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(687) (Prof.) DENISON OLMSTED, b. at E. Hartford, Conn., June 18, 1791; d. May 13, 1859; m. (1) June 1, 1818, Eliza Allyn; b. at New London, Conn., Apr. 26, 1794; d. June 8, 1829: dau. of Robert and Nancy (Jeffries) Allyn. (2) Aug. 24, 1831, in New York City, Julia Mason; b. Aug. 12, 1803; dau. of Charles and Rebecca (Nichols) Mason, of Nassau, N. Y. He grad. Yale, 1813; tutor in College of North Carolina; professor of chemistry, mathematics, natural philosophy and astronomy at Yale; degree of LL. D. from University of New York. "He executed the first State geological survey in America and was a noted mineralogist." — Loomis Genealogy, p. 126.
A discourse commemorative of the life and services of Denison Olmsted, D.D., Professor of natural philosophy and astronomy in Yale College, was delivered in the College Chapel, May 20, 1859, by the Rev. Theodore D. Woolsey, D.D., President of Yale College. In the course of his address occurs this passage:
"I appear before the academical body, and this respected audience, to-day, as the eldest of the acting colleagues of Prof. Olmsted, in order to pay an official, but willing tribute to his worth and services. Not thirteen years have elapsed since he stood the fifth, and I the sixth, in the order of seniority upon our catalogue. Of the four elder members of the Faculty, one whom I love to think of, and love to honor. Prof. Kingsley, was called away by death a year after he had resigned his work of half a century in the service of the college; and three others, whom age or infirmities had induced to leave their stations, still survive, to show to the world how honored is the old age of a scholar, who has built his life upon the foundations of Christian virtue. Prof. Olmsted, the next in this series, presents an example of what has not happened before in our Faculty for more than a generation, (for Prof. Stanley had suspended his labors a long time before his death) he died in the midst of his work, with his armor on, actively engaged in his lectures through the last term, and looking forward, Just before his disease attacked him, to instructions during the summer. He had intended, for a considerable time before his death, to resign his Professorship in the year 1861, when he should have reached the age of seventy. But God's ways are not our ways. The tranquil shade of the evening of life, that harbor from care and toil, where the old man of intellectual resources and Christian hopes can look forward and backward without disturbance, was not allotted to him. He thought of rest on earth, as the aged Christian may; but God did better things for him— he gave him rest in Heaven.
"His family affections were delightful, and, united with his sense of duty, made him an exemplary son, husband, father, and kinsman. His children revered without fearing him; they were trained to exercise their powers of thinking, and he was thus within the house their chief teacher. Their characters rewarded his efforts; but alas, much more than the usual amount of affliction came upon him from a chastening God.
"Between the years 1844 and 1852, four sons, graduates of Yale College, blameless and exemplary in Christian life, giving promise of usefulness, were snatched away by consumption, two of them in 1846 in which same year also his saintly mother, at the age of nearly ninety, fell asleep in Christ. His eldest son, Francis Allyn, found it necessary, soon after graduation in 1839, to go upon a voyage in quest of health. He visited the Southern seas, and on his return published a small volume on what he had seen, especially on the Sandwich Islands. But his voyage was of no permanent use. He died not long after receiving the degree of doctor of medicine, in 1844. The second son, John Howard, was kept from College for some years by ill health, so that he received his degree after his younger brothers, in 1845. He died but a few months after taking his degree, in January, 1846, at Jacksonville, in Florida, whither his commencing illness had carried him, and was laid by the side of Francis. Two of the brothers, Denison and Alexander Fisher, were members of the same class of 1844, and both appear as orators on the list of appointments for Commencement. Denison, second to none in the hopes with which he inspired his friends, and having passed through college without strain upon his constitution, seemed to have a career of eminence before him as a natural philosopher, when he, too, in 1846, was placed by the side of his brothers. The feeblest of them all, Fisher, with great care, prolonged his life until 1853. He had repaired to a southern climate and taught chemistry in the University of Alabama. Returning to New Haven he engaged in chemical studies in the analytical laboratory, and published an introduction to his science; but the malady only delayed its visit, and his monument records that death again desolated this family in 1853. But Prof. Olmsted, some time before these successive strokes fell on him, had known what the cup of sorrow was. In 1829 his wife died, and the husband, with five little children between the ages of five and ten, followed her body to the tomb."
1st marriage:
1481, Francis Allyn (M. D.); b. July 14, 1819; d. July 19, 1844; grad. Yale, 1839; Doctor's Degree, 1844; author of "Incidents of a Whaling Voyage," etc., 1841.
1482, John Howard; b. Sept. 8, 1820; d. June 17, 1846; grad. Yale, 1845.
1483, Cornelia A. +.
1484, Alexander Fisher; b. Dec. 20, 1822; d. May 5, 1853; grad. Yale, 1844.
1485, Denison; b. Feb. 16, 1824; d. Aug. 2, 1846; grad. Yale, 1844.
1486, Eleza; b. June 1825; d. Oct. 16, 1826.
1487, Lucius Duncan +.
2d marriage:
1488, Julia Mason; b. Aug. 15, 1832; d. Dec. 11, 1880.
