Ford County IL Archives Biographies.....Beach, Hugh 
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Source: History of Ford County, Illinois : from its earliest settlement to 1908, volume 2, pages 445-450
Author: Gardner, Ernest Arthur

Judge Hugh Parish Beach, a lawyer of Piper City and editor and proprietor of 
the Pan Handle Advocate, was born in a log cabin in the then wilderness about 
thirty miles south of Cleveland, in Montville township, Medina county, Ohio, 
more than sixty-six years ago. On the paternal side he is descended from an 
old family of New Jersey. His grandfather, David Beach, served in the war of 
the Revolution, and his grandmother, Mary Tomkins was a near relative of 
Daniel D. Tomkins, who was prominent in the early history of this country and 
at one time was governor of New York, and afterward vice president of the 
United States, for eight years, with President James Monroe.

Moses Tomkins Beach, father of our subject, was born in Cayuga county, New 
York, in 1810, and was reared to agricultural pursuits in that state. He 
married Maria Wylie Gillett a native of Bergen, Genesee county, New York, but 
directly connected with the Gilletts, Tullers, Phelpses, Pages and other 
leading families of Hartford, Connecticut, and vicinity, in the early history 
of that state. Her mother's maiden name was Pattie Tuller, who married 
Grandfather Gillett at Hartford, Connecticut, before they moved to Genesee 
county. New York. With his young wife Moses Tomkins Beach moved to the Western 
Reserve of Ohio about 1830. Being a skillful woodsman, he cleared and improved 
several farms in that heavily wooded section but later in life engaged in the 
practice of medicine until his death. In politics he was a whig and afterward 
a republican, and was a strong opponent of slavery.

The mother of our subject died when he was fourteen years of age but to her 
teachings and the remembrance of her exemplary character he owes much. He was 
the fourth in a large family. He was early inured to hard labor on the farm 
but acquired a good education for that period, for the settlers in the Western 
Reserve always established good schools, no matter what else had to be 
sacrificed. When his mother died he left school and began to earn his own 
livelihood, with no resources but his intellect and a strong determination to 
succeed. 'He had read accounts of the struggles and successes of Benjamin 
Franklin and a desire was created thereby to become a printer. In the spring 
of 1857 the opportunity presented itself to gratify the ambition, and for the 
next two years he was constantly employed in that work, successively in two 
well appointed newspaper offices, in the course of which he passed through all 
grades of work, from "printer's devil," to assistant in the local news 
department. Like many others, he is indebted to this early newspaper work for 
much of his earlier general information in regard to public affairs. 
Succeeding this, a desire was aroused to become a lawyer and accordingly, for 
two following years he was found under the able tutelage of two of the leading 
lawyers of the state, Hon. Henry Grove and Hon. J. K. Cooper (both now 
deceased), pursuing the "labyrinthine intricacies" of the law, as embraced in 
Blackstone, Kent and other leading textbooks of that department of learning. 
At that time he was a member of a home company' of Zouaves, and when the 
country was startled by the firing upon Fort Sumter, the services of his 
company were immediately tendered to Governor Richard Yates, at Springfield. 
Not receiving any satisfaction from the governor, they sent one of their 
officers to Springfield to confer with him but, such was the patriotic rush to 
the defense of the country. Governor Yates replied to the effect that the 
applications ahead of the Zouaves were sufficient to fill the Illinois quota 
several times over. Nothing daunted, these determined patriots met in their 
armory and decided to tender their services direct to the general government 
and thereupon wired the then secretary of war, Hon. Simon Cameron, at 
Washington, D. C, to that effect. Imagine their disappointment when his reply 
came back: "Consult your governor!" This tended to abate the ardor of their 
patriotism, as there was no Immediate hope of their services being accepted. A 
good part of the company returned to their accustomed pursuits but others kept 
up the organization and, months afterward, with recruited ranks, went to St. 
Louis and joined the Eighth Missouri Infantry. Still engaged in the study of 
the law, it was not until the government called for three hundred thousand 
volunteers that our subject went into actual service. Then for more than four 
years and a half continuously, in both infantry and heavy artillery, he served 
successively in about all positions from private to that of commander of his 
company. He was for a time cleric in the Quartermaster's department at New 
Orleans, Louisiana; also clerk of a court martial in that city, and after 
being promoted to a commissioned officer was a member of a military commission 
by appointment of General Sheridan, commander of the Department of the Gulf. 
He campaigned through Kentucky, Missouri, Tennessee, Arkansas, Mississippi, 
Louisiana and across Lake Pontchartrain and the Gulf of Mexico. He 
participated in some of the most important military operations of the 
Mississippi valley, under Generals Grant, Sherman, Sheridan, Banks, 
McClernand, A. J. Smith, Canby, Hurlbut, Ord and others, and was present at 
the engagements at Haine's Bluff, Chickasaw Bayou, Arkansas Post, Magnolia 
Hills, Grand Gulf, Port Gibson, Champion Hills, Raymond, Black River Bridge 
and the siege of Vicksburg. He went on the famous campaign of General Banks up 
Red river, then across Lake Pontchartrain, and on the march of General Gordon 
Granger through eastern Mississippi in the combined movement against Mobile, 
being then in command of his company, and in all engagements of that campaign. 
During the latter part of his service he was stationed successively at Fort 
St. Philip and Fort Jackson, commanding the defenses of New Orleans, on the 
Gulf coast, at the mouth of the Mississippi. Through all his long and perilous 
service he received only two slight wounds, but he has now in his possession 
his army cartridge-box which undoubtedly saved his life, as it was perforated 
by a ball of the enemy in an engagement, while it was drawn in front of his 
body for convenience in loading his gun, as it was the practice in a fight.

While in the service and in command of his company, he raised a subscription 
in the company to the National Lincoln Monument at Springfield of seven 
hundred and fifteen dollars and thirty cents, and received a personal letter 
from Governor Oglesby in acknowledgment of its receipt, expressed in the most 
complimentary terms. The documents accompanying the subscription are now in 
the archives of the National Lincoln Monument Association.

Just about the close of his military career he was brevetted to a higher rank 
by the president of the United States "for faithful and meritorious services," 
as the parchment commission states. A singular incident is connected with 
this. The commission was forwarded at the proper time but to the wrong 
postoffice, and, not being called for, was returned to the war department at 
Washington. As the fact of being brevetted was unknown to the recipient of the 
honor, no call was made for the commission until many years after his return 
to civil life, when, accidently, a brother officer in the east, who knew about 
it, mentioned the fact in a letter. This gratifying news led to correspondence 
with the War Department, at Washington, and the highly prized document was 
forwarded by return mail, after slumbering in the official vaults of the 
government for about twenty-four years; however it was none the less 
gratefully received.

Another matter relating to his military service, which also has a most 
grateful side to it, is the fact that no complete settlement was ever had with 
the government of his accounts as an officer until the winter of 1892, when 
the government found itself indebted to the Judge several hundred dollars.

While in the military service, Judge Beach wedded Mary Estelle Smith, of 
Louisiana, a daughter of Captain Henry Lyon Smith, of the engineer corps of 
the regular army, and Mrs. Armalie H. Smith, nee Hebert. Captain Smith was a 
graduate of the West Point Military Academy and for a time professor at that 
school. Although himself a native of Maine, his military duties took him to 
Louisiana, where he married Armalie H. Hebert, a sister of his classmate at 
West Point, General Louis Hebert. The Heberts were a very prominent family 
under the old order of affairs before the war. Grandfather Vallery Hebert held 
a prominent position under General Jackson at the battle of New Orleans in 
1851. Paul 0. Hebert was a governor of Louisiana, another representative was a 
speaker of the legislature, still another was a superintendent of one of their 
railways, while another, Mrs. Ernestine S. Stevens, widow of the late General 
Walter Stevens, another graduate of the West Point Military Academy, was first 
librarian of the patent office at Washington, D. C, and for many years was 
librarian of the department of agriculture. She is rightfully classed among 
the great women of the nation. She is Mrs. Beach's aunt.

The subject of our sketch received his discharge from the army February 22, 
1867, and, with his young wife, immediately came north, locating at Piper City 
(then called New Brenton), where they arrived April 19th. His sister, Mrs. 
Mary A. Wilber, now deceased, then resided here. It was her advice that 
brought him here. She and her husband and family had come from Ohio a couple 
of years before, when there was no town and only a few scattered residents 
near groves of timber on the then broad expanse of virgin prairie. She was a 
well educated, talented and exemplary woman and an especially devoted wife and 
mother. As a school teacher before her marriage and a shrewd investor in real 
estate after her marriage, she was a marked success. She died all too soon, in 
1869, leaving a large family of young children to mourn her untimely loss. Her 
remains were laid to rest in Brenton cemetery at Piper City. Her husband built 
the first hotel in the town — the Wilber House — in 1867.

At Piper City, Judge Beach resumed the study of law and in 1870 was admitted 
to the bar by the supreme court of the state, and has since practiced that 
profession. In the early history of Piper City he was elected president of the 
board of trustees and it was during his administration that many important 
streets were graded, the town park, now a beautiful grove, was planted, and a 
number of artesian fire wells sunk in different localities, which latter have 
since saved the place at least two very disastrous conflagrations. During said 
term the first fire engine was bought, which eventually led up to the present 
efficient fire department service of the village. In the spring of 1873 his 
fellow townsmen elected him a member of the county board of supervisors. In 
that body his advocacy of retrenchment, economy and reform in county affairs 
called public attention to him, and he was the same year nominated and elected 
county judge, and was reelected for two successive terms. He served until 
December, 1886, a year having been added by an amendment to the state 
constitution, and it is not too much to say that he had the good will and 
confidence of the people as a just, faithful and upright judge.

For the past quarter of a century he has been editor, publisher and proprietor 
of the Pan Handle Advocate. It is sufficient to say that as a journalist he 
has always endeavored to advocate that which was for the very best interests 
of the people among whom the paper circulates, and he is always able to state 
in clear and forcible language just what he means. His success in this 
department is highly deserved. He is an acknowledged forcible public speaker 
and has delivered many public addresses. In the presidential campaign of 1900 
he was one of the campaign speakers in the state for the McKinley and 
Roosevelt Campaign Committee.

He is a Knight Templar in Masonry, is a patriarch in Odd Fellowship and has 
been in attendance upon the grand lodges of both bodies. He is a past post 
commander of Piper City Post, No. 361, Department of Illinois, Grand Army of 
the Republic, and while commander took the initiatory steps which resulted in 
organizing Gresham Camp, No. 187, Sons of Veterans, of which the Judge is an 
honorary member. Judge Beach cast his first presidential vote for Abraham 
Lincoln at Chicago in 1860, and has always been a believer in republican 
principles. He heard Lincoln and Douglas at Ottawa in the great joint 
discussion of 1858; has also listened to Lovejoy, Logan, Trumbull, Seward, 
Corwin, Hale, Ingersoll, Blaine, Oglesby, Harrison and a host of other leading 
orators of their day; has heard the greatest pulpit orator, Beecher; the 
greatest actor. Booth; and the greatest songstress, Patti. He was a member of 
the Pioneer Wide Awake Club of Chicago, in 1860, the captain of which was 
Orderly Sergeant J. R. Ilayden, of the famous Ellsworth Zouave cadets.

Judge Beach has not accumulated wealth, but his love of good literature has 
brought around him one of the finest private libraries to be found anywhere. 
The field covered is very wide. Besides his law library, there are works of 
history, biography, travel, philosophy, science, mathematics, rhetoric, 
poetry, art, music, also medical, theological, political, military, 
agricultural, horticultural, pomological, stock-raising and various other 
works, the accumulations of a half century. These, and current leading 
journals and magazines of the day, furnish an extensive field for intellectual 
thought and culture on all manner of interesting subjects.

Some years ago the judge found that his long and arduous military service, and 
too close confinement to sedentary pursuits since, had made inroads upon his 
health, to counteract which he has felt compelled to seek more active life in 
the open air than formerly, and in this connection he has what he calls his 
“gymnasium.” It consists in interesting himself in the raising of blooded 
roadster horses and Jersey cattle, and taking care of them himself. Also in 
engaging in horticultural and other open air pursuits.

Judge and Mrs. Beach have a family of five living children. Henry Lyon, born 
and educated here and also trained in journalism in the Advocate office, was 
employed on the Chicago Tribune for four years and on the Record for one year. 
For the past nine years he has been connected with the Union Traction Company, 
now the Chicago Railways Company, of which he is a superintendent. He was 
married in Chicago, in 1899, and has a little daughter, Muriel. Carrie 
Estelle, Ernestine Kellogg, Metta Armalie and Daisy May have all received 
instruction and training in various duties in the office of the Advocate. All 
the children obtained a high-school education. Lillian Mary, the second 
daughter, pronounced a very interesting child by all who knew her, died 
suddenly of membranous croup in the fourth year of her age.

In closing this outline of the biography of one of Ford county's best known 
citizens, let us say that Judge Beach is an unassuming, pleasant and 
companionable gentleman and stands among the first for integrity of purpose 
and general high character in the community where he has so long resided.

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