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Individuals desiring to use this material in their own research may do so. ============================================================================= Formatted by USGenNet Data Repository Chief Archivist, Linda Talbott All of the above information must remain when copied or downloaded. ============================================================================= The Detroit Free Press Sunday, 3 January, 1875 Death of Captain E. B. WARD Captain E. B. WARD died suddenly in this city on Saturday of apoplexy. No similar calamity that has occurred in Detroit in many years occasioned so profound a sensation as this sudden and unlooked for death. The Details Of the sad event are briefly told. He left home at the corner of Fort and Nineteenth streets about half-past 9 o'clock Saturday morning in company with his son CHARLES. During the early hours of the morning he had been engaged in writing an article on the currency, the copy of which he directed CHARLES to deliver to the printer. He spent half or three-quarters of an hour in his office, when a summons came for him to appear as witness in the diamond drill suit on trial in the Superior Court. He put on his overshoes, coat and muffler and started for the court room. He walked along briskly until he reached E. K. Roberts' banking office on the west side of Griswold street, a few feet from Jefferson avenue. At that point he was seen to stop, throw up his arms violently and sink to the ground. R. W. KING and two or three other gentlemen who saw him fall ran up and inquired if he was hurt. Receiving no re- ply, MR. KING looked at him more closely and discovered that his face was black and swollen. MR. KING exclaimed "HE IS DYING," And with the help of some of the bystanders immediately carried him to MR. ROBERT's office and laid him on a lounge. Dr. D. O. FARRAND, who chanced to be at hand, was called in, but the dying man was past all hope of human help. He breathed fitfully a few times and there was no- ticed an occasional muscular movement, but within three minutes from the time he was carried into the office HE WAS DEAD Drs. HAMILTON E. SMITH and JAMES A. BROWN were also in attendance, and while there was yet a faint indication of life it was thought advisable to try the effect of bleed- ing. Before that could be done, however, those who looked closely could see that the end had come. The under jaw dropped slightly, and the blackness all left the face which a moment later took on the pallor of death. Some of the persons present composed the limbs and performed such other offices as the occasion required. Meantime news of the calamity had spread through the business districts, and the place where the body lay was besieged with a crowd of men all anxious to learn if it was really true that CAPT. WARD was dead. The office where the solemn scene was acted was packed with the more immediate friends of the deceased and the few reporters who had been able to make their way through the excited crowd. A policeman was stationed just with- in the door, and his best efforts were required to keep the throng from pressing in when the door was opened for an instant to let some person out. His son CHARLES was the first of the family to reach the scene, but his emotion was too great for him to remain long in the sorrowful presence, and he was escorted away. A few minutes later Miss EMILY WARD, the only sister of the deceased, came in and at once gave orders to have the remains taken to the family residence. That done she set her face homeward, but what occurred between that noble and devoted woman and her beloved dead cannot concern the public. Her affection for him was of the most exalted type. In all his life he had never known so wise a counselor, so sure and stanch a friend, or so loving and loyal a follower. Older than he by some years, she was his sister-mother in childhood, and he was always the object of her unselfish care and dear solicitude. In trouble she was his soother; in his happiness she was happy; in his good fortunes she re- joiced. She loved him with an undivided heart, and his death has wrung her sore. Coroner's Inquest Coroner GRIFFIN held an inquest and the jury rendered a verdict of death from apoplexy. Public Sentiment Before noon the sad occurrence was known in every portion of the city, and everywhere the news was re- ceived with deep regret. One prominent lawyer upon be- ing told of it remarked, "There is gone the man from whose hand came the bread of hundreds, perhaps thousands." Another said that of his personal knowledge CAPT. WARD had, by great individual sacrifices, kept some of his extensive enterprises moving this winter that poor men might live. The universal expression was one of sorrow for the loss of the man. Purely in a business sense his sudden taking off cannot be regarded otherwise than as a great calamity. The Board of Trade When the Board met at the noon hour President PARSONS announced the event in the following language: It becomes my painful duty to make you the announcement of an event which has doubtless ere this reached all of you - the death of EBER B. WARD. At half-past ten this forenoon, in the flush of health, eager in the enter- prises of an active and busy life, he walked the streets alone, and at a quarter to eleven he lay prone in death. No man among us probably more thoroughly exemplified the grand characteristics of American institutions than MR. WARD. I will recollect when his entire means consisted of an interest in the schooner Harrison, after which he bought out the steamer Huron, which, through his inde- fatigable energy and tireless industry, became the mother of a vast fleet of steamers which dotted the Northern lakes from west to east; and later, when it became evi- dent that railways would compete successfully for the carrying passenger traffic, at the expense of steamers, his teeming brain brought out a scheme of iron works which has developed a city of 2,500 people and their vast industries in the iron manufacturing interests of Wyan- dotte. Later the North Chicago rolling mills, blast fur- naces and steel works were established, and among other enterprises traceable directly to his master mind may be mentioned the Milwaukee rolling mills and furnace, the Frankfort rolling mills and furnace, and recently an enterprise for the manufacture of plate glass, near St. Louis, with a capital of more than a half million dollars. Surely, then, it becomes us to make honorable mention of a man so prolific in developing industries which make a people great and rich. On motion of ALEX. LEWIS the Board decided to attend the funeral in a body, and as a further mark of respect the Board adjourned. During the afternoon the death of CAPT. WARD and the probable or possible consequences of that calamity were the chief topics of conversation in business circles. The impression seems to be quite general that his affairs are so shaped that they will not suffer ver materially as a direct consequence of this death, though all concede that it will be surprising if there shall be raised up among his associates a man to fill his place in the man- agement of the enterprises with which he had devoted his administrative genius. His Career EBER BROCK WARD was born near the site of the BROCK monument in Lincoln County, Ontario, December 25th, 1811. He was therefore sixty-three years of age on last Christ- mas - an event which he celebrated with the greatest en- joyment and in the best of health. His birth in Canada occurred during a temporary sojourn there of his father's family, they having gone thither from Rutland County, Ver- mont, to escape the threatened ravages of the last war with Great Britain. Immediately after the war, the family returned to Vermont. In 1817 several families, among them MR. WARD's, determined to go West. Kentucky was fixed upon as the place whither they would go, and they set out on the then tedious journey. MRS. WARD, the mother of EBER, died en route at Waterford, Pennsylvania. This event dis- arranged the elder WARD's plans, and when he reached Con- neaut, Ohio, he abandoned the purpose of going to Kentucky. EBER WARD first came to Detroit in 1821, when he was less than ten years of age. Of his subsequent career the brief address of President PARSONS will afford a general knowledge but a full record of his busy and eventful life would fill volumes. His interests at Wyandotte, Ludington, Silver Islet, Chicago, Milwaukee, the new plate glass works in Missouri, and his real estate and vessel property in De- troit were all more or less under his personal supervision, though of course the details were committed to the care of men whom his sagacity had prompted him to select for the hundreds of subordinate executive positions. It is impos- sible with the figures at hand to correctly estimate his wealth, but a gentleman who has been for many years one of his most intimate and trusted friends informed a re- porter for The Free Press that $5,000,000 would not be too large an estimate. His investments in Silver Islet are considerably over $1,000,000. The mills at Ludington cost $500,000. He has $1,000,000 in the Chicago rolling mill; $500,000 at Wyandotte, $500,000 in floating property, and perhaps $2,000,000 in real estate, to say nothing of the glass works venture which is now, although just started, in excellent shape, and with very flattering prospects for the future. His Family CAPT. WARD leaves seven children - HENRY, ELIZABETH, MILTON D., CHARLES H., MARY, EBER B., Jr., and CLARA, the two last named being five and two years old respect- ively. They are the children by his second marriage, all the others being grown to men's and women's estate. MRS. WARD is now at Conneaut, Ohio, visiting friends. She expected to return on the Monday, the 4th instant, but the telegraph informed her of her bereavement yes- terday and she will hasten hither at the earliest pos- sible moment. His Last Will Was made about six months ago. Its contents are not, of course, publicly known, beyond the fact that the instrument names as executors TUBAL C. OWNE, of Detroit, a MR. WYMAN, of Cleveland, and ORRIN W. POTTER of Chi- cago. As a man CAPTAIN WARD was perhaps too well known to require any extended notice of his prominent character- istics. Still it may not be out of place to advert to the fact that he was keenly alive to the importance of all new industries that promised to aid the country. He was a benevolent man, too, but his charities were bestowed modestly, and he seldom alluded to his works of that kind even to his most intimate companions. It is only a few days since he bestowed a single gift of $1,000 upon a struggling young church in the western part of the city. His love for children was proverbial, and his correspondence with his only grandchild, the stepdaughter of Dr. HAMILTON E. SMITH, beautifully examplifies this trait in his character. He was a man of remarkable tact and energy, as the results of his busy life amply show, and yet, with all the weight of business cares which he bore so long, he found pleasure in cultivating literature and the graces of life. For one to whom early advantages were in a great measure denied, he may truthfully be said to have gathered a surprising fund of information as well from books as by experience. Politically he was a Republican. He was a strong protectionist and an advocate of inflation. His views on financial questions gave him a national prominence, and his name had more than once been men- tioned in connection with the Secretaryship of the Treasury. He was an abstemious man, never having used liquor or tobacco in any form, and his religious belief was based on the doctrine of Spritualism. However, he was never obtrusive in his social or spiritual views, preferring that every man should think and practice according as light was given him. To reiterate that his death is a great public cala- mity is to record a truth which thousands will sorrow- fully attest. ===============================================================================