JOHN LEWIS COCHRAN
was born in Staunton, Va., August 22, 1827, and educated at the university of Virginia. Leaving that institution in 1848 he was admitted to the bar in the following year, and began practice in Charlottesville. He continued his practice there until 1872, when he was elected county judge and administered that office for two terms of six years each. Since his retirement from the bench he has not practiced, but has attended to his property interests. Mr. Cochran, in April, 1861, entered the Confederate service as lieutenant of a company in the Nineteenth Virginia regiment and served as such in the same company and regiment until the army was re-organized in the spring of 1862. He was then elected captain of his company and, in the spring of 1863, was appointed captain provost marshal on Longstreet's military court and served in that capacity until the surrender. He was in the following battles: First Manassas, Williamsburg! Sharpsburg, Greensborough Gap, second Manassas, first Fredericksburg and numerous minor engagements. In 1865 he was elected to the legislature and received his commission while on the retreat from Richmond, but as the legislature then elected was never convened he did not take his seat. In 1861 he was the whig candidate for the legislature from Albemarle county, but the war coming on, he entered the service. He was a delegate to the American convention which met in Philadelphia and nominated Fillmore and Donelson on its presidential ticket. Mr. Cochran was married in 1868 to Miss Mary James, daughter of Thomas James of Chillicothe, Ohio, and to them three children, named John Lewis, Mary Massie and William Lynn Cochran, were born. John Cochran was the name of John L. Cochran's father. He was born in Augusta county, Va., in 1793. He was a merchant in early life and in 1826 came to Charlottesville, where he carried on the merchandise trade until 1860, retiring from the business at that date. He was a magistrate and member of the old county court in Albemarle county for several years. In politics, he was a Henry Clay whig all his life. In October, 1826, he was married to Miss Margaret Lynn (Lewis), daughter of Capt. John Lewis of Sweet Springs, W. Va., and eight children were born to them, seven of whom came to maturity as follows: John Lewis, James C, who was in the Confederate service and was colonel of the regiment of militia when it was called out in Augusta, where he now resides; Dr. Henry King, who served as surgeon in the Confederate army throughout the war; Howe Peyton, who was captain of the ordnance department in the field in the Confederate service all through the war, and now living at Charlottesville, superintendent of public schools; William Lynn (deceased in 1883), was a lawyer and at one time mayor of Charlottesville; he was also a major in the quartermaster's department in the Confederate service, taking a position in that department on account of his physical condition, being a cripple; and George Moffett Cochran (deceased in 1886). The last named was a private in Gen. J. E. B. Stuart's command, entering the service when about sixteen years of age; and Mary Lewis, who married her kinsman, Capt. John M. Preston, and resides at Seven Mile Fork, Smyth county, Va. There were 105 of the Lewis family, including the subject ot this sketch, his brothers, his father's and mother's nephews and grandnephews, in the Confederate service. John L. Cochran's father died in 1884, and his mother in 1882. His grandfather's name was James Cochran, born in Augusta county in 1768. He was a farmer all his life, though educated for the ministry. He was a presiding magistrate in Augusta county twice and succeeded to the office of high sheriff. He married Magdalen Moffett, daughter of George Moffett of Augusta county, a colonel in the Revolutionary war. To them were born four children, named James (deceased); George M., deceased in 1890 at the age of ninety-two years; Henry K. (deceased) and James A. Cochran, deceased in 187o. The grandfather died in 1836, his wife preceding him in 1826. Mr. Cochran's great-grandfather, John Cochran, was born in county Antrim in the north of Ireland in 1712, emigrating to this country about the year 1742. He settled in Augusta county and married Miss Susanna Donelly. a native of Antrim county, Ireland, with whom he was acquainted in his native country. He carried on merchandising in Augusta county for many years and there he died. An uncle of Mr. Cochran's father was a soldier in the Revolutionary army under Gen. Greene in North Carolina. The maiden name of Mr. Cochran's mother was Margaret Lynn Lewis, daughter of John Lewis of Monroe county, Va., a son of William Lewis, of Augusta county, a son of John Lewis who was born in Ireland, and whose father's name was Andrew Lewis. John Lewis, who was the progenitor of this branch of the family in America, was born in Ireland in 1678 and came to America in his early manhood, settling in Augusta county. He was known as "the pioneer." His wife's maiden name was Margaret Lynn, a native of Ireland, born in 1693. She was a descendant of the Lynns, of Lock Lynn, Scotland, her father's name being William Lynn. This couple (John, the pioneer, and his wife) had seven children, of whom Samuel, the eldest, was a member of the Virginiaconventionof 1774. Andrew,another son, was a general in the Revolutionary army and commanded the state troops at the battle of Great Bridge, near Norfolk, and also led the state troops at the battle of Point Pleasant, in western Virginia, where his brother, Col. Charles Lewis, was killed. Gen. Andrew Lewis was at one time suggested by Gen. Washington for commander-in-chief of the colonial forces. John Lewis, the pioneer, fled from Ireland for killing a nobleman, who had responded to the remonstrance of a crippled brother of John for riding through their wheat field, by a blow from his riding whip. A grandson of John Lewis, the pioneer, was John Lewis, son of William Lewis, who was a captain of the regular troops in the Revolution, and was at the battles of Saratoga, Monmouth and Brandywine, and was at Valley Forge in 1777-8. He was the maternal grandfather of the subject of this sketch. John Lewis, the pioneer, settled in what is now Augusta, near the town of Staunton, Va., in 1731. The county of Augusta was organized in 1745, and John Lewis was made a magistrate, and his son Thomas was made surveyor. Five of John Lewis' sons were in the Revolutionary army and were all at Braddock's defeat.