Robert Wilton Bringhurst, Rapides Parish Louisiana
Submitted by: Suzanne Shoemaker

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Source: Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Northwest Louisiana
The Southern Publishing Company, Chicago & Nashville,  1890

ROBERT WILTON BRINGHURST.

A lifetime of hard, earnest endeavor, in pursuing the various occupations in
which he has been engaged, coupled with strict integrity, honesty of purpose
and liberality, has tended to place Mr. Bringhurst among the highly honored
and successful men of Rapides Parish.  He was born in Alexandria, La.,
December 13, 1840, and was a very sedate and precocious youth during his early
years.  At the age of nine years he was put to school and was taught the
rudiments of his education in his native town, but at the age of twelve years
he was enrolled as a day scholar in the Rapides High School, under the
tutorship of Luther Fay Parker, and at fourteen years of age, in company with
an elder brother, he was sent to Alexandria, Va., High School, which was under
the able management of Caleb S. Hallowell, a Quaker of much erudition and
strict discipline.  His career in this institution was marked by rapid
progress, for he not only applied himself diligently to his studies, but he
possessed an active mind, quick to grasp new ideas, and a retentive memory,
and although he was sufficiently mischievous not to be termed a mollycoddle,
he was not in the least vicious, and was consequently a favorite with his
instructors.  From this school he was graduated and sent to Union College,
Schenectady, N. Y., where he entered the sophomore year in the civil
engineering department under the immediate instruction of Prof. William M.
Gillespie, and at the age of nineteen years, in his second term, he
graduated as a civil engineer.  He then returned to his native home and
State and was at once appointed assistant engineer on the New Orleans,
Opelousas & Great Western Railroad (now the Texas & Pacific), then under
construction, the building of which was soon put a stop to by the opening
of the Rebellion.  The beginning of a life full of ambition and impatient
to enter upon the real duties of life was nipped in the bud, and the
hardening scenes of four years' service as a soldier totally changed the
plans of his life.  Although repugnant to his nature to become a soldier,
in 1861 he enlisted in the Confederate service in the Army of Tennessee, at
Corinth, Miss., and very soon after became attached to the engineers' corps
under Gen. Ruggles.  In 1863 he was assigned to service in the engineers'
department west of the Mississippi River as second lieutenant of engineers
in the Red River Valley, afterward becoming first lieutenant of engineers
with Gen. Sterling Price, and was acting chief of the engineers' department
of Arkansas at Camden.  Notably among his engineering accomplishments were
the Sugar Cooler pontoon bridge across the Atchafalaya River over which
Gen. Taylor's army crossed, Yellow Bayou and Boota Bayou bridges, Cane
River pontoon bridge, the fortifications' at Doolie's Ferry and at Fulton,
Ark., and the pontoon and equipage for Gen. Prices's march to Missouri.
Mr. Bringhurst's military career closed at Navasota, Tex., after which he
returned home and was commissioned parish surveyor almost immediately, a
position he filled with satisfaction to all.  Hen engaged in planting, but
has also been United States deputy surveyor and real estate agent.  In
1869-70 he owned and operated a saw mill, but this occupation not proving
at all remunerative he abandoned it and has since given his attention to
the above mentioned calling.  His life, up to the present time, has been
very active, therefore a healthy one and although he is now forty-nine
years of age he is in full vigor of manhood, and is blessed with a fair
amount of this world's goods, fully sufficient token the wolf from the
door.   He always endorses every word and act that leads to progression and
civilization, is a man of very superior natural endowments, which have been
strengthened and enriched by the highest culture.  His mind is clear,
concise and well poised, and being of quick perception, what might cost
others hours of study he reaches at a bound, and the reasons for his views
are always clear and well defined.  He is highly esteemed in social
circles, and being kind, generous and hospitable, he wins many friends and
rarely loses any.  At the age of twelve years, his father, Augustus L.
Bringhurst, who was born in Germantown, Penn. (now Philadelphia), died, and
was buried with Masonic honors.  He possessed a wise Christian mother, who
was Mary E., daughter of Capt. William Waters, one of the early pioneers to
Louisiana from Mason County, Ky., who devoted herself to the education of
her five sons, and nobly did she fulfill every duty.  She died in 1880, in
full communion with the Methodist Episcopal Church.  The Bringhursts are of
German descent, a member of the family coming from Germany to this country
many years ago and settling in Pennsylvania.  The family are noted for
their excellent constitutions, their longevity and morality.  The subject
of this sketch was married in New Orleans November 25, 1865, to Miss Judith
Taliaferro Leckie, and their happy union thus far has been blessed in the
birth of nine children, eight of whom are now living.  Mr. Bringhurst's
motto is, "Be true to God, to his fellowman and to himself.  Be sure you
are right and then go ahead."