Richmond City-Nelson-Augusta County Virginia USGenWeb Archives Biographies.....Horsley, John Shelton 1870 - ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/va/vafiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Joy Fisher http://www.rootsweb.com/~archreg/vols/00001.html#0000031 February 23, 2008, 7:31 pm Author: Leonard Wilson (1916) JOHN SHELTON HORSLEY ENGLISH surnames came into general use between 1050 and 1250, and the distinguished name of Horsley can be traced back to the twelfth century. Little Hellingbury in County Hertford was the original family seat, and, according to English authorities, the name is subsequently found in the Registers of Counties Northumberland, Northampton and York. Robert Horsley was the sheriff of York in the time of Richard II (1367-1400). This family became numerous in Wiltshire. The earliest mention of the name in Virginia appears in the land records of Northumberland County under date of October 6, 1665, when land was patented by a Robert Horsley. He is supposed to have been the direct ancestor of William Horsley, who in 1744 married Mary Cabell. Owing to the destruction of many early Virginia records, the relationship has not been positively established. Mary Cabell, born February 13, 1726, was the eldest child of Dr. William Cabell and his first wife Elizabeth Burks. Dr. Cabell was a native of Warminster, England, he was educated for his profession at the Royal College of Medicine and Surgery, and for a time practiced in London. He then became a surgeon in the British Navy. His ship came to Jamestown, Virginia, and Dr. Cabell visited the interior of the colony. He was so pleased with the country that he returned to England, resigned his commission, and emigrated to Virginia in 1724. He became the founder of a family illustrious in the civic and social annals of the Old Dominion. Robert Horsley of St. Paul's Parish, Hanover, direct ancestor of Dr. J. Shelton Horsley is the first of this family in Virginia of whom we have definite information. He was granted lands on the north side of the Rivanna River, September 17, 1731. He died in 1734. His brother Roland was a resident of Hanover, and his sister Fanny married, in 1739, Richard Burks, brother of Elizabeth Burks who married Dr. William Cabell. William Horsley, son of Robert of St. Paul's Parish, was a retired country gentleman and student. For several years he was tutor to the children of Dr. Cabell, who was then living in the upper part of the present County of Goochland. The romantic courtship and marriage, in 1744, of this quiet and dignified instructor with his winsome pupil of eighteen years, lends scope to the imagination. Their home in Goochland County was the gift of Dr. Cabell, and here their four children, William Andrew, Robert, Elizabeth and John were born. William Andrew Horsley, eldest child of William and Mary (Cabell) Horsley, was born in 1745. He held the office of Justice from Amherst in the years 1770 to 1775, and in 1776 was appointed Justice under the Commonwealth. Early in the Revolution he enlisted with the Continental troops, serving as a lieutenant from 1778 to 1781. He married Martha, daughter of Colonel William Megginson, and the following children were born: William, Mary Cabell, Joseph, Judith, Robert, Martha, Samuel Cabell, Elizabeth, John and Nicholas. Special mention should be made of (a) William, born in 1772, a magistrate in Nelson County; (b) Mary Cabell, who married Micajah Pendleton of Amherst County, a soldier in the Revolutionary War; (c) Samuel Cabell, a surgeon in the United States Navy who served in the War of 1812 to 1815. He was on Commodore Perry's flagship at the battle of Lake Erie, and when that vessel was sinking, he escaped with Perry and a half dozen officers in an open boat and the party was transferred to the "Niagara." This perilous undertaking in the face of a heavy fire from the British guns was the turning point in the inland sea fight, which culminated in Perry's brilliant victory, memorable in history, (d) John, born 1787, died 1850. He was a merchant, planter and man of affairs. He was twice married. By his first wife, Philadelphia Hamilton Dunscombe, he had a son William Andrew Horsley. He married secondly in 1819, Mary Mildred Cabell, and had issue Frederick C., Edmund W., Nicholas C., Alice W., Paulina, Mary E., Frances M., and John Horsley, Jr. John Horsley, Jr., youngest child of John and Mary Mildred (Cabell) Horsley, was born February 21, 1845. At the outbreak of the Civil War, when but sixteen years of age, he joined the infantry company recruited at Norwood, Nelson County, Virginia, in April, 1861. The company was assigned to the 49th Virginia Infantry as Company H, Early's Brigade, Jackson's Corps. Governor William Smith was colonel of this regiment. Under a provision by which soldiers under eighteen years of age could be taken from the army by their parents or guardians, John Horsley, Jr., was removed from the army by his mother, December 15, 1862, two days after the first battle of Fredericksburg. Up to this time he was in all the battles fought by his corps, including the battle of Fredericksburg. In January, 1863, he went to the Virginia Military Institute and fought in the battle of New Market, May 15, 1864, being in D Company. The gallant advance and final charge by the brave cadets in this battle, resulting in a complete rout of the federal forces, and the capture of Captain Von Kleiser's Battery, was the most brilliant exploit of the corps, but by no means the only active field service in which the cadets engaged. Soon after Hunter burned the institute, Mr. Horsley joined Colonel Mosby's Independent Command September 1, 1864, being in the company under Captain Samuel Chapman, and served with valor until the close of the War. Mr. Horsley married in 1868, Rose Evelyn Shelton, daughter of John Marshall Shelton of Nelson County, Virginia, and his wife, Mary H. Digges. They had issue three sons, of whom John Shelton Horsley, a distinguished surgeon of Richmond, Virginia, is the oldest. The second son, Frederick M. Horsley, is a physician in active practice in Livingston, Nelson County, Virginia, and married in January, 1915, Miss Laura Boyd, of the same county. The third son, Guy W. Horsley, died in El Paso, Texas, of typhoid fever, in 1900, when about fifteen years of age. John Shelton Horsley, was born on his father's plantation at Livingston, Nelson County, Virginia, November 24, 1870. He was educated in the academic department of the University of Virginia, 1889-90, and graduated from the medical department of this institution in 1892, supplementing his medical training with a post graduate course in New York. He began the practice of his profession in Nelson County, and in 1894 removed to Staunton, Virginia. In 189G he was assistant to Dr. John A. Wyeth of New York, and editor of the New York Polyclinic Medical Journal. He then spent five years in El Paso, Texas, when he returned to his native State, and became a professor in the Medical College of Virginia, lecturing on the principles of surgery. He was surgeon of Memorial Hospital, and at present is surgeon in charge of St. Elizabeth's Hospital in Richmond. Dr. Horsley holds memberships in the Southern Surgical and Gynecological Association, of which he was Vice-President; Richmond Academy of Medicine (Ex-President); the American Medical Association; Virginia Medical Society; Beta Chapter of Virginia of the Phi Beta Kappa; Westmoreland Club; Country Club, Richmond, and the Colonade Club, Charlottesville. His religions affiliation is with the Unitarian Church. Dr. Horsley is widely recognized as an authority on the practice of surgery, and is the author of a volume entitled "Surgery of the Blood Vessels." He is co-author of "American Practice of Surgery," and a constant contributor to the Medical Press on surgical subjects. Dr. Horsley, February 14, 1899, at Staunton, Virginia, married Eliza W., daughter of Dr. Tomlin and Mary (Caperton) Braxton. Of this marriage there are seven children: John Shelton, Jr., Elizabeth Braxton, Caperton Braxton, Guy Winston, Mary Caperton, Tomlin Braxton, and Fred Horsley. The Horsley arms are described as follows: "Azure a fesse or, between three horses heads erased argent, bridled gules, within a bordure gobonated of the third and vert." Additional Comments: Extracted from: MAKERS OF AMERICA BIOGRAPHIES OF LEADING MEN OF THOUGHT AND ACTION THE MEN WHO CONSTITUTE THE BONE AND SINEW OF AMERICAN PROSPERITY AND LIFE VOLUME II By LEONARD WILSON, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF ASSISTED BY PROMINENT HISTORICAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL WRITERS Illustrated with many full page engravings B. F. JOHNSON, INC. CITY OF WASHINGTON, U. S. A. 1916 Copyright, 1916 by B. F. Johnson, Inc. Photo: http://www.usgwarchives.net/va/richcity/photos/bios/horsley52gbs.jpg File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/va/richmondcity/bios/horsley52gbs.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/vafiles/ File size: 9.2 Kb