BIOGRAPHY: Edward Vincent; New York co., NY
surname: Vincent

submitted by Elizabeth Burns (burns at asu.edu) 
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Submitted Date: June 3,2005
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Author: Walter Barrett

Edward Vincent
Page 155
Old Merchants, 
by Walter Barrett,Clerk,
Knox and Sons, 1885

Edward Vincent died suddenly. He was formerly a merchant in this city.  
Curious enough in Chapter 26 of this work I alluded to him pleasantly in this 
way: "Captain Edward Vincent, James B. Glenworth and George L. Pride used to 
out to Cato's in the early summer morning and drink mint juleps together, 
previous to the late war with England in 1812."  The next day Mr. H-, a broker 
went to Captain Vincent, and asked him if he would sell him a land warrant, 
granted to soldiers of the 1812 War.  Of course, the captain had none. The 
visitor expressed surprise, as he, Captain Vincent, was out in that war.  He 
took the joke at once--said he should have to challenge W.B. for making him 
nearly seventy years old.

I do not think he was far from sixty years old. Thirty years ago he was a 
merchant, under the firm of Vincent and Butterworth, in Pearl, near Old Slip, 
about No. 86.  At that time Vincent was a splendid fellow of very agreeable 
manners, plenty of customers and plenty of cash, lived at Mrs. Mann's or one 
of those ostentatious boarding houses in Broadway, below the old Grace Church. 
He was a Virginian and was welcomed wherever he went. He was a military man 
and popular.  He was a regular attendant upon the old City Hall assembly 
balls. He could have picked a wife anywhere.

Vincent and Butterworth did a very extensive business, until the cold night in 
December 1835, when the lower part of New York, on the East River side was 
laid in ashes. They were insured but no insurance company paid their losses.  
I think the concern was staggered and a new order of things was started, for 
he opened again at No. 45 Broad Street, under the firm of Brett and Vincent. 
That firm continued some years, at least as late as the election of General 
Harrison in 1840.  From Tyler, his successor, I think, Captain Vincent 
received an appointment in the Custom House and if my memory serves me, he was 
not removed from it until within a few weeks of his death.