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Gov. Eli H. Murray
Eli H. Murray, of San Diego, the subject of this sketch, has all the
warrant of hereditary antecedents for the stability and integrity that in
his career he has manifested. His father was born in Washington County,
Kentucky, whence he removed to Hardinsburg. In the course of his business
he brought goods across the Alleghanies and shipped them down the Ohio in
flat-boats. He became satisfied that a certain point was a natural
location for a city, and so founded there the present town of Cloverport,
now of some 2,000 inhabitants.
The elder Murray, merchant and large tobacco dealer, was a man of high
intelligence, a representative Kentuckian. In conjunction with Hon.
William F. Bullock, he founded the common school system of Kentucky. He
also gave the ground and built a church for the Presbyterians - his own
faith - in Cloverport.
Mr. Murray was married to Mrs. Anna Maria (Allen) Crittenden, a daughter
of John Allen, a leading land lawyer, and Colonel of the famous Rifle
Regiment of Kentucky. He was killed in the River Raisin, in the war of
1812. The lady's first husband was a brother of John J. Crittenden, one of
whose sons by her (Thomas F.), after being graduated in law under his
paternal uncle, Thomas F. Crittenden, settled in. Lexington, Missouri,
where he became a successful lawyer, a member of Congress, and finally
Governor. An older son, William Logan Crittenden, having been graduated in
General
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Grant's West Point class, serving
in the Mexican war with distinction, resigned, and in later years
embarked in the revolutionary movement of La Pez, tempted by the
thought of freedom for Cuba, and being a man of great impulse, dash
and daring, uneasy in the "piping times of peace." He was a Colonel
in the ill-fated band, was captured and shot. When ordered to kneel
before his executioners, he answered, "A Kentuckian kneels to none
but his God," and in spite of all commands and threats was shot
standing firm and fearless. The noble, sweet and saintly mother of
this brave son was early left a widow, with an insolvent estate and
five children. Next to the anxiety for her children was that for her
servants, and to avoid the sale of the latter she secured from the
estate the management of a factory called a "rope walk," where was
made a coarse cloth for the baling of cotton, which she conducted
with such diligence that in three years she had earned enough to
redeem her servants from the fate that was impending over them, and
forty years later these same servants, with streaming eyes, carried
her body to the grave. |
Mrs. Crittenden, by a second marriage, gave birth, in 1843, to Eli
Huston Murray, named after a kinsman, Eli Huston, of Mississippi, from
whose Natchez office Sargent S. Prentice started upon his brilliant
career. His elder brother, Judge John Allen Murray, lives at the old
Cloverport home. The third, Logan Crittenden Murray, is now president of
the United States National Bank of New York, and several terms president
of the National Bankers' Association of the United States. The fourth,
named like his father, David Rodman, was elected State Senator before he
was of the age requisite to take the seat; he is now an active lawyer of
Cloverport.
General Murray was educated largely by private tutors, and in part at
Professor Hogan's High School, Cloverport, from which he entered the army
at the age of eighteen years. General Anderson, of Fort Sumter fame, then
commanded the department of Kentucky. Mr. Murray was one of the first
soldiers commanded by Sherman in the early part of the war. After several
months' service on the front lines of the Union forces, he enlisted under
General James S. Jackson, later killed at Perryville, who raised that
splendid regiment, the Third Kentucky Cavalry. Murray recruited many men
for this regiment, and on its organization he was commissioned Junior
Major. His first fight was a hand-to-hand encounter of four companies of
this regiment against Forrest, with two regiments, at Sacramento,
Kentucky. This was also the first fight of Forrest. In this engagement
one-third of Murray's command was on the list as killed, wounded or
captured. Forrest was wont to say after the war that this was "the biggest
little fight" in which he had shared. In this fight the horse which Murray
in boyhood had reared from a colt was shot under him, and he escaped only
by seizing a horse from which a Confederate officer had just been killed.
He served through Tennessee with Buell, to Shiloh, Corinth, across to
Alabama, and through what was known as the Bragg campaign in Kentucky. He
received promotion to the Colonelcy of Jackson's regiment, having been
promoted on the field of Perryville, upon which his old Colonel, General
Jackson, was' killed. Murray served with the regiment continuously in the
campaigns of the West, re-enlisting it and making it a veteran regiment.
He served with McCook's and Mintie's brigades, and later commanded
Kilpatrick's first brigade, from Chattanooga, and his division after he
was wounded at Resaca, Georgia, continuing to serve tinder Kilpatrick and
to command his division in the noted raid around the Confederate army at
Atlanta, also commanding half of Kilpatrick's cavalry in Sherman's march
to the sea. He received complimentary mention in various reports, and
special mention by General. Rosecrans at Stone River, his promotion having
more especial reference to his service in the march to the sea. He was
sent back with a view to his taking a cavalry command under General
Thomas, in a contemplated movement of Thomas on Richmond. His last
military service was when he succeeded General Hugh Ewing, at the close of
the war, in the western district of Kentucky, where he received the
surrender of many Confederates in the grand finale. Being mustered out of
service, he studied law with his half brother, Governor Crittenden, of
Missouri, after graduating from the University of Louisville. At the time
of his graduation, a student who had failed presented at Murray's breast a
pistol, which at the moment of discharge was struck down by a fellow
student, wounding Murray in the leg. Settling for practice at Owensboro,
Kentucky, he was later appointed United States Marshal for that State. He
then removed to Louisville, and was reappointed by Grant. He successfully
tided over the trying and delicate times of the Civil Rights bill, and of
the "Moonshiners," and fought openly and actively the Ku-Klux organization
in that State. Helping to found the Louisville Daily Commercial, he became
its editor and manager, establishing it firmly as about the only
Republican journal south of Mason and Dixon's line, which succeeded amid
adverse surroundings. While thus engaged he accepted President Hayes'
offer of the Governorship of Utah, to which post he was successively
reappointed by Garfield and Arthur. He promptly tendered his resignation
on Cleveland's succession to office, but was retained for over a year by
that Democratic President, serving, all told, some seven years in Utah.
| Having thoroughly studied the situation on
arriving in the Territory, he devoted himself to the establishment
there of a sound government. To his efforts is due the banishment
of polygamistic members from the halls of Congress. The infamous
Mormon leader, Cannon, had boasted that he wore at his girdle the
scalps of the preceding Governors unfriendly to them, and that he
would have that of Governor Murray. But not so. This incumbent
sought to surround himself with able prosecuting attorneys and
upright judges; he battled against vexatious Congressional delays;
against misinterpretations and misrepresentations, venal and
ignorant, from metropolitan |
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journals; against determined savage opposition from the wealth and
power of Morrison leaders and their slavishly obedient constituents; but
at last he succeeded in procuring the passage of laws, pure and strong,
whose faithful execution sent the corrupt Mormon leaders either into
permanent exile or the penitentiary. Time has proved the justice of
Governor Murray's opinion as then announced; that no man can be a
faithful Mormon and a loyal citizen of the United States; and that the
exercise of political power by Mormon leaders is un-American, and in no
sense or manner to be tolerated: Thus the establishment of a good
government in Utah is mainly due to his long service, his wisdom and
determination.
On leaving this office, Governor Murray, becoming interested in a
railroad enterprise, removed to San Diego, California, where he is now
engaged in these and other active enterprises. He is a Lower California
land owner, having purchased a large tract of land ten miles south of
the Mexican boundary.
General Murray was a bachelor, a husband and a father in the Centennial
year, having married in 1876 Miss Evelyn Neale, daughter of E. P. Neale,
a Louisville merchant. Their children are: a daughter, Evelyn, and a
son, Neale, both born in Kentucky. Mr. Murray positively refused to be
put forward again as Governor of Utah on the election of President
Harrison. He was frequently mentioned in connection with cabinet
appointments, although declining to enter the lists of any public
official position. The newspapers to-day are quoting Governor Murray as
a possible Gubernatorial nominee for California. In view of his past
record, certainly it is a strong factor in his honor that no man
received more solid support from Republicans and Democrats alike than
he, during his service in Utah, and from the press and people of the
United States.
Source: An Illustrated History of Southern California;
pub. Chicago: Lewis Pub. Co., 1890.
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