850. Making his campaign on the abstract issue of secession and
declaring his readiness to vote men and money to whip any seceding state back
into the Union, he was returned to Congress by an increased majority. Defeated
for re‑election in 1853, he moved to California in 1854 and in San
Francisco won instant success in his career. He supported Freemont in 1856. And
in 1857, though still a slaveholder and scarcely in accord with his party, he
was nominated for Governor by the Republicans, but was defeated.
Secession brought only anger and horror to Edward's mind. Unaware
of the change in public sentiment he could not rid himself of the belief that
the withdrawal of North Carolina from the Union was the result of Democratic
deception. He thought if they could be informed of the purposes of the North by
one in whom they had confidence; they would renew their allegiance. He
expressed to Lincoln his eagerness to undertake that mission. In 1862, he was
made Military Governor of the state. He assumed office on May 26, and soon
learned he had an impossible task. He could get no hearing and was despised as
a traitor. Soon he was also in trouble with the abolitionists. He found himself
unable to protect private property from what he characterized as "the most
shameful pillaging performed by an army in any civilized land." The last
straw was the Emancipation Proclamation in January 1863, to which he was
bitterly opposed. He resigned and returned to California in March 1863.
After the War he opposed the Congressional Reconstruction with is
accustomed vehemence. In 1867, he left the Republican Party to canvas the state
against the policy. His death, following a stroke of apoplexy, occurred in San
Francisco.
Part Two
Taken from A Rough Road in
a Good Land, Chapter Four:
Lord Granville of England owned what is now the counties of
Washington and Sullivan in Tennessee. His property may have included a section
of southwest Virginia. This territory was under the jurisdiction of the
Province of North Carolina.
Granville sent Gilbert and Robert Christian to the Holston River
Valley to investigate his land holdings. Robert Crockett, who was a kinsman of the
famous Davy Crockett, must have been one of the first settlers in this valley
since he was killed here by the Indians in 1769. We do know that the majority
of the first settlers came from Pittsylvania County in Virginia, and that after
a short time the town of Jonesboro, Tennessee became the county seat of the new
county.
Two men, Henry Skaggs and Joseph Drake, brought a hunting party
to the valley in 1770. The Cherokee Indians found and robbed this party of a
large collection of furs. The hunters left an inscription on a beech tree which
read, "2300 deer skins lost, Ruination by God." Carter and Parker's
store was established in the valley in 1771.
Daniel Boone, from the Yadkin River Valley in North Carolina,
visited the Holston River Valley on what must have been an Indian or game trail
that lead from the area of Johnson City of today toward Cumberland Gap on the
Tennessee ‑Kentucky line. He marked on a beech tree on this trail,
"D. Boon cilled a bar on tree 1760."
The first Stanley in southwest Virginia, by records and
tradition, was named Alfred Stanley. It s from this man that Lawrence Stanley
traces his own lineage. He used family stories, family Bibles, and records kept
at Scott, Bouteroit, and Pittsylvania counties in Virginia; Hawkins,
Washington, Sullivan, and Unicoi counties in Tennessee; Burke, Clancy, Avery,
Mitchell, Madison, Buncombe Jackson, Macon, and Cherokee counties in North
Carolina and Fannin, Union, Gilmer, and Whitfield counties Georgia.
Here is related a story, as told by Lawrence Stanley, of the
Stanley family in Stanley Valley, Hawkins County, Tennessee:
“ ... In order to understand the
statement of Cissy Green in regard to her grandfather's visit to Virginia to
see his folks, it is necessary to look again at the Holston River Valley,
especially in Scott County, Virginia and Hawkins County, Tennessee.
On June 4, 1969, the writer interviewed Mr. Hard near the Big
Creek Baptist Church in Stanley Valley, Hawkins County, Tennessee. This man
said he had always heard the Stevenson farm, owned at present by Ralph Jennings
and sometimes called the Michael Looney place, was also known as the Stanley
place, and that Alfred Stanley was the name used by his folks when they talked
about the Stanley place for which the creek, knob and valley were named.
He asked the writer to see Mr. A. W. Johnson and Mr. Jennings.
Johnson lived next door to Mr. Jennings. The writer saw Johnson the next
morning. He said the name Alfred Stanley was a named used by his folks when he
was a boy. He also said the old Stanley cabin stood in the back yard of the
present Looney house and near this cabin, there had been some ditches and
embankments of what appeared to be fortifications built by white men. On the
creek bank nearby, Mr. Johnson said, Indian relics were found every time the
field was plowed when he was a boy.
On this site a man named Stanley had built this log cabin about
1777, and in so doing gave his name to the valley, creek and knob that runs all
the way from the mouth of Big Creek at the junction with the Holston River, to
Gate City, Virginia, or about twenty‑six miles.
Sometime during 1777 Mr. Stanley was in the woods near his cabin
with is gun and an axe cutting timbers for barn building on this 1,200 acre
grant, made to him for his year's service in the Revolutionary War. He heard
screams, a dog bark, and a gun fired at
the cabin. He rushed through the woods to find his wife and child lying on the
ground near the door, stuck full of arrows, scalped and mutilated with a
tomahawk. They were the victims of a Creek and Cherokee Indian was party,
apparently under the direction of a red‑headed Cherokee chief known as
Benge, or Captain Bench, as he was known to white settlers in the valley.
Mr. Stanley, in grief over the loss of his family, sold or gave
his grant to Michael Looney, who had received a further grant of 1,200 acres
for his service in the Lord Dunemore's War and the Revolution. Michael Looney
came from the Isle of Man in the Irish Sea. Lord Stanley, Earl of Derby, was
the governor of the Isle of Man, and there is no doubt that the Stanley who
built the cabin, and gave his name to the valley, was in some way kinsman of
the English Stanley family. Michael Looney moved to this valley from Bouteroit
County, Virginia in 1780. Immediately after the grant was given up to Mr.
Looney, Mr. Stanley returned to Virginia.
The town of Stanley, seven miles from Luray, Virginia in the
Shenandoah Valley has a population of 1,039 people, and Stanleytown, Virginia,
population 500, is in Henry County near Martinsville, next door to Pittsylvania
County. From this area, the early settlers moved to the Holston River Valley
prior to 1780.
Luray, Virginia is no further away from Stanley Valley in
Tennessee than the distance the Stanley families covered in the great move from
Virginia to Georgia, by way of North Carolina.
Part Three
1828‑1902
Taken from Dictionary of
American Biography:
This man was a soldier, born at Cedar Valley, Ohio, the son of
John Bratton and Sarah (Peterson) Stanley, and a descendant of Thomas Stanley
who came to America from England in 1634. David was educated in a log
schoolhouse until he was fourteen years old, when he was apprenticed to study
medicine. In 1848, he entered the U. S. Military Academy at West Point, New
York, graduating in 1852 as second lieutenant of dragoons. His first
assignments were in Texas and California. In April 1857, he married Anna Maria,
daughter of J. B. B. Wright, an Army surgeon. In 1856, he was active in the
Kansas disturbances, and the next year in operations against the Cheyenne
Indians.
The commencement of the Civil War found him a captain of cavalry
at Fort Smith, Arkansas. He was offered colonelcy of an Arkansas regiment in
the Confederate service, but he declined. In May 1861, he escaped from Southern
territory by a hazardous march to Kansas. Later that same year he served in the
Missouri campaign, receiving and accepting a commission as Brigadier‑general
of volunteers in October 1861. He next participated in the capture of Corinth,
Mississippi. When the Confederates attempted to retake that city, he counter‑attacked
and drove the enemy back. For this victory, he was given command of a cavalry
division in Tennessee, becoming a Major‑general in April 1863. He ably
seconded the campaigns of Rosecrans during 1863. In 1864, he took part in
Sherman's Atlanta, Georgia operations, being particularly commended for gallant
conduct at Resaca, Georgia. On July 27th, he succeeded to the command of the
Fourth Corps, and in September (1864) he was wounded at Jonesboro, Georgia.
In June 1865, his Fourth Corps was sent to Texas to support
diplomatic relations against French interference in Mexico. In February 1866,
he was mustered out of the volunteer service as a Major‑general. In July,
he became Colonel, 22nd Infantry in the Regular Army. He was then sent to the Indian
frontier. In 1873, he led the expedition into the Yellowstone area, and between
1879 and 1882, he settled several Indian disturbances in Texas. In 1884, he was
promoted to the rank of Brigadier‑general, U. S. Army, and subsequently
commanded in Texas until his retirement in 1892.
He was governor of the Soldiers Home, Washington, from 1893 to
1898, and thereafter lived in Washington until his death.
Part Four
1841‑1904
The
following narrative was taken from A Rough Road in a Good Land:
One ... of the earliest ... Stanleys came to New Orleans and one
of his descendants was living there about 1850 who had become a wealthy
merchant. He had no children, and one day a young man appeared at one of his
stores looking for employment. His name was John Rollands or Rowland, which may
have been the English spelling of his name. He was born near the town of
Denbigh in Wales. His father died when he was two years old. His mother married
again. He was a pupil at the poor house of St. Ashap for several years. Then he
was an instructor at the town of Mould in Flintshire. He went to Liverpool and
shipped as a cabin boy to New Orleans where he met Mr. Stanley. The wealthy
childless merchant liked the young homeless man who worked in his store, and
gave him rapid promotion, and finally adopted him as a son and gave him his
name which was Henry Morton Stanley.
Henry Stanley, bored by life in New Orleans ran away to the wild
area of Arkansas, and on to California camping with Indians along the way. His
adopted father thought him dead, and welcomed him as one brought back from the
dead when he returned to New Orleans.
Shortly after he returned his adopted father died without a
Will. Henry, who had been told he would be an heir to Mr. Stanley's estate,
found himself facing angry relatives who took over the merchant's property
leaving him nothing but the name of his adopted father. He joined the Southern
army at the beginning of the Civil War. He was captured in one of the fierce
battles, and promptly joined the Union army where he served on a ship of war.
He was destined to go as a newspaper reporter with Lord Napier's
army to Magdala in Ethiopia. He witnessed the fall of Magdala and the death of
Emperor Theodore, King of Abyssenia. As a newspaperman, he was sent back to
Africa to find Dr. David Livingstone who was supposed to be lost in the heart
of the great continent. He succeeded in his task and was sent back to rescue
Emin Pasha stranded in Central Africa after the death of General Gordon at
Khartoum in the Sudan.
Later he was to explore the Congo River from the Central
African lakes to the Atlantic Ocean. He was destined to become one of the
world's greatest travelers and explorers. We do not
know who the relatives were
that inherited the New Orleans merchant's wealth, or how he was related to
other Stanleys in America. We do know that his name was borne only by an
adopted son, who after becoming famous returned to England and died there. He
was always known to the world as Henry Morton Stanley, the man who found
Livingstone.
1849‑1918
This inventor and manufacturer was born in Kingfield, Maine, the
son of Solomon and Apphia (French) Stanley. His father was a teacher and
farmer, a descendant of Matthew Stanley who emigrated from England to Lynn,
Massachusetts about 1646. He attended public school at Kingfield and graduated
in 1871 at the Farmington Normal and Training School. For a number of years he
taught school in various towns in Maine, at the same time having a talent for
crayon portraiture he built a portrait business. In 1874, the demands of his
work led him to give up teaching. He removed to Lewiston, Maine, where he
believed a larger opportunity lay. In the course of the succeeding nine years,
which were successful ones, he added photography to his business and became one
of the leading photographers in New England. Having begun in 1883 to experiment
with photographic dry plates, he devised a formula for a dry plate firm. The
firm seemed to have such possibilities that in partnership with his brother
(Freelan 0. Stanley) he organized the Stanley Dry Plate Company in Lewiston.
Their products soon came into general use in the United States and other
countries. In 1890, the brothers established a new plant in Newton,
Massachusetts, where better railroad facilities were to be had. In 1905, the
brothers sold their business to the Eastman Kodak Company of Rochester, New
York.
Meanwhile, Francis had become interested in steam automobiles,
and early in 1897 began a series of experiments, which resulted in the
production of the first steam motorcar to be successfully operated in New
England. This vehicle was known as the Stanley Steamer.
Having set up a manufacturing plant to produce one hundred steam
motorcars in 1898, the company and all patents were sold. In 1902, however, the
brothers repurchased their original patents and established the Stanley Motor
Carriage Company, with Francis as president. The brothers continued their
business until retirement in 1917.
At the time of his death, which was the result of an automobile
accident, Francis was survived by his widow and three children.
That the name of Stanley has figured prominently in the
political history of England and America is well known fact. Since the Norman
Conquest in the year 1066, through the War of the Roses, a line of Earls of
Derby, Lord Deputies of Ireland, and Prime Ministers of England the Stanleys
have a proud heritage in Great Britain. Upon moving to the Colonies, as early
as 1634, the Stanleys have played a prominent role in the government of the
United States. There have been Congressional representatives, Whigs and later
secessionists. In recent history, three men became governor of their states.
Born in December 1844 in Knox County, Ohio, son of Almon Fleming
Stanley, a physician, and Angelina Sapp Stanley, both of whom were Methodists.
Brother of Hattie and J. R., he married to Emma Lenora Hills in May 1876. He
was the father of Charles, who died in infancy, Harry Wilbur, Harriett Eugenia
and William Eugene.
He was educated in common schools, briefly attended Ohio Wesleyan
College, and studied law in Kenton and Dayton, Ohio. He was admitted to the bar
in 1868 and moved to Jefferson County, Kansas, in 1870.
As a Republican he was County Attorney, 1871‑72; then he
moved to Wichita and served as the Sedgwick County Attorney, 1874‑80. He
was in the State House of Representatives from 1881 to 1883 and declined offers
of appointment from Governor Morrill to various state courts. In 1898, he was
nominated by the Republican State Convention for Governor and defeated Populist
John W. Leedy, the incumbent. William Stanley became the fifteenth Kansas
governor in January 1899. He was the first governor to live in the Kansas
Executive Mansion.
Considerable reorganization of the Kansas government took place
during his four years as governor, although he was usually unsuccessful in
passing legislation to abolish 'useless' offices. A Traveling Library
Commission was established and a factory to make binder‑twine was set up
at the State Penitentiary. The Supreme Court justices were increased from three
to seven, and he angered the railroads when he did not make an appointment from
among their spokesmen. Prohibition was less an issue under him than before,
although he was lectured by Carry Nation on his proper role as governor. He
strongly criticized the Leavenworth County Sheriff for permitting a mob to
lynch a man. The legislature passed a motion condemning the lynching and set
into motion a drive for capital punishment.
In 1902, William sought a seat in the U. S.
Senate. After the State Legislature was deadlocked for sixteen ballots, he
threw his support to Chester I. Long, who was thus elected.
He resumed his practice of law in Wichita. He was appointed to
the Dawes Commission to the Five Civilized Tribes, with headquarters in
Tishomingo, Indian Territory, where he served from 1903 to 1904.
He was an active Methodist. He died in Wichita October 13, 1910,
and was buried there in Highland Cemetery.
Augustus Stanley was born in May 1867, in Shelbyville, Kentucky.
He was son of William Stanley, a minister, and Amanda (Owsley) Stanley, the
eldest of seven children, and a member of the Christian Church. He married Sue
Soaper in Henderson, Kentucky in 1903, and was father of Augustus Owsley, Jr.,
William Soaper, and Marion Shelby.
He attended Gordon Academy at Nicholasville, the Kentucky
Agricultural and Mechanical College at Lexington, and Centre College at
Danville. At Centre College he was awarded the B. S. degree in 1889. After
teaching for four years, he read law under Gilbert Cassidy of Flemington,
Kentucky, and was admitted to the bar there in 1894. Four years later, he moved
to Henderson and entered the Democratic Party.
In 1900, he served as presidential elector for the Bryan‑Stevenson
ticket. He was elected as a Democrat to the fifty‑eighth and five
succeeding Congresses, serving from 1903 until 1915. As a Congressman, he
attracted national attention by sponsoring and conducting an investigation of
the United States Steel Corporation. In August 1914, he ran unsuccessfully for
the Democratic Senatorial nomination, losing to former Governor John Beckham.
In 1915, he defeated Henry McChesney for the Democratic gubernatorial
nomination. The following November he was elected Governor over Edwin P.
Morrow, the Republican nominee.
Under Augustus Stanley's leadership the General Assembly enacted
Kentucky's first Workman's Compensation Law, strengthened the Corrupt Practices
Act, and adopted the state's first budget system.
On May 19, 1919, he resigned the governorship in order to assume
the U. S. Senate seat to which he had been elected in 1918. In 1924, he was
defeated for re‑election to the Senate defeated by the Republican
candidate, Frederick Sackett, Jr.
Augustus resumed the practice of law in Washington, D. C. In May
1930, he was appointed by President Hoover to the International Joint
Commission, which had been established to arbitrate disputes arising along the
U.S. ‑Canadian border. Elected Chairman of the IJC, he served in that
capacity until his retirement in 1954. He died in 1958 and was buried at
Frankfurt Cemetery in Washington, D. C.
Thomas Stanley was born in
1890, near Spencer, Henry County, Virginia. He was a son of Crockett, a farmer,
and Susan Matildah (Walker) Stanley. He was a Methodist. In 1918, he married
Anne Pocahontas Bassett, and was father of Anne, Thomas B., and John D.
Stanley.
He attended public schools of
Henry County, and worked in the coalmines of North Polk Coal and Coke Company
in Maybeury, West Virginia. In 1912, he graduated from Eastman National
Business College in Poughkeepsie, New York.
He worked as a bookkeeper with
the R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company in Winston‑Salem, North Carolina from
1912 to 1913. He was a clerk with the Bank of Ridgeway, Virginia in 1913; a
clerk‑bookkeeper at the First National Bank of Martinsville, Virginia
from 1914 to 1916; and a cashier at the First National Bank of Rural Retreat,
Virginia from 1916 to 1920.
He served as vice president of
Vaughn‑Bassett Furniture Company in Galax, Virginia from 1921 to 1922;
vice president of the Bassett Furniture Company from 1922 to 1924. He organized
the Stanley Furniture Company in 1924, and raised purebred Holstein cattle.
He was elected to the Virginia
House of Delegates, serving from 1930 until 1946. He was later elected to the
U. S. House of Representatives to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of
Thomas Burch. He was subsequently elected to four succeeding Congresses,
serving from 1946 until 1953.
In 1953, he resigned the House
of Representatives to seek office as Governor of Virginia. Running as a
Democrat, he was elected Governor in 1953. During his administration, he
recommended an increase in teacher's salaries, and proposed a higher gasoline
tax to increase state highway funds. He also signed a bill restricting roadside
advertising; favored federal aid for maintenance of interstate highways; and
formed a resolution, along with eight other governors from coal‑producing
states, which requested the U. S. Congress to restrict imports of residual oil
and natural gas. He also urged repeal of the state constitutional provision
that required the state to maintain a public school system.
Since he was ineligible to
succeed himself, he left office in 1958. He returned to his furniture business.
He later became a trustee at Randolph‑Macon College; president and
director of the First National Bank of Virginia; and, chairman of the
Commission on State and Local Revenues and Expenditures.
Thomas Stanley died in July
1970, in Martinville, Virginia. He was buried at Roselawn Park.