Augustus Krieckhaus

UGUSTUS KRIECKHAUS, who for many years had been affiliated in a prominent way with the business interests of the city and who had acceptably served in a number of public offices, was born in Kleve, Rhenish Prussia, March 17, 1835, and departed this life November 5, 1903. He was a son of Charles L. and Helena (De Lachausse) Krieckhaus. His father, a tanner by trade, came to the United States in 1849 and settled in St. Louis, where he engaged in the manufacture of leather goods until his death in 1853.

Before coming to the new world Augustus Krieckhaus had acquired a fair business education and at the same time had become proficient in the French language. Soon after his arrival here he gained a speaking knowledge of the English tongue and entered the employ of L. C. Speck, a wholesale dealer in “Yankee notions,” which establishment he left after having served one year, and during the two succeeding years was employed as a drug clerk. Under the direction of his father he then learned the tanner’s trade, and after the death of his parent continued to carry on the business for a period of four years, when he became general manager of the Commercial Alley, between Vine and Washington streets, engaging in the purchase of hides and the manufacture and sale of leather. In 1858 he bought the business from its owner, Mr. Luthercord, and conducted it under the name of A. Krieckhaus & Company, and in a short time made it one of the largest commercial establishments in the city. In 1878 the firm of which he was president began to deal extensively, in tallow and in this line transacted the largest business of any house in St. Louis. As a conservative and honorable business man Mr. Krieckhaus was held in high esteem in the commercial world and placed his house in the position where to the fullest extent it courts the confidence of the entire public and is noted for its financial solidity and straightforward transactions.

During the Civil war Mr. Krieckhaus served as first lieutenant of Company K, Fifth Regiment, Home Guard. Not only as a military man did he serve his fellowmen, but also in several civic capacities, having been a member of the city council from the year 1864 to 1873, during this period having officiated as president and also as vice president of that body. Subsequently he was a member of the “committee of thirteen,” which formed the present city charter and accorded St. Louis its independent form of government. As a member of the city council he served with prominence on the ways and means committee, was enthusiastic for public improvements and was largely instrumental in effecting the construction of the present city waterworks. When slavery was the paramount issue in American politics Mr. Krieckhaus affiliated himself with the republican party, but after its abolition, when the economic question became a telling issue, he allied himself with the democratic party and voted three times for Grover Cleveland, who was eminent for the stand he took in behalf of the revenue reform movement.

As to his religious convictions Mr. Krieckhaus was an agnostic but, while he took this stand, he was not embittered nor did he manifest animus toward those who accepted the confessions of the several religious denominations. lie was largely associated with fraternal organizations, having been a member of the Masonic order and of the Knights of Honor. He also belonged to the Liederkranz and Turner societies and to the Missouri Crematory Association, having been a director of the latter. For many years he served on the board of directors of the German Mutual Life Insurance Company, and officiated for a long period as president of the German Insurance Company. His business relations were inclusive of many commercial enterprises, in all of which he served in a prominent capacity, having been a member of the board of directors of the Washington Mutual Fire Insurance Company, having at one time served as its vice president and also having officiated as president of the German Bank.

Notwithstanding the pressure of extensive business cares Mr. Krieckhaus found time for accomplishments along literary lines. He was a close and exhaustive student, particularly of scientific and literary subjects, having devoted considerable attention to the sciences of botany and chemistry. At one time he was president of the Floral & Horticultural Society of St. Louis, in which line of work he took great interest and delighted to devote his spare time in the cultivation of flowering plants, vines and shrubs. He was so much in love with the classification and growth of flora that he built a conservatory on the south side, where he spent most of his leisure time in raising rare plants, at which he had become an adept. During the Louisiana Purchase Exposition the products of his conservatory were much sought for, and he sold seven palms which he had raised from the seed to the World’s Fair authorities.

In 1857 Mr. Krieckhaus was united in marriage to Katherine Kiefaber, who was born in Bavaria, July 13, 1838. She is a daughter of Jacob and Catherine Kiefaber, and one of a family of ten children, four of whom are living, the others being:

William, who resides here; and two sisters, who are residents of California. Her mother departed this life in Bavaria and her father came to the new world in 1870 and passed away in St. Louis. Mr. and Mrs. Krieckhaus have six children living: Laura, wife of

W. H. Proetz; Matilda E.; Lucy; Catherine, who was married to William F. Baxter, of

Omaha; Ella E.; and Augusta, wife of Charles W. Robinson.

Mr. Krieckhaus lived a long, active and useful career and was not only beneficial to the community as a business man but served the city in an eminent way in civic capacities. While a member of the city council he was always in favor of improvements and when he essayed to induce the members of that body to install free baths he was ridiculed and widely cartooned in the daily papers but, notwithstanding the many rejoinders with which he was combated, he earnestly persisted in advocating every improvement which he thought would add to the reputation of the city and the welfare of its citizens. In friendship Mr. Krieckhaus was not lax and his charitableness was well known throughout the entire community. He was a hard worker and from the time he took his initial steps in the business world at a very early age he labored persistently not only to mass a fortune for himself but to be of service to his fellowmen. He led an active business life until two years before his death, during which time he had won a host of warm friends and, as well, the esteem of the entire community.

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LPIIONSO Cl I ASK STEWART is (he senior partner of the distinguished law firm of Stewart, Eliot, Chaplin & Blayncy, and also counsel for the St. Louis Union Trust Company. His life, however, is varied in its activities and the public work that he has done has made extensive demands upon his time, his thought and his energies, although it has largely been of a nature that has brought no pecuniary reward. In his life are the elements of greatness because of the use he has made of his talents and his opportunities, because his thoughts are not self-centered, but are given to the mastery of the life problems and the fulfillment of his duty as a man in his relations to his fellowmen and as a citizen in his relations to his state and country.

Mr. Stewart was born at Lebanon, Tennessee, August 27, 1848. Family records name Milesius* of Spain as the first known ancestor of the family. Robert Bruce and a brother of the father of Mary, Queen of Scots, were also lineal ancestors of A. C. Stewart. After residing for some time in Scotland, representatives of the family went to Ireland and later the family was founded in Delaware, where it figured prominently in the early history of the state. It was before the beginning of the seventeenth century that the Stewarts set foot on American soil, and the great-great-great-grandfather of A. C. Stewart lies buried in the heart of the city of Wilmington, the small burial ground which contains his remains being now surrounded by the buildings composing the business center of that city.

Alexander J. Stewart, father of Alphonso C. Stewart, was a West Point graduate and an army officer. He completed his course of study at the age of nineteen years, became a lieutenant of artillery and for one year commanded Fort Buford, North Carolina, after which he was ordered back to West Point as assistant professor of mathematics. Later he was called to the chair of mathematics in Cumberland University, at Lebanon, Tennessee, where he remained for a number of years. He afterward spent two years as a member of the faculty of the University of Nashville, and then returned to Cumberland University, where he remained until the outbreak of the Civil war. He then entered the military service of the state of Tennessee and after it seceded lie joined the Confederacy, serving as lieutenant general at the close of the war. He had entered the Confederate army as major of artillery and saw much action, serving in the Western Army and building all of the Confederate fortifications along the Mississippi. He was associated with Generals Johnson, Bragg and Beauregard. Following the cessation of hostilities he was for a time engaged in civil engineering at Lebanon, Tennessee, and in 1869 came to St. Louis as secretary of the St. Louis Mutual Life Insurance Company, with which he was thus associated for a number of years. He resigned to become chancellor of the University of Mississippi, where he remained for ten or twelve years, when he became the Confederate representative of the Cbattanooga-Chickamauga National Military

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Park commission and had principal charge of the work of laying out that beautiful park. Subsequently he retired and lived with his son, Alphonso, until November, 1906, when he removed to Biloxi, Mississippi, where he now resides, at the venerable age of eighty-seven years. He married Harriet Byron Chase, a representative of the Spaulding family of Connecticut, daughter of Dr. Benjamin and Alice Fassett (Spaulding) Chase, and a relative of Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase. The Chase family was a prominent old one of Connecticut. Mrs. Stewart passed away in 1900.

Alphonso Chase Stewart began his education at the age of five years, when he became a pupil in a private school conducted by Mrs. Jones at Lebanon, Tennessee. He after ward matriculated in the academic department of the Cumberland University, where he remained until the outbreak of the war, when the school was closed. He next entered a private school at Memphis, Tennessee, and afterward attended a military school called the University of Alabama, at Tuscaloosa, but at the age of sixteen years he put aside his text-books in order to enter the Confederate army. He had previously, however, joined the southern army at the age of fifteen years. He enlisted as a private in Starne’s Fourth Tennessee Cavalry and saw very active service, being in the battle of Saltville on the line between Virginia and Tennessee and in numerous hotly contested skirmishes.

Through the exigencies of the war the family fortunes were ruined and Alphonso C. Stewart found the necessity of making his own way in life. He studied for a time under the direction of his father and engaged in farming the home place in order to support the family, but it was his desire to enter upon a professional career and he qualified for entrance to the law department of the Cumberland University at Lebanon, from which he was graduated in 1867, at the age of nineteen years, with the degree of Bachelor of Law. Being too young to enter upon active practice, he remained and pursued the post-graduate course in that institution, and had barely reached the age of twenty years when he finished that work. The county court of Wilson county removed his legal disability, however, and admitted him to the bar when he had not yet completed the second decade of his life.

Removing to Winchester, Tennessee, Mr. Stewart entered upon active practice there but a year later removed to Enterprise, Mississippi, where he continued until January, 1873. In February of the latter year he arrived in St. Louis, opened an office and continued alone in practice until 1874, when he became the junior partner of the law firm of King, Phillips & Stewart. This association was maintained until 1875, when the firm dissolved and a partnership was formed under the style of Phillips & Stewart, which had a continuous existence for fourteen years, or until 1889. The law firm of Phillips, Stewart, Cunningham & Eliot was then in existence until 1896, followed by Stewart, Cunningham & Eliot, until 1902. Upon the death of Major Cunningham the firm became Stewart, Eliot & Williams, and when Judge Williams was elevated to the bench in 1905 the present law firm of Stewart, Eliot, Chaplin & Blayney was formed. The firm originally engaged in general practice, but in 1883 Phillips & Stewart became general counsel for what is now known as the Cotton Belt Railroad and so continued until January, 1889. They then resumed the general practice of law, but in the fall of 1889 Mr. Stewart organized the St. Louis Union Trust Company and has remained its counsel to the present time. He had previously had considerable experience in managing the business interests of trust companies and the business of the new institution grew rapidly, become ing recognized Sis one of the strong and able financial enterprises of the city. In the general practice of law Mr. Stewart has displayed a mind naturally analytical and well aiptjonso Cfjase tttoart trained. His comprehensive knowledge of the law, especially the department of corporation law, has made him a valued factor in the affairs of various business concerns with which he is connected. He has been a director in the St. Louis Cotton Compress Company; is a director of the Schultz Belting Company; of the Mermod, Jaccard & King Jewelry Company; Goodwin Manufacturing Company; Tower Realty Company; a director and president of the Vinita Realty Company; and a director and president of the Spring Avenue Realty Company. His attention is practically devoted, however, to the interests of the St. Louis Union Trust Company.

Mr. Stewart was married July 19, 1871, to Miss Elizabeth Smith, of Winchester, Franklin county, Tennessee. Their son, Samuel Smith Stewart, born in Winchester, November 28, 1872, is now a practicing physician at Little Rock, Arkansas, and division surgeon of the Iron Mountain and allied railroads in Arkansas. The daughter, Harriet, is now the wife of Judge George H. Williams, and was born at Winchester, Tennessee, in October, 1873.

In professional lines Mr. Stewart is connected with the St. Louis Bar Association and with the Missouri Bar Association. He belongs also to the St. Louis, the Noonday, the Racquet and the St. Louis Country Clubs. He has taken the thirty-third, the highest degree in Masonry, and is at the head of the Scottish Rite bodies in the city of St. Louis. He is also grand treasurer of the Grand Lodge, A. F. & A. M., of Missouri, associations which indicate his marked prominence in Masonic circles. He is fond of automobiling and is the owner of two fine cars. General literature has always been a subject of great interest to him and, moreover, he has been a close student of the languages, speaking fluently French, German, Spanish and Italian. In community affairs his labor has been effective as a force for good, and from January, 1905, until February, 1908, he was president of the board of police commissioners. His political allegiance is given to the democracy. Long a member of the Presbyterian church, he has been one of its active workers for many years, served as Sunday school superintendent for eighteen years and for twenty-one years he has been president of the State Sunday School Association of the Presbyterian church. He has been particularly interested in the field of labor for the moral development of the youth, realizing the importance of early training and environment in establishing the character and holding the destinies of the individual. No good work done in the name of charity or religion seeks his aid in vain and no plan or movement for the benefit of the city along lines of progress and improvement fails to gain his hearty cooperation and endorsement. In his personal relations he adheres to high ideals. He holds friendship inviolable and as true worth may always win his regard he has a very extensive circle of friends, while his life demonstrates thetruth of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s statement that “the way to win a friend is to be one.”

MOS RILEY TAYLOR is the senior partner of the law firm of A. R. and Howard Taylor of St. Louis. He was born January 23, 1842, about six miles west of Owensboro, Kentucky, on his father

As printed in St. Louis, the fourth city : pictorial and biographical (1909). See the original pages. Wording is the original; obvious scanning errors have been corrected, and a few may remain.