Thomas W. Bennett (1831-1893)

Thomas Warren Bennett was born in Union County, Indiana, where his father was a farmer. In 1850 he left to attend Indiana Asbury University (now DePauw University) where he received his law degree in 1855. He returned to Liberty and practiced law until the beginning of the Civil War. At the first call for troops, he raised a company of volunteers and was commissioned a captain in what became the 15th Regiment of Indiana Volunteers. In October 1862 Governor Morton appointed him Colonel of the 69th Regiment, and with this unit he participated in the battles leading to the fall of Vicksburg in July 1863. Promoted to Brigadier General soon after, he led his brigade in the Red River Campaign. In September 1864 the War Department detailed him to serve on the military tribunal which tried a group of conspirators, known as the “Sons of Liberty.” These sympathizers of the South had plotted to murder Governor Morton and force Indiana to seceed.

In October 1864 he was elected state senator representing Fayette and Union Counties. In 1868, he moved to Richmond and was elected mayor the following year. He had served for two years in Richmond before President Grant appointed him Territorial Governor of Idaho. He was governor until 1875 when he was elected to Congress, in which he served one year.

In 1876 he returned to Richmond and resumed his law practice. He served as mayor again from 1877-1883 and 1885-1887. He was responsible for renaming the city streets in 1881 to the current system of numbers beginning at the Whitewater River, and letters north and south from Main Street.

General Bennett was an active member of the Grand Army of the Republic veterans group and also served as the president of the Indiana State Pension Association.

Charles Fremont Conner (1857-1905)

by Gretchen Brown

Charles Fremont Conner was born February 4, 1857 (though other sources conflict with differing dates of 1852 and 1860) in Richmond, Indiana, the fifth child of James and Sarah Conner. Conner’s first artistic expression was while employed by the Hoosier Drill Company (later International Harvester) where he painted landscapes and decorations on farm machinery. Completely self-taught, Mr. Conner did not make use of a studio, but painted his works largely out of doors. He was also a woodcarver, a mechanic and played the coronet in Conner’s Military Band with his four brothers.

In 1887, Conner and his brother Albert, also an artist, went to California. Here, Charles met and married his wife Carrie Stanton. This marriage produced two children, Russell Conner and Pauline Conner Foien.

By the time he returned in 1903, there was an association of artists known as The Richmond Group, of which he became a prominent member. Charles was said to be of modest personality and it was said of him by a friend that he “does not appear to have realized his own ability.”

“A Wet Night in February” and “Woodland Memory”, two of his most highly acclaimed works, were exhibited in 1903 in Indianapolis. “A Wet Night in February” went on to be selected for exhibit at the St. Louis World’s Fair.

The Richmond Art Museum owns many of his paintings today which were on display during a 2008 exhibition. Most others are valued in private collections. “Old Swimming Hole” is owned by the Northeastern Wayne School Corporation, bought in part by the collection of funds of school children.

Charles Conner, afflicted by poor health throughout his life, passed away in Fountain City on February 15, 1905. He was only forty-eight.

Sources:

Dingwerth, Shaun T. The Richmond Group artists

Dingwerth, Shaun T. California to Indiana: The Art of Charles Conner 1857-1905. Richmond Art Museum

John Finley (1797-1866)

Born in Rockbridge County, Virginia on January 11, 1797, he came to Indiana in 1821 and served in various public offices for the rest of his life, beginning in 1822 when he became Justice of the Peace. He represented Wayne County in the State Legislature from 1828 to 1831, and for three years after that was the Enrolling Clerk of the Senate. From 1833 to 1837 he owned and edited the Richmond Palladium. In 1837 he was elected Clerk of the Wayne County Courts for a seven year term. In 1852 he was elected Richmond’s second mayor, and he held that position until his death on December 23, 1866.

Finley was also a poet who is credited with the first literary use of the word “Hoosier” in his poem titled The Hoosier’s Nest.

He had five children: two sons, William, who died in 1846 at age 19, and John H., who was a major in the 69th Indiana Infantry during the Civil War. In May 1863 he was badly wounded during an assault on the city of Vicksburg and died of his wounds the following August. “From this blow the father never recovered,” reported his oldest daughter, Mrs. Sarah Wrigley. In 1864, Sarah Wrigley became librarian of the newly opened Morrisson Library and remained in that position until 1903. His two other daughters were Miss Julia Finley and Mrs. Mary F. Hibberd.